HISTORY OF SANSKRIT

It is said that Brahma introduced this language to the sages of celestial bodies.

Sanskrit is traceable to the 2nd millennium BCE in a form as Vadic Sanskrit, with the Rigveda as the earliest known composition. A more refined and standardized grammatical form called Classical Sanskrit emerged in the mid 1st millennium BCE withthe Astadhyayi treatise of Panini

In the ancient era, Sanskrit composition were orally transmitted by method of memorization of exceptional complexity, rigour and fidelity.

Sanskrit texts dated to the 1st millennium CE were written in the BRAHMISCRIPT, the NAGARI SCRIPT, the historic South Indian Script and their derivative scripts.

Vadic Sanskrit 

Pre-classical form of sanskrit(vadic sanskrit language had a "set linguistic pattern" by the 2nd millennium BCE) 

#IT IS LESS HOMOGENEOUS #

rigveda, samveda, yajurveda, atharvaveda

(Brahmanas, Aranyats, Upanishads) 

classical Sanskrit 

The formalization of the sanskrit language is credited to Panini along with Patanjali's MAHA BHASYA & KATYAANA's.

Panini composed ASTADHYAYI (eight chapter grammar) 

Astadhyayi was not the 1st description of Sanskrit grammar but it is the earliest that has survived in full. 

Panini cites ten scholars  on the phonological and grammatical aspects of sanskrit language before him, as well as the variants in the usage of Sanskrit in different region of India. 

Ten vadic scholar he quotes are:-

1. Aspisali

2. Kashyapa

3. Gargya

4. Galava

5. Cakra varmana

6. Bharadvaja

7. Sakatayana

8. Sakalya

9. Senaka

10. Sphotayana

PANINI MADE USE OF A TECHNICAL META LANGUAGE CONSISTING OF A SYNTAX, MORPHOLOGY & LEXICON. THIS METALANGUAGE IS ORGANIZED ACCORDING TO A SERIES OF META-RULES, SAME OF WHICHARE EXPLICITLY STATED WHILE OTHER CAN BE DERIVED.