Note 111 — II POST-VEDIC LITERATURE AND THE ORIGIN OF THE DRAMA

The stage reached by the Prākrits of Açvaghoṣa shows clearly how late are the Prākrits of the orthodox classical drama,111 and reminds us how much more closely akin to Sanskrit must have been the Prākrit of the drama of the time of, or shortly after, Patañjali. The classical drama with its broken-down forms of Prākrit gives a false impression of the original dramatic form in which either perhaps Sanskrit alone, if the matter were epic, or both Sanskrit and a closely akin Çaurasenī appeared.