From harshadehejia at HOTMAIL.COM  Fri Aug  1 10:43:19 2008
From: harshadehejia at HOTMAIL.COM (Harsha Dehejia)
Date: Fri, 01 Aug 08 10:43:19 +0000
Subject: Padmashali
Message-ID: <161227083058.23782.7370461056350033998.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Friends:
 
Can anyone help me with the story of Padmashali, the first weavers, who draw a fibre from the lotus that arises from the navel of Vishnu, and then weave fabrics for the gods?
 
I remember seeing an Andhra scroll may years ago. Are there any images in museums of this episode?
 
Thank you.
 
Harsha.
Prof. Harsha V. Dehejia




From axel.michaels at YAHOO.DE  Sat Aug  2 06:04:06 2008
From: axel.michaels at YAHOO.DE (Axel Michaels)
Date: Sat, 02 Aug 08 06:04:06 +0000
Subject: 3 short=?utf-8?Q?=E2=80=90term?= (3 month) scholarships for Asi              an PhD/Doctoral students
Message-ID: <161227083060.23782.13270408867442538297.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

The Graduate Programme for Transcultural Studies (GPTS) is part of the Cluster of Excellence "Asia and
Europe in a Global Context: Shifting Asymmetries in Cultural Flows" at the University of Heidelberg
(http://www.vjc.uni?hd.de/). For the winter term 2008/2009 the GPTS offers 
3 short?term (3 month) scholarships for Asian PhD/Doctoral students
 
The GPTS is looking for applicants with an excellent academic background. Selected students will take part in the regular programme of the GPTS and contribute actively to it. The scholarships are awarded for 3 months. Scholarship holders are expected to be in Heidelberg between October 2008 and February 2009. The short?term scholarship includes travel expenses to Heidelberg and back home, and a monthly stipend of 1000,? ?.
 
Currently contributors to the Cluster work in the fields of Anthropology, Archeology, Art History,South and East Asian Studies, Assyriology, Cultural Studies, English Philology, Ethnology, Geography, History,
Indology, Islamic Studies, Musicology, Philosophy, Political Science, Public Health, Religious Studies,
Sinology, Sociology and others. Reflecting the interdisciplinary approach of the Cluster, the GSTS invites
Asian doctoral students from these as well as other disciplines from the humanities and social sciences to apply.
 
Candidates submit their applications including a letter of intention (400 words maximum), a CV, and a
project proposal (1000 words) related to the major themes and topics of the Cluster to the online application system (https://www.w1system08.de/vjc/intern/start_start_for.php).
 
Electronic submission of the application is mandatory.
 
Deadline for application is August 31st, 2008.
 
For further details of the GPTS see http://www.vjc.uni?hd.de/graduate.htm




From ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK  Sat Aug  2 08:26:24 2008
From: ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK (Dominik Wujastyk)
Date: Sat, 02 Aug 08 09:26:24 +0100
Subject: India resources. (fwd)
Message-ID: <161227083062.23782.12119380513193209756.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

This is a quasi-commercial project, but has partnership backing from 
UNESCO too, so I am forwarding this information here.  I have visited the 
Invis company in Trivandrum, and they are doing interesting work on 
promoting and publicizing popular aspects Indian culture.

Best,
Dominik


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 09:01:37 +0530
From: Hari M.R. <hari at invis.in>
Subject: India resources.

Dear Sir,
Kindly recall our discussion regarding the recomendation of
www.indiavideo.org to  indiology group.
We have added more  content to our website like monuments etc.  We have also
added a text session which covers Yoga, Ayurveda, Panchakarma etc., which we
continuously enrich by adding more topics. Please visit
http://www.indiavideo.org/text/ and let us know whether there is any chance
to link the site.
with regards
Hari

-- 

M.R.Hari
Managing Director
Invis Multimedia Pvt Ltd
www.invismultimedia.com
www.indiavideo.org




From ashok.aklujkar at GMAIL.COM  Sun Aug  3 14:01:40 2008
From: ashok.aklujkar at GMAIL.COM (Ashok Aklujkar)
Date: Sun, 03 Aug 08 07:01:40 -0700
Subject: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
In-Reply-To: <66E85B0F-C4B1-4917-BBA7-E14A488C9AAC@fas.harvard.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083067.23782.567432322357446277.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Michael,

Thanks for the clarification. Enjoyed your wit. Glad to note that honesty
continues to be important at my Alma Mater.

In the spirit of your note and on the growing pattern illustrated by
"Newton-Bhaaskara," "Einstein-Bose" etc. (or their reversals), may I suggest
thaat Behaghel's law should be referred to as "Paa.nini-Behaghel's law"? See
Paa.nini 2.2.34 (alpaactaram). Even your "metrically shorter" is anticipated
in a Vaarttika to this rule (laghv-ak.sara.m puurvam).

Sorry for not following Kyoto-Harvard in the above, although I have very
fond memories of both places.

Best.

ashok




From witzel at FAS.HARVARD.EDU  Sun Aug  3 13:37:31 2008
From: witzel at FAS.HARVARD.EDU (Michael Witzel)
Date: Sun, 03 Aug 08 09:37:31 -0400
Subject: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
Message-ID: <161227083064.23782.3767923872755828470.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear All,

it is Summer and the weekend now, so a lazy note of correction:

Colleagues have been referring, since 1990, to our 7-bit  
transliteration for Sanskrit as Harvard-Kyoto (a A, i,  I ...,  etc.).

But the laws of language do not trump the (perceived) pre-eminence of  
Harvard.
In compounds, the shorter member precedes the longer one. This is  
Behaghel's 19th century 'law of growing members' (Gesetz der  
wachsenden Glieder).

Here we have a problem as both Kyoto and Harvard have two syllables.  
(Something like the erstwhile Baltimore-Washington or Washington- 
Baltimore airport)

However, as Kyoto  is metrically shorter (kyoo-to, 2+ 1) than Harvard  
(har-vard, 2+ 2), and thus also has less letters, Kyoto takes  
precedence. In addition, the system was devised at Kyoto in 1990.

In short, call it the "Kyoto-Harvard" system!

To be honest, it was based, to a large degree, on that created by  
Andrea van Arkel at Leiden in 1984, when our department was the first  
there to use a PC (together with Mathematics) for the input of the  
Paippalada Samhita of the Atharvaveda.

Have a good Summer!

Michael





Michael Witzel
witzel at fas.harvard.edu
www.fas.harvard.edu/~witzel/mwpage.htm

Dept. of Sanskrit & Indian Studies, Harvard University
1 Bow Street
Cambridge MA 02138, USA

phone: 1- 617 - 495 3295 (voice & messages), 496 8570, fax 617 - 496  
8571;
my direct line (also for messages) :  617- 496 2990




From rrocher at SAS.UPENN.EDU  Sun Aug  3 19:18:08 2008
From: rrocher at SAS.UPENN.EDU (Rosane Rocher)
Date: Sun, 03 Aug 08 15:18:08 -0400
Subject: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
In-Reply-To: <CA4AD28A-4D89-432C-AED1-28CAF4AEF3DE@inria.fr>
Message-ID: <161227083073.23782.1995545125768091929.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

I recall an early article by Richard Salomon titled "An ancient 
diplomatic dispute," or something to that effect, which studies the dire 
consequences of contravening to this Sanskrit (and Indo-European) "law." 
Sorry I can't give an exact reference at this time. I am up in the 
mountains, and my collection of offprints is in town. Rich is also out 
of station at the moment.

Rosane Rocher

G?rard Huet wrote:
> Dear colleagues,
>
> I was very interested to learn about Behaghel's law. I presume it is a 
> general statement about the Indo-European family of
> languages, which may be more or less verified for the various 
> languages. Concerning Sanskrit, thanks to Ashok for providing the
> reference, indeed justifying calling it this "Paa.nini-Behaghel" law. 
> It is intriguing whether this "law" is merely a standardized
> rhetorical device, or whether it is related to some information 
> theoretic notion such as Huffman coding 
> (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huffman_coding) since it is likely that 
> shorter words are more frequent than longer ones.
> Some relation with sandhi-splitting ease could also exist (specially 
> in light of Paa.nini 2.2.32 and 33).
>
> Of course the law concerns only copulative compounds (dvandva). The 
> problem arises when listing several authors of a paper.
> The usual rule (of Western academics) is that authors are given in 
> alphabetical order, only in case of balanced authorship.
> Otherwise the authors are put in decreasing order of their respective 
> contribution, and this is a fairer law than any syntactic
> one.
>
> Actually, vaarttikas recommend the fair law: first should be come the 
> notion worthy of most respect, like in maatapitarau.
> And of course braahma.nak.satriyavi.t"suudraa.h - br?hmans should 
> always go first!
>
> I hope you do not have problems with my transliteration scheme. I call 
> it VH encoding. Velthuis is of course the primary author.
> I merely restrict his code to lower case letters, using aa and not A 
> etc. It would be unfair to call this the HV encoding because
> of some obscure IE law ...
>
> Cheers
> GH
>
> Le 3 ao?t 08 ? 16:01, Ashok Aklujkar a ?crit :
>
>> Dear Michael,
>>
>> Thanks for the clarification. Enjoyed your wit. Glad to note that 
>> honesty
>> continues to be important at my Alma Mater.
>>
>> In the spirit of your note and on the growing pattern illustrated by
>> "Newton-Bhaaskara," "Einstein-Bose" etc. (or their reversals), may I 
>> suggest
>> thaat Behaghel's law should be referred to as "Paa.nini-Behaghel's 
>> law"? See
>> Paa.nini 2.2.34 (alpaactaram). Even your "metrically shorter" is 
>> anticipated
>> in a Vaarttika to this rule (laghv-ak.sara.m puurvam).
>>
>> Sorry for not following Kyoto-Harvard in the above, although I have very
>> fond memories of both places.
>>
>> Best.
>>
>> ashok
>>
>




From baums at U.WASHINGTON.EDU  Sun Aug  3 19:41:31 2008
From: baums at U.WASHINGTON.EDU (Stefan Baums)
Date: Sun, 03 Aug 08 15:41:31 -0400
Subject: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
In-Reply-To: <48960470.8060102@sas.upenn.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083076.23782.9950461820150118976.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Professor Rocher,

> an early article by Richard Salomon titled "An ancient 
> diplomatic dispute"

the reference for this article is:

    Richard Salomon, 1987. An ancient Indian diplomatic dispute.
   In: Festschrift for Professor Ludo Rocher. Madras: Adyar
   Library and Research Centre, pp. 71?79.

Cf.

   http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/65999916
   http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/221607803

(Unfortunately, the book seems to be neither in the Unversity of 
Washington nor Harvard libraries, and as you note Rich is out of 
town. But I will make sure to ask and make a copy when we are both 
back in Seattle later this summer ? unless you return from the 
mountains first.)

All best wishes,
Stefan Baums

-- 
Stefan Baums
Asian Languages and Literature
University of Washington




From rrocher at SAS.UPENN.EDU  Sun Aug  3 20:55:59 2008
From: rrocher at SAS.UPENN.EDU (Rosane Rocher)
Date: Sun, 03 Aug 08 16:55:59 -0400
Subject: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
In-Reply-To: <489609EB.20906@u.washington.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083081.23782.12247856132155759854.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Thanks. I ought to have remembered the reference to that one!  :-)    
It is in a volume of BrahmavidyA, the Adyar Library Bulletin, and, of 
course, we have the book in town, where we go back soon.

RR

Stefan Baums wrote:
> Dear Professor Rocher,
>
>> an early article by Richard Salomon titled "An ancient diplomatic 
>> dispute"
>
> the reference for this article is:
>
>    Richard Salomon, 1987. An ancient Indian diplomatic dispute.
>   In: Festschrift for Professor Ludo Rocher. Madras: Adyar
>   Library and Research Centre, pp. 71?79.
>
> Cf.
>
>   http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/65999916
>   http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/221607803
>
> (Unfortunately, the book seems to be neither in the Unversity of 
> Washington nor Harvard libraries, and as you note Rich is out of town. 
> But I will make sure to ask and make a copy when we are both back in 
> Seattle later this summer ? unless you return from the mountains first.)
>
> All best wishes,
> Stefan Baums
>




From sanjay.kumar at MAIL.MCGILL.CA  Sun Aug  3 21:00:47 2008
From: sanjay.kumar at MAIL.MCGILL.CA (Sanjay Kumar)
Date: Sun, 03 Aug 08 17:00:47 -0400
Subject: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
Message-ID: <161227083084.23782.6372429682927472602.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

According to Kaatyaayana and Patanjali as well later Sanskrit grammarians such as Jayaaditya and KaiyaTa, the order of appearance of the four varnas in copulative compound is not indicative of "the notion worthy of most respect." It rather indicates the sequence as mentioned in the Vedas (see KaiyaTa's commentary on the Vaartika "varnaanaam aanupuurvyeNa" {Panini 2.2.34}). At least the (early) grammatical tradition does not presuppose hierarchy in this context.

Sanjay

McGill University 


________________________________

From: Indology on behalf of G?rard Huet
Sent: Sun 8/3/2008 2:18 PM
To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
Subject: Re: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration



Dear colleagues,

I was very interested to learn about Behaghel's law. I presume it is a 
general statement about the Indo-European family of
languages, which may be more or less verified for the various 
languages. Concerning Sanskrit, thanks to Ashok for providing the
reference, indeed justifying calling it this "Paa.nini-Behaghel" law. 
It is intriguing whether this "law" is merely a standardized
rhetorical device, or whether it is related to some information 
theoretic notion such as Huffman coding (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huffman_coding
) since it is likely that shorter words are more frequent than longer 
ones.
Some relation with sandhi-splitting ease could also exist (specially 
in light of Paa.nini 2.2.32 and 33).

Of course the law concerns only copulative compounds (dvandva). The 
problem arises when listing several authors of a paper.
The usual rule (of Western academics) is that authors are given in 
alphabetical order, only in case of balanced authorship.
Otherwise the authors are put in decreasing order of their respective 
contribution, and this is a fairer law than any syntactic
one.

