Abstract
Viśākhadatta’s Mudrārākṣasa is somewhat unique among Sanskrit dramas in that its plot is concerned with political intrigue. Though the occurrence of certain stanzas of the Mudrārākṣasa in other (non-fiction) works has been noted even by early editors of the play, no attempt has yet been made to fully explore the textual interconnections of the play. The present paper attempts to sketch a map of the appearance of Mudrārākṣasa stanzas in anthologies of Sanskrit poetry. Such anthologies containing hundreds of well-phrased (subhāṣita) stanzas — collected from classical literature, but detached from their context and usually arranged in thematic chapters — made their appearance on the literary stage at the end of the 11th century and remain popular to the present day. Out of the total 175 stanzas of poetry in the Mudrārākṣasa, 18 occur in one or more major subhāṣita anthologies and other literary works. While 12 of these are probably indeed Viśākhadatta’s own compositions according to the testimony of the anth...
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