The literary evidence of Sanskrit authors from about 600 to 1100 A.D. supplies us with a considerable amount of information as to the state of the great epic during those five centuries. An examination of the works of Bana, and of his predecessor Subandhu, shows that these authors, who belong to the beginning of the seventh century, not only studied and made use of legends from every one of the eighteen books of the Mahabharata for the poetical embellishment of their works, but were even acquainted with the Harivamça. We also know that in Bana's time the Bhagavadgita was included in the great epic. The same writer mentions that the Mahabharata was recited in the temple of Mahakala at Ujjain. That such recitation was already a widespread practice at that time is corroborated by an inscription of about 600 A.D. from the remote Indian colony of Kamboja, which states that copies of the Mahabharata, as well as of the Ramayana and of an unnamed Purana, were presented to a temple there, and that the donor had made arrangements to ensure their daily recitation in perpetuity. This evidence shows that the Mahabharata cannot have been a mere heroic poem, but must have borne the character of a Smriti work of long-established authority. Even at the present day both public and private recitations of the Epics and Puranas are common in India, and are always instituted for the edification and religious instruction of worshippers in temples or of members of the family. As a rule, the Sanskrit texts are not only declaimed, but also explained in the vernacular tongue for the benefit both of women, and of such males as belong to classes unacquainted with the learned language of the Brahmans. We next come to the eminent Mimamsa philosopher Kumarila, who has been proved to have flourished in the first half of the eighth century A.D. In the small portion of his great commentary, entitled Tantra-varttika, which has been examined, no fewer than ten of the eighteen books of the Mahabharata are named, quoted, or referred to. It is clear that the epic as known to him not only included the first book (adiparvan), but that that book in his time closely resembled the form of its text which we possess. It even appears to have contained the first section, called anukramanika or "Survey of contents," and the second, entitled parva-samgraha or "Synopsis of sections." Kumarila also knew Books XII. and XIII., which have frequently been pronounced to be of late origin, as well as XIX. It is evident from his treatment of the epic that he regarded it as a work of sacred tradition and of great antiquity, intended from the beginning for the instruction of all the four castes. To him it is not an account of the great war between the Kauravas and Pandus; the descriptions of battles were only used for the purpose of rousing the martial instincts of the warrior caste.