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- Lord Mahāvira and His Times . These systems of philosophy certainly had their beginning much earlier, earlier perhaps than even Lord Mahāvīra, but the texts of the Sūtras which embody their conclusions were composed later. There is a great controversy among scholars about the chronology of these Sūtras. The proposed dates for the different. Sūtras vary over a wide range of more than a thousand years between the fifth century B.G. and fifth century A.D. Generally, Vaiseshika and Nyāya Sūtras are regarded as the earliest and Sānkhya as the latest.. :
It is to be noted that the philosophers to whom these systems are ascribed were not necessarily their originators. They gave the final form to the Sutras which themselves refer to older philosophers. Some of the Sūtras refer to the opinions of other Sūtras and their refutations which show that the different philosophical schools were already in existence before the final redaction of the Sūtras took place. It may.further be noted that the extant literary works in which the doctrines of the six systems are embodied are themselves much later in date than their original founders. It is possible that these systems of philosophy originated much earlier but they were composed in Sūträ style much later. .. TECHNICAL AND SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE
Another noteworthy feature of this age is that separate schools of Kalpa; Vyakarana, and 7 otisha“ apart from Vedic schools, came into existence. These subjects were not taught ás auxiliary branches of the Vedic lore to the students of a common school, but each of these subjects was attaining independent development through treatment in a special school. Independent works were written on these branches of knowledge. . ini
: ** (A) Grammar . . . . . . . .The earliest existing work, dealing with the Grammar of the contemporary spoken language is Pāṇini's -Ashțādhyāyi. The author refers to his predecessors like 'Sākațāyana and Saunaka but their works are not available. It indicates the existence of a long tradition of grammatical studies before the days of Pāṇini. Pāṇini was the native of a village called Śālātura in N.W.F. Province. His work. consists of some 4,000 Sūtras divided, as the title' suggésts, into eight chapters.
