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OCTOBER, 1926]
CHRONOLOGY OF PANINI AND THE PRATISAKHYAS
185
jedenfalls ein vollkommenes Recht zu schliessen, dase, wenn Vyali, der Verfasser des Sam graha, viel jünge rwar als Pânini, er unmöglich derselbe Vyali gewesen sein kanu, welcher das Prâtisâkhya zitiert.
Now this is a petitio principii, presupposing that which ought to be proved; and Max Müller's other arguments have proved to be so feeble, that they can by no means make up for the lack of evidence in the Vyali question.
First of all, I request, we know only of one Vyadi, who was the author of a Samgraha. The Prâtisâkhya can hardly be thought to refer to any other author.
Now Vyâdi is quoted by the Mahabharya to I. 2. 64. His school is referred to in the commentary on VI. 2. 36, in connection with that of other grammarians, thus: Apisala. Paniniya-Vyaliya Gautamiyah. Accordingly the Apisali school is made out to be the oldest one, while the school of Pânini precedes that of Vyâdi, this one being older than that of Gotama. The Trikândadeśa II. 7. 24. 25, also puts Vyâdi after Panini, but makes him older than Katyayana (the epithet of Vindhyastha, which would be applicable to this last mentioned grammarian, is erroneously transferred on Pânini).
It thus seems probable that Vyâdi is later than Pânini, but older than Kâtyâyana and (of this there can be no doubt) older than Patanjali.*
I may point out another fact which corroborates my contention, viz., that the Vyâdi of the Ṛk Prâtisâkhya must be a grammarian who worked after the time of Pânini.
This same Prâtisâkhya in rule 509 (according to Müller's numeration) quotes the opinion of a certain Kautsa. Now the Mahabhasya also refers to a Kautsa sub. III, 2, 108; "als spezieller Zeitgenosse, und wie es scheint Schüler Pânini's ", according to Weber (the passage runs: upasediván Kautsaḥ Paninim). A Kautsa is also quoted by the Nirukta.
Since to the best of our belief no work of any Kautsa has been handed down to us, a wide field for conjecture lies open; and he who believes in the priority of the Ṛk Prâtisâkhya might well retort that more than one Kautsa must have existed. This possibility I do not deny. But, until the contrary is proved, I maintain emphatically that, if the name of a certain grammarian is quoted in different grammatical works and if we have no proof of the existence of more than one grammarian of that name, it is in the highest degree probable that all the grammatical works.refer to one and the same individual grammarian.
Belvalkar's Systems of Sanskrit Grammar, p. 27, places Vyadi between Panini and Patanjali,