Panini
(c. 520–460 BCE), Sanskrit grammarian. There is controversy regarding the dates of Panini, but most scholars believe that he lived in the fifth century BCE. He was born in Shalatura, near Attock in present-day Pakistan.
Panini's magnum opus, Astadhyayi, consists of four thousand sutras or Vedic precepts divided into eight chapters. It deals with the rules of Sanskrit grammar and systemizes such basic elements as nouns, verbs, and sentence structure. Astadhyayi covers phonetics, phonology, and morphology, making it a source text for Indian linguistics.
The Astadhyayi also gives insight into the religious and social development of the period. For instance, reference to bhakti (religious devotion) can be found in the discussion of the word Vasudevaka. (The word is a name for a person whose religious devotion is focused on Vasudeva.) There are also references to different categories of lowly born people, such as aniravasita (those living within society) and niravasita (those living outside society), and Panini also mentions women students pursuing Vedic knowledge.
His scientific study of grammar made Panini one of the luminaries in Sanskrit language. Some have seen Astadhyayi as a precursor of modern formal language theory. Panini's work systematizing the grammar of Sanskrit in Astadhyayi kept the Sanskrit language largely unchanged for about two millennia. He himself died after being attacked by a lion.
Further Reading
Sharma, Ramanath, trans. (1998) The Astadhyayi of Panini. New Delhi, India: Munshiram.
Vasu, Srisa C., trans. (1980) The Astadhyayi of Panini. Columbia, MO: South Asia Books.
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