Part 5 - Date of Kohala

The exact time when Kohala flourished in the field of nāṭya is a matter that has been debated for several decades. One fact that is undisputable is that he was a contemporary of Bharata. This fact is corroborated by the mention of Kohala’s name in Bharata’s Nāṭyaśāstra as one of the hundred sons of Bharata. Some scholars interpret that Kohala was a ‘son of the same artistic lineage’ or in other words a disciple of Bharata rather than an offspring. This interpretation would also play a role in determining the date of Kohala. An offspring can under no circumstance pre-date the parent. But a disciple can. Further, there is a prophetic statement of Bharata in the Nāṭyaśāstra that Kohala would explain all that he had left out in his work called Uttaratantra^[1]. Since the Nāṭyaśāstra has the earliest reference to Kohala, the text and its author play an important role in understanding Kohala. The date of Bharata himself is yet to be concretely arrived at. There are different views on this subject. 

For instance, V. Raghavan, based on the statements made by Śāradātanaya, feels that “the name Bharata as a sage is a later myth and Bharatas at first meant only actors”^[2]. 

नाट्यवेदप्रयोक्तारं भारतीसहितोऽस्मरत् ।
स्मृतमात्रे मुनिः कश्चित् शिष्यैः पञ्चभिरन्वितः ॥
पुरोऽवतस्थे भारत्य सहितस्याब्जजन्मनः ।
तानब्रवीत् नाट्यवेदं भरत इति पितामहः ॥

nāṭyavedaprayoktāraṃ bhāratīsahito'smarat |
smṛtamātre muniḥ kaścit śiṣyaiḥ pañcabhiranvitaḥ ||
puro'vatasthe bhāratya sahitasyābjajanmanaḥ |
tānabravīt nāṭyavedaṃ bharata iti pitāmahaḥ ||

—Bhāvaprakāśana: 1968: p.285

तुष्टस्तेभ्यो वरं प्रदात् अभीष्टं पद्मविष्टरः ।
नाट्यवेदमिदं यस्मात् भरत इति मयेरीतम् ॥
तस्माद् भरत नामानः भविष्यथ जगत्त्रये ।
नाट्यवेदोऽपि भवता नाम्ना ख्यातिं गमिष्यति ॥

tuṣṭastebhyo varaṃ pradāt abhīṣṭaṃ padmaviṣṭaraḥ |
nāṭyavedamidaṃ yasmāt bharata iti mayerītam ||
tasmād bharata nāmānaḥ bhaviṣyatha jagattraye |
nāṭyavedo'pi bhavatā nāmnā khyātiṃ gamiṣyati ||

—Bhāvaprakāśana: 1968: p. 286

On the other hand, R. Sathyanarayana feels that “In view of the wide currency and universal recognition which the work obtained, it is more likely that the term Bharata acquired the general connotation of actor in later times than the reverse^[3]. There is also the theory of the ‘Pañcabharatas’, which says that there were five different authorities (contemporary?) whose combined efforts are available to us today as the Nāṭyaśāstra. The inescapable fact here is that the date of Kohala depends, to a great extent on that of Bharata. 

This encyclopedic work Nāṭyaśāstra does not appear to have been composed at one go, but had a stage by stage evolution into its present form. There are references to an Ādibharata and a Bharata in Raghava Bhatta’s commentary on Śākuntala. 

Śāradātanaya mentions that Bharata dealt with the rasas and Vṛddhabharata the prose portions of the rasa chapter.

एवं हि नगट्यवेदेऽस्मिन् भरतेनोच्यते रसः ।
तथा भरतवृद्धेन कथितं गद्यमीदृशम् ॥

evaṃ hi nagaṭyavede'smin bharatenocyate rasaḥ |
tathā bharatavṛddhena kathitaṃ gadyamīdṛśam ||

—History of Sanskrit Poetics: 1971: p.26

Clearly, these show a plurality of personalities, all of whom are probably members of the ‘Bharata’ clan, or the families whose profession it was to study, perform and propagate the art of drama.

1 Date of Kohala—Views of Modern Scholars

Kohala was a contemporary of Bharata. The date of Nāṭyaśāstra will help in deciding that of Kohala. Scholars differ on the date of Bharata. It is known that the Nāṭyaśāstra, after its many stages of evolution attained its existing form, probably around the 8th century C.E^[4]. Also, there is a reference to Kohala as an ancient authority alongside Bharata in Damodara’s Kuṭṭanīmatam^[5] which belongs to the 8th century C.E. Further, Mataṅga quotes Kohala in his work Bṛhaddeśī (7th-8th century C.E.). From this, we can infer that the latest Kohala could have lived would be 7th century C.E. 

Mukund Lath while speaking of the date of Dattila presents some views of scholars on the date of Kohala too. He says that according to Paranjape, Kohala is a post-Harṣa author (i.e. post 7th century C.E.). The basis for this opinion arises from a statement found in Abhinavabhāratī, wherein the nāndī of the famous drama—Ratnāvalī of Harṣa is being discussed. 

Abhinava says—

इत्येषापि भारतीयत्वेन प्रसिद्धा कोहलप्रदर्शिता नान्द्युपपन्ना भवति ।

ityeṣāpi bhāratīyatvena prasiddhā kohalapradarśitā nāndyupapannā bhavati |

Paranjape is of the opinion that Kohala has quoted the Nāndī of Ratnāvalī and hence Kohala must post-date Harṣa. At this juncture Mukund Lath contends that this statement implies that though this nāndī is well known as one composed according to the specifications of Bharata (Bhāratīyā nāndī), in actuality it is one based on the model exhibited by Kohala^[6]. Mukund Lath also mentions the views of Ācārya Viśveśvara, who interprets the passage in Abhinavabhāratī as meaning that the nāndī in question was one that occurred in a work by Bharata, but this fact was revealed by Kohala. In other words, Ācārya Viśveśvara feels that it is possible that Harṣa may have adapted this śloka from a work of Bharata or another early work which quoted him. Furthermore, K. C. Pandey interprets the word ‘Bhāratīya’ to mean ‘propounded by the son of Bharata’^[7] and says that Abhinava answers the question of who that ‘son of Bharata’ is by qualifying it with the word ‘Kohalapradarśitā’. In his view Kohala was a son of Bharata. 

Dattilācārya, in his text ‘Dattilam’ (Circa 2nd century C.E.) also refers to Kohala and quotes from his work. This would mean that Kohala was either a predecessor or at best, a contemporary of Dattila. If Dattila, who lived in the 2nd century C.E. quoted from Kohala, then Kohala could not possibly have lived after 2nd century C.E. Mukund Lath mentions that there is a possibility that Dattila was a pre-Bharata author. If that be the case, then Kohala would consequently also be a pre-Bharata author, since Dattila quotes Kohala in his work. 

The mention of Kohala in Nāṭyaśāstra as one of the hundred sons / disciples of Bharata is one of the key pieces of information in deciding the date of Kohala. Such a mention corroborates the fact that Bharata and Kohala were contemporaries or at best, that Kohala was a junior contemporary of Bharata. 

The date of Bharata is in itself yet to be ascertained with exactness. The accepted range of time during which Bharata is believed to have flourished is between 5th century B.C.E. and 2nd century C.E. It is interesting to note that even though the entire text of Nāṭyaśāstra is available, we are till date only able to give to it a rough time frame (spanning 7 centuries). In comparison, the work of Kohala is available only as fragments and even in that available material there is no personal information about Kohala. Therefore it is not surprising that several modern scholars such as V. Raghavan, P. V. Kane, Mukund Lath etc. only present Kohala as a contemporary of Bharata and do not offer any particulars regarding the date. M. R. Kavi is one scholar who specifies the date of Kohala as being 3rd century B.C.E.^[8]

On this point, R. Satyanarayana sums up—

“It is very difficult, if not impossible to fix the date of the earliest Kohala in the present state of our knowledge. This is due to the inderdependent chronologies of Bharata, Dattila, Kohala, Mataṅga, and Śārdūla, all of whom very co-operatively but confusingly call upon each other for support and authority. Spurious works of later date and un-isolated interpolations in the extant early works have not helped the situation. The best that can be said under the circumstances is that the earliest Kohala was probably a junior contemporary of Bharata.”^[9]

Further, the views of Kohala on subjects such as rūpaka-s, uparūpakas etc. that authors like Abhinavagupta, Dattila and Mataṅga mention do strenghthen the assigning of a date around that of Bharata.

5.2 Could Kohala ante-date Bharata?

Vinjamuri Varaha Narasimhachary is one scholar who says that Kohala is a pre-Bharata author^[10]. He disagrees with the theory that Bharata and Kohala were contemporaries. The reason he cites for such a view is that Bharata mentions the name of Kohala in his work. But this alone cannot be sufficient proof to say that Kohala existed before Bharata, because both of these authors could have very well lived in the same period of time and still written works one after the other. Furthermore, Nāṭyaśāstra does not contain any doctrines of Kohala in the matter of nāṭya. In fact, Nāṭyaśāstra does not contain the doctrines of any authority specifying his name. But there are ānuvaṃśya ślokas which are concepts that were traditionally handed down (and therefore not composed by Bharata himself) and also some instances where Bharata hints that he has referred to ‘some’ authority^[11]. 

Also there are some minor varieites of drama called uparūpakas that were introduced by Kohala. Kohala belonged to a performing tradition that was different from Bharata’s (Bharata belonged to the daśarūpaka tradition) and it appears that his system took stands quite divergent to Bharata. Could that mean that Kohala’s system was the deśī tradition of those times? This aspect has been dealt with in the coming chapters. 

It is possible that Kohala’s sampradāya and may be even those of others flourished during or before the time of Bharata. But when Bharata’s Nāṭyaśāstra gained the kind of universal acceptance and popularity that it did, these other schools were pushed to relative obscurity. It is also possible that the theories of Bharata and Kohala on nāṭya were developed in different geographic locations which could account for the differences of opinion. 

Dattila and Kohala were both highly respected authorities of their times. Therefore it is possible that for the sake of convenience, the followers of Bharata had the names of both Dattila and Kohala included in the list of hundred sons of Bharata. This would strengthen their own position. Parallel traditions do not emerge in a day. It takes several years to establish a school of thought and to bring it into practice. Considering these facts, some might construe that Kohala even pre-dates Bharata. This theory though, needs more substantiation. In addition to the relative date of Bharata, clues regarding the date of Kohala can also be gathered from the references obtained from citations in later lakṣaṇagranthas. The topics that Kohala discusses and the thoughts that he presents would help to arrive at his date. These have been discussed in the following chapters.

Footnotes and references:

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[1]:

śeṣamuttaratantreṇa kohalastu kariṣyati | 37.18 ||—Nāṭyaśāstra: 2006: GOS Vol. IV: p.517

[2]:

Collected writings on music: 2007: Vol. II: p.72

[3]:

Abhinavabharatasārasaṅgraha:1960: Intro: p. LIV

[4]:

Ibid.

[5]:

Kuṭṭanīmatam by Dāmodara Gupta: 1991: V. 81

[6]:

A study of Dattilam: 1978: pp.442-443

[7]:

Abhinavagupta-A Historical and Philosophical Study: 1963: p.181

[8]:

Bharatakośa: 1999: Intro: p.xxi

[9]:

Abhinavabharatassarasaṅgraha:1960: Intro: p.LVII

[10]:

The Early Writers on Music: 1930: p.259

[11]:

Mukund Lath says—“True, Bharata does not name any older authority in his delineation of gāndharva, yet he gives clear indication of the fact that he was writing within a tradition of established musical codes and texts.”—A Study of Dattilam:1978: p.441