Theory of Government in Ancient India (Post-Vedic) c13.s1.7

c13.s1.7

Distinct in style from the Pañchatantra type of fable is the literary tale. The object of both, however, is the same. From the testimony of Bāṇa, Daṇḍin and, above all, Somadeva and Kṣemendra, it appears that about the fifth century A.D. or earlier, a great creative writer, Guṇāḍhya, composed the Bṛhat Kathā in the Paiśāchī dialect. It was on its basis that Somadeva, in the latter half of the eleventh century, wrote his Kathāsaritsāgara, the Ocean of the Rivers of Stories, which shows distinct traces of Buddhist influence and refers to Jātaka tales. At the very start a Brāhmaṇa offender is unceremoniously sentenced to death by a king. But, on the whole, its tone and spirit are Brahmanic. The Kathāsaritsāgara paints the rule of the Mlechchhas as one of persecution of Brāhmaṇas, interruption of sacrifices and abduction of the hermit’s daughters. The gods are frightened. Śiva comes to the rescue and commissions his son to assume the form of a man and slay the Mlechchhas.²