year 1606 (1486) B.C.=first year of the Kuru (Kaurava), as the commencement of the third period, which, supposing it only to have lasted 500 years, extended to the year 1107 (987) B.C. In this period we have shown the probability of Garâsandha being the contemporary and opponent of Semiramis; therefore the age of Garasandha=middle of 13th century B. C. Hence, we must place his predecessor, the founder of the line, at about 1280.

Immediately anterior to the third period there intervened, according to Megasthenes, a break of 300 years; consequently, the End of the second period was about 1900 (1800) B.C. If again we assume the most moderate term possible for the length of this period, we have in round epochal numbers, Beginning of the second period =2400 (2300) B. C. That is to say; the beginning of district of the Sarasvati cannot fall later than about 2600 or 2500 B. C.

the settlement in the

It is hardly necessary to remark that, to limit the length of the monarchical period to about the double of the intervening times of anarchy is by no means the most probable computation. The epochs in which the historical feeling was in progress must, in fact, be supposed of much longer duration than the interregna which caused the breaks between them. The remarks of Megasthenes upon the length of time that the dissolution of the kingly government lasted, and of the independence of the separate municipalities, give it an air of greater historical probability, from the fact of his stating of the first two that they extended to as much as 200 or 300 years. In speaking of the last republican epoch he uses a different phraseology; it was a period of 120 years. The earlier epochs of this kind lasted in one case longer, in the other a shorter time, and their longest duration was 200 and 300 years.

It is, therefore, highly probable that the second period did not commence later than about the beginning of

the third millennium B. C., so that we must assign to each of the two middle periods (the second and third) an average of about 300 years.

The approximate determination of the epochs will in that case take somewhat the following shape:

End of the third era about

Duration of this period 800 years Commencement of it therefore

B. C. 1100-1000 800- 800

B. C. 1900-1800 300-300

B. C. 2200-2100

Second interregnum prior to it Consequently beginning of 2nd inter. Second period anterior to it, 800 yrs. Beginning of second era therefore

Prior to it, first interregnum of Consequently end of 1st period

800-800

B. C. 3000-2900

120-120

B. C. 31203020

Lastly, as regards the length of the first period from the immigration of the Arians into the country of the Indus down to their advance to the land of the Sarasvati, we have no standard whatever from our present point of view by which to estimate it. All we can say is, that peculiar habits of life were contracted in the land of the Five Rivers, and that out of the religion there instituted, allusions to which are found in the oldest Vedic hymns, the Brahminical system, with a new mythology, and the introduction of castes, gradually grew up on the other side of the Sutledj.

Hence, if we place the Arian immigration at about 4000 B. C., and add another thousand years for what was Arian rather than historical life, we shall certainly err again on the side of too great limitation, rather than of too great an extension of time.

This fact will be more clearly established if we form a correct idea of the vast difference between the oldest Vedic hymns and all other Indian compositions. For this purpose we will examine first the epochs of the latter.

SECTION III.

THE EPOCHS OF INDIAN LITERATURE, AND THEIR APPLICATION TO THE MORE ACCURATE DEFINITION OF THE AGE OF ZOROASTER.

A.

THE EPOCHS OF INDIAN LITERATURE.

Ar the outset of these inquiries we have termed the history of language and of written composition the second main element of authentic chronology, and, to a certain extent, the touchstone of other computations. We now proceed to apply this element to the solution of our problem, commencing from below, and so proceeding upwards.

I. THE GRAMMATICAL AGE OF SANSKRIT, AND THE FORMATION OF PROSE.

STARTING from below, we have here, in the first place, PANINI, the founder of the present system. His age has been fixed 267 at

B. C. 350 Before him stands YASKA, the author of the Nirukta (interpretation) of the Vedic tongue. This work is based upon Nighantavas (the organized), i. e. the collection of obsolete Vedic words, arranged according to contents, works which were obviously used in the schools. The first part of the Nirukta contains merely

267 Weber's objections to the system adopted by Böthling, Roth, and Lassen seem to me of no weight. The authority is of recent date, but it is not encumbered with internal contradictions and unhistorical assumptions, like the Buddhist tradition, on which Weber bases his arguments.

an explanation of grammatical forms and difficult words; the second, the names of the Gods. Passages of the Veda are also quoted word for word. The grammatical expressions are so far perfectly simple; not a trace is to be found of the later artificial, almost algebraic, terms for the moods, tenses, cases, &c., which were in common use after the time of Pânini. There being this great difference between them, it is impossible to agree with Roth, who dates it only fifty years before Pânini. It must be at least B. C. 450 In his time the use of the Vedic texts in the religious services was already established. But the right understanding of many Vedic words and ideas was even then totally lost.

Before Yâska there were three older schools of grammarians (Prâtisâkhya 268), which, being confined exclusively to the teaching of the pronunciation, established the rules of writing employed in the Veda. Assuming a century for these together

·

- 550 These grammarians, however, cite thirty others of earlier date, each according to their different schools, of the more northern or southern, eastern or western races, among which are the Kambôga, represented in the Hindu-Kush. Allowing only a century for them again, we bring down what is demonstrably the beginning of the grammatical age to · 650 By proving in this way the existence of grammar about the end of the second century and a half of the Bharadrata period, which extended, as we have seen, from about 1000 to 650, the date of the formation of prose may certainly be placed in this obviously important epoch. The oldest Sanskrit prose we possess is in the Brâhmana, or books of ritual, and in the Upanishad, or philosophical treatises, the language of which,

268 The Prâtisâkhya to the Rik has been in part published by Max Müller in his manual of the Rigveda. Leipsic, 1857.

on the whole, differs but little from that of the epics. Of the Brahmanas, the oldest and most important is the Aitareya-Brâhmana, which is full of historical information, but unfortunately it is not yet published.

II. THE MOST ANCIENT EPIC PERIOD, AND THE DATE OF THE COLLECTION OF THE VEDAS.

THERE are at least two separate epochs, which can be clearly distinguished in the two epic poems. The latest extant version of them I should not be disposed to refer to an earlier date than that of the Asoka; it contains allusions which imply the existence of Alexander and Buddha. Weber, in his instructive lectures on the history of Indian literature, has shown that this is more decidedly the case with Manu's code, owing to the unmistakable allusions to the Buddhist nuns. Here, also, it will be necessary to institute a special inquiry, philological, philosophical, and political, in order to see whether we are justified in considering these marks of later origin in the two epics as interpolations and adulterations of the original text. My reason for thinking so is the high, and even political, position of the Brahmins in respect to their kings, which pervades the whole book. On the other hand, I should not be disposed to assign any very great antiquity to the nucleus of it, even if it be anterior to Buddha.

Now, as the original plan of the two epic poems goes down to the fall of the race of princes after the great battle of Kurukshetra, it is obvious that they must also have been composed in the Bharatide epoch. The 120 years of interregnum barely suffice to account for the complete substitution of mythical for historical and the predominance of the mythical. The eighth century, therefore, must be considered as the highest possible date that can be assigned to it.