Actually, vaarttikas recommend the fair law: first should be come the 
notion worthy of most respect, like in maatapitarau.
And of course braahma.nak.satriyavi.t"suudraa.h - br?hmans should 
always go first!

I hope you do not have problems with my transliteration scheme. I call 
it VH encoding. Velthuis is of course the primary author.
I merely restrict his code to lower case letters, using aa and not A 
etc. It would be unfair to call this the HV encoding because
of some obscure IE law ...

Cheers
GH

Le 3 ao?t 08 ? 16:01, Ashok Aklujkar a ?crit :

> Dear Michael,
>
> Thanks for the clarification. Enjoyed your wit. Glad to note that 
> honesty
> continues to be important at my Alma Mater.
>
> In the spirit of your note and on the growing pattern illustrated by
> "Newton-Bhaaskara," "Einstein-Bose" etc. (or their reversals), may I 
> suggest
> thaat Behaghel's law should be referred to as "Paa.nini-Behaghel's 
> law"? See
> Paa.nini 2.2.34 (alpaactaram). Even your "metrically shorter" is 
> anticipated
> in a Vaarttika to this rule (laghv-ak.sara.m puurvam).
>
> Sorry for not following Kyoto-Harvard in the above, although I have 
> very
> fond memories of both places.
>
> Best.
>
> ashok
>




From sanjay.kumar at MAIL.MCGILL.CA  Sun Aug  3 21:03:17 2008
From: sanjay.kumar at MAIL.MCGILL.CA (Sanjay Kumar)
Date: Sun, 03 Aug 08 17:03:17 -0400
Subject: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
Message-ID: <161227083086.23782.11903106657493723786.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

According to Kaatyaayana and Patanjali and later Sanskrit grammarians such as Jayaaditya and KaiyaTa, the order of appearance of the four varnas in copulative compound is not indicative of "the notion worthy of most respect," as noted by G?rard Huet. It rather indicates the sequence as mentioned in the Vedas (see KaiyaTa's commentary on the Vaartika "varnaanaam aanupuurvyeNa" {Panini 2.2.34}). At least the (early) grammatical tradition does not presuppose hierarchy in this context.

Sanjay

McGill University 


________________________________

From: Indology on behalf of G?rard Huet
Sent: Sun 8/3/2008 2:18 PM
To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
Subject: Re: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration



Dear colleagues,

I was very interested to learn about Behaghel's law. I presume it is a 
general statement about the Indo-European family of
languages, which may be more or less verified for the various 
languages. Concerning Sanskrit, thanks to Ashok for providing the
reference, indeed justifying calling it this "Paa.nini-Behaghel" law. 
It is intriguing whether this "law" is merely a standardized
rhetorical device, or whether it is related to some information 
theoretic notion such as Huffman coding (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huffman_coding
) since it is likely that shorter words are more frequent than longer 
ones.
Some relation with sandhi-splitting ease could also exist (specially 
in light of Paa.nini 2.2.32 and 33).

Of course the law concerns only copulative compounds (dvandva). The 
problem arises when listing several authors of a paper.
The usual rule (of Western academics) is that authors are given in 
alphabetical order, only in case of balanced authorship.
Otherwise the authors are put in decreasing order of their respective 
contribution, and this is a fairer law than any syntactic
one.

Actually, vaarttikas recommend the fair law: first should be come the 
notion worthy of most respect, like in maatapitarau.
And of course braahma.nak.satriyavi.t"suudraa.h - br?hmans should 
always go first!

I hope you do not have problems with my transliteration scheme. I call 
it VH encoding. Velthuis is of course the primary author.
I merely restrict his code to lower case letters, using aa and not A 
etc. It would be unfair to call this the HV encoding because
of some obscure IE law ...

Cheers
GH

Le 3 ao?t 08 ? 16:01, Ashok Aklujkar a ?crit :

> Dear Michael,
>
> Thanks for the clarification. Enjoyed your wit. Glad to note that 
> honesty
> continues to be important at my Alma Mater.
>
> In the spirit of your note and on the growing pattern illustrated by
> "Newton-Bhaaskara," "Einstein-Bose" etc. (or their reversals), may I 
> suggest
> thaat Behaghel's law should be referred to as "Paa.nini-Behaghel's 
> law"? See
> Paa.nini 2.2.34 (alpaactaram). Even your "metrically shorter" is 
> anticipated
> in a Vaarttika to this rule (laghv-ak.sara.m puurvam).
>
> Sorry for not following Kyoto-Harvard in the above, although I have 
> very
> fond memories of both places.
>
> Best.
>
> ashok
>




From witzel at FAS.HARVARD.EDU  Sun Aug  3 23:00:49 2008
From: witzel at FAS.HARVARD.EDU (Michael Witzel)
Date: Sun, 03 Aug 08 19:00:49 -0400
Subject: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
In-Reply-To: <AB941C7D7D110F4EA66C7DC1A42465E101E2D236@EXCHANGE2VS4.campus.mcgill.ca>
Message-ID: <161227083089.23782.9803515346284193925.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Sanjay (below) seems to refer to the frequent Vedic compound  
zUdrArya- (Unicode: ??dr?rya-), where to many people's surprise,  
the grammarians mentioned below included, the Shudras come first.

Well, for a good  reason  -- again that of prosody or syllable count.

The Rgveda mostly has the clear, metrically indicated, trisyllabic  
reading  [aariya]  (?riya) for (KH) Arya (aarya, ?rya-), as noted  
already by Grassmann 1873, RV Dictionary column 185-6.

In short, Panini-Behaghel's  (2+1+1, 2+2+2) rule is strictly  
followed, against all contemporary social sensitivities:

zUdra+Ariya (??dra+?riya):  2 syll + 3 syllables, or :  2+1, 2+1+1  
morae.

In fact, this has been noted and explained long ago by Hans Oertel :  
"zUdrArya", I think in ZDMG 1936;  see now H.Oertel, Kleine  
Schriften. Heinrich Hettrich,  Thomas Oberlies (eds.). Stuttgart :  
Franz Steiner Verlag, 1994.


A nice weekend!

Michael


On Aug 3, 2008, at 5:00 PM, Sanjay Kumar wrote:

> According to Kaatyaayana and Patanjali as well later Sanskrit  
> grammarians such as Jayaaditya and KaiyaTa, the order of appearance  
> of the four varnas in copulative compound is not indicative of "the  
> notion worthy of most respect." It rather indicates the sequence as  
> mentioned in the Vedas (see KaiyaTa's commentary on the Vaartika  
> "varnaanaam aanupuurvyeNa" {Panini 2.2.34}). At least the (early)  
> grammatical tradition does not presuppose hierarchy in this context.
>
> Sanjay
>
> McGill University
>
>

Michael Witzel
witzel at fas.harvard.edu
www.fas.harvard.edu/~witzel/mwpage.htm

Dept. of Sanskrit & Indian Studies, Harvard University
1 Bow Street
Cambridge MA 02138, USA

phone: 1- 617 - 495 3295 (voice & messages), 496 8570, fax 617 - 496  
8571;
my direct line (also for messages) :  617- 496 2990




From Gerard.Huet at INRIA.FR  Sun Aug  3 18:18:32 2008
From: Gerard.Huet at INRIA.FR (=?utf-8?Q?G=C3=A9rard_Huet?=)
Date: Sun, 03 Aug 08 20:18:32 +0200
Subject: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
In-Reply-To: <C4BB0854.A48C%ashok.aklujkar@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <161227083070.23782.15808863745491723053.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear colleagues,

I was very interested to learn about Behaghel's law. I presume it is a  
general statement about the Indo-European family of
languages, which may be more or less verified for the various  
languages. Concerning Sanskrit, thanks to Ashok for providing the
reference, indeed justifying calling it this "Paa.nini-Behaghel" law.  
It is intriguing whether this "law" is merely a standardized
rhetorical device, or whether it is related to some information  
theoretic notion such as Huffman coding (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huffman_coding 
) since it is likely that shorter words are more frequent than longer  
ones.
Some relation with sandhi-splitting ease could also exist (specially  
in light of Paa.nini 2.2.32 and 33).

Of course the law concerns only copulative compounds (dvandva). The  
problem arises when listing several authors of a paper.
The usual rule (of Western academics) is that authors are given in  
alphabetical order, only in case of balanced authorship.
Otherwise the authors are put in decreasing order of their respective  
contribution, and this is a fairer law than any syntactic
one.

Actually, vaarttikas recommend the fair law: first should be come the  
notion worthy of most respect, like in maatapitarau.
And of course braahma.nak.satriyavi.t"suudraa.h - br?hmans should  
always go first!

I hope you do not have problems with my transliteration scheme. I call  
it VH encoding. Velthuis is of course the primary author.
I merely restrict his code to lower case letters, using aa and not A  
etc. It would be unfair to call this the HV encoding because
of some obscure IE law ...

Cheers
GH

Le 3 ao?t 08 ? 16:01, Ashok Aklujkar a ?crit :

> Dear Michael,
>
> Thanks for the clarification. Enjoyed your wit. Glad to note that  
> honesty
> continues to be important at my Alma Mater.
>
> In the spirit of your note and on the growing pattern illustrated by
> "Newton-Bhaaskara," "Einstein-Bose" etc. (or their reversals), may I  
> suggest
> thaat Behaghel's law should be referred to as "Paa.nini-Behaghel's  
> law"? See
> Paa.nini 2.2.34 (alpaactaram). Even your "metrically shorter" is  
> anticipated
> in a Vaarttika to this rule (laghv-ak.sara.m puurvam).
>
> Sorry for not following Kyoto-Harvard in the above, although I have  
> very
> fond memories of both places.
>
> Best.
>
> ashok
>




From baums at U.WASHINGTON.EDU  Mon Aug  4 01:02:22 2008
From: baums at U.WASHINGTON.EDU (Stefan Baums)
Date: Sun, 03 Aug 08 21:02:22 -0400
Subject: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
In-Reply-To: <C0A013EE-7F6F-436C-96F5-84A4A2BE4898@fas.harvard.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083094.23782.2292827556352107672.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear all:

[As I was writing the below Mark?s email arrived, but it is maybe 
worth adding the additional details and examples. Mark: Did you 
address the issue of mora count in your book ? which I have of 
course, but not with me?]

One might add that the principle of waxing syllables (and moras, 
see below) remained operative in MIA formulaic language, see e.g. 
pp. 15 ff. of:

    Oskar von Hin?ber, 1994. Untersuchungen zur M?ndlichkeit fr?her
   mittelindischer Texte der Buddhisten. Mainz: Akademie der
   Wissenschaften und der Literatur. (Abhandlungen der geistes?
   und sozialwissenschaftlichen Klasse, Jahrgang 1994,Nr. 5 /
   Untersuchungen zur Sprachgeschichte undHandschriftenkunde des
   P?li, III.)

who notes that in the Pali grammatical tradition it is referred to 
by Aggava?sa (under the name v?c?sili??hat?) and provides the 
following reference to another early discussion of P??ini 2.2.34 
and the OIA side of the coin:

   W. Caland, 1931. A rhythmic law in language. Acta Orientalia 9:
    59?68.

Now the mora count of words like ?r(i)ya or s?r(i)ya differs of 
course between ?gvedic and Pali as consonant assimilation and 
epenthesis were based on the disyllabic OIA form and operated 
after the Law of Two Moras:

   ?rya > *arya > ayya, ariya / ayira

But it appears from other examples that mora count (secondary to 
syllable count) remained relevant in MIA formulas. Among the 
examples given on pp. 15?31 of von Hin?ber?s study there are, at a 
glance, six cases where two adjacent member have the same syllable 
but a rising mora count:

   abhir?pa dassan?ya p?s?dika (4 + 4 + 4 s.; 5 + 6 + 6 m.) [18]
   dubbhikkhe dv?hitike seta??hike (3 + 4 + 4 s.; 6 + 6 + 7 m.) [20]
   dubbhikkha duhitika seta??ika sal?kavutta (3 + 4 + 4 + 5 s.; 5 
+ 4 + 6 + 7) [20]
   vu??hi? vir??hi? vepulla? (2 + 3 + 3 s.; 4 + 5 + 6 m.) [23]
   daliddo appadhano appabhogo (3 + 4 + 4 s.; 5 + 5 + 6 m.) [29]
   a??ho mahaddhano mah?bhogo (2 + 4 + 4 s.; 4 + 6 + 7 m.) [29]

and only one counterexample (same syllable but falling mora count):

   attaman? pamudit? p?tisomanassaj?t? (4 + 4 + 8 s.; 6 + 5 + 13 
m.) [30]

The continued relevance of mora count in MIA rhythmic language is 
of course unsurprising seeing the rise of m?tr?chandas etc. Von 
Hin?ber does not seem to go into the mora side of things (unless I 
missed it), but surely this has been discussed elsewhere.

Best wishes,
Stefan Baums

-- 
Stefan Baums
Asian Languages and Literature
University of Washington




From zydenbos at UNI-MUENCHEN.DE  Sun Aug  3 19:46:17 2008
From: zydenbos at UNI-MUENCHEN.DE (Robert Zydenbos)
Date: Sun, 03 Aug 08 21:46:17 +0200
Subject: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
In-Reply-To: <CA4AD28A-4D89-432C-AED1-28CAF4AEF3DE@inria.fr>
Message-ID: <161227083078.23782.815137275767948168.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Op Sun, 03 Aug 2008 20:18:32 +0200 schreef G?rard Huet  
<Gerard.Huet at inria.fr>:

> I hope you do not have problems with my transliteration scheme. I call
> it VH encoding. Velthuis is of course the primary author.
> I merely restrict his code to lower case letters, using aa and not A
> etc. It would be unfair to call this the HV encoding because
> of some obscure IE law ...

