Did Ramayana happen before the vedic period?

 

a)   According to the story of Battle of 10 Kings (dāśarājñá),  King Sudas, the descendant of emperor Bharata , was faced by 10 kings led by Purus.

Battle of the Ten Kings

However, In Mahabharata story, Puru was the son of Yayati and descendant of King Bharata.

So the king Sudas cannot be ancestor of Kauravas and Pandavas. 

Some scholars inferred that the Mahabharata story was written based on this story mentioned in Rig Veda, which is also a doubtful theory.

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b)   Coming to the age of Vedas, it is very difficult, in my opinion, to fix the period.  The Vedas contain pure spiritual matters and rituals covering those spiritual aspects.  Inferring the age of Vedas based on the issues mentioned in Vedas may not be appropriate, in my view.

Many scholars adopted different periods, depending upon their perception.  The Vedas were orally transmitted from one generation to another generation. 

With the least understanding that I had, I understood that some Mandalas of Rig Veda were attributed to a single family/person each.

Now, we can observe now-a-days that son of a great scholar generally may not be of that standard.  Some times it so happens that another great scholar will be born in that family only after 2 or 3 generations.

So it cannot be presumed that a single person composed the entire Mandala of Rig Veda in a single generation.  And, just now we have seen that birth of scholars in consecutive generations is a remote chance.

In my opinion, the name of scholar, say Sage Viswamitra, to whom one Mandala was attributed, may be a combination of Guru and disciples for generations together.

For Example: Sage Viswamitra -> His disciple -> His disciple and so on.  In ancient tradition, the disciple is called mAnasaputra also.

c)     Normally, scholars say the Vedas were succeeded by Ramayana, Mahabharata and Puranas.

The dating of Ramayana and Mahabharata is a different task because,

• The Ramayana and Mahabharata might have occurred long back, but the content of those stories might have been transmitted to one generation to another, and 
• by the time they were penned, the authors might have quoted the circumstances/customs prevailing at that point of time, keeping the story intact.
• Some of the concepts like ayOnija, non-uterine birth, mentioned in those EPICs, are still mysterious to the today's generations.  They may indicate test tube births or something else.