काव्यप्रकाश (आचार्य मम्मट - सम्पूर्ण १० उल्लास सटीक)

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वाक्यं रसादिमत् काव्यम्—(utterance embodying emotion is poetry), accord-
ing to a quotation in Alaṁkāra Shekhara. It is only a matter of con-
jecture whether he belonged to the genuine Sūtra period of Sanskrit
literature—the period immediately following Vyāsa, the great or-
ganiser of Sanskrit learning
The outlines and the elementary principles of Sāhitya are given
in the Agni Purāna also as now extant, but as to the authorship,
authenticity and antiquity of the work grave doubts are entertained
by those learned in these matters.
As regards Bharata, a tradition says that the Kārikās (memorial
verses), of the Kāvya-Prakāça, themselves are the work of Bharata,
and that Mammata wrote only the prose portion of the text in the
form of a commentary. But another tradition, as also the fact that
Mammata refers to Bharata in one place, in the fourth Chapter of the
work, in support of the doctrine stated in the Kārikā, goes against this.
The truth, as usual, probably lies between, and Mammata seems to
have made large use of the Sūtras of Bharata in fashioning his verses,
and has perhaps incorporated therein large pieces of them bodily,
thus giving rise to the first mentioned tradition.
Mammata himself was undoubtedly a Brāhmana of Kashmir and
lived and wrote his famous work certainly before the 12th century
A. C., about the time when English literature was just beginning to
be born. The earliest commentary on his work now available and
apparently the earliest in fact also, is, that of Mānikya-Chandra, and
that is expressedly dated by Mānikya-Chandra himself, in the colophon,
with the Saṁvat year 1216, corresponding with 1159 A. C. At the
same time there is no reason to believe that the author of the Kāvya-
Prakāsha lived earlier than the eleventh century A. C.; for he quotes
a verse in his 10th Chapter from Bhoja, who reigned in the earlier
half of that century, for a tradition has it that his younger brother
Uvvata attended the court of this very Bhoja at his capital Avanti
for some time; and he was probably the medium of the quotation.
It is easy to understand that the Court-Pandit should have gladly
seized on the first opportunity that offered of paying an elegant com-
pliment to the literary merits of his really deserving master, by securing
for a production of his a gratifying reference and quotation in the
masterpiece of his famous brother, and of, at the same time, and by
the same stroke of policy, obtaining for that masterpiece an introdu-