2009 -- India Election -

[Husky]

<!--QuoteBegin-Bodhi+Apr 5 2009, 11:21 AM-->QUOTE(Bodhi @ Apr 5 2009, 11:21 AM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->Husky, 159: thanks a lot for the reasearch.  I was only joking about greek thing.  such a thought is generic enough in all heathen soceities and I suppose can be had from all of them.  BTW, bhartR^ihari is considered 1st c BCE, a contemporary of kAlidAsa.  In any case he is much before 7th c. of CE, since a chinese traveller of this age describes reminiscence of bhartR^ihari in India as someone from long past.[right][snapback]96114[/snapback][/right]<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->1. It was no research on my part. As I recall, all I did was google "Euripides" or something. It's what's called "cheating".

2. Well, as usual western dating doesn't agree - neither with Indians dating nor with itself either apparently. Usually they date him 6th century CE (I checked another encyclopaedia). Although the above wacky page on Euripides had him in the 7th century.

http://www.iep.utm.edu/b/bhartrihari.htm
From a site calling itself the "internet encyc of philosophy"
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Bhartrihari <b>(c. 450-510 CE?)</b>
(Isn't that question-mark cute?)

1. Bhartrihari's Life and Works

Bhartrihari's works were so widely known that even the <b>Chinese traveler Yijing (I-Tsing) (635-713 CE)</b> mentions the grammarian-philosopher, mistaking him for a Buddhist.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhartrihari
Wacky's page on Bhartrhari mentions the above Chinese traveller's book by name:
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->The Grammarian
Further information: Sphoá¹­a

Bhartṛhari was an early figure in Indic linguistic theory, mentioned in the 670s by Chinese traveller Yi-Jing, author of the Vākyapadīya ("About Words and Sentences"). The work is divided into three books, the Brahma-kāṇḍa, (or Āgama-samuccaya "aggregation of traditions"), the Vākya-kāṇḍa, and the Pada-kāṇḍa (or Prakīrṇaka "miscellaneous").<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Was the Chinese traveller you mentioned a different person from the above YiJing?

<b>ADDED:</b>
Missed out adding this:
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->BTW, bhartR^ihari is considered 1st c BCE, a contemporary of kAlidAsa.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->As we know, christowestern dating is not always completely inconsistent (it's a miracle!). They've dated Bharatrhari to 5th-6th century and Kalidasa too:

http://www.cs.colostate.edu/~malaiya/kalidas.html
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Kalidasa: life and works
A collection from various sources
Last update: January 16, 1996

<b>Kalidas
From: Encyclopedia Americana</b>
Written by: Walter Harding Maurer
University of Hawaii at Manoe
[...]
KALIDASA, (kaalidaasa), India's greatest Sanskrit poet and dramatist. In spite of the celebrity of his name, the time when he flourished always has been an unsettled question, <b>although most scholars nowadays favor the middle of the 4th and early 5th centuries A.D., during the reigns of Chandragupta II Vikramaaditya and his successor Kumaaragupta.</b> Undetermined also is the place of Kaalidaasa's principal literary activity, as the frequent and minute geographic allusions in his works suggest that he traveled extensively.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->Thank gawd he comes after jeebus and the Gita and the Mahabharatam. Else the <i>Timeframe Superimposed On India</i> just wouldn't fit, now would it. There's only so many centuries since them lovely Oryans invaded, for the Rg and other Vedas and the Upanishads and everything to have been composed and written up, and for one Indian celebrity after another to have come and gone.


<b>ADDED2:</b>
No longer of any consolation, but for informative purposes, note that Monier Monier-Williams who did a translation of Shakuntala (as Sakoontala):
From Introduction, p. vii-viii of Śakoontalá By Kālidāsa, Monier Monier-Williams
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Of all Indian dramatists, and indeed of all Indian poets, the most celebrated is <b>Kalidasa</b>, the writer of the present play. He comes next in date to the author of the 'Toy-cart'; and although little is known of the circumstances of his life, yet there is <b>satisfactory evidence to prove that he lived in the time of King Vikramaditya I.,</b> whose capital was Ujjayini, now Oujein (a sacred and very ancient city situated to the north-east of Gujarat), and <b>who flourished in the middle of the century preceding the commencement of our era.</b><!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->(Note the 'satisfactory evidence' used back then to draw conclusions, compare with the 'probably' and 'perhaps' and the question-marks of today.)

So the last line indicates that Kalidasa was dated to 1st century BCE back in Monier-Williams' time (who, if I recall it aright from what I read in Hinduwisdom, was a christian). Yes, see at end.

But like each subsequent entry in various encyclopaedias dated the Mahabharatam and Gita nearer and nearer our own time, Kalidasa has also since then leaped some 4 to 5 centuries closer <!--emo&--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif' /><!--endemo--> Christian dating is wonderful. Tomorrow or the day after I will be contemporary with Rama <!--emo&--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif' /><!--endemo-->


<b>ADDED3:</b>
http://hinduwisdom.info/FirstIndologists.htm
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Successor to Wilson in  Oxford's Boden Chair  was Sir Monier-Williams(1819-1899) who was a Christian of warm Evangelical convictions. He said:

"For what purpose then has this enormous territory been committed to England? Not to be the 'corpus vile' of political, social, or military experiments; not for benefit of our commerce, or the increase of our wealth - but that every man, woman and child, from Cape Comorin to the Himalaya mountains, may be elevated, enlightened Christianized."

(source: Missionaries in India: Continuities, Changes, Dilemmas - By Arun Shourie ASA Publications ASIN 8190019945 p. 152)<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->