2 



THE NITIPRAKASIKA. 



The Dhanurveda is the Upaveda attached to the Yajur- 

 veda, so that it is easy to understand why Vaisampayana has 

 been connected with the authorship of the Nitiprakasika, 

 which contains the Dhanurveda. 



The Nitiprakasika belongs to the same class of works as the 

 Mahabharata and the Harivamsa ; the narrator of both the 

 latter being Vaisampayana, it is natural to suppose that he 

 should also recite the Nitiprakasika to Janamejaya. More- 

 over, in style and language it closely resembles those poems, 

 and its contents supply no grounds which would prevent us 

 from assigning to it a considerable age. On the other hand, 

 the Nitiprakasika does not appear to have been often men- 

 tioned in other old Sanskrit works, if we omit a not yet certi- 

 fied quotation in the Vikramarkacaritra ; 1 but the absence of 

 such evidence is no argument against its antiquity. For we 

 should never forget that we possess only a small portion of the 

 ancient Sanskrit literature, that our actual knowledge of the 

 political and domestic constitution of the ancient Hindus is 

 insignificant to a degree, and that the earlier the truth of 

 this fact is admitted and recognized by the investigating 

 scholar the less shall we be overwhelmed with groundless 

 assertions, the less shall we have to listen to absurd criticisms, 

 and the more is opened out to us the hope to get nearer to 

 the truth. 



As I have mentioned in my monograph on the arms and 

 weapons of the ancient Hindus, the Nitiprakasika has never 

 yet been published, and the first intimation of its existence 



1 The commentary of Sitarama ascribes the following SlOka to the Vikra- 

 markacaritra : 



