Telugu history

[DEVARAKONDA VENKATA NARAYANA SARMA]

At 06:39 PM 5/2/98 -0400, you wrote:

>How does Tamil's antiquity undermine the rest of the
>Dravidian languages?

Please do not twist facts. Has anybody questioned the antiquity of Tamil?
It is unnecessary to fight non-existent enimies. That will be fighting
wind-mills. But just being an antique language does not make any language
the best language in the world. This has to be kept in mind in order
to have a balanced view of things.

>Why do we gladly accept the antiquity of Sanskrit,
>while we find it difficult to accept that one of our sister languages could
>have that distinction as well.

The antiquity of Sanskrit is an established fact and again there is not
much anybody can do about it. But if somebody who has energy and time wants
to question the antiquity of Sanskrit nobody can prevent him. But using
invectives like "muraTTu" is not questioning its antiquity? It is simply
giving vent to ones frustration. But is it necessary to question the
antiquity of Sanskrit in order to establish the antiquity of Tamil?
Why dont you try to find out the real reason behind this? If you do that
I am sure you will find that the reasons are not academic.

>I noticed one of you gentlemen say
>in the heat of the argument, "English, the greatest language". Why are we
>gladly giving English that distinction while fighting among ourselves.
>

English has become the lingua franca of the modern world not just
because of a concerted campaign by English people. It has its present
position because of its adaptability, readiness to borrow words from
other languages, availability of a large body of modern knowledge
(especially scientific and technical) and so on. I think that it will
continue to enjoy this position quite for some time. Let us look at
Tamil. The custodians of Tamil on this list are apologetic about the
presence sanskrit words in Tamil. They perhaps consider it as pollution.
They take heart in the assumption that Tamil has the least number of
Sankrit words. (This has been questioned by Prof.Bh.KrishnaMurti in
one of his recent postings). They want to straight-jacket Tamil.
How can a straight-jacketed device function properly?

>Here's a good anecdote for you. It goes like this:
>
>A ship was carrying a load of crabs. The crabs were being exported in
>baskets. When the ship's captain passed by he noticed that all the baskets
>were closed except for one. He asked why one of the baskets of crabs was
>left open and if the crabs will not get out. The attendant answered "Sir,
>those crabs in that particular basket are Indian crabs, they pull each other
>down. So they don't need a lid".
>

Does not your example apply when there are attempts to pull down Hindi
and Sanskrit?

>Well, why not, for a change, look for the truth without prejudice.
>

Amen.

>Regards,
>Sujatha
>
>