“It is idle to attempt an authentic history of the life and times of the Great Sri Sankaracharya when scholars who have specialised in the ransacking of old records are unable to arrive at any definite conclusion as regards his date and when the dates variously suggested by them range from 509 B.C to 788 A.D i.e. for a period of nearly thirteen hundred years.

I may mention, however, that the Sringeri tradition gives a date between these two limits and that date, 44 B.C. is probably nearer the truth.

Whatever it be, it matters very little when and where Sri Sankara was born. The permanent charm of his name lies undoubtedly in the Advaita philosophy he taught then and for ever to India and the world at large.”

(The Greatness of Sringeri and of the Jagadgurus that adorned the Vyakhyana Simhasana there By Sri.T. K. Balasubrahmanya Iyer, Vanivilas Press, Srirangam – Bhakta Kusumanjali, 1938)