[Pramāṇa](https://indike.org/pramana/) › [Studies](https://indike.org/pramana/ins) › [Reference works](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference) › [Puranic Encyclopaedia: A Comprehensive Dictionary with Special Reference to the Epic and Puranic Literature](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.mani-1975) › c9.224 # Puranic Encyclopaedia: A Comprehensive Dictionary with Special Reference to the Epic and Puranic Literature c9.224 Purāṇic Encyclopaedia: A Comprehensive Dictionary with Special Reference to the Epic and Purāṇic Literature c9.224 - **Language:** English ### [c9.224](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.mani-1975.c9.224) 3) \*Different views about the author.\* Tradition ascribes the authorship of the Rāmāyaṇa to Vālmīki. But, western scholars hold the view that a part of Bālakāṇḍa and the whole of Uttarakāṇḍa are interpolations of a future date. The following are the reasons for this view. (i) Two different texts are found for cantos one and three of Bālakāṇḍa. In one of them many of the stories mentioned in the other are missing. It may, therefore, be surmised that the two texts were composed during different periods. (ii) In the early texts of Rāmāyaṇa stories like Gaṅgā-vataraṇam are not to be found. So they must be interpolations of a later period. (iii) Only in Kāṇḍas one and seven is Śrī Rāma treated as an incarnation. In the other Kāṇḍas he is considered in the capacity of a hero only. (iv) Uttarakāṇḍa is not to be found among the early translations of Rāmāyaṇa into other languages. (v) In the Bālakāṇḍa it is stated that Vālmīki composed the Rāmāyaṇa, taught it to Kuśa and Lava, and that they recited the whole poem before Śrī Rāma at Ayodhyā. Many of the things mentioned in this Kāṇḍa are repeated in Uttarakāṇḍa, which, therefore, must have been written by someone else. - [Previous: c9.223](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.mani-1975.c9.223) - [Next: c9.225](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.mani-1975.c9.225) - [Up: c9](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.mani-1975.c9) --- Source: [https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.mani-1975.c9.224](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.mani-1975.c9.224) · Pramāṇa