22 Ancient Indian Weights. [No. 1, 
nominal terms should appear in the grammar of a people would, at the 
very least, imply that the object designated had attained extensive 
local recognition. Without touching the higher ground, as to how 
soon in a nation’s linguistic progress fixed grammatical definitions 
may become a religious, intellectual, or material need, it cannot but be 
conceded that if the name and description of a coin find a place among 
rules for the formation of words, this should be evidence sufficient to 
prove that such a product of mechanical art must long have passed 
into the dealings and commercial life of the nation at large ere it could 
have become incorporated in the conventional speech, and been sanc- 
tioned in the teachings of the schools. 
Admitting these inferences, it remains to decide upon the date of 
the grammarian himself. Professor Goldstiicker conceives that he has 
lately obtained most important confirmatory testimony that Panini lived 
before Buddha Sdkya Muni (8.c. 543).* Accepting this period for the 
record in writing of the passage in question, I am satisfied to leave the 
limit of the anterior currency of the coins open to free discussion. 
The allusions to money in the sacred literature of Sakya Muni are 
so frequent, in comparison with their rare occurrence in the Vedic 
writings, as to have led one of our modern inquirers to infer that the 
Buddhists understood and employed the art of coining long before their 
Brahman adversaries ;+ a more simple and satisfactory reason may be 
assigned for the apparent data, in the fact that the Vedas and their 
supplemental rituals refer to an ideal polytheism, while the Buddhist 
scriptures are based on the personal biography of a man living in the 
flesh among the people of India, whose manners and customs are thus 
a form.”’ Katyéyana and Patanjali make no observation on these words, but 
the Kasika-vritti says that ‘form’ here means ‘the form or shape of a man 
which was struck on it;’ and considering that riépa, ‘form,’ is in this Sitra 
used without any addition—or emphatically, the ellipsis of pwrusha, ‘ man’—is 
perfectly natural and justified. As to the date of the Kasikavritti, nothing 
positive is as yet known of it; it is certain, however, that it is much later than 
the Mahabhashya; but even without its interpretation, I hold that no other 
sense than that put by it on this Satra could rationally be attributed to it.” 
* While on the subject of dates, I may mention that since the publication of 
the earlier portion of this article, a paper has been presented to the Royal Asiatic 
Society, by Dr. Whitney, “On the Jyotisha Observation” (adverted to in Note 
14, page 255, “Journal As. Soc. Bengal,” 1864) questioning the accuracy of the 
results of previous calculations. The utmost possible limit of error, however, 
is admitted to lie between 1120 and 1187 B8.c., instead of within the 1181 and 
1186 B.c., already quoted. 
+ Spence Hardy, “ Eastern Monachism,” Lond., 1850, p. 66. 

