Materials for the Study of the Early History of the Vaishnava Sect c8.96

c8.96

But the exact date of this prince of grammarians is uncertain. According to Hopkins³ “no evidence has yet been brought forward to show conclusively that Pāṇini lived before the third century B.C.” Böhtlingk places him in the fourth century B.C. and his view is accepted by Macdonell,⁴ Keith and many other western scholars; while Sir R. G. Bhandarkar says that “Pāṇini must have flourished in the beginning of the seventh century B.C. if not earlier still.”⁵