There's another dialect (or rather: sub-dialect) of V encoding in  
existence: it's the Aklujkar-Tubb (or Tubb-Aklujkar?) scheme with  
extensions for writing the literary Dravidian languages: ee, oo, _l, _n  
and _r. I suppose it ought to be called TAZ ;-) -- Tubb is monosyllabic,  
and Aklujkar and Zydenbos look prosodically  identical, but the Z is  
historically clearly the latest, represents a junior, and looks best at  
the end of the abbreviation.

Why does this exist? TAZ is used for writing a flat ASCII text which can  
be converted to a number of other codings (CSX+, Unicode, TeX [codes that  
look like \={a}, etc.], and Baraha for Kannada) using filters which I've  
written. (Anybody interested? Contact me off-list. You need a Python  
interpreter on your computer. This is standard on Mac and Linux systems,  
and is available free of cost for Windows.)

RZ




From glhart at BERKELEY.EDU  Mon Aug  4 13:50:20 2008
From: glhart at BERKELEY.EDU (George Hart)
Date: Mon, 04 Aug 08 06:50:20 -0700
Subject: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
In-Reply-To: <AB941C7D7D110F4EA66C7DC1A42465E101E2D236@EXCHANGE2VS4.campus.mcgill.ca>
Message-ID: <161227083101.23782.12904973699101743678.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

It is perhaps worth noting that the dominant castes (and arguably  
highest castes) in most of South India are technically "sudra."  In  
Sangam literature, the 4th Varna is not "sudra" but VeLLaaLar, the  
dominant land-owning group.  Through history, the VeLLaaLars and their  
equivalents in other areas (e.g. Reddys and Kammas in Andhra), all  
considered "Sudras" by the 3-4% Brahmin population, have been the  
major force behind the construction of temples and even the  
importation of Brahmins from the north.  Apparently, these  
"Sudras" (later sometimes called "Sat Sudras") were a dominant caste  
before Brahmins arrived in South India, and they maintained that  
position until the present.  It's also worth noting that the Varna  
system after Vedic times was tenuous and ill-defined at best; as far  
as I know, no outside observer ever saw 4 (or 5) Varnas -- they did  
however see caste (jaati / kuTi) differentiation.  George Hart

On Aug 3, 2008, at 2:00 PM, Sanjay Kumar wrote:

> According to Kaatyaayana and Patanjali as well later Sanskrit  
> grammarians such as Jayaaditya and KaiyaTa, the order of appearance  
> of the four varnas in copulative compound is not indicative of "the  
> notion worthy of most respect." It rather indicates the sequence as  
> mentioned in the Vedas (see KaiyaTa's commentary on the Vaartika  
> "varnaanaam aanupuurvyeNa" {Panini 2.2.34}). At least the (early)  
> grammatical tradition does not presuppose hierarchy in this context.
>
> Sanjay
>
> McGill University
>
>
> ________________________________
>
> From: Indology on behalf of G?rard Huet
> Sent: Sun 8/3/2008 2:18 PM
> To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
> Subject: Re: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
>
>
>
> Dear colleagues,
>
> I was very interested to learn about Behaghel's law. I presume it is a
> general statement about the Indo-European family of
> languages, which may be more or less verified for the various
> languages. Concerning Sanskrit, thanks to Ashok for providing the
> reference, indeed justifying calling it this "Paa.nini-Behaghel" law.
> It is intriguing whether this "law" is merely a standardized
> rhetorical device, or whether it is related to some information
> theoretic notion such as Huffman coding (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huffman_coding
> ) since it is likely that shorter words are more frequent than longer
> ones.
> Some relation with sandhi-splitting ease could also exist (specially
> in light of Paa.nini 2.2.32 and 33).
>
> Of course the law concerns only copulative compounds (dvandva). The
> problem arises when listing several authors of a paper.
> The usual rule (of Western academics) is that authors are given in
> alphabetical order, only in case of balanced authorship.
> Otherwise the authors are put in decreasing order of their respective
> contribution, and this is a fairer law than any syntactic
> one.
>
> Actually, vaarttikas recommend the fair law: first should be come the
> notion worthy of most respect, like in maatapitarau.
> And of course braahma.nak.satriyavi.t"suudraa.h - br?hmans should
> always go first!
>
> I hope you do not have problems with my transliteration scheme. I call
> it VH encoding. Velthuis is of course the primary author.
> I merely restrict his code to lower case letters, using aa and not A
> etc. It would be unfair to call this the HV encoding because
> of some obscure IE law ...
>
> Cheers
> GH
>
> Le 3 ao?t 08 ? 16:01, Ashok Aklujkar a ?crit :
>
>> Dear Michael,
>>
>> Thanks for the clarification. Enjoyed your wit. Glad to note that
>> honesty
>> continues to be important at my Alma Mater.
>>
>> In the spirit of your note and on the growing pattern illustrated by
>> "Newton-Bhaaskara," "Einstein-Bose" etc. (or their reversals), may I
>> suggest
>> thaat Behaghel's law should be referred to as "Paa.nini-Behaghel's
>> law"? See
>> Paa.nini 2.2.34 (alpaactaram). Even your "metrically shorter" is
>> anticipated
>> in a Vaarttika to this rule (laghv-ak.sara.m puurvam).
>>
>> Sorry for not following Kyoto-Harvard in the above, although I have
>> very
>> fond memories of both places.
>>
>> Best.
>>
>> ashok
>>




From mark.allon at USYD.EDU.AU  Mon Aug  4 00:43:54 2008
From: mark.allon at USYD.EDU.AU (Mark Allon)
Date: Mon, 04 Aug 08 10:43:54 +1000
Subject: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
In-Reply-To: <20080803230203.9EDCE2CAF08@london.ucc.usyd.edu.au>
Message-ID: <161227083092.23782.8896065767120855269.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear all,

The "Waxing Syllable Principle (WSP)" is extensively applied in Buddhist canonical prose texts and in some Jaina prose texts as well. See Study 2 in my Style and Function: A Study of the Dominant Stylistic Features of the Prose Portions of Pali Canonical Sutta Texts and their Mnemonic Function. Tokyo: International Institute for Buddhist Studies, 1997. Oskar von Hin?ber also wrote about this (mentioned in my study).

Regards
Mark
 
 
Dr Mark Allon
Department of Indian Subcontinental Studies
University of Sydney
Brennan MacCallum Building A18
Sydney NSW 2006, Australia
Phone 02-93513891; fax 02-93512319



>-----Original Message-----
>From: Indology [mailto:INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Michael Witzel
>Sent: Monday, August 04, 2008 9:01 AM
>To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
>Subject: Re: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
>
>Sanjay (below) seems to refer to the frequent Vedic compound
>zUdrArya- (Unicode: ??dr?rya-), where to many people's surprise,
>the grammarians mentioned below included, the Shudras come first.
>
>Well, for a good  reason  -- again that of prosody or syllable count.
>
>The Rgveda mostly has the clear, metrically indicated, trisyllabic
>reading  [aariya]  (?riya) for (KH) Arya (aarya, ?rya-), as noted
>already by Grassmann 1873, RV Dictionary column 185-6.
>
>In short, Panini-Behaghel's  (2+1+1, 2+2+2) rule is strictly
>followed, against all contemporary social sensitivities:
>
>zUdra+Ariya (??dra+?riya):  2 syll + 3 syllables, or :  2+1, 2+1+1
>morae.
>
>In fact, this has been noted and explained long ago by Hans Oertel :
>"zUdrArya", I think in ZDMG 1936;  see now H.Oertel, Kleine
>Schriften. Heinrich Hettrich,  Thomas Oberlies (eds.). Stuttgart :
>Franz Steiner Verlag, 1994.
>
>
>A nice weekend!
>
>Michael
>
>
>On Aug 3, 2008, at 5:00 PM, Sanjay Kumar wrote:
>
>> According to Kaatyaayana and Patanjali as well later Sanskrit
>> grammarians such as Jayaaditya and KaiyaTa, the order of appearance
>> of the four varnas in copulative compound is not indicative of "the
>> notion worthy of most respect." It rather indicates the sequence as
>> mentioned in the Vedas (see KaiyaTa's commentary on the Vaartika
>> "varnaanaam aanupuurvyeNa" {Panini 2.2.34}). At least the (early)
>> grammatical tradition does not presuppose hierarchy in this context.
>>
>> Sanjay
>>
>> McGill University
>>
>>
>
>Michael Witzel
>witzel at fas.harvard.edu
>www.fas.harvard.edu/~witzel/mwpage.htm
>
>Dept. of Sanskrit & Indian Studies, Harvard University
>1 Bow Street
>Cambridge MA 02138, USA
>
>phone: 1- 617 - 495 3295 (voice & messages), 496 8570, fax 617 - 496
>8571;
>my direct line (also for messages) :  617- 496 2990




From zysk at HUM.KU.DK  Mon Aug  4 10:12:51 2008
From: zysk at HUM.KU.DK (Kenneth Zysk)
Date: Mon, 04 Aug 08 12:12:51 +0200
Subject: Position in Modern Indian Studies, University of Copenhagen
In-Reply-To: <857A4D84DE6D1D41837DD9284F2729AB057F9D8B@exchangesrv1.hum2005.hum.ku.dk>
Message-ID: <161227083099.23782.1257112445763574618.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Please see the following announcement for a position in modern
Indian/South Asian Studies and kindly forward to other appropriate
lists. Thank you.

http://asiandynamics.ku.dk/english/vacancies/india_southasia/

Kenneth Zysk
Department of Asian Studies
University of Copenhagen                  Ph:  +45 3532 8832
Leifsgade 33,5                                  Fax: +45 3532 8835
DK-2300 Copenhagen S    Denmark                 Email: zysk at hum.ku.dk




From ashok.aklujkar at GMAIL.COM  Mon Aug  4 20:50:16 2008
From: ashok.aklujkar at GMAIL.COM (Ashok Aklujkar)
Date: Mon, 04 Aug 08 13:50:16 -0700
Subject: [Fwd: "Ten pomegranates" in Dharmakirti's Pramanavarttika]
In-Reply-To: <48975F41.8050904@uchicago.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083108.23782.14398742900094184418.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

The example is almost certainly quoted from Pata;njali's Mahaabhaa.sya under
Paa,nini 1.1.1 and 1.2.45 (Kielhorn edn pp 38 and 217).

ashok aklujkar


> From: "Christian K. Wedemeyer" <wedemeyer at UCHICAGO.EDU>
> Organization: University of Chicago Divinity School
> Reply-To: Indology <INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk>
> Date: Mon, 04 Aug 2008 14:57:53 -0500
> To: <INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk>
> Subject: [Fwd: "Ten pomegranates" in Dharmakirti's Pramanavarttika]
> 
> Dear Friends,
> 
> I received the following query last month, but am unable to come up with
> anything to help this very worthy person with their uncertainty.
> 
> Does any of this ring a bell to anyone else on the list? I will pass on
> any replies to the person who sent the question.
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Christian
> 
> 
> 
> -------- Original Message --------
> 
> I am writing with regard to a passing reference in Dharmak?rti's
> /Pram??avarttika /to what may be a Vedic ritual. In his commentary to a
> verse on the subject of /?ptav?da? /he makes the remark: "statements
> like the one containing the words 'ten pomegranates'"
> (/da?ad??im?div?ky?ni/)/. /A subcommentary by Kar?akagom? provides a
> fuller description of the reference: ?the phrase ?ten pomegranates,
> etc.? is such statements as ?ten pomegranates, six cakes, a bowl, a goat
> skin, and straw (?)? (S: /da?a d??imety?di da?a d??im?ni ?adp?p?? ku??am
> aj?jina? palalam ityevam ?d?ni v?ky?ni/). Still, neither writer
> identifies the source or meaning of this reference. The passage is cited
> as an example of statements that lack "consistency" (/asambandha//?/) or
> "coherence" (/anupasa?h?ra?/). One further piece of the puzzle is a
> Tibetan translation of a verse that appears in a commentary by a later
> Indian Buddhist scholar named ??ntarak?ita which also mentions this "ten
> pomegranates" passage. Although the exact meaning of the end of the
> verse is uncertain it may contain a reference to a type of ritual called
> /sparakratu /(The Tibetan contains what seems to be a transliteration of
> the Sanskrit words but is probably a distortion of the correct
> spelling). My best read of the line is that it says something like "the
> false daughter's (? an?taduhit?) cow, [which was the object] of a
> /sparakratu /ritual, died." It sounds like this list of items may appear
> in some Vedic ritual that is intended to save sick cows. I have
> virtually no knowledge of Vedic literature at all and cannot seem to
> locate any material that even verifies the existence of this type of
> ritual, much less provides any explanation of what it may involve.
> 
> I would very much appreciate any clarification you might be willing to
> offer. 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Christian K. Wedemeyer
> Assistant Professor of the History of Religions
> University of Chicago Divinity School
> 1025 E 58th Street
> Chicago, IL 60637 USA
> http://divinity.uchicago.edu/faculty/wedemeyer.shtml
> http://home.uchicago.edu/~aryadeva




From wedemeyer at UCHICAGO.EDU  Mon Aug  4 19:57:53 2008
From: wedemeyer at UCHICAGO.EDU (Christian K. Wedemeyer)
Date: Mon, 04 Aug 08 14:57:53 -0500
Subject: [Fwd: "Ten pomegranates" in Dharmakirti's Pramanavarttika]
Message-ID: <161227083106.23782.3170341339814233614.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Friends,

I received the following query last month, but am unable to come up with 
anything to help this very worthy person with their uncertainty.

Does any of this ring a bell to anyone else on the list? I will pass on 
any replies to the person who sent the question.

