4 Systems of Sanskrit Grammar §ge
came in mainly by way of illustration, or because no other equally cogent. explanation of the Sarhhita passage in question was at band. We cannot make much capital out of their stray and half poetic utterances.
4. Grammatical speculations ia allied works —It was in the next period that the study of grammar as a science was taken in earnest. This was the period when the scatter- ed hymns of the Vedas came to be collected into family- books and elaborate rules were framed for the regulation, of the payishads or charenas.1 To help students in their task there also came into being about the same time various manuals on phonetics,? which dealt with letters, accents, quantity, pronunciation, and euphonic rules. In course of time the retentive faculty came to be culti- vated to an extent which is without any parallel in the history of the world. Afurther advance was made by the constitution of the Padapitha, commonly ascribed to Sakalya, which resolved the euphonic combinations and gave each word, each member of a compound, each prefix of the verb, as also each suffix or termination of the noun separately. The stock of grammatical notions familiar to this stage of development, though not very large, is already sufficient to indicate the earnestness of the search for truth.
5. The predecessors of Yaska—We are not yet certain
- when the art of writing came to be invented~or intro-
duced—in Ancient India. It was certainly much earlier than what Max Miiller once believed it to be.? What- ever that period might be, it must have been prior to the production of the Pratiédkhya literature; and by this we
1 Sco Maz Miller’s History of ature, p, 620. Compare on the
Ancient Indian literature, 2nd subject Bibler’s contribation edition pp. 128, 187, &e, to the Grundriss der Indo~
2 Op, Talitintya Araqyaka, vil. 1. Arischen Philologie, especially 3 History of Ancient Indian Lite page 18. . �
