The Mauryan Polity c12.46

c12.46

¹ In the Gotrapravaranibandhakadamba (Mysore Govt. Orient. Series, 1900, pp. 32 and 161) the term Kauṭalya occurs as a gotra name in two different places. The pravaras mentioned in the first reference are Bhārgava, Vitahavya and Savedasa, and the pravaras mentioned in the second reference are Gautama, Bhāradvāja and Aṅgirasa. Thus the pravaras for the two Kauṭalyas occurring in different places are different; and it is impossible to decide whether these two Kauṭalyas are one and the same person. If there is any force in the argument of the late Gaṇapati Śāstri and if from Kuṭala—not found mentioned in the Mysore publication and hence an insignificant gotra—the name Kauṭalya is to be traced, then we have to take that Viṣṇugupta must have been a putrikā-putra or dvyāmuṣyāyaṇa for whom, two gotras are generally mentioned, one that of his mother's father and the other that of his own father (Janaka-pita). If this position were granted, both Kuṭala and Vatsa must be his gotras. This will explain the identification of Kauṭalya and Vātsyāyana by the well-known nighaṇṭus like the Vaijayanti and Abhidhānacintāmani. These writers did not invent anything. Neither did they confound the one with the other as Haraprasad Śāstri would have it. They simply put into writing what was traditionally current in their times. Literary tradition, being one fruitful source of information for the early epoch of Indian History, cannot be easily discarded. There is much to say for the identification of the author of the Arthaśāstra with that of the Kāmasūtra.