Thanks,

Christian



-------- Original Message --------

I am writing with regard to a passing reference in Dharmak?rti's 
/Pram??avarttika /to what may be a Vedic ritual. In his commentary to a 
verse on the subject of /?ptav?da? /he makes the remark: "statements 
like the one containing the words 'ten pomegranates'" 
(/da?ad??im?div?ky?ni/)/. /A subcommentary by Kar?akagom? provides a 
fuller description of the reference: ?the phrase ?ten pomegranates, 
etc.? is such statements as ?ten pomegranates, six cakes, a bowl, a goat 
skin, and straw (?)? (S: /da?a d??imety?di da?a d??im?ni ?adp?p?? ku??am 
aj?jina? palalam ityevam ?d?ni v?ky?ni/). Still, neither writer 
identifies the source or meaning of this reference. The passage is cited 
as an example of statements that lack "consistency" (/asambandha//?/) or 
"coherence" (/anupasa?h?ra?/). One further piece of the puzzle is a 
Tibetan translation of a verse that appears in a commentary by a later 
Indian Buddhist scholar named ??ntarak?ita which also mentions this "ten 
pomegranates" passage. Although the exact meaning of the end of the 
verse is uncertain it may contain a reference to a type of ritual called 
/sparakratu /(The Tibetan contains what seems to be a transliteration of 
the Sanskrit words but is probably a distortion of the correct 
spelling). My best read of the line is that it says something like "the 
false daughter's (? an?taduhit?) cow, [which was the object] of a 
/sparakratu /ritual, died." It sounds like this list of items may appear 
in some Vedic ritual that is intended to save sick cows. I have 
virtually no knowledge of Vedic literature at all and cannot seem to 
locate any material that even verifies the existence of this type of 
ritual, much less provides any explanation of what it may involve.

I would very much appreciate any clarification you might be willing to 
offer.	








-- 
Christian K. Wedemeyer
Assistant Professor of the History of Religions
University of Chicago Divinity School
1025 E 58th Street
Chicago, IL 60637 USA
http://divinity.uchicago.edu/faculty/wedemeyer.shtml
http://home.uchicago.edu/~aryadeva




From sanjay.kumar at MAIL.MCGILL.CA  Mon Aug  4 21:27:03 2008
From: sanjay.kumar at MAIL.MCGILL.CA (Sanjay Kumar)
Date: Mon, 04 Aug 08 17:27:03 -0400
Subject: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
Message-ID: <161227083114.23782.4297017262503995174.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Prof. Witzel:
Thank you for the reference to zuudraarya. 
I was in fact referring to what G?rard Huet had to say about the order of names of the four varnas. I quote him from his second-last email:
"Actually, vaarttikas recommend the fair law: first should be come the notion worthy of most respect, like in maatapitarau. And of course braahma.nak.satriyavi.t"suudraa.h - br?hmans should always go first!"
According to (secularist) grammatical tradition, "the notion of worthy of respect" applies to the first example: maataapitarau; the second example (braahma.nak.satriyavi.t"suudraa.h) simply alludes to the sequence (aanupuurvya) in which they appear in the Vedas, i.e. Rig-Veda 10.90.12. It should be noted that Sanskrit texts often follow the same sequence even outside Dvandva compound. 
Sanjay
McGill University
Canada
 

________________________________

From: Indology on behalf of Michael Witzel
Sent: Sun 8/3/2008 7:00 PM
To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
Subject: Re: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration



Sanjay (below) seems to refer to the frequent Vedic compound 
zUdrArya- (Unicode: sudrarya-), where to many people's surprise, 
the grammarians mentioned below included, the Shudras come first.

Well, for a good  reason  -- again that of prosody or syllable count.

The Rgveda mostly has the clear, metrically indicated, trisyllabic 
reading  [aariya]  (ariya) for (KH) Arya (aarya, arya-), as noted 
already by Grassmann 1873, RV Dictionary column 185-6.

In short, Panini-Behaghel's  (2+1+1, 2+2+2) rule is strictly 
followed, against all contemporary social sensitivities:

zUdra+Ariya (sudra+ariya):  2 syll + 3 syllables, or :  2+1, 2+1+1 
morae.

In fact, this has been noted and explained long ago by Hans Oertel : 
"zUdrArya", I think in ZDMG 1936;  see now H.Oertel, Kleine 
Schriften. Heinrich Hettrich,  Thomas Oberlies (eds.). Stuttgart : 
Franz Steiner Verlag, 1994.


A nice weekend!

Michael


On Aug 3, 2008, at 5:00 PM, Sanjay Kumar wrote:

> According to Kaatyaayana and Patanjali as well later Sanskrit 
> grammarians such as Jayaaditya and KaiyaTa, the order of appearance 
> of the four varnas in copulative compound is not indicative of "the 
> notion worthy of most respect." It rather indicates the sequence as 
> mentioned in the Vedas (see KaiyaTa's commentary on the Vaartika 
> "varnaanaam aanupuurvyeNa" {Panini 2.2.34}). At least the (early) 
> grammatical tradition does not presuppose hierarchy in this context.
>
> Sanjay
>
> McGill University
>
>

Michael Witzel
witzel at fas.harvard.edu
www.fas.harvard.edu/~witzel/mwpage.htm

Dept. of Sanskrit & Indian Studies, Harvard University
1 Bow Street
Cambridge MA 02138, USA

phone: 1- 617 - 495 3295 (voice & messages), 496 8570, fax 617 - 496 
8571;
my direct line (also for messages) :  617- 496 2990




From ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK  Mon Aug  4 17:11:21 2008
From: ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK (Dominik Wujastyk)
Date: Mon, 04 Aug 08 18:11:21 +0100
Subject: MAURER: The Sanskrit Language: An Introductory Grammar and              Reader
In-Reply-To: <alpine.WNT.1.10.0807171646280.356@Caraka>
Message-ID: <161227083103.23782.7445601107380871519.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

I can report an initial positive response from Routledge about a 
print-on-demand paperback edition of Maurer's primer.  Discussions are 
continuing, and final decisions and procedures have not yet been made, but 
things seem to be moving in the right direction.


-- 
Dr Dominik Wujastyk
Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
University College London




From mark.allon at USYD.EDU.AU  Mon Aug  4 08:28:39 2008
From: mark.allon at USYD.EDU.AU (Mark Allon)
Date: Mon, 04 Aug 08 18:28:39 +1000
Subject: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
In-Reply-To: <20080804010357.685EF177DAC@sanaa.ucc.usyd.edu.au>
Message-ID: <161227083097.23782.14260179467066284046.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Stefan,

I did look at mAtrA counts but found that 

"mAtrA value does not does not seem to be a determining factor, for although there are examples of sequences which conform to the WSP and which also conform to a possible ?waxing mAtrA value principle? (e.g. sukha-dukkha, 2+2 syllables, 2+3 mAtrAs; kesa-massu, 2+2 syll., 3+3 mAtrAs) there are many examples which conform to the WSP but whose mAtrA values are erratic. For example, mUla-phala (2+2 syll., but 3+2 mAtrAs); lAbha-sakkAra-siloka (2+3+3 syll., but 3+5+4 mAtrAs)." (p. 194).

I meant to add in my previous email that the WSP is applied to the ordering of all sequences of similar word elements in prose texts (strings of adjectives, nouns, verbs, etc.), not just to the components of dvandvas.

Regards
Mark

Mark Allon
Department of Indian Subcontinental Studies
University of Sydney
 

>[As I was writing the below Mark?s email arrived, but it is maybe
>worth adding the additional details and examples. Mark: Did you
>address the issue of mora count in your book ? which I have of
>course, but not with me?]
>
>One might add that the principle of waxing syllables (and moras,
>see below) remained operative in MIA formulaic language, see e.g.
>pp. 15 ff. of:
>
>    Oskar von Hin?ber, 1994. Untersuchungen zur M?ndlichkeit fr?her
>   mittelindischer Texte der Buddhisten. Mainz: Akademie der
>   Wissenschaften und der Literatur. (Abhandlungen der geistes?
>   und sozialwissenschaftlichen Klasse, Jahrgang 1994,Nr. 5 /
>   Untersuchungen zur Sprachgeschichte undHandschriftenkunde des
>   P?li, III.)
>
>who notes that in the Pali grammatical tradition it is referred to
>by Aggava?sa (under the name v?c?sili??hat?) and provides the
>following reference to another early discussion of P??ini 2.2.34
>and the OIA side of the coin:
>
>   W. Caland, 1931. A rhythmic law in language. Acta Orientalia 9:
>    59?68.
>
>Now the mora count of words like ?r(i)ya or s?r(i)ya differs of
>course between ?gvedic and Pali as consonant assimilation and
>epenthesis were based on the disyllabic OIA form and operated
>after the Law of Two Moras:
>
>   ?rya > *arya > ayya, ariya / ayira
>
>But it appears from other examples that mora count (secondary to
>syllable count) remained relevant in MIA formulas. Among the
>examples given on pp. 15?31 of von Hin?ber?s study there are, at a
>glance, six cases where two adjacent member have the same syllable
>but a rising mora count:
>
>   abhir?pa dassan?ya p?s?dika (4 + 4 + 4 s.; 5 + 6 + 6 m.) [18]
>   dubbhikkhe dv?hitike seta??hike (3 + 4 + 4 s.; 6 + 6 + 7 m.) [20]
>   dubbhikkha duhitika seta??ika sal?kavutta (3 + 4 + 4 + 5 s.; 5
>+ 4 + 6 + 7) [20]
>   vu??hi? vir??hi? vepulla? (2 + 3 + 3 s.; 4 + 5 + 6 m.) [23]
>   daliddo appadhano appabhogo (3 + 4 + 4 s.; 5 + 5 + 6 m.) [29]
>   a??ho mahaddhano mah?bhogo (2 + 4 + 4 s.; 4 + 6 + 7 m.) [29]
>
>and only one counterexample (same syllable but falling mora count):
>
>   attaman? pamudit? p?tisomanassaj?t? (4 + 4 + 8 s.; 6 + 5 + 13
>m.) [30]
>
>The continued relevance of mora count in MIA rhythmic language is
>of course unsurprising seeing the rise of m?tr?chandas etc. Von
>Hin?ber does not seem to go into the mora side of things (unless I
>missed it), but surely this has been discussed elsewhere.
>
>Best wishes,
>Stefan Baums
>
>--
>Stefan Baums
>Asian Languages and Literature
>University of Washington




From rt2036 at COLUMBIA.EDU  Tue Aug  5 02:54:11 2008
From: rt2036 at COLUMBIA.EDU (Roy Tsohar)
Date: Mon, 04 Aug 08 22:54:11 -0400
Subject: [Fwd: "Ten pomegranates" in Dharmakirti's Pramanavarttika]
In-Reply-To: <48976E75.2070208@univie.ac.at>
Message-ID: <161227083117.23782.8850524744479737175.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

This example is also cited by Abhinavagupta in his Locana to the
Dhvanyaa.loka 1.4, and used for exemplifying the mere grouping of
words without a syntactical connection (anvaya). In this
respect see note 10, page 93 in Ingalls, Masson, and Patwardhan.
The Dhvany*Aloka of *Anandavardhana with the Locana of Abhinavagupta,
Harvard Oriental Series ;. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press,
1990.
Hope it might be helpful,
Best,
Roy Tzohar










Quoting Birgit Kellner <birgit.kellner at UNIVIE.AC.AT>:

> As it luckily happens to lie on my desk - Vincent Eltschinger's "Penser
> l'autorit? des ?critures. La Pol?mique de Dharmak?rti contre la notion
> brahmanique orthodoxe d'un Veda sans auteur. Autour de Pram??av?rttika
> I.213-268 et Svav?tti" (Vienna 2007: ?sterreichische Akademie der
> Wissenschaften) contains a footnote on the passage in question with
> further references: p. 102, n. 106. According to Eltschinger, the
> example is widespread and can also be found at ?abarabh??ya on
> M?ma?sas?tra 1.1.5, Ny?yabh??ya on Ny?yas?tra 5.2.10, Dharmak?rti's own
> V?dany?ya (ed. Much, p. 43, l.14), and further in Jaina commentaries on
> the Ava?yakaniryukti, see Nalini Balbir, "The Perfect S?tra as Defined
> by the Jainas", Berliner Indologische Studien 3 (1987), 3-21.
>
> Hope this helps,
>
> Birgit Kellner
>
> Christian K. Wedemeyer wrote:
>> Dear Friends,
>>
>> I received the following query last month, but am unable to come up  
>>  with anything to help this very worthy person with their  
>> uncertainty.
>>
>> Does any of this ring a bell to anyone else on the list? I will   
>> pass on any replies to the person who sent the question.
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Christian
>>
>>
>>
>> -------- Original Message --------
>>
>> I am writing with regard to a passing reference in Dharmak?rti's   
>> /Pram??avarttika /to what may be a Vedic ritual. In his commentary   
>> to a verse on the subject of /?ptav?da? /he makes the remark:   
>> "statements like the one containing the words 'ten pomegranates'"   
>> (/da?ad??im?div?ky?ni/)/. /A subcommentary by Kar?akagom? provides   
>> a fuller description of the reference: ?the phrase ?ten   
>> pomegranates, etc.? is such statements as ?ten pomegranates, six   
>> cakes, a bowl, a goat skin, and straw (?)? (S: /da?a d??imety?di   
>> da?a d??im?ni ?adp?p?? ku??am aj?jina? palalam ityevam ?d?ni   
>> v?ky?ni/). Still, neither writer identifies the source or meaning   
>> of this reference. The passage is cited as an example of statements  
>>  that lack "consistency" (/asambandha//?/) or "coherence"   
>> (/anupasa?h?ra?/). One further piece of the puzzle is a Tibetan   
>> translation of a verse that appears in a commentary by a later   
>> Indian Buddhist scholar named ??ntarak?ita which also mentions this  
>>  "ten pomegranates" passage. Although the exact meaning of the end   
>> of the verse is uncertain it may contain a reference to a type of   
>> ritual called /sparakratu /(The Tibetan contains what seems to be a  
>>  transliteration of the Sanskrit words but is probably a distortion  
>>  of the correct spelling). My best read of the line is that it says  
>>  something like "the false daughter's (? an?taduhit?) cow, [which   
>> was the object] of a /sparakratu /ritual, died." It sounds like   
>> this list of items may appear in some Vedic ritual that is intended  
>>  to save sick cows. I have virtually no knowledge of Vedic   
>> literature at all and cannot seem to locate any material that even   
>> verifies the existence of this type of ritual, much less provides   
>> any explanation of what it may involve.
>>
>> I would very much appreciate any clarification you might be willing  
>>  to offer.




