This conclusion does not at first sight seem to be borne out by the linguistic evidence of the Ramayana, For the epic (arsha) dialect of the Bombay recension, which is practically the same as that of the Mahabharata, both betrays a stage of development decidedly later than that of Panini, and is taken no notice of by that grammarian. But it is, for all that, not necessarily later in date. For Panini deals only with the refined Sanskrit of the cultured (çishta), that is to say, of the Brahmans, which would be more archaic than the popular dialect of wandering rhapsodists; and he would naturally have ignored the latter. Now at the time of the Açoka inscriptions, or hardly more than half a century later than Panini, Prakrit was the language of the people in the part of India where the Ramayana was composed. It is, therefore, not at all likely that the Ramayana, which aimed at popularity, should have been composed as late as the time of Panini, when it could not have been generally understood. If the language of the epic is later than Panini, it is difficult to see how it escaped the dominating influence of his grammar. It is more likely that the popular Sanskrit of the epics received general currency at a much earlier date by the composition of a poem like that of Valmiki. A searching comparative investigation of the classical Kavyas will probably show that they are linguistically more closely connected with the old epic poetry, and that they deviate more from the Paninean standard than is usually supposed. In style the Ramayana is already far removed from the naïve popular epic, in which the story is the chief thing, and not its form. Valmiki is rich in similes, which he often cumulates; he not infrequently uses the cognate figure called rupaka or "identification" (e.g. "foot-lotus") with much skill, and also occasionally employs other ornaments familiar to the classical poets, besides approximating to them in the style of his descriptions. The Ramayana, in fact, represents the dawn of the later artificial poetry (kavya), which was in all probability the direct continuation and development of the art handed down by the rhapsodists who recited Valmiki's work. Such a relationship is distinctly recognised by the authors of the great classical epics (mahakavis) when they refer to him as the adi-kavi or "first poet."