SV: method of dating RV, III

[Jacob Baltuch]

George:

> In short, to my knowledge the 'conventional wisdom' recognizes these two
> metrical systems as closely related.

Closely related and identical is not the same. How do you and others
explain the differences? You call the Av. system "more primitive". Does
that mean the Ved. system is derived and innovated from a system identical
to the Av. one? If yes, how did that innovation come about? Did the Ved.
poets one day think: "Why don't we start worrying also about cadential
quantitative rhythm"? Wasn't there any problem fitting the old supposedly
shared formulas into the new metrical constraints? I'm used to thinking of
a poetic tradition as something that closely associates various aspects of
the poetic technique. Since in this case this small (but real) difference
exists I was interested to hear the most common (even conjectural) account.

> And what is it that seems misleading about the term "Indo-Iranian" in this
> context?

Well, under Yaroslav's assumption of the similarities being explained by a
period of Indian & Iranian community in a "second Aryan homeland" I would
think it is good to emphasize that you're not talking about the first period
of Indo-Iranian community (before the split of IIr).