From birgit.kellner at UNIVIE.AC.AT  Mon Aug  4 21:02:45 2008
From: birgit.kellner at UNIVIE.AC.AT (Birgit Kellner)
Date: Mon, 04 Aug 08 23:02:45 +0200
Subject: [Fwd: "Ten pomegranates" in Dharmakirti's Pramanavarttika]
In-Reply-To: <48975F41.8050904@uchicago.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083111.23782.12473665084204896459.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

As it luckily happens to lie on my desk - Vincent Eltschinger's "Penser 
l'autorit? des ?critures. La Pol?mique de Dharmak?rti contre la notion 
brahmanique orthodoxe d'un Veda sans auteur. Autour de Pram??av?rttika 
I.213-268 et Svav?tti" (Vienna 2007: ?sterreichische Akademie der 
Wissenschaften) contains a footnote on the passage in question with 
further references: p. 102, n. 106. According to Eltschinger, the 
example is widespread and can also be found at ?abarabh??ya on 
M?ma?sas?tra 1.1.5, Ny?yabh??ya on Ny?yas?tra 5.2.10, Dharmak?rti's own 
V?dany?ya (ed. Much, p. 43, l.14), and further in Jaina commentaries on 
the Ava?yakaniryukti, see Nalini Balbir, "The Perfect S?tra as Defined 
by the Jainas", Berliner Indologische Studien 3 (1987), 3-21.

Hope this helps,

Birgit Kellner

Christian K. Wedemeyer wrote:
> Dear Friends,
>
> I received the following query last month, but am unable to come up 
> with anything to help this very worthy person with their uncertainty.
>
> Does any of this ring a bell to anyone else on the list? I will pass 
> on any replies to the person who sent the question.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Christian
>
>
>
> -------- Original Message --------
>
> I am writing with regard to a passing reference in Dharmak?rti's 
> /Pram??avarttika /to what may be a Vedic ritual. In his commentary to 
> a verse on the subject of /?ptav?da? /he makes the remark: "statements 
> like the one containing the words 'ten pomegranates'" 
> (/da?ad??im?div?ky?ni/)/. /A subcommentary by Kar?akagom? provides a 
> fuller description of the reference: ?the phrase ?ten pomegranates, 
> etc.? is such statements as ?ten pomegranates, six cakes, a bowl, a 
> goat skin, and straw (?)? (S: /da?a d??imety?di da?a d??im?ni ?adp?p?? 
> ku??am aj?jina? palalam ityevam ?d?ni v?ky?ni/). Still, neither writer 
> identifies the source or meaning of this reference. The passage is 
> cited as an example of statements that lack "consistency" 
> (/asambandha//?/) or "coherence" (/anupasa?h?ra?/). One further piece 
> of the puzzle is a Tibetan translation of a verse that appears in a 
> commentary by a later Indian Buddhist scholar named ??ntarak?ita which 
> also mentions this "ten pomegranates" passage. Although the exact 
> meaning of the end of the verse is uncertain it may contain a 
> reference to a type of ritual called /sparakratu /(The Tibetan 
> contains what seems to be a transliteration of the Sanskrit words but 
> is probably a distortion of the correct spelling). My best read of the 
> line is that it says something like "the false daughter's (? 
> an?taduhit?) cow, [which was the object] of a /sparakratu /ritual, 
> died." It sounds like this list of items may appear in some Vedic 
> ritual that is intended to save sick cows. I have virtually no 
> knowledge of Vedic literature at all and cannot seem to locate any 
> material that even verifies the existence of this type of ritual, much 
> less provides any explanation of what it may involve.
>
> I would very much appreciate any clarification you might be willing to 
> offer.   
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>




From athr at LOC.GOV  Tue Aug  5 15:11:52 2008
From: athr at LOC.GOV (Allen W Thrasher)
Date: Tue, 05 Aug 08 11:11:52 -0400
Subject: New CDs of Skt. learning, Grantha, and the Vacaspatyam
Message-ID: <161227083119.23782.127503590386336450.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

This is a circular from my institution's Delhi office to participants in the Cooperative Acquisitions Program.  Since we have been discussing Sanskrit instruction of late, I am forwarding this as of unusual interest.

Allen


Allen W. Thrasher, Ph.D.
Senior Reference Librarian
Team Coordinator
South Asia Team, Asian Division
Library of Congress, Jefferson Building 150
101 Independence Ave., S.E.
Washington, DC 20540-4810
tel. 202-707-3732; fax 202-707-1724; athr at loc.gov
The opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the Library of Congress.

>>> New Delhi <ndl-book at loc.gov> 08/05/08 2:23 AM >>>

Rashtriya Sanskrit Vidyapeetha, Tirupati is a centre of excellence in the subject of traditional Shastras. They have brought out the following CD-ROM?s:
 
 
1. Samskrtasiksika = A self learning CD in Interactive mode.
 
Language: Sanskrit and English.
 
LCCN: I-CD-2008-306283 
 
Price: Rs260.00 less 10% = $5.63
 
This CD is a unique approach to learn Sanskrit language. Main features are: Perfect pronunciation; Different styles of conversation; excellent styles of speech;
Several styles of reading prose & poetry; Writing styles of Devanagari script;                        Grammar in simple way; Sanskrit literature & science in Sanskrit words for daily use;    Stories with excellent animation; Melodious songs & slokas; Antyaksari; Fun with words; Fun with numbers; Quiz; Exercise; Conversation practice and more.
 
2. Granthalipibodhini = Grantha script tutor (set of three CDs)
 
Language: Sanskrit
 
LCCN: 2008-306282
 
Price: Rs210.00(Set) less 10% = $4.55
 
This is an educational CD (auto run) is the outcome of a project- Electronic tools for learning Ancient Indian Scripts under the Centre of excellence in the subject of traditional Sastras, a special scheme of University Grants Commission, New Delhi during 2002-2007. The tutor has been planned and presented in 3 CDs consisting of 75 hours material covering all aspects necessary to learn Grantha Script in learner friendly manner. Grantha script is the major script through which manuscripts were written in ancient times through out South India particularly Tamil Nadu area. The notable specialty of the tutor is that it gives ample practice material by providing copies of printed texts and palm leaves in Grantha scripts.
 
 
3. Vacaspatyam / Taranathatarkavacaspatisankalitam.
 
Language: Sanskrit
 
LCCN: I-CD 2008-306281
 
Price: Rs100.00 less 10% = $2.16
 
CD version of the Vacaspatyam = an encyclopedic lexicon of Sanskrit. This work consisting of about 5442 printed pages of ? demy size was compiled by Pandit Taranatha Tarkavacaspati. Having recognized the importance and usefulness of the VACASPATYAM , Rashtriya Sanskrit Vidyapeetha, Tirupati has undertaken a project for Web and CD version of the Vacaspatyam in the Sans-Net Centre from July 2005 to March 2007 under the Centre of Excellence Scheme of University Grants Commission, New Delhi. This CD version (1.0) to be revised regularly can be referred to search:
 
1. The stem and its meaning
2. Multiple meanings
3. Derivation
4. Linguistic specialties
5. Missing letters in works, while editing manuscripts
6. Related words of a particular word or any other information available in the Vacaspatyam.
 
Web version can be viewed at www.sansknet.org.
 
Please respond by August 20, 2008 if you want acquire any of these CD-ROM?s
 
 
Usha Kataria & Sheenu Mathew
 
Cataloging & Acquisitions Division




From ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK  Tue Aug  5 17:35:14 2008
From: ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK (Dominik Wujastyk)
Date: Tue, 05 Aug 08 18:35:14 +0100
Subject: Google continues to amaze: Hindi dictionary
Message-ID: <161227083123.23782.3710152843052747159.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

http://translate.google.co.uk/translate_dict?q=&hl=en&langpair=en%7Chi

This set of dictionaries includes Hindi-English and English-Hindi, and 
even has picture illustrations and illustrative phrases.

D

-- 
Dr Dominik Wujastyk
Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
University College London




From jemhouben at GMAIL.COM  Tue Aug  5 22:15:26 2008
From: jemhouben at GMAIL.COM (Jan Houben)
Date: Wed, 06 Aug 08 00:15:26 +0200
Subject: Google continues to amaze: Hindi dictionary
In-Reply-To: <alpine.WNT.1.10.0808051834160.5212@Caraka>
Message-ID: <161227083125.23782.7111569312976149123.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

It's indeed amazing.
But still a beta version.
I tried "love":
it gives only anuraaga as translation: no prem, pyaar, priiti, ishq etc.;
under phrases related to "love" there is for instance: "national (!) love
and affection" which is translated as "sahaja (!) prem aur anuraag"
("national" for "natural" which sounds vaguely similar?).
There seems to be an option to give feedback according to the FAQ but I
could not reach that option from the Dictionary mode.
JH

On Tue, Aug 5, 2008 at 7:35 PM, Dominik Wujastyk <ucgadkw at ucl.ac.uk> wrote:

> http://translate.google.co.uk/translate_dict?q=&hl=en&langpair=en%7Chi
>
> This set of dictionaries includes Hindi-English and English-Hindi, and even
> has picture illustrations and illustrative phrases.
>
> D
>
> --
> Dr Dominik Wujastyk
> Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
> University College London
>




From mccomas.taylor at ANU.EDU.AU  Wed Aug  6 01:52:37 2008
From: mccomas.taylor at ANU.EDU.AU (McComas Taylor)
Date: Wed, 06 Aug 08 11:52:37 +1000
Subject: 2nd notice for Spoken Sanskrit Summer School, Australia,              6-20 February 2009
Message-ID: <161227083128.23782.17914112867733731879.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Colleagues

We still have five places left in our Spoken Sanskrit Summer School, 
Australia, 6-20 February 2009, but they are filling fast. The course 
will be taught by Pandit Dr Sadananda Das of the University of Leipzig. 
I would be grateful if you would draw this course to the attention of 
your colleagues and students, wherever they may be.

Details are available on our website: 
http://asianstudies.anu.edu.au/Spoken_Sanskrit_Summer_School

It will be held at our magnificent coastal campus: http://kioloa.anu.edu.au

Yours

McComas

-- 
===============================
Dr McComas Taylor
Head, South Asia Centre
Faculty of Asian Studies
The Australian National University
ACTON ACT 0200

Tel: +61 2 6125 3179
Fax: +61 2 6125 8326

Email: mccomas.taylor at anu.edu.au
URL: http://asianstudies.anu.edu.au/wiki/index.php/Dr_McComas_Taylor
Location: Room E4.24 Baldessin Precinct Building 




From baums at U.WASHINGTON.EDU  Wed Aug  6 18:51:34 2008
From: baums at U.WASHINGTON.EDU (Stefan Baums)
Date: Wed, 06 Aug 08 14:51:34 -0400
Subject: svArtha derivation and subtypes of taddhita pratyaya affixes
In-Reply-To: <857A4D84DE6D1D41837DD9284F2729AB03E85D51@exchangesrv1.hum2005.hum.ku.dk>
Message-ID: <161227083132.23782.18314239328045154829.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Ulrich,

is there any chance that the derivation being discussed is not

    mitra/maitra ? maitra

but

    mitra/maitra ? maitraka/maitreya

(?byams pa being a possible Tibetan translation for both maitra 
and maitreya, though you don?t say what the Tibetan word for 
maitra is in your passage), and that mthun pa?i rkyen is just an 
unusual translation for taddhita (influenced by the meaning 
?agreeable? of hita)?

If Bh?vaviveka?s bdag gi don la de dang mthun pa?i rkyen is for 
sv?rthataddhitapratyaya, then I can sort of see how Avalokitavrata 
comes to explain the whole term as bdag dang mthun pa?i tshig gi 
rkyen ?affix of a word agreeing with itself (in meaning)? (taking 
sv?rthataddhita as a unit). Still, the step from commentary to 
subcommentary remains a bit peculiar. Is it possible that the 
Tibetan translation of Bh?vaviveka?s commentary was used alongside 
the Sanskrit original in the preparation of the Tibetan 
translation of Avalokitavrata?s subcommentary (similar to the 
Ud?navarga / Ud?navargavivara?a translation procedure as 
demonstrated by Michael Balk)?

Best wishes,
Stefan

-- 
Stefan Baums
Asian Languages and Literature
University of Washington




From utkragh at HUM.KU.DK  Wed Aug  6 13:10:36 2008
From: utkragh at HUM.KU.DK (Ulrich T. Kragh)
Date: Wed, 06 Aug 08 15:10:36 +0200
Subject: svArtha derivation and subtypes of taddhita pratyaya affixes
Message-ID: <161227083130.23782.350960264448221609.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear members,

I am trying to understand a passage from Buddhist 6th century commentary by Bhavaviveka and its 7th century sub-commentary by Avalokitavrata, wherein a taddhita derivation of the word maitra is discussed. Although the texts were written in Sanskrit, they are now only extant in Tibetan, and I am struggling with figuring out three grammatical terms, which I hope someone on this list might recognize and explain to me in their Sanskrit context.

 

The passage concerns a taddhita svArtha-derivation, i.e., a nominal derivation where the derivative "maitra" has the same meaning as its base (prakRti), which either is "mitra" or "maitra" itself, depending on which manuscript I rely on (too complex an issue to lay out here). To explain this svArtha-derivation, the commentators give the following argument (in Tibetan): bdag gi don la de dang mthun pa'i rkyen brjod par bya ba'i phyir ro. The first part "bdag gi don" is clearly svArtha, probably in the locative case. This is followed by the term I have problems identifying, namely "de dang mthun pa'i rkyen". The term means "an affix agreeing with that". The last part "rkyen" is Skt. "pratyaya". The first part might be "tad-AnurUpa-" or tat-svArUpya-". Does this ring any bells? Is there a pratyaya called a "tad-AnurUpa-pratyaya" or "tat-svArUpya-pratyaya" or anything similar, and what does it mean (references to literature would be very welcome)?

