Social Life in Ancient India: Studies in Vatsyayana's Kamasutra c5.s2.124

c5.s2.124

We thus see that from the literary data given above, the earlier limit to the composition of the *Kāmasūtra* may be assigned on the basis of Vātsyāyana's quotations from the *Gṛhya* and *Dharma Sūtras*, the *Arthaśāstra* of Kauṭilya and the *Mahābhāṣya* of Patañjali and that the lower limit may be fixed at *circa* 100 A.C. based on the dates of Kālidāsa and Subandhu and, further, that there are strong reasons to believe that it was known in the third century A.C. From the historical data that the *Kāmasūtra* affords we can come to a more definite determination of Vātsyāyana's date.