The Mahabharata as a dynamic text

The essentials

The original story of the Mahabharata was probably composed by charioteer-bards known as sutas, who accompanied Kshatriya warriors to battle and composed poems celebrating their victories. These compositions circulated orally. From the fifth century BCE, Brahmanas took over the story and began to commit it to writing. This was the period when chiefdoms like those of the Kurus and Panchalas were gradually becoming kingdoms.

Between c. 200 BCE and 200 CE, there was another phase: the worship of Vishnu was growing in importance, and Krishna, one of the important figures of the epic, came to be identified with Vishnu. Later, between c. 200 and 400 CE, large didactic sections resembling the Manusmriti were added. With these additions, a text that initially had less than 10,000 verses grew to comprise about 100,000 verses. The text is traditionally attributed to the sage Vyasa.

Key points

• Historians classify the Mahabharata's content into narrative (stories) and didactic (prescriptions about social norms) sections.
• The epic is described as itihasa, "thus it was".
• Its language is relatively simple Sanskrit, suggesting it was widely understood.
• Archaeologist B. B. Lal excavated Hastinapura (Meerut, UP) in 1951–52; whether this is the Hastinapura of the epic remains uncertain.
• The epic grew through retellings in many languages, performances and folk versions; it is a "dynamic text".
• Many regional versions were written, and stories were represented in sculpture and painting.

Common mistakes

• Thinking the Mahabharata was written down at one time by one person.