drama, on which it must essentially be based, and he then uses the early date of the puppet-play as a proof of the still earlier existence of the drama. The latter argument, however, is unsatisfactory on various grounds. Apart from the fact that we cannot date the epic references or prove them earlier than the Mahābhāṣya, we have the doubt whether such a contention can possibly be justified. The use of puppets is primarily, of course, derived from the make-belief of children in playing with dolls; the terms for puppets which denote 'little daughter' (putrikā, puttalī, puttalikā, duhitṛkā), show this clearly enough, and the popularity of puppets is indicated by the erotic game known as the imitation of puppets, where the word for puppet (pāñcalī) suggests that the home of the puppet-play in India was the Pañcāla country. The growth of the drama doubtless brought with it the use of puppets to imitate it in brief, and from the drama came the Vidūṣaka, and not vice versa.
Though Pischel's theory[1] of the puppet-play as the origin of drama has failed to find supporters, the shadow play, on whose importance in India he was the first to lay stress, has emerged in lieu in the hands of Professor Lüders[2] as an essential element in the development of the Sanskrit drama, a position accepted by Professor Konow. The place found for the drama is in connexion with the displays of the Çaubhikas of the Mahābhāṣya. Owing to the misinterpretation of that passage it is held that the Çaubhikas were persons who explained matters to the audience to supplement either dumb actors[3] or shadow figures. It is admitted by Professor Lüders that there is no proof which of these two eventualities is correct, but he endeavours both to prove the existence of the shadow-play in early India and to show that the Çaubhikas had the function of showing them. Based on this misinterpretation of the Mahābhāṣya and on the hypotheses – wholly in the air – which it necessitates, is his view that the influence of the epic on the drama was conveyed through
- ↑ SBAW. 1906, pp. 481 ff.
- ↑ SBAW. 1916, pp. 698 ff. Contra, Hillebrandt, ZDMG. lxxii. 230 f. Winternitz (ZDMG. lxxiv. 120) reduces the Çaubhikas to people who tell tales of what is depicted on pictures, a clearly impossible version, but valid against Lüders.
- ↑ Based on Kaiyaṭa's version of Çaubhika: Kaṁsādyanukāriṇāṁ naṭānāṁ vyākhyānopādhyāyāḥ. This is clearly incompatible with Lüders's view, as he admits (pp. 720 f.). Kaiyaṭa is far too late or useful evidence.
