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INTRODUCTION
73
are composed poems like the Setubandha-that ocean of the gems. The rise of an eminent poet like Pravarasena (c. 420 A. D.) in Mahārāstra was sure to attract the attention of Dandin and induce him to call the Prakrit cultivated in Maharastra as the Prakrit par excellence. Dandin has weilded great influence not only on later poeticians but also on Prākrit grammarians with the result that the term Mahārāstri came to be easily equated with Prakrit, distinguished from Sauraseni and other dialects. An author like Uddyotana (A. D. 779), however, distinguishes Payaya. bhäsa from Marahatthaya-desi [-bhāsā). From grammarian to grammarian the linguistic connotation of Prākrit has not been static; what Vararuci means from and describes under Präkrit is not entirely identical with that in Hemacandra's grammar and so on. The reasons are apparent : every subsequent grammarian not only incorporated the earlier material but also brought under his analysis additional literature; and his purpose being mainly practical, as many forms etc. as available were noted sometimes even ignoring the need of dialectal specification. The result has been that the grammarians, when all of their usages are put together, do not come to our rescue in solving a problem whether a word or a form is allowed in Mahärästri or Sauraseri. And by using the terminology of later authors for the earlier language-stratum, much confusion in thought has been created; and widely different views are held on the linguistic relation of Mahārāstri and Sauraseni.
It has been always felt that there was a deplorable want of
it compositions which specifically mentioned their dialect and the text of which was available to us in a sufficiently authentic form. It is such texts that will enable us to fix what was allowed in a particular dialect. Though modern scholars are accustomed to presume (of course with partial accuracy ) that Gähäkoso and Gaiļavaho are written in Maharastrí, the texts themselves call their language Prakrit. The Setubandha is silent, and it is Dandin who tells us that it is written in
1 महाराष्ट्राश्रयां भाषा प्रकृष्टं प्राकृतं विदुः। सागरः सूक्तिरलाना सेतुबन्धादि यन्मयम् शौरसेनी च गाडी च लाटी
चान्यापि तादृशी । याति प्राकृतमित्येवं व्यवहारेषु सनिधि ॥ 2 V. V. Mirashi : Some Royal Poets of the Vakataka Age, I. H. Q. XXI; The
Vakataka Chronology, Ibidem XXIV pp. 148 ff. 3 पायय-भासा-रइया मरहट्ठय-देसि-वण्णय-णिबद्धा । मुद्धा सयल-कह च्चिय तावस-जिण-सत्थवाहिल्ला ॥ कोऊहलेण 799 9799- T - TI fra F
T THTIT Quoted from the MSS. 4 For important sources see Kamsavaho, Intro., p. 42, footnote 40. Bombay 1940 5 See Saptaśatakam 2, Gaudavaho 65, 92 etc.
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