The Date of the Ramayana

Author(s): A. Berriedale Keith

Source: The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, e Journal of
the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland (Apr., 1915), pp. 318-328
Published by: Cambridge University Press
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318 THE DATE OF THE RAMAYANA

Or, with vasasa = varshasya understood:?

"In the year 136: on the day 15 of the month
AshaaMia of this year.11
Either rendering is acceptable: but there is, I think,
a preference in favour of the second one.
_ J. F. Fleet.
THE DATE OF THE RAMAYANA
The arguments of Professor Jacobil on the date of the
Rdmdyana are of the greatest value and importance, and
it is therefore of interest after a lapse of over twenty
years to consider to what extent their validity can be
accepted.
1. The conclusion from language 2 is that the epic must
have been written in a period before a Prakrit was the
popular form of speech in the country, Oudh, in which
the epic in its kernel was produced. Now by Anoka's
time, and probably in the Buddha's time, a Prakrit was
there the popular speech, and thus the epic may bo held to
belong to the sixth century B.C. The epic language is,
indeed, of a more recent type than the Bhasa of Panini;
that fact is not, however, a sign of a date later than Panini,
but proves that the epic was the speech of a class outside
the oistas, to whom the Mahdbhdsya ascribes the norm of
Sanskrit proper. This fact explains why Panini ignored
the epic language : it did not conform to the speech of
the Sistas, and on the other hand it was not, like the
speech of the Brahmanas, an older form of that speech.
This is by far the most effective argument for the early
date of the epic speech. It is useless to see archaisms
proper in the Rdmdyana, as I have sought to show
elsewhere.3 The epic speech is undoubtedly in a more
1 Das lidmdyana, Geschichte und Inhalt (Bonn, 1S93). The argument*
aro accepted with some modification by Profossor Macdonell, Sanskrit
Literature, pp. 305 soqq.
9 pp. 112-19.
3 JRAS. 1910, pp. 1321 seqq. ; contra Miohelson, ibid. 1911, pp. 160
seqq. Cf. Bohtlingk, ZDMG. xliii, 59 seqq. ; Jacobi, pp. 5 seqq.

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 THE DATE OF THE RAMAYANA 319

advanced stage of development than Panini's Bha$a,

but it is a perfectly reasonable view that it could be
contemporaneous with it and represent the speech of
a'different class of the population. This is perfectly in
harmony with the general facts of the differentiation of
class in India, and it has a very striking support in the
soliloquy of Hanumant when he deliberates1 whether to
address Sita in speech which is manual and sarhslcrtd or
to speak in samskrtd speech dvijdtir iva. It is impossible
to avoid the conclusion that here we have a plain contrast
between the Sanskrit of men generally and of the Sistas;
both aro expressly called saritslcrtd, and therefore it is
impossible to see in the first a Prakrit speech, nor is such
a speech ever mentioned in the epic. Moreover, the view
that epic Sanskrit and Prakrit developed independently
and that the first is not a remodelling of the second is
supported by Jacobi's acute observation that Pali uses the
aorist frequently, tho perfect seldom, as a narrative tense,
epic Sanskrit uses tho perfect frequently and tho aorist
rarely.
As an argument.for the date of the Ramayana itself,
there is less to be said for the argument, unless we accept
the view that tho epic speech largely owed its fixation to
Valmiki's work. For that there seems no reasonable
evidence, and while this is the case it must be admitted
that we are left to conjecture at how late a date the epic
speech could be used for the composition of an epic with
claims to popularity.2 This depends on factors which we
have no materials to estimate. To what degree of
1 v,30. 17, 18.
9 See Jacobi, pp. 02-3, and cf. Hertel, Tantrdkhydyika, pp. 8 seqq.;
Thomas, JRAS. 1910, pp. 972-3. It must be remembered that the
Vedic period had a contemporaneous literature of a popular character,
though littlo of it is prosorved in tho texts. There is a fragment of it
in a verso prosorved in KB. xxvii, 1, which has escaped the notice of
Lindner, of Aufrecht (ZDMG. xxxiv, 175-0), and the Vedic Concordance
alike, and which contains the form ydmaki, clearly of popular character.
JKA8. 1915. 21

