126 
LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE OE 
Vedas,) and whatever they wished to keep secret from the 
people (Brahmandapurana and the Tuturs.) 
The Kawi contained all these works by which the ideas 
of worship and the cherished mythology of the priests were 
communicated to the people. It thus became a sacred lan¬ 
guage to the people, and the holiness attached itself to all the 
words, principally however to the Sanskrit, which were 
rendered conspicuous by capital letters (the aksara g’de or 
murda). For the priests of Ball this language is that of 
pleasure ; they always use it for their poetical compositions ; 
almost every one of them composes a poem of greater or less 
extent which is communicated to their colleagues or scholars. 
But the Kawi is not sacred to them ; they greatly distinguish 
between Kawi and Sloka. Sloka is the usual Epic measure 
of India, in which at Bali the Manttas (secret writings) and 
also the Vedas are composed. The name Sanskreta , as 
significative of the language, is unknown in Bali. It is not 
even of a very old date in India having come into use to 
contradistinguish it from the Prakreta , the vulgar languange. 
Sloka (the measure used in the Epic poems of India) is used 
at present in Bali as the denomination of the works composed 
in that measure, the language of which is Sanskrit. Those 
are sacred and must be kept hidden from the people frahasya.) 
The Kawi has various epochs ; in the opinion of the Balinese 
there are three principal ones, viz: 
1. —The epoch of Ayer Langgia ; in the compositions of 
his age, according to the Siva Brahmins, the Kawi appears in 
the most beautiful and oldest form. He reigned in Kediri and 
was one of the ancestors of Jayabaya. In his time the wor¬ 
ship of Siva seems to have been predominant. 
2. —The epoch of Jayabaya j of his time is the Batata 
Yudda t less esteemed than, for instance, the Wiwuha, and 
indeed of a more recent style, also many works of Budhist 
authors. His period cannot be ascertained from the 
Balinese records; according to them he reigned in Barata 
IVarsa (India), but this is the India transferred by the Ba¬ 
rata Yudda into Java. His period would appear to comprise 
several dynasties, sirce so many works are ascribed to him. 
3. —The epoch of Majapahit , where we meet with still grea¬ 
ter admixtures of the vulgar language, and less acquaintance 
with the riches of the Sanskrit. This period is succeeded by 
a fourth one, formed by the continued compositions of the 
priests and seme princes on Bali. These, at least the priests, 
have preserved the knowledge of the Kawi and even aug¬ 
mented it by new Sanskrit expressions, which they take 