 

In the sub-commentary, Avalokitavrata paraphrases the same term by calling it "bdag dang mthun pa'i tshig gi rkyen" meaning "a pada-affix agreeing with itself", perhaps Skt "svAnurUpa-pada-pratyaya" or something similar. Any remarks on this term would also be appreciated.

 

Finally, the sub-commentator attempts to contrast this explanation with a second explanation given by for the taddhita derivation of maitra from mitra (here certainly understood as derived from mitra). In the course of that passage, he introduces a term, which in Tibetan is "gzhan gyi don", i.e., literally "other-meaning", which might be *anyArtha or *anyadartha or even *parArtha. Also, he parallels the longer term mentioned above and writes "gzhan dang mthun pa'i tshig gi rkyen" meaning "a pada-affix agreeing with other", perhaps Skt. *anyAnurUpa-pada-pratyaya or something similar. Here my question is: I understand that svArtha derivation denotes a derivation, where the derivative is synonymous with its base, but is there really an opposite term, such as "anyArtha" or "parArtha"? I am aware that such words exist in general, but does such a term occur as an opposite of svArtha in the context of derivation?

 

I hope someone out there might have one or more answers. I have been through Kartre's "Dictionary of Panini" and I have tried almost every available Tibetan-Sanskrit dictionary. I have also searched the Tibetan Buddhist canon electronically and found that these terms are only used by the two above-mentioned authors, so they seem to be very rare - at least in Buddhist writings.

 

With best regards,

Ulrich Timme Kragh

 
Dr. Ulrich Timme Kragh
Assistant Professor
Geumgang Center for Buddhist Studies
Geumgang University, Dae-myeong Ri, Sang-wol Myeon
Nonsan-si, Chungnam 320-931, Republic of Korea
Tel. +82-41-731 3618
 




From peterfriedlander at YAHOO.COM.AU  Thu Aug  7 12:01:45 2008
From: peterfriedlander at YAHOO.COM.AU (Peter Friedlander)
Date: Thu, 07 Aug 08 05:01:45 -0700
Subject: Google continues to amaze: Hindi dictionary
In-Reply-To: <INDOLOGY%200808060000030056.001B@LISTSERV.LIV.AC.UK>
Message-ID: <161227083137.23782.11489353345453910723.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Colleagues,
its a fantastic resource, but its sad that like shabdakosh.com it gives no gender for nouns, which will make it less useful for language learners in a way, they will still have to go and check in an old fashioned dictionary!
regards
Peter


Peter Gerard FRIEDLANDER (Dr) :: Senior Lecturer, Centre for Language Studies and South?Asian Studies Programme?:: Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences :: National University of Singapore :: AS4 9 Arts Link, #02-01 :: Singapore 117570 :: 65-6516 2468 (DID) :: 65-6777 7736 (Fax) :: clspgf at nus.edu.sg (E) :: www.nus.edu.sg (W) :: http://www.fas.nus.edu.sg/cls/ (CLS Website) :: Company Registration No: 200604346E


      Win a MacBook Air or iPod touch with Yahoo!7. http://au.docs.yahoo.com/homepageset




From drdavis at WISC.EDU  Thu Aug  7 14:59:15 2008
From: drdavis at WISC.EDU (Donald R. Davis, Jr.)
Date: Thu, 07 Aug 08 09:59:15 -0500
Subject: Parasara-Madhaviya Reference
Message-ID: <161227083139.23782.485750744184834871.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

I am trying to track down a reference from Kane's History of 
Dharmasastra to a passage from the Parasara-Madhaviya, specifically the 
Bombay Sanskrit Series edition by Vaman Sastri Islampurkar.  My library 
only has the Calcutta/Bibliotheca India edition by Tarkalankara.  Kane 
gives the citation as Vol. 2, Part 2, pp.206-207 (Prayascittakanda) and 
the passage in question from Madhava's commentary reads in part "nAyaM 
doSaH prAyazcittArthavAdatvena tadupayogAt...."  I would like to read 
the full context of this citation, but I cannot seem to find the passage 
in my edition.  If someone who happens to have the Bombay S.S. edition 
handy would kindly inform me which adhyaya this occurs in and/or which 
verse it is commenting upon, I should be able to find the full 
discussion in my edition.  Many thanks in advance for the help. 

Best regards,

Don Davis
Dept of Languages & Cultures of Asia
University of Wisconsin-Madison




From jpo at UTS.CC.UTEXAS.EDU  Thu Aug  7 15:44:26 2008
From: jpo at UTS.CC.UTEXAS.EDU (Patrick Olivelle)
Date: Thu, 07 Aug 08 10:44:26 -0500
Subject: Parasara-Madhaviya Reference
In-Reply-To: <489B0DC3.5000306@wisc.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083141.23782.2424631236155609743.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Don: it is in Prayascitta Kanda, 12th Adhyaya,  -- and section 
beginning with "atha karmavipAko nirpyate", and cited passage comes 
very early in this section. But really there is no verse to which 
this is a commentary; this is a long digression. If you cannot find 
it let me know and I can send you a xerox of these pages.

Patrick




>I am trying to track down a reference from Kane's History of 
>Dharmasastra to a passage from the Parasara-Madhaviya, specifically 
>the Bombay Sanskrit Series edition by Vaman Sastri Islampurkar.  My 
>library only has the Calcutta/Bibliotheca India edition by 
>Tarkalankara.  Kane gives the citation as Vol. 2, Part 2, pp.206-207 
>(Prayascittakanda) and the passage in question from Madhava's 
>commentary reads in part "nAyaM doSaH prAyazcittArthavAdatvena 
>tadupayogAt...."  I would like to read the full context of this 
>citation, but I cannot seem to find the passage in my edition.  If 
>someone who happens to have the Bombay S.S. edition handy would 
>kindly inform me which adhyaya this occurs in and/or which verse it 
>is commenting upon, I should be able to find the full discussion in 
>my edition.  Many thanks in advance for the help.
>Best regards,
>
>Don Davis
>Dept of Languages & Cultures of Asia
>University of Wisconsin-Madison




From dbhattacharya2004 at YAHOO.CO.IN  Thu Aug  7 06:05:05 2008
From: dbhattacharya2004 at YAHOO.CO.IN (Dipak Bhattacharya)
Date: Thu, 07 Aug 08 11:35:05 +0530
Subject: svArtha derivation and subtypes of taddhita pratyaya affixes
In-Reply-To: <857A4D84DE6D1D41837DD9284F2729AB03E85D51@exchangesrv1.hum2005.hum.ku.dk>
Message-ID: <161227083135.23782.5171434111240457620.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Though a definite decision cannot be taken without examining the text in more versions than one, prima facie de dang mthun pa'i rkyen might mean 'a suffix in accordance with that' ie with the desired meaning of the word. A particular suffix among many permissible ones is meant. This is necessitated by the fact that quite a few svaarthika pratyayas are mentioned by Paa.nini 5.4.5ss and also elsewhere. Here the a.(n) suffix is meant that generates maitra in the sense of mitra. This is the 'suffix in accordance'. For maitra by a svaarthika suffix the commentator seems to have the authority of Vaarttika 4 on Paa.nini 5.4.38? in?mind. The suutra speaks of amitra that can have the suffix in svaartha. The varttika authorises the operation for both?amitra ie mitra.? In order to clarify Pata;njali illustrates with the word maitra in the sense of mitra with the a(.n) suffix.
DBhattacharya


      Bring your gang together. Do your thing. Find your favourite Yahoo! group at http://in.promos.yahoo.com/groups/




From jpo at UTS.CC.UTEXAS.EDU  Thu Aug  7 17:12:17 2008
From: jpo at UTS.CC.UTEXAS.EDU (Patrick Olivelle)
Date: Thu, 07 Aug 08 12:12:17 -0500
Subject: Addresses
In-Reply-To: <20080122104709.22A77404@bonito.ulb.ac.be>
Message-ID: <161227083143.23782.11137617067102823793.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Friends:

Could someone send me the email addresses of the following:

A. A. Vigasin
A. M Samozvantsev (the two of these Russian scholars wrote "Society, 
State, and Law in Ancient India"

Gen'ichi Yamazaki, who published "The Structure of Ancient Indian 
Society" in 2005 and works at the Toyo Bunko.

Thank you very much.


Patrick Olivelle




From vglyssenko at YANDEX.RU  Thu Aug  7 18:13:44 2008
From: vglyssenko at YANDEX.RU (Viktoria Lyssenko)
Date: Thu, 07 Aug 08 22:13:44 +0400
Subject: Addresses
In-Reply-To: <9040000000248142086>
Message-ID: <161227083145.23782.4053510677269785962.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

The email of Vigasin is as follows 

vigasin at iaas.msu.ru

Victoria Lysenko

??????.????????. ?? ???? ???? http://cards.yandex.ru/ 




From utkragh at HUM.KU.DK  Fri Aug  8 07:48:08 2008
From: utkragh at HUM.KU.DK (Ulrich T. Kragh)
Date: Fri, 08 Aug 08 09:48:08 +0200
Subject: svArtha derivation and subtypes of taddhita pratyaya affixes
Message-ID: <161227083147.23782.1370471312363576262.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Indology list members,
thank you very much to Stefan Baums and Dipak Bhattacharya for their responses to my inquiry about svArthika derivation and taddhita affixes. Both mails contained several leads that were helpful to me.
 
I am still left with one question I would like to pose to the list. I have been considering the possibility that the grammatical term tacchiila "having that (action) as its nature or habit, characterized by that" might be the term I have been looking for (for the Tibetan translation "de dang mthun pa'i rkyen). However, I see in Tubb and Boose's "Scholastic Sanskrit" page 58 that this function only seems to be applicable to primary derivation (kRt pratyaya) from verbal stem to noun, and in the case of my passage, I am dealing with a secondary nominal derivation (taddhita pratyaya). 
 
So here is my new question: would it at all be possible for a tacchiila interpretation to be applied to a taddhita derivation?
 
Now, shortly in response to the postings by Baums and Bhattacharya. Bhattacharya's explanations of the svArthika and its application to my passage were very helpful - thank you very much. Baums asked whether the Tibetan word "byams pa" might reflect Skt. maitraka/maitreya here. The answer is no, the word is taken from Nagarjuna's Mmk root-text verse 17.1 on which the passage comments, and the root-text (extant in Skt) clearly has maitram. Secondly, Baums suggested that the Tibetan phrase "de dang mthun pa'i rkyen" might be an unusual translation for taddhita (the regular translation is "de dang phan pa'i rkyen). I appreciate this idea very much, and I have also been toying with that possibility. However, the only problem is that it cannot account for how the subcommentator Avalokitavrata substitutes the word "de" (= Skt tad) with "bdag" (= Skt. sva-) and "gzhan" (= Skt. any- or para-) in his explanation of the passage, where he writes "bdag dang mthun pa'i rkyen" and "gzhan dang mthun pa'i rkyen". I do not think that *taddhitapratyaya could be turned into *svahitapratyaya and *anyahitapratyaya. So, though the solution is tempting, then it does not solve all the problems. Further, Baums suggested that the Tibetan translations of Bhavaviveka's Mmk commentary and Avalokitavrata's subcommentary might be closely related, and could have been adjusted to each other in the translation process. I agree, and consider this quite likely. Both texts were translated by the same translators, namely Jnanagarbha and cog ro klu'i rgyal mtshan. 
 
Once again, thank you to both of you for taking time to help me.
 
With best regards,
Tim
 
Dr. Ulrich Timme Kragh
Assistant Professor
Geumgang Center for Buddhist Studies
Geumgang University, Dae-myeong Ri, Sang-wol Myeon
Nonsan-si, Chungnam 320-931, Republic of Korea
Tel. +82-41-731 3618




From mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU  Fri Aug  8 15:42:05 2008
From: mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU (mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU)
Date: Fri, 08 Aug 08 10:42:05 -0500
Subject: svArtha derivation and subtypes of taddhita pratyaya affixes
Message-ID: <161227083152.23782.6528992487677330721.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

I am travelling and away from my library just now,
but if my recollection is correct then
Skt. taddhita should be Tib. de la phan pa.
I suggest that de dang mthun pa may not
in fact be an unusual translation of
taddhita, but perhaps a perfectly regular
translation of tatsama. Without access to
my sources, however, I cannot say whether
or not this term had  a documented use
that would be helpful in the present context.
It is of course now most frequently encountered
to describe NIA vocabulary that is borrowed
unchanged from Skt. Might it have referred, then,
to a derivation in which the derived term conserves
the form of its source (as is the case, e.g., in
gu.na derivations where the vowel is short a)?

 

Matthew T. Kapstein
Numata Visiting Professor of Buddhist Studies
The University of Chicago Divinity School

Directeur d'?tudes
Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris




From kauzeya at GMAIL.COM  Fri Aug  8 17:52:28 2008
From: kauzeya at GMAIL.COM (Jonathan Silk)
Date: Fri, 08 Aug 08 10:52:28 -0700
Subject: Kyoto-Harvard transliteration
In-Reply-To: <CA4AD28A-4D89-432C-AED1-28CAF4AEF3DE@inria.fr>
Message-ID: <161227083158.23782.8683649218526293195.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

I am afraid that, being out of station (although, sadly, not at the moment
in the mountains), I have missed this discussion until now. I would like to
study it carefully, but just one remark a propos the following:

On 8/3/08, G?rard Huet <Gerard.Huet at inria.fr> wrote:
>
> Dear colleagues,
> ...




Actually, vaarttikas recommend the fair law: first should be come the notion
> worthy of most respect, like in maatapitarau.
> ...


