History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v7.c90.97.1

v7.c90.97.1

Some remarks on the important conclusions of Pargiter and Kirfel are necessary. Pargiter tries to construct history from the earliest times to the Bhārata war which he holds to have taken place about 950 B. C. (AIHT, chap. 15 p 182). He holds that there were two traditions in ancient India, viz. the Kṣatriya tradition and the Brāhmaṇa tradition (AIHT, chap. 5 pp. 58-77). He harps dozens of times on the utter lack of the historic sense among the brāhmaṇas in his work (AIHT), holds that the Purāṇas represent the kṣatriya tradition, that there were three racial stocks, viz. the Mānavas (or Mānvas as he styles them), the Ailas and the Saudyumnas, that respectively represent the Dravidian, the Aryan and Munda (AIHT chap. 25 pp. 289-302), that the Purāṇas are Sanskritizations of works in Prakrit (pp. X-XI) of 'Dynasties of the Kali age'. His date for the Mahābhārata war has not been accepted by later scholars, since his handling of that subject is not judicial, objective or straightforward, but relies too much on his own prejudices and on averages. In his 'Purāṇa texts of the dynasties of the Kali age (pp. 58, 74) he appears to favour the view that the Bhārata war was fought 1050 years before the Nandas i. e. about 1475 B. C. The mss. and the printed Purāṇas give four different periods between the birth of Parīkṣit¹³⁷⁶ and the crowning of Nanda, viz 1015 years (Viṣṇu), 1050 years (Vāyu, Brahmāṇḍa and mss of Matsya), 1115 years (Bhāgavata), 1500 years (some mss.