Chhandas (prosody)

Authorship

Traditional: Pingala (Chandaḥśāstra, traditional)

Scholarly note: Meters for Vedic and classical poetry.

Why it was written

Enumerate moric/syllabic meters so chandas of mantras and kāvya stays correct.

Structure & length

Extent · Pingala’s work ~8 chapters (sūtras)

Algorithmic generation of meters from gaṇas.

Key themes

• gaṇa
• triṣṭubh
• anuṣṭubh

Related texts

• Shiksha (phonetics)
• Rigveda

Sources

• Sanskrit prosody (Wikipedia)
• Vedanga (Wikipedia)