Interestingly, I have survyed this (naturally, references not to hand, but
they will be found in a footnote in my recent paper in JIPh on Good and Evil
in Buddhism), and at least in the limited context of listing of the 5 sins
of immediate retribution, the first two of which are killing one's mother
and/or father, the ordering appears to be entirely free in both Pali and
Skt. It is possible that since the list of 5 appears generally, although not
always, to be in increasing order of seriousness, there was a conflict
between listing the mother first, as noted by Dr Huet, and listing her
second, since killing her is worse than killing a father. I discussed this
issue of relative seriousness in the paper, but not the grammatical issue of
ordering of compounds, other than the brief note.

Thanks to all for the interesting discussion!

jonathan


-- 
J. Silk
Instituut Kern / Universiteit Leiden
Postbus 9515
2300 RA Leiden
Netherlands




From ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK  Fri Aug  8 16:31:58 2008
From: ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK (Dominik Wujastyk)
Date: Fri, 08 Aug 08 17:31:58 +0100
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit
Message-ID: <161227083156.23782.6239337604995041475.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>


There's an interesting set of reflections on the topic here:

Journal of Linguistic Anthropology
June 2008, Vol. 18, No. 1, pp. 24-45
Posted online on July 28, 2008.
(doi:10.1111/j.1548-1395.2008.00002.x)

Licked by the Mother Tongue: Imagining Everyday Sanskrit at Home and in 
the World
by Adi Hastings

Abstract:
This paper examines the ways in which Sanskrit revivalists in contemporary 
India imagine social contexts for the production and reproduction of 
Sanskrit speech. In contrast to the received view of Sanskrit as being a 
ritual language par excellence, opposed at every step to the domestic 
sphere and everyday life, Sanskrit revivalists treat Sanskrit as a ?mother 
tongue,? figuring the home as the primary site for the creation of an 
?everyday Sanskrit? world and the mother as the primary agent of this 
process of Sanskritizing the domestic sphere. ?Domesticating Sanskrit,? 
the process of bringing the elevated ritual language down into everyday 
life, at the very same time ?Sanskritizes the domestic,? that is, ritually 
transforms or elevates the home into a ?Sanskrit home.? Moving outward 
from the Sanskritized domestic sphere, activists also imagine other 
contexts in which one could use Sanskrit, which nonetheless conforms to a 
notion of a Sanskrit interiority or domesticity.




-- 
Dr Dominik Wujastyk
Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
University College London





From dbhattacharya2004 at YAHOO.CO.IN  Fri Aug  8 14:15:23 2008
From: dbhattacharya2004 at YAHOO.CO.IN (Dipak Bhattacharya)
Date: Fri, 08 Aug 08 19:45:23 +0530
Subject: svArtha derivation and subtypes of taddhita pratyaya affixes
In-Reply-To: <857A4D84DE6D1D41837DD9284F2729AB03E85D52@exchangesrv1.hum2005.hum.ku.dk>
Message-ID: <161227083150.23782.7679948786395251432.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

08 08 08
Dear Dr.Kragh,
The primarihood of the tacchiila suffixes is inherent and not a metalinguistic innovation. ;siila means 'habit, usual conduct' and pertains to action, taacchiilya: 'the state of having that as habit'. There cannot be any question of having that sense with a proper name. For de dang mthun pa'i rkyen the literal translation is tadanukuulapratyaya. But the commentator by all probability was thinking in Sanskrit and not in Tibetan. So this may elliptically mean tada(artha)anukuula pratyaya 'a pratyaya conducive to that meaning ie the meaning of the prak.rti'. One cannot question or criticise the author for not using a term for 'vaacaka' or 'abhidhaayin'. 
I shall be glad to know if this makes things a bit clearer. 
DB

--- On Fri, 8/8/08, Ulrich T. Kragh <utkragh at HUM.KU.DK> wrote:

From: Ulrich T. Kragh <utkragh at HUM.KU.DK>
Subject: Re: svArtha derivation and subtypes of taddhita pratyaya affixes
To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
Date: Friday, 8 August, 2008, 1:18 PM

Dear Indology list members,
thank you very much to Stefan Baums and Dipak Bhattacharya for their responses
to my inquiry about svArthika derivation and taddhita affixes. Both mails
contained several leads that were helpful to me.
 
I am still left with one question I would like to pose to the list. I have been
considering the possibility that the grammatical term tacchiila "having
that (action) as its nature or habit, characterized by that" might be the
term I have been looking for (for the Tibetan translation "de dang mthun
pa'i rkyen). However, I see in Tubb and Boose's "Scholastic
Sanskrit" page 58 that this function only seems to be applicable to primary
derivation (kRt pratyaya) from verbal stem to noun, and in the case of my
passage, I am dealing with a secondary nominal derivation (taddhita pratyaya). 
 
So here is my new question: would it at all be possible for a tacchiila
interpretation to be applied to a taddhita derivation?
 
Now, shortly in response to the postings by Baums and Bhattacharya.
Bhattacharya's explanations of the svArthika and its application to my
passage were very helpful - thank you very much. Baums asked whether the Tibetan
word "byams pa" might reflect Skt. maitraka/maitreya here. The answer
is no, the word is taken from Nagarjuna's Mmk root-text verse 17.1 on which
the passage comments, and the root-text (extant in Skt) clearly has maitram.
Secondly, Baums suggested that the Tibetan phrase "de dang mthun pa'i
rkyen" might be an unusual translation for taddhita (the regular
translation is "de dang phan pa'i rkyen). I appreciate this idea very
much, and I have also been toying with that possibility. However, the only
problem is that it cannot account for how the subcommentator Avalokitavrata
substitutes the word "de" (= Skt tad) with "bdag" (= Skt.
sva-) and "gzhan" (= Skt. any- or para-) in his explanation of the
passage, where he writes "bdag dang mthun pa'i rkyen" and
"gzhan dang mthun pa'i rkyen". I do not think that
*taddhitapratyaya could be turned into *svahitapratyaya and *anyahitapratyaya.
So, though the solution is tempting, then it does not solve all the problems.
Further, Baums suggested that the Tibetan translations of Bhavaviveka's Mmk
commentary and Avalokitavrata's subcommentary might be closely related, and
could have been adjusted to each other in the translation process. I agree, and
consider this quite likely. Both texts were translated by the same translators,
namely Jnanagarbha and cog ro klu'i rgyal mtshan. 
 
Once again, thank you to both of you for taking time to help me.
 
With best regards,
Tim
 
Dr. Ulrich Timme Kragh
Assistant Professor
Geumgang Center for Buddhist Studies
Geumgang University, Dae-myeong Ri, Sang-wol Myeon
Nonsan-si, Chungnam 320-931, Republic of Korea
Tel. +82-41-731 3618



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From harshadehejia at HOTMAIL.COM  Fri Aug  8 19:49:00 2008
From: harshadehejia at HOTMAIL.COM (Harsha Dehejia)
Date: Fri, 08 Aug 08 19:49:00 +0000
Subject: Arches
Message-ID: <161227083161.23782.913322345833279715.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Friends:
 
I am working on arches in Indian designs and forms.
 
Very often Indian artists and artisans create arches even in a two dimensional design to enclose the main form. 
 
Are these arches a variation of toranas or festoons or gateways?
 
I would love hearing from scholars who have thought about this.
 
Regards.
 
Harsha
HArsha V. Dehejia




From dbhattacharya2004 at YAHOO.CO.IN  Fri Aug  8 16:01:34 2008
From: dbhattacharya2004 at YAHOO.CO.IN (Dipak Bhattacharya)
Date: Fri, 08 Aug 08 21:31:34 +0530
Subject: svArtha derivation and subtypes of taddhita pratyaya affixes
In-Reply-To: <20080808104205.BIS58911@m4500-02.uchicago.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083154.23782.3732913765377612402.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

In fact this explanation is better than mine.I have not yet encountered the word for taddhita in Tibetan, nor does the Mvy record it, still Matthew T. Kapstein's explanation is more plausible than mine.
DB?

--- On Fri, 8/8/08, mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU <mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU> wrote:

From: mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU <mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU>
Subject: Re: svArtha derivation and subtypes of taddhita pratyaya affixes
To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
Date: Friday, 8 August, 2008, 9:12 PM

I am travelling and away from my library just now,
but if my recollection is correct then
Skt. taddhita should be Tib. de la phan pa.
I suggest that de dang mthun pa may not
in fact be an unusual translation of
taddhita, but perhaps a perfectly regular
translation of tatsama. Without access to
my sources, however, I cannot say whether
or not this term had  a documented use
that would be helpful in the present context.
It is of course now most frequently encountered
to describe NIA vocabulary that is borrowed
unchanged from Skt. Might it have referred, then,
to a derivation in which the derived term conserves
the form of its source (as is the case, e.g., in
gu.na derivations where the vowel is short a)?

 

Matthew T. Kapstein
Numata Visiting Professor of Buddhist Studies
The University of Chicago Divinity School

Directeur d'?tudes
Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris



      Unlimited freedom, unlimited storage. Get it now, on http://help.yahoo.com/l/in/yahoo/mail/yahoomail/tools/tools-08.html/




From utkragh at HUM.KU.DK  Sun Aug 10 15:32:38 2008
From: utkragh at HUM.KU.DK (Ulrich T. Kragh)
Date: Sun, 10 Aug 08 17:32:38 +0200
Subject: svArtha derivation and subtypes of taddhita pratyaya affixes
Message-ID: <161227083162.23782.7130853119028608045.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Thank you very much to Dipak Bhattacharya and Matthew Kapstein for their replies to my continued inquiry. I believe that Professor Kapstein's suggestion "tatsama" works well in the passage, provided of course that it can be understood in a more literal meaning that is different from its later technical use of denoting Sanskrit loanwords in New Indo-Aryan languages, as also noted by Kapstein. I think that would be an acceptable supposition for its occurrence in two 6th-7th century texts. Thank you very much for the kind help.
 
Sincerely, 
Tim
 
Dr. Ulrich Timme Kragh
Assistant Professor
Geumgang Center for Buddhist Studies
Geumgang University, Dae-myeong Ri, Sang-wol Myeon
Nonsan-si, Chungnam 320-931, Republic of Korea
Tel. +82-41-731 3618




From dbhattacharya2004 at YAHOO.CO.IN  Sun Aug 10 17:49:06 2008
From: dbhattacharya2004 at YAHOO.CO.IN (Dipak Bhattacharya)
Date: Sun, 10 Aug 08 23:19:06 +0530
Subject: svArtha derivation and subtypes of taddhita pratyaya affixes
In-Reply-To: <857A4D84DE6D1D41837DD9284F2729AB03E85D53@exchangesrv1.hum2005.hum.ku.dk>
Message-ID: <161227083164.23782.11636965909699792766.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

10 08 08
?I am afraid I reacted with undue haste without going through the whole of Kapstein's letter.?
The difficulty is that I have not?the documents with me. What appeared to me striking is that the very word taddhita could have been meant. It has been meant, I think. But I could have been absolutely certain if I had consulted the material concerned. 
In?case this suggestion of mine is correct the translation bdag gi don la de dang mthun pa'i rkyen brjod par bya ba'i phyir ro? should have been based on an original that stood as svaarthe taddhitapratyayasya vihitatvaat that can be roughly translated into English as? ?since a taddhta suffix has been enjoined in the meaning of the stem?. But as I said this is a provisional translation.
But it seems very likely that the commentator's skill lies in his ability to make a rendering that makes the meaning of the word taddhita explicit though, as Kapsein argues, it is not the usual translation. That I am unable to comment on at present.
DB
?
?

--- On Sun, 10/8/08, Ulrich T. Kragh <utkragh at HUM.KU.DK> wrote:

From: Ulrich T. Kragh <utkragh at HUM.KU.DK>
Subject: Re: svArtha derivation and subtypes of taddhita pratyaya affixes
To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
Date: Sunday, 10 August, 2008, 9:02 PM

Thank you very much to Dipak Bhattacharya and Matthew Kapstein for their replies
to my continued inquiry. I believe that Professor Kapstein's suggestion
"tatsama" works well in the passage, provided of course that it can be
understood in a more literal meaning that is different from its later technical
use of denoting Sanskrit loanwords in New Indo-Aryan languages, as also noted by
Kapstein. I think that would be an acceptable supposition for its occurrence in
two 6th-7th century texts. Thank you very much for the kind help.
 
