OUTLINES OF THE HISTORY OF SANSKRIT 51 means of an arduous discipline. It was a prerequisite for all men of letters of the period that they should know by heart the Astadhydyt, and evidence of this dependence appears continu- ally in their works. As time went on, the cultivation of classical Sanskrit also came to depend on the Kosas or lexica. Apart from the Vedic nighantus lexicography is a later growth in India than grammar. The extant lexica are mostly late and are compilations out of earlier works. Amarakosa , the earliest existing, has not been accurately dated, but it is put approximately in the period a.d. 600-800. Earlier works are known and sometimes quoted, but not preserved. These works are in metre and intended to be learnt by heart, a practice which in the traditional schools has continued to this day. When this first became an essential re- quirement of a literary education is not clearly known, but certainly for the later period of Sanskrit literature we may assume that the writers were so equipped. In spite of their late date and, in general, unscientific method, the lexica are of considerable value, since they preserve a large number of words which are not recorded in available texts. At the same time careless copying and inaccurate transmission has created some ghost words, which careful comparison of the various lexica may remove. §4. Epic Sanskrit The bulk of the classical Sanskrit literature was composed at a period very much later than the fixing of the language by Panini. An earlier period in literary and linguistic history is represented by the two great popular epics, the Mahabharata and the Ramayana. It does not seem that either of these two works reached its final form until well after the Christian era, but the tradition of epic recitation goes back into the Vedic age. The Mahabharata in particular was a long time in forming, and a good deal of what is incorporated in the final recension may claim an earlier date. We have therefore in the Epics extensive documents of Sanskrit belonging to a period nearer to Panini than the classical, literature in the narrow sense. They provide also evidence of the wide popularity of one type of Sanskrit literature among the masses of the people, since these works were reserved for no
