Like the Iliad and the Odyssey, the two great Indian epics, the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, are cornerstones of world literature. The realm of legends, the spiritual life, the education, and the distinctiveness of one of the most remarkable ancient cultures have been embodied in a grand overall picture, which has delighted and inspired subsequent generations for more than two millennia, educating and shaping them. A large part of later Sanskrit literature has blossomed from this fertile rootstock and cannot be understood without it. Although the time and origin of the two poems are still shrouded in uncertain darkness, there is no doubt that the legends underlying them reach back into a considerably ancient past, beyond the beginning of our calendar, and that they continue to thrive among one of the most populous nations on Earth to this day.