The Uttarakāṇḍa as Appendix and Its Attribution

The Uttarakāṇḍa, or Last Book, is described by the source commentary as a supplement to a Rámáyan whose central story was already complete: Ráma returns with his rescued queen to Ayodhyá and is consecrated and crowned. Its status therefore rests on a tension between literary structure and inherited attribution. The commentary regards it as an appendix, while acknowledging that Indian scholars traditionally include it in Válmíki’s epic.

A poem considered complete

The commentary locates the Rámáyan’s epic completion in the triumphant return of Ráma and his queen, followed by his consecration and coronation in the capital of his forefathers. The ending of the sixth book reinforces that judgment: its final canto describes Ráma’s glorious and happy reign and promises blessings to those who read or hear the poem. In the commentator’s view, those verses show that the Rámáyan was already considered finished when they were added; the story’s return and royal settlement supply a conclusion before the Last Book begins.

The Last Book as supplement

Rather than continuing the original poem’s central sequence, the Uttarakāṇḍa is characterized as an appendix or supplement. The commentary says that it relates events both antecedent and subsequent to those described in the original poem. Its position thus gathers material outside the main narrative’s completed arc: it can look back to earlier times as well as forward beyond the coronation. This account distinguishes the book’s contents and function from the narrative closure already provided at the end of Book VI.

Attribution and tradition

The commentary presents a clear contrast between its literary-historical assessment and received tradition. It considers the final canto of Book VI evidently the work of a later hand than Válmíki’s, and treats the Last Book as an appended body of material. Indian scholars, by contrast, are said unanimously to ascribe the Uttarakāṇḍa to Válmíki, out of reverential love of tradition, and to regard it as part of the Rámáyan. The book’s authorship is consequently not stated as settled fact: the commentary records both a judgment about the poem’s completion and the traditional claim of common authorship.

Translations and sources

The commentator describes Signor Gorresio’s Italian prose translation of the Uttarakāṇḍa, based on the recension current in Bengal, as excellent. Mr. Muir had also epitomized part of the book in an appendix to the fourth part of his Sanskrit Texts, published in 1862. The commentator says that the following pages borrow freely from these scholars and thanks them for sparing substantial labor. These acknowledgments show that the discussion of the Last Book is mediated through translations and scholarly summaries as well as through inherited claims about its place in the epic.