Communist paNDita DD Kosambi had come to fore with his work on bhartR^ihari. He holds B to have been in nearabouts of CE 200s.
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->But he must have been a brahmin of a comparatively late period. Certainly, he could not have belonged to that earliest of all stages when the brahmins were yet to develop as an in- integral part.of the social system; when they were still fulgitivcs in the woods, living spiritually on the exaggerated memories of a culture destroyed by fighting invaders ( later to become the kshatriya caste) and subsisting upon roots, wild fruit, cattle. This period, however, left its mark on the language in the form of two bits of wish- thinking: the cow and the vine that fulfil all desire: kamadhenu and kalpalata; these are reflected in the advice our poet gives to the king as to the best means of exploiting the earth (N. 46). Even the later ideal of retiring to a sylvan life after having enjoyed that of a householder is absent in Bhartrihari, whose renunciation hardly rises above complete aesthetic paralysis (V. 97, V'. 8, 29: N. 81). He can only have belonged to the period after the Mauryan "universal monarchy', after the brahmins had saturated all petty royal courts as ministers and advisers, had saturated the lower sociaI strata as priests, had finished their chief contribution to religious and productive organization by outmoding the age of great monasteries, and were at the beginning of their last great phase, a literary expansion of secular type. This can hardly have been much before the fourth century A.D., and might not have taken place simultaneously over the whole country. Any attempt to assign a very early date for Bhartrihari would have to cope with the reference to the ten incarnations of Vishnu (N. 100), and to the hermaphrodite Shiva (V. 18: original in Sanskrit missing).
The authenticity of these two stanzas can be challenged, as also of the Shringara verse, which extols the pale golden complexion of Shaka maidens. But the word samanta, originally 'neighbour', can only mean 'feudal baron' in V. 42. This usage, though current in the 6th century, would be difficult to establish before the Gupta period. Therefore, the late 3rd century A.D. would be the earliest reasonable period for the Bhartrihari who saw this beginning of Indian feudalism, but no empire of any size.
http://www.geocities.com/dialecticalmeth...ihari.html<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
But certainly many scholars after Kosambi would disagree with him on many of the marxist-derived prrofs cited above. E.g. his saying that in this suggested era brAhmaNa-s had saturated the offices of kings - we do know that in post-mauryan and pre-gupta period many non-brAhmaNa castes were deep entrenched in office too. Look for example in history provided in rAjatara~NgiNI that mentions many non-brAhmaNa AmAtya-s. drama mR^ichcHakaTikA mentions a kAyastha secretary to the corrupt relative of the king. and so on.
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->But he must have been a brahmin of a comparatively late period. Certainly, he could not have belonged to that earliest of all stages when the brahmins were yet to develop as an in- integral part.of the social system; when they were still fulgitivcs in the woods, living spiritually on the exaggerated memories of a culture destroyed by fighting invaders ( later to become the kshatriya caste) and subsisting upon roots, wild fruit, cattle. This period, however, left its mark on the language in the form of two bits of wish- thinking: the cow and the vine that fulfil all desire: kamadhenu and kalpalata; these are reflected in the advice our poet gives to the king as to the best means of exploiting the earth (N. 46). Even the later ideal of retiring to a sylvan life after having enjoyed that of a householder is absent in Bhartrihari, whose renunciation hardly rises above complete aesthetic paralysis (V. 97, V'. 8, 29: N. 81). He can only have belonged to the period after the Mauryan "universal monarchy', after the brahmins had saturated all petty royal courts as ministers and advisers, had saturated the lower sociaI strata as priests, had finished their chief contribution to religious and productive organization by outmoding the age of great monasteries, and were at the beginning of their last great phase, a literary expansion of secular type. This can hardly have been much before the fourth century A.D., and might not have taken place simultaneously over the whole country. Any attempt to assign a very early date for Bhartrihari would have to cope with the reference to the ten incarnations of Vishnu (N. 100), and to the hermaphrodite Shiva (V. 18: original in Sanskrit missing).
The authenticity of these two stanzas can be challenged, as also of the Shringara verse, which extols the pale golden complexion of Shaka maidens. But the word samanta, originally 'neighbour', can only mean 'feudal baron' in V. 42. This usage, though current in the 6th century, would be difficult to establish before the Gupta period. Therefore, the late 3rd century A.D. would be the earliest reasonable period for the Bhartrihari who saw this beginning of Indian feudalism, but no empire of any size.
http://www.geocities.com/dialecticalmeth...ihari.html<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
But certainly many scholars after Kosambi would disagree with him on many of the marxist-derived prrofs cited above. E.g. his saying that in this suggested era brAhmaNa-s had saturated the offices of kings - we do know that in post-mauryan and pre-gupta period many non-brAhmaNa castes were deep entrenched in office too. Look for example in history provided in rAjatara~NgiNI that mentions many non-brAhmaNa AmAtya-s. drama mR^ichcHakaTikA mentions a kAyastha secretary to the corrupt relative of the king. and so on.