for it to mature.  What changes take place in language, even with a written literature, in the space of a few centuries, may be seen in Persian, Greek, Latin, and German.  No two thousand years are required to bridge the linguistic extremes of the Vedic and classical Sanskrit language.[6] But in content it will be seen that the flower of the later literature is budding already in the Vedic age.  We are unable to admit that either in language or social development, or in literary or religious growth, more than a few centuries are necessary to account for the whole development of Hindu literature (meaning thereby compositions, whether written or not) up to the time of Buddha.  Moreover, if one compare the period at which arise the earliest forms of literature among other Aryan peoples, it will seem very strange that, whereas in the case of the Romans, Greeks, and Persians, one thousand years B.C. is the extreme limit of such literary activity as has produced durable works, the Hindus two or three thousand years B.C. were creating poetry so finished, so refined, and, from a metaphysical point of view, so advanced as is that of the Rig Veda.  If, as is generally assumed, the (prospective) Hindus and Persians were last to leave the common Aryan habitat, and came together to the south-east, the difficulty is increased; especially in the light of modern opinion in regard to the fictitious antiquity of Persian (Iranian) literature.  For if Darmesteter be correct in holding the time of the latter to be at most a century before our era, the incongruity between that oldest date of Persian literature and the “two or three thousand years before Christ,” which are claimed in the case of the Rig Veda, becomes so great as to make the latter assumption more dubious than ever.

We think in a word, without wishing to be dogmatic, that the date of the Rig Veda is about on a par, historically, with that of ‘Homer,’ that is to say, the Collection[7] represents a long period, which was completed perhaps two hundred years after 1000 B.C, while again its earliest beginnings precede that date possibly by five centuries; but we would assign the bulk of the Rig Veda to about 1000 B.C.  With conscious imitation of older speech a good deal of archaic linguistic effect doubtless was produced by the latest poets, who really belong to the Brahmanic age.  The Brahmanic age in turn ends, as we opine, about 500 B.C., overlapping the S[=u]tra period as well as that of the first Upanishads.  The former class of writings (after 500 B.C. one may talk of writings) is represented by dates that reach from circa 600-500 B.C. nearly to our era.  Buddhism’s floruit is from 500 B.C. to 500 A.D., and epic Hinduism covers nearly the same centuries.  From 500 to 1000 Buddhism is in a state of decadence; and through this time extend the dramatic and older Puranic writings; while other Pur[=a]nas are as late as 1500, at which time arises the great modern reforming sect of the Sikhs.  In the matter of the earlier termini a century may be added or subtracted here and there, but these convenient divisions of five hundreds will be found on the whole to be sufficiently accurate.[8]