SANSKRIT, the name of the ancient literary language of India. It forms the extreme branch of the great Indo-Ger manic (Indo-European, Aryan) stock of languages, and the one which, thanks to its early literary cultivation (from 1500 B. c.) and grammatical fixation, and its consequent transparency of structure and fulness of form, approaches nearest to the parent language. In some respects, however, the primitive appearance of the Sanskrit, as of the closely allied Iranian or Persic branch, is now generally ascribed to a special Indo-Iranian de velopment, or to a later return to a phonetic phase already outgrown by the parent language at the time of the sep aration. While it is admitted on all hands that the Aryan dialect, out of which the literary language of India has developed, cannot have been indige nous to the peninsula, but must have been introduced from the N. E., there is still considerable difference of opinion as to the original home of the primitive Aryan community—whether it is to be sought for in Asia, as used to be universally be lieved, or whether, as many scholars are now inclined to think, it was from some part of Europe that the Asiatic Aryans originally came. On entering India, the Aryan tribes found the country occupied by people of different races; but, favored by physical and intellectual superiority, they gradually succeeded in extending their sway, as well as their language and their social and religious institutions, over the whole of northern India.
Though the term Sanskrit, as the "per fected" language, properly speaking only belongs to the grammatically fixed form of the language which was employed from about the 4th or 5th century B. c., and which came more and more to as sume the character of a mere literary and learned idiom, it is usual to extend the term so as to include an earlier form of the same language used in the Vedic writings, and hence often called Vedic Sanskrit. The two phases of the lan guage show considerable differences as regards both vocabulary and grammar.
In accordance with the general devel opment of the language, the history of the ancient literature of India may con veniently be divided into two chief pe riods, the Vedic Literature and the (Classical) Sanskrit Literature.
The Hindus possess two great national epics, the "Mahabharata" and the "Ra mayana." Along with these may be classed the "Puranas," which, though in their present form they were doubtless. composed or recast for sectarian pur poses several centuries after Christ, seem to contain a considerable amount of gen uine old legendary matter akin to large portions of the Mahabharata. Thdugh the final redaction of the two epics can scarcely be assigned to an earlier period than about the beginning of our era, it can hardly be doubted that the vast mass of legendary lore and complete epic lays of which the Mahabharata is composed, at all events must have required cen turies to grow and assume its present shape. At a subsequent period, from about the 5th or 6th century A. D. on ward, there arose a second crop of epic poems, artificial in style, product of an age when the literary language had long lost touch of the popular mind. Their subject-matter, such as there is, is en tirely derived from the old legends; but the form in which it is here presented has nothing of the old popular ring about it. Of such poems (ka vya) there ex isted a considerable number; but the na tive taste has singled out six of them as maluikavyas or great poems—viz., two by Kalidasa, by far the greatest poet of this period, the "Raghuvam'sa" and the "Kumarasambhava"; further the "Kirar tarjuniya" by Bharavi (probably a con temporary of Kalidasa, 500-550 A. D.) ; the "S'is'upalabadha" by Magha, hence also called "Mahakavya," the "ItIvana badha" or "Bhattikavya," composed by Bhatti with the view of illustrating the less common grammatical forms of speech; and the "Naishadliiya" of S'ri Harsha (12th century).