The Mauryan Polity c5.s2.t6.6

c5.s2.t6.6

Equally inconclusive is the effort of some scholars to fix the date of *Yājñavalkyasmṛti* in the 3rd century A.D.² and to bring down the *Arthaśāstra* to a later date on the evidence of several parallel passages. The close affinity of both the *Arthaśāstra* and the *Dharmaśāstra* of Yājñavalkya lands us in the difficulty to determine which was the earlier. There are three schools of thought. One holds the view that Yājñavalkya was a pre-Kauṭalīyan writer. The second view is that whatever be the date of Yājñavalkya he drew his materials from Kauṭalya. The third school maintains that Kauṭalya lived in or about the third century A.D. (one date for the Yājñavalkyasmṛti), and the composition of the *Arthaśāstra* must have been about that date. Though arguments advanced by each school of thought are supported by evidence of some kind or other, the substantive weight of the argument is cast on the side of the first school of thought whose staunch supporter is the late Gaṇapati Śāstri. In the introduction to his edition of the *Arthaśāstra* the learned Indologist has examined this question in a scholarly spirit and his conclusion must appeal to every impartial student of Sanskrit literature. It would not be out of place to refer to some of his arguments as they are of much consequence.