Sanskrit Grammar - Grammatical Tradition

Grammatical Tradition

The grammatical tradition of Sanskrit (vyākaraṇa, one of the six Vedāṅga disciplines) began in late Vedic India and culminated in the Aṣṭādhyāyī of Pāṇini, a work which consists of 3990 sutras or aphorisms. Kātyāyana composed Vārtikas (explanations) on Pāṇini's sũtras. Patañjali, who lived three centuries after Pānini, wrote the Mahābhāṣya, the "Great Commentary" on the Aṣṭādhyāyī and the Vārtikas. Because of these three ancient this grammar is called Trimuni Vyākarana or 'grammar of three sages'. Jayaditya and Vāmana wrote the commentary named Kāsikā 600 CE, to elucidate the meaning of the sũtras,

Pāṇinian grammar is based on 14 Shiva sutras. The whole Mātrika (alphabet) is abbreviated here. This abbreviation is called Pratyāhāra. Kaiyaṭa's (12th century AD) commentary on Patañjali's Mahābhāṣya also exerted much influence on the development of grammar, but more influential was the Rupāvatāra of Buddhist scholar Dharmakīrti which popularised simplified versions of Sanskrit grammar.

The most influential work of the Early Modern (Mughal) period was Siddhānta Kaumudi by Bhaṭṭoji Dīkṣita (17th century) and its various derivate versions by Varadarāja. European grammatical scholarship began in the 18th century with Jean François Pons and others, and culminated in the exhaustive expositions by 19th century scholars such as Otto Boehtlingk, William Dwight Whitney, Jacob Wackernagel and others.