Panchatantra, the oldest extant collection of apologues and stories in Sanskrit literature. This work is a compilation due to a Brahman named Vishnusaarman, who is represented as at once the narrator of the stories and author of the book. Composed of narratives, some of which are found in different literary monuments, and of passages borrowed from legislators, moralists, and poets, the Panchatantra has been subjected to many modifications. Wilson, who first gave a detailed analysis of the work (Trans. Roy. Asiatic Soc. of Great Britain, i., Lond. 1827), had three widely varying MSS. before him. Kosegarten, the first editor of the Sanskrit text, found the same variety in the eleven MSS. he used. In these he recognised two distinct redactions, one simple and without ornament, the other more extended and elaborated. Neither of these is, however, the first form of the work. Benfey held that there existed a still more ancient text, from which the lost Pehlevi translation was made, and that the Panchatantra was composed subsequent to that translation. This Pehlevi version was the parent of the Arabic Kalilah wa Dimnah, as also of the old Syriac version of Bickell and Benfey (1876). The book of Kalilah wa Dimnah differs considerably from the Panchatantra. It is divided into eighteen chapters, of which only five (5, 7, 8, 9, 10) correspond to the five parts of our collection. The literary history of this work and its extraordinary diffusion among the languages of western Europe are sketched in the article BIDPAI.
Some of the fables contained in the Panchatantra are found in the Mahābhārata, others have their source in Buddhist books, and there exist in Sanskrit several abridgments or imitations. Of these the most ancient forms part of the Kathāsaritsāgara ('Ocean of the Streams of Story'), composed by Somadéva about the beginning of the 12th century. The text of this work was edited by H. Brockhaus (Leip. 1839-62-66); a German translation by the same scholar was published in 1839 (Leip. 2 vols.), and one in English by Professor C. H. Tawney in 1880 (Calcutta, 2 vols.). It contains, of the Panchatantra, the first three books, three fables of the fourth, and one of the fifth. Another abridgment, in which most of the poetical quotations are omitted, is entitled Kathāmritamidhi ('Treasure of the Ambrosia of Stories'). But the most celebrated of its imitations is the Hitopadēsa ('Useful Instruction'), of comparatively modern date. Like Somadéva, its author, Sri Nārāyana, has taken only the first three books of the Indian original; he has drawn from the last two four fables only, and inserted them in his third and fourth books.
The Panchatantra belongs to the class of works designated in India as Nitisāstras (sāstra, 'book of knowledge,' and niti, 'conduct'), composed for the instruction of princes and all those called to take a share in the direction of public affairs. The five books of which it is composed form as many distinct parts, related to each other by an introduction in which a king, after having taken the advice of his councillors, entrusts to a Brahman the education of his three sons. The latter composes the Panchatantra for the instruction of the young princes, and by the reading of that work he succeeds in overcoming their indolence and in developing their faculties.
The first book is the longest, and has for special title Mitrabhedā ('The Disunion of Friends'). Its object is to acquaint kings how dangerous it is to lend an ear to the perfidious insinuations of those who seek to sow divisions between a prince and his faithful friends. The second book, entitled Mitraprāpti ('The Acquisition of Friends'), has for its aim to show how advantageous it is to form unions and help each other. The third book, Kākoloūkiya ('The War of the Crows and the Owls'), shows the danger of trusting to men unknown or to enemies. The fourth, Labdha-pranasana ('The Loss of Acquired Good'), proves that we often lose by imprudence what we had gained with difficulty. The fifth and last book, Aparikehitakāritwa ('Inconsiderate Conduct'), shows the danger of being too precipitate in action. A principal apologue forms the subject, or, more correctly, the framework, of each of the five books. Fables contained in that apologue, and often involved the one with the other, are related by the personages introduced. The narrative is intermingled with a multitude of sentences, maxims, remarkable thoughts, extracts from codes of legislators, heroic and other poems, and dramas.
The text of the Panchatantra has been edited by Kosegarten (2 vols. Bonn and Greifswald, 1848-59), and G. Bühler and F. Kielhorn in the 'Bombay Sanskrit' series (1868-69). There is an admirable German translation by Benfey (2 vols. Leip. 1859), a French translation, with useful notes on the sources and imitations of the stories, by Édouard Lancereau (1871). Vol. i. of Benfey's work is entirely taken up by a masterly and exhaustive introduction, the best work that has yet appeared on the sources and the diffusion of Indian fables.