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320 THE DATE of the ramayana

popularity did the poem really aim ? How far could the
several classes understand Sanskrit even when they did
not speak it ? How far were those who did not speak or
understand Sanskrit able to enjoy it on the strength of
explanations given in vernacular ? To these questions,
which could easily be multiplied, we have no means of
replying, and the most that seems reasonable is to say
that such an epic as the Rdmdyana was more probably
composed a century before than a century after the period
of As'oka, in the literary language of the Ksatriya class.
With this date, the fourth century B.C., accords adequately
the fact that Panini does not happen to cite the name of
a personage of the Rdmdyaijta, as he would very possibly
have done had the great work of Valmiki existed. It
must be remembered that several of the personages of the
Mahablidrata appear in Panini.
On the other hand, it is really inconceivable that after
Panini s influence had spread the epic language should
have been created as a mode of rendering a story
originally framed in Prakrit. What did happen with
the spread of his authority was that the Kavya poets
refined the epic language by throwing aside its irregu
larities and conforming in the main to Paninis rules,
though they show their historical connexion with the
epic by their use of the narrative perfect irrespective of
Paninis restriction, and by occasional deviations from his
norms which can be traced in the epic. Moreover, the
evidence which has steadily accumulated for the early age
of the Kavya literature is a decided argument against any
attempt to date tho Rdmdyana in the first century B.C.
Despite the fact that the Rdmdyana has characteristics
which anticipate the Kavya style,1 there is a very real
difference between the style of that poem and the style
of Asvaghosas Buddhacarita, and the later work is

1 See Jacobi, pp. 119-27.

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 THE DATE OF THE RAMAYANA 321

admittedly and clearly a court epic as contrasted with

a work with a more popular appeal.
2. From the metre as compared with that of the Pali
texts it is impossible to derive any clear argument. That
theiloka in Valmiki is a better and more regular verse
than the Buddhist sloka is perfectly true, but apart from
Jacobi'81 arguments from the incorrectness of Buddhist
texts, the carelessness of composers of non-literary works,
the use in Pali of the Arya metre, and the difficulty of
adopting the language to the metre, it is impassible to
hold that any relation of time can be deduced from the
metres of works in different languages, when these metres
are of a definite type which can easily be imitated.
Moreover, wo know that works like the Brliaddeoatd and
the Jtgvidlidna, which belong to the fourth century B.C.,2
show a similar form of metre to the epic, and we are
therefore entitled to say that the epic metre points to
a period about that date.
3. Stress is laid by Jacobi 3 on tho fact that Pataliputra
is never mentioned in the epic, and yet by Megasthenes'
time it was the chief city of India, and it was founded by
Ajata&ttru's son or grandson, Kalaioka. The force of
this argument rests on the fact that the epic mentions
other places where the fame of tho epic spread, such as
Kau&Lmbi, Kanyakubja, Oirivraja, Dharmaranya, and
Kampilya, but passes over Pataliputra. We have, how
ever, no proof of the greatness of the town before the
Maurya period, and therefore this argument only aids us
to a date in the fourth century B.C. The same conclusion
can be derived from tho further consideration that the
poet ignores the existence of any great empire, and
apparently must have flourished before the foundation of

1 Jacobi, p. 93.
8 See Macdonell, Brhaddtmtd, i, pp. xxii-iv ; Keith, JRAS. 1912,
pp. 769 seqq.
? pp. 101-4.

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322 THE DATE OF THE RAMAYANA