Sincerely, 
Tim
 
Dr. Ulrich Timme Kragh
Assistant Professor
Geumgang Center for Buddhist Studies
Geumgang University, Dae-myeong Ri, Sang-wol Myeon
Nonsan-si, Chungnam 320-931, Republic of Korea
Tel. +82-41-731 3618



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From glhart at BERKELEY.EDU  Mon Aug 11 14:07:05 2008
From: glhart at BERKELEY.EDU (George Hart)
Date: Mon, 11 Aug 08 07:07:05 -0700
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <965fdc5f0808110047j29640bcbp30d3dcfb9ca9c662@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <161227083170.23782.16693062939762156610.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

I myself once encountered someone from Karnataka who lived in the  
village where "Sanskrit" is spoken.  It was a dumbed-down language not  
much resembling (in my opinion) the eloquent tongue used by Kalidasa  
and Sankara -- or even the epics.  It dispenses with such frills as  
the dual and many verb forms.  I asked him if he had read Sanskrit  
literature -- poetry, darsana, whatever.  He seemed nonplussed by the  
question -- he spoke Sanskrit; why should he read Kalidasa?  I felt he  
was entirely ignorant of the intellectual grandeur and scope of the  
language and spoke it (or his version of it) merely to make a  
statement.  I would remark parenthetically that the use of Sanskrit in  
a Malayalam historical novel I once read -- including 3-line Sanskrit  
compounds -- was far more sophisticated than this "Sanskrit" speaker  
could have managed.  If he had studied the literature of Kannada --  
which I suspect was his real native language -- his Sanskrit would  
certainly have been much better.  George Hart

On Aug 11, 2008, at 12:47 AM, veeranarayana Pandurangi wrote:

> dear friends,
> welcome to such new studies.
> but is is difficult for a naiyayika to imagine ritual transformation  
> of
> household in the context of modern sanskrit revivalism. Since I know
> personally many sanskrit families here, it is nothing but some kind of
> national revivalism.
> thanks
> veeranarayana
>
> On Fri, Aug 8, 2008 at 10:01 PM, Dominik Wujastyk  
> <ucgadkw at ucl.ac.uk> wrote:
>
>>
>> There's an interesting set of reflections on the topic here:
>>
>> Journal of Linguistic Anthropology
>> June 2008, Vol. 18, No. 1, pp. 24-45
>> Posted online on July 28, 2008.
>> (doi:10.1111/j.1548-1395.2008.00002.x)
>>
>> Licked by the Mother Tongue: Imagining Everyday Sanskrit at Home  
>> and in the
>> World
>> by Adi Hastings
>>
>> Abstract:
>> This paper examines the ways in which Sanskrit revivalists in  
>> contemporary
>> India imagine social contexts for the production and reproduction of
>> Sanskrit speech. In contrast to the received view of Sanskrit as  
>> being a
>> ritual language par excellence, opposed at every step to the  
>> domestic sphere
>> and everyday life, Sanskrit revivalists treat Sanskrit as a "mother  
>> tongue,"
>> figuring the home as the primary site for the creation of an  
>> "everyday
>> Sanskrit" world and the mother as the primary agent of this process  
>> of
>> Sanskritizing the domestic sphere. "Domesticating Sanskrit," the  
>> process of
>> bringing the elevated ritual language down into everyday life, at  
>> the very
>> same time "Sanskritizes the domestic," that is, ritually transforms  
>> or
>> elevates the home into a "Sanskrit home." Moving outward from the
>> Sanskritized domestic sphere, activists also imagine other contexts  
>> in which
>> one could use Sanskrit, which nonetheless conforms to a notion of a  
>> Sanskrit
>> interiority or domesticity.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Dr Dominik Wujastyk
>> Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
>> University College London
>>
>>
>
>
> -- 
> Veeranarayana N.K. Pandurangi
> Head, Dept of Darshanas,
> Yoganandacharya Bhavan,
> Jagadguru Ramanandacharya Rajasthan Samskrita University, Madau, post
> Bhankrota, Jaipur, 302026.




From glhart at BERKELEY.EDU  Mon Aug 11 14:42:29 2008
From: glhart at BERKELEY.EDU (George Hart)
Date: Mon, 11 Aug 08 07:42:29 -0700
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <EF3838B287B79D47AF84D86AE402C7AD3FBCF3@email.colmex.mx>
Message-ID: <161227083174.23782.6168847015898403237.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Rasik Joshi Tripathi,

I myself spoke Sanskrit for a year with pandits from the Sanskrit  
Sanskrit college -- I made sure none of them knew English.  I became  
pretty fluent, and was intrigued to discover that my wife, who is  
Tamil and has studied Tamil literature thoroughly, could understand us  
after a time.  Colloquial Tamil contains thousands of Sanskrit words,  
though of course high Tamil uses pure Dravidian equivalents (e.g.  
tuuymai for suddam < suddha).  Sanskrit syntax has been deeply  
influenced by Dravidian -- and this is even more true of spoken  
Sanskrit (bhavaan aagamisyati vaa, where the vaa replicates the  
Dravidian interrogative -aa).  This no doubt made it easier for her to  
understand.  The Sanskrit used by the pandits had, in my estimation,  
very little in common with the language of the person from the  
Sanskrit village.  They used the language sensitively, creatively, and  
with a full knowledge of all its forms.  I remember once being taken  
to task for using too many bhaave constructions, a convenient  
workaround that, of course, enables one to avoid remembering all the  
various verb conjugations.  It is certainly true that there are many  
like yourself who are well-versed in Sanskrit even today.  A Tamil  
gentleman living in the Bay Area recently presented me with a  
composition -- quite well done -- he had written in Sanskrit on the  
Titanic.  He had truly mastered the language.  George Hart

On Aug 11, 2008, at 7:27 AM, Rasik Vihari Joshi Tripathi wrote:

> Dear Hart,
> Do you know that there are fourteen Sanskrit Vidyapeetha in India, and
> six Sanskrit universities in Varanasi,Tirupati, Delhi,Jaipur etc.   
> where
> sanskrit is the media of teaching and all Professors and students  
> speak
> Sanskrit. My mother toung was Sanskrit. My father Pandit Rampratap
> Shastri was Professor and Head of the Departrment of Sanskrit at the
> Nagpur university and I learnt Sanskrit with him as a  child and  
> then at
> Varanasi I studied upto Shastri degree. I took my first Ph.D. in India
> and second at Sorbonne.I have  composed and published 15 Sanskrit  
> Kavyas
> I still speak Sanskrit fluently. My latest Sanskrit Kavya is Satyam
> Universl Truth). I wonder if you have met any Professor or student of
> these institutions? With best regards,
> Rasik Vihari Joshi
>
>
> -----Mensaje original-----
> De: Indology [mailto:INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk] En nombre de George  
> Hart
> Enviado el: Lunes, 11 de Agosto de 2008 09:07 a.m.
> Para: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
> Asunto: Re: Spoken Sanskrit
>
>
> I myself once encountered someone from Karnataka who lived in the
> village where "Sanskrit" is spoken.  It was a dumbed-down language not
> much resembling (in my opinion) the eloquent tongue used by Kalidasa
> and Sankara -- or even the epics.  It dispenses with such frills as
> the dual and many verb forms.  I asked him if he had read Sanskrit
> literature -- poetry, darsana, whatever.  He seemed nonplussed by the
> question -- he spoke Sanskrit; why should he read Kalidasa?  I felt he
> was entirely ignorant of the intellectual grandeur and scope of the
> language and spoke it (or his version of it) merely to make a
> statement.  I would remark parenthetically that the use of Sanskrit in
> a Malayalam historical novel I once read -- including 3-line Sanskrit
> compounds -- was far more sophisticated than this "Sanskrit" speaker
> could have managed.  If he had studied the literature of Kannada --
> which I suspect was his real native language -- his Sanskrit would
> certainly have been much better.  George Hart
>
> On Aug 11, 2008, at 12:47 AM, veeranarayana Pandurangi wrote:
>
>> dear friends,
>> welcome to such new studies.
>> but is is difficult for a naiyayika to imagine ritual transformation
>> of
>> household in the context of modern sanskrit revivalism. Since I know
>> personally many sanskrit families here, it is nothing but some kind  
>> of
>> national revivalism.
>> thanks
>> veeranarayana
>>
>> On Fri, Aug 8, 2008 at 10:01 PM, Dominik Wujastyk
>> <ucgadkw at ucl.ac.uk> wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> There's an interesting set of reflections on the topic here:
>>>
>>> Journal of Linguistic Anthropology
>>> June 2008, Vol. 18, No. 1, pp. 24-45
>>> Posted online on July 28, 2008.
>>> (doi:10.1111/j.1548-1395.2008.00002.x)
>>>
>>> Licked by the Mother Tongue: Imagining Everyday Sanskrit at Home
>>> and in the
>>> World
>>> by Adi Hastings
>>>
>>> Abstract:
>>> This paper examines the ways in which Sanskrit revivalists in
>>> contemporary
>>> India imagine social contexts for the production and reproduction of
>>> Sanskrit speech. In contrast to the received view of Sanskrit as
>>> being a
>>> ritual language par excellence, opposed at every step to the
>>> domestic sphere
>>> and everyday life, Sanskrit revivalists treat Sanskrit as a "mother
>>> tongue,"
>>> figuring the home as the primary site for the creation of an
>>> "everyday
>>> Sanskrit" world and the mother as the primary agent of this process
>>> of
>>> Sanskritizing the domestic sphere. "Domesticating Sanskrit," the
>>> process of
>>> bringing the elevated ritual language down into everyday life, at
>>> the very
>>> same time "Sanskritizes the domestic," that is, ritually transforms
>>> or
>>> elevates the home into a "Sanskrit home." Moving outward from the
>>> Sanskritized domestic sphere, activists also imagine other contexts
>>> in which
>>> one could use Sanskrit, which nonetheless conforms to a notion of a
>>> Sanskrit
>>> interiority or domesticity.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Dr Dominik Wujastyk
>>> Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
>>> University College London
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Veeranarayana N.K. Pandurangi
>> Head, Dept of Darshanas,
>> Yoganandacharya Bhavan,
>> Jagadguru Ramanandacharya Rajasthan Samskrita University, Madau, post
>> Bhankrota, Jaipur, 302026.




From jrasik at COLMEX.MX  Mon Aug 11 14:27:02 2008
From: jrasik at COLMEX.MX (Rasik Vihari Joshi Tripathi)
Date: Mon, 11 Aug 08 09:27:02 -0500
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit
Message-ID: <161227083172.23782.6049844765649184292.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Hart,
Do you know that there are fourteen Sanskrit Vidyapeetha in India, and
six Sanskrit universities in Varanasi,Tirupati, Delhi,Jaipur etc.  where
sanskrit is the media of teaching and all Professors and students speak
Sanskrit. My mother toung was Sanskrit. My father Pandit Rampratap
Shastri was Professor and Head of the Departrment of Sanskrit at the
Nagpur university and I learnt Sanskrit with him as a  child and then at
Varanasi I studied upto Shastri degree. I took my first Ph.D. in India
and second at Sorbonne.I have  composed and published 15 Sanskrit Kavyas
I still speak Sanskrit fluently. My latest Sanskrit Kavya is Satyam
Universl Truth). I wonder if you have met any Professor or student of
these institutions? With best regards,
Rasik Vihari Joshi


-----Mensaje original-----
De: Indology [mailto:INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk] En nombre de George Hart
Enviado el: Lunes, 11 de Agosto de 2008 09:07 a.m.
Para: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
Asunto: Re: Spoken Sanskrit


I myself once encountered someone from Karnataka who lived in the  
village where "Sanskrit" is spoken.  It was a dumbed-down language not  
much resembling (in my opinion) the eloquent tongue used by Kalidasa  
and Sankara -- or even the epics.  It dispenses with such frills as  
the dual and many verb forms.  I asked him if he had read Sanskrit  
literature -- poetry, darsana, whatever.  He seemed nonplussed by the  
question -- he spoke Sanskrit; why should he read Kalidasa?  I felt he  
was entirely ignorant of the intellectual grandeur and scope of the  
language and spoke it (or his version of it) merely to make a  
statement.  I would remark parenthetically that the use of Sanskrit in  
a Malayalam historical novel I once read -- including 3-line Sanskrit  
compounds -- was far more sophisticated than this "Sanskrit" speaker  
could have managed.  If he had studied the literature of Kannada --  
which I suspect was his real native language -- his Sanskrit would  
certainly have been much better.  George Hart

On Aug 11, 2008, at 12:47 AM, veeranarayana Pandurangi wrote:

> dear friends,
> welcome to such new studies.
> but is is difficult for a naiyayika to imagine ritual transformation
> of
> household in the context of modern sanskrit revivalism. Since I know
> personally many sanskrit families here, it is nothing but some kind of
> national revivalism.
> thanks
> veeranarayana
>
> On Fri, Aug 8, 2008 at 10:01 PM, Dominik Wujastyk
> <ucgadkw at ucl.ac.uk> wrote:
>
>>
>> There's an interesting set of reflections on the topic here:
>>
>> Journal of Linguistic Anthropology
>> June 2008, Vol. 18, No. 1, pp. 24-45
>> Posted online on July 28, 2008.
>> (doi:10.1111/j.1548-1395.2008.00002.x)
>>
>> Licked by the Mother Tongue: Imagining Everyday Sanskrit at Home
>> and in the
>> World
>> by Adi Hastings
>>
>> Abstract:
>> This paper examines the ways in which Sanskrit revivalists in
>> contemporary
>> India imagine social contexts for the production and reproduction of
>> Sanskrit speech. In contrast to the received view of Sanskrit as  
>> being a
>> ritual language par excellence, opposed at every step to the  
>> domestic sphere
>> and everyday life, Sanskrit revivalists treat Sanskrit as a "mother  
>> tongue,"
>> figuring the home as the primary site for the creation of an  
>> "everyday
>> Sanskrit" world and the mother as the primary agent of this process  
>> of
>> Sanskritizing the domestic sphere. "Domesticating Sanskrit," the  
>> process of
>> bringing the elevated ritual language down into everyday life, at  
>> the very
>> same time "Sanskritizes the domestic," that is, ritually transforms  
>> or
>> elevates the home into a "Sanskrit home." Moving outward from the
>> Sanskritized domestic sphere, activists also imagine other contexts  
>> in which
>> one could use Sanskrit, which nonetheless conforms to a notion of a  
>> Sanskrit
>> interiority or domesticity.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Dr Dominik Wujastyk
>> Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
>> University College London
>>
>>
>
>
> --
> Veeranarayana N.K. Pandurangi
> Head, Dept of Darshanas,
> Yoganandacharya Bhavan,
> Jagadguru Ramanandacharya Rajasthan Samskrita University, Madau, post
> Bhankrota, Jaipur, 302026.




From klaus.karttunen at HELSINKI.FI  Mon Aug 11 07:38:08 2008
From: klaus.karttunen at HELSINKI.FI (Klaus Karttunen)
Date: Mon, 11 Aug 08 10:38:08 +0300
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <alpine.WNT.1.10.0808081728260.3308@Caraka>
Message-ID: <161227083166.23782.3151289590387830010.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear colleagues,
H. H. Hock studied spoken Sanskrit in the 1980s in U.P., in Lucknow  
and Varanasi, if I remember right. See his article  ?Spoken Sanskrit  
in Uttar Pradesh ? a sociolinguistic profile?, Journal of  
Orientology. Lokapraj?? vol. 2. Prof. N. