potters, brahmins, and RSis (contd.)

[PROF. BH. KRISHNA MURTHY]

This is imagination running riot.Too far-fetched and unscientific. Bh.k.

On Sun, 5 Oct 1997, Sudalaimuthu Palaniappan wrote:

> In a message dated 97-10-02 02:40:41 EDT, thillaud at UNICE.FR writes:
>
> << But backed bricks are too common if you have a lot
>  of wood and workers. That can't be a proof. Informations on similar shapes
>  would be better. >>
> F. Staal in his description of Agnicayana ritual cites Converse (1974) as
> saying,"The bricks of the Harappa civilization in its mature phase were
> beautifully made, well fired, and standardized in size. The basic size for
> the bricks was 11 1/2 inches long, 5 3/4 inches wide, and two or three inches
> thick. There were also double bricks 11 inches square, and special bricks for
> well copings, drain covers, corners, etc.
>        Now in the whole of the Rg-Veda there is no word for brick, nor any
> descriptive phrase for bricks.....Thus, in the BrAhmaNas, when references to
> bricks begin to appear, their use is confined to one specialized rite, and
> the rite itself is found only in the Yajurveda tradition......
>        The size of the bricks to be used in the rite was one foot square, and
> half-bricks were also to be used (ZB vii, 5,3,viii,7,2,17). This size ans
> shape corresponds very closely to that of the Harappa bricks described
> above..."
>
> There seems to be several problems for deriving an IE etymology for "aGgiras"
> . Considering that "agni" is frequently called "aGgiras" and first "aGgiras",
> I wonder why nobody looked to see if Classical Tamil could help in this
> regard. In CT texts, there are two instances when "agni" is referred to by
> the word-form "aGgi" (paTTin2ppAlai 54, and paripATal 11.7). (In fact, this
> form "aGgi" can be seen in later texts also. Here there is an alternation
> much like nuclear vs. nukelar or ask vs. aks in American English.  n before g
> in Tamil becomes a homorganic nasal.)Thus aGgiras could be related to a
> Dravidian group borrowing "agni" to give themselves an Aryan name, in that
> process altering it to aGgi. Then the name could have been re-Sanskritized to
> aGgiras.
>
> While I do not know what processes could takeplace in this
> re-Sanskritization, out of curiosity I applied what we saw in the change from
> "agni" > "aGgi" to a possible suffix that might have been added to "agni"
> when it was first borrowed to create a name for this group of people in
> Dravidian.
>
> agni+ ar > agni+y+ar  ,
> where y is a glide and ar is a suffix denoting people, meaning people of agni
>
> agniyar > agnisar
> ( intervocalically y alternates with "c" pronounced as "s" in Tamil. For
> instance, the form "kuyavar" (potter) alternates with "kucavar" pronounced as
> "kusavar")
>
> agnisar > aGgisar (based on agni > aGgi)
>
> If the second part of the word "sar" undergoes a similar process, we get
>
> aGgisar > aGgiras
>
> This is interesting. Is it  not? I am not a subsriber to the theory of
> deliberate inversion in Dravidian. But we know that the exigencies of trying
> to get themselves elevated in the Aryan/brahminical hierarchical social
> structure has led many groups in India to concoct for themselves far more
> etymologically fanciful names and histories. So who knows if this could not
> have happened even in the pre-historic times?
>
> Regards
>
> S. Palaniappan
>