the power of Magadha, which is reflected in the Malvd

bhdrata account of Jarasandha. But it is impossible to
carry the date further back by any argument based on
the omission of any mention of Sravasti, which was in the
Buddha's time the capital of Prasenajit, or the mention of
Mithila and Visala as two separate states. Still less is it
important that in the fifth century B.C. the Ikgvaku power
was in decay and the poet wrote his preface in i, 5 at
a time when the Iksvaku race was at its height of power.
There is nothing here that a poet could not legitimately
produce or omit even if he wrote in tho fourth century
B.C. The only part of the argument which is of real
weight is the apparent ignorance by the poet of an
Indian empire of Magadha and its capital.
4. Sati is practically not referred to in the kernel
of the epic; it flourished with official recognition in
Magadha in Megasthenes' time, and it is perfectly fair
therefore to hold that this fact is an argument of some
slight weight in favour of a date before the third
century B.C. But we cannot take this as proof of
a sixth century date.
5. Stress is laid by Jacobix on two astronomical
arguments, according to the first2 of which Pusya was in
the sky from the beginning to the end of the night at the
winter solstice, i.e. in the seventh century B.C.; while
according to the second3 the poet must have seen a total
eclipse of the sun, probably in the sixth (546, 548, or 574
B.C.) or eighth century B.C. (719, 704 B.C.). Neither of these
arguments can be taken as a serious contribution to the
question. The first depends on the meaning of Pusya
nltdh, and on the theory that the notice cannot be
a traditional one, while the second is based on the
gratuitous assumption that only a total eclipse could
explain the description.
1 pp. 108 12.
Ramayana, iii, 16. 12. ' Ibid, iii, 23. 12 seqq.

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 THE DATE OF THE RAMAYANA 323

These arguments so far go, not to prove a date before*

the sixth century B.C., as Jacobi holds, but a probable
date in the fourth century B.C., and it is worth con
sidering what can be said against such a date. (1) The
term Yavana is actually found in i, 54 and iv, 40, but
both passages are for quite other reasons clearly not parts
of the kernel of the text.1 There is therefore reason to
regard the absence of any reference to the Greeks as
bearing out the main thesis of a comparatively early date.
(2) The DaSaratha Jataka contains a verse which
deserves consideration ; it runs?
dasa, vassasahassdni saUhim vassasatani ca
leambugivo mahdbdhn Rdmo rajjam akarayi,
and must be compared with the Ramayana, vi, 128 :
daSa var$asahasrdni daSa var$a4atdni ca
bhrdtrbhih sahitah Srimdn 2 Rdmo rdjyam alcd/rayat.
Jacobi concludes that the epic is the source of the P&li
verse, while the opposite theory has been equally main
tained.3 The Jataka itself doubtless is an attempt to
turn the Rama story to pious purposes, and it cannot be
held to be an older version or source of the Ramayana.
On the other hand, the diversity of the verses and the
variants of the epic verse point to both using an older verse
of the same traditional type as those of which specimens in
Sanskrit are preserved to us in the Aitareya Brahmana
and the Satapatha Brahmana, as said of great kings.
Therefore the Jataka of unknown date throws no light
on the epic.
(3) Nothing can be made out of the relation of the
Ramayana to Buddhism. On the argument of Hopkins,4
1 Jacobi, pp. 37 seqq., 50 seqq.
8 It is im{M)rtant to note that the first half of the second line is
variously read {vitafokabtiayakrodho and evathgunasamdyukto) and that
the line appears at i, 1. 07 in a changed form.
* Liiders (<?N. 1897, pp. 120 seqq.), who argues for a Prakrit original
form for tho old vorsesin such cases.
4 Great Mpic of Inlia, p. 399.

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324 THE DATE OF THE RAMAYANA

in the case of the Mahdbhdrata, if the epic were an attack

on Buddhism, it could not well have been produced in
Kosala before the second century B.C. But that it
contains such an attack is most improbable, and the
only reference to Buddha is clearly a late interpolation,
probably of the second century B.C. or still later.
(4) The question of Lanka is difficult. Was it Ceylon,
and was Ceylon so called in the sixth century B.C. and
known to a poet in Kosala ? The evidence that Lanka
was Ceylon is extremely weak: the oldest names for the
island are Tamraparni and Simhala, and it is difficult to
resist the conclusion that the identification of the more or
less mythical Lanka with Ceylon is the product of the
spread of the poem as Jacobi has argued.1 It is perfectly
clear that the conquest of the south, as Lassen2 suggested,
or the spread of Aryan civilization, as Weber8 thought,
is not the kernel of the epic, and Jacobi's explanation 4
of the underlying myth of Rama, Sita, and Hanumant is
the most convincing yet offered. With it disappears any
ground for holding that the mention of Ceylon is natural,
and the poet's extremely vague view of the south as
suggested by his references tell in favour of an early date.
(5) The relation of the Ramayana in metre to the
Malvdblidrata has been elaborately considered by Hopkins,6
who finds in the Ramayana not merely a more refined
type of s*loka than that of the Mahdbhdrata, a fact which
would naturally be ascribed to mere individual ability
and taste, but also a later type, equivalent to that of the
pseudo-epic. He proceeds to date the pseudo-epic type
and that of the epic generally as not before the second
century B.C., because the Mahabhasya quotes from an epic
source verses which deviate far more than any Mahd
bhdrata verses from the norm of the 31oka, viz. in having
the first and third Pddas ending in ^ w-and
1 pp. 90-3. 2 Ind. Alt. i, 535. 5 Ind. Lit. p. 192.
4 pp. 130 seqq. Op. cit. pp. 238-9.

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 THE DATE OF THE RAMAYANA 325

w ? w w respectively, and in having a final Pada in

^-w# The reasoning is surely an impossible one,
for apart from the fact that the Mahdbhasya also knows
perfectly regular verses of epic type,1 there is not the
slightest evidence that the verses are typical of the second
century B.C. There is nothing to suggest that the verses are
verses made by the author of the Malidbhdsya, or that they
represent the contemporaneous stage of epic versification,
and once that is conceded,as it must be, no argument of date
can possibly be drawn. The real argument is a different
one: the verse of the epic is a freer verse than that of the
classical poetry and a stricter verse than that of the
Upanisads, and of the two epics the Rdmdyana shows
a greater limitation in the use of the Vipulas. From the
latter fact the posteriority of tho Rdmdyana cannot
safely be deduced, because it is the work of an individual
of great ability, and we cannot even say that the Rdmd
yana must be later than the Upanisad slokas, since the
epic is not the work of the same hands or school as the
Upanisads. To get a positive date, we are reduced
to seeking some works of approximately similar metre
which can on other grounds be dated, and as already
mentioned the nearest parallels are such texts as the
Brhaddevatd2 and Rgvidhana. These texts can reason
ably be compared with the epic because their contents in
part belong to the epic tradition, and they yield us the
reasonable view that the epic might be, as far as metre is
concerned, of the fourth century. It is true that the
Brhaddcvatd is possibly somewhat older in form than the
epic,3 but there is no such distinction as can enable us to
deny the possibility of a similar date. But it should be
emphasized that the metrical evidence is not convincing
proof of date, as once a general norm of the 61oka was
arrived at in the fourth or third century B.C. that
1 Great Epic of India, p. 472. 8 Keith, JRAS. 1906, pp. 1 seqq.
3 See Oldenberg, ON. J 909, p. 234.

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326 THE DATE OF THE RAMAYANA

norm might be observed for many years after. Even

then, if we accept the theory 1 that the P&n<Ju epic could
not be written until the fall of the Buddhist kingdom in
the second century B.C., the fact that the metre of that
epic is on the whole rather less accurate and more archaic
than that of the Ramayana cannot be used as ah
argument for the date of the Ramayana in the second
century B.C. or later. There is nothing in the least
improbable in a poet like Valmlki adopting a refined
form of sloka while the more careless form lasted on for
many generations thereafter.
The general relation of the two epics 2 shows nothing to
contradict this view ; the Ramayana is clearly known to
the later Mahdbhdrata, while the addenda to the former
poem recognize the Mahdblidrata. Again, the Ramayana
knows the Kuru story, but not anywhere the Pandus.
The Pandus are known at soonest to Panini, as he
mentions Yudhisthira, and in this fact as contrasted with
the silence of the Ramayana we have a support for
a fourth century date for that epic, even allowing for
difference of place between Panini and the Rdmdyaiia.
(6) No argument against this date can be derived from
the identification of llama with Visnu, for this is clearly
a later part of the epic. In the main body of the work
the great god is rather Indra,3 a fact which points partly
to an early dating and partly to the fact that the
Rdmdyatm represents the religious views of the Ksatriya
rather than of the priestly class.
(7) No stress can be laid on tho mention of the King of
Anga in the RsyasVriga episode (i, 9-11) as connected
with Dasaratha. Jacobi,4 indeed, concludes from it that,
as Anga as a kingdom fell a victim to the advance of
Magadha, no poet would have inserted this detail of the
contemporaneity of the Anga king with Das'aratha after
1 Hopkins, op. cit. p. 399. 2 Ibid. pp. 60 seqq.
' Jacobi, p. 138, ii. I. 4 p. 101.

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 THE DATE OF THE RAMAYANA 327

the fall of the kingdom. But the episode is a late one,

far from primitive,1 and it might just as well be argued
that the connexion of the kings was made in the second
century B.C. when the fall of Magadha allowed Anga to
revive its power.
(8) If Janaka of Videha could be dated, as suggested
by Professor Hoernle,2 about 500 B.C. as a contemporary
of Ajatasatru, then the date before 500 B.C. suggested by
Jacobi would be at onco disposed of. But this identifica
tion of Ajatasatru of the Upanisads with the Buddhist
Ajatasattu cannot possibly be held to be correct.3
On the whole, therefore, it appears to me that while
the date before 500 B.C. cannot well be maintained, there
is no reason to go below a date before 300 B.C. for the
kernel of the Rdmdyana. With this date all the evidence
accommodates itself fairly easily and naturally, and there
is removed one difficulty which interferes with the
acceptance of Jacobi's theory. He lays just stress on the
probability that the Mahdblidrata was in large measure
redacted in the Pandii interest by poets, after the writing
of the lidmdyana, under the influence of that poem, and
he gives as the place of this redaction Paftcala, where the
Panolu family was clearly popular. This is a very
reasonable theoiy, and with the fourth century date
suggested fits in well with Hopkins's suggested date of
400-200 B.C. for tho first Pandu version of the epic. It
is no real objection to this that the Maltdblidrata metre
remains freer in its earlier portions even in the redaction
preserved (after 200 B.C.) than in the Rdmdyana. The
metrical form of the latter poem is duo to the unity of its
authorship, that of the former to the diversity and to
the absence of the hand of one author of genius, who
introduced a more refined and elegant style of metre.

1 Liiders, <JN. 1897, pp. 104 seqq.

J Keith, ZDMU. lxii, 138, 139.
J Osteology, p. 106.

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328 THE DYNASTIES OF THE KALI AGE

Of the final date of the completion of the Ramayana

with the first and seventh books nothing definite can be
said, except that the mention of Yavanas and general
probabilities suggest that the second century B.C. saw
most of the work complete, as was also tho case (in the
view of Hopkins) with the Mahdbhdrata.
A. Berriedale Keith.

THE DYNASTIES OP THE KALI AGE

Mr, Pargiter's note in the last number of the Journal

(pp. 141-7) on the Puranic account of the dynasties of
the Kali age asks for certain information, which I shall
attempt to give with as much brevity as is possible.
1. Bhaviyye leathitdn has precisely the same sense as
the v.l. of various M$S. (above, 1914, p. 1023), bliavi^yan;
the kings are told of as future kings or told of as kings
in the future. I take tho obvious view that bhavi$ye
and bhaviiydn have the same sense as in bhavisya ye
nrpdH tathd. Mr. Pargiter has to emend bhavisydn to
avoid this obvious conclusion, which is in truth fatal to
his theory.
2. Mr. Pargiter (pp. 142, 147) asks when the dynastic
account was compiled, whence came the material and in
what shape it existed, and what the author did with it
when he composed the prophetic account which is found
in the Puranas. To these questions I have no answer
to give; Mr. Pargiter, who calls them "elementary
questions ", has attempted an answer, and my purpose in
the paper to which his note is a reply was to show that
the evidence on which he bases that answer is wholly
insufficient to justify his conclusions. That there was
a common source for the dynastic account in the
Puranas is common property and has for years been so.
Mr. Pargiter's contribution to the argument is a detailed

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