[1] The text has been attributed to the 16th century astrologer-astronomer Nilakantha by earlier sources, but later research suggests that the original Prashna-tantra was written by Samara-simha in the 13th century, largely based on Sahl ibn Bishr's 9th century text Kitāb fi l-masa'il wa-l-ahkam.
Nilakantha or one of his students may have compiled the hybrid version of Prashna-tantra to complement the two volumes of Nilakantha's Tajika-Nilakanthi, by adding excerpts from other texts to the original work.
These other texts include mainly non-Tajika Sanskrit works such as Bhattotpala's Prashna-jnana, Padma-prabha-suri's Bhuvana-dipaka, Narayana-dasa Siddha's Prashna-vaishnava, Prthyu-yashas's Shatpanchashika, Varaha-mihira's Brhadyatra, Ramachandra's Samara-sara, Yaska's Nirukta, Prashna-chintamani, Prashna-dipaka, Prashna-pradipa, Trailokya-prakasha, and Jnana-muktavali, among others.
The aspects considered by this work are those of the Tajika system, an aspect by itself has no orb but planets have orbs of operation; Yogas in this system arise on the basis of applying and separating aspects, the closer the yoga (Ithsala etc.,), the more certain will be the results.
[3] The rules and methods initiated by this text have found favour with astrologers since the time it was written and came to light around 1580.