Panchatantra (pŭn'chətŭn`trə) [Sanskrit,=five treatises], anonymous collection of animal fables in Sanskrit literature Sanskrit literature, literary works written in Sanskrit constituting the main body of the classical literature of India.

Introduction

The literature is divided into two main periods—the Vedic (c.1500–c.200 B.C.
..... Click the link for more information. , probably compiled before A.D. 500 (see Bidpai Bidpai or Bidpay (both: bĭd`pī), supposed name of the author of the fables of the Panchatantra .
..... Click the link for more information. ). The work, derived from Buddhistic sources, was intended as a manual for the instruction of sons of the royalty. The fables are in prose, with interspersions of aphoristic verse. The stories in the Panchatantra appear to have entered European literature circuitously through an Arabic version (c.A.D. 750) of the translation into Syriac of the Pahlavi (literary Persian) translation (c.A.D. 550) from the original. A variant spelling is Pancatantra.

Bibliography

See the translation from the Sanskrit by A. W. Ryder (1925, repr. 1956).

Panchatantra

(Sanskrit; “Five Treatises” or “Five Chapters”)

Collection of Indian beast fables written in Sanskrit that has had extensive circulation throughout the world. The original work, now lost, may have been written down between 100 BC and AD 500. A textbook for instructing three sons of a king, it contained aphorisms that glorify shrewdness and cleverness over altruism. As early as the 11th century one version reached Europe, where it was known as The Fables of Bidpai (for the narrator, an Indian sage).

Panchatantra (redirected from Fables of Bidpaï)

Introduction

Bibliography

Panchatantra

Panchatantra
(redirected from Fables of Bidpaï)