concluding stutis

[Ulrich T. Kragh]

Dear fellow members,
I am writing a piece on the concluding verses in the various writings of the
7th century Buddhist author Candrakirti. These verses express the author's
sources, intent of writing, a dedication of merit and often also a homage,
and are occassionally very poetic. In one of the colophons, such verses are
referred to as a stuti, a term which also appears for the same kind of
concluding verses in the later Tibetan tradition of Buddhist commentaries,
where they in Tibetan are called "bstod pa." In the case of Candrakirti, the
genre of the texts is philosophical commentary (vRtti).

My questions are:
(1) is there a specific Sanskrit term for such concluding verses?
(2) are they prescribed, defined or characterized anywhere, e.g., in the
poetic tradition or any work outlining the standard features of a shastra or
a vrtti?
(3) in case of the Buddhist Madhyamaka-tradition, such concluding stutis
first seem to become a standard feature in the 6th-7th century. Can that be
generalized or what are the important precursors for this feature?

With best wishes,
Ulrich Timme Kragh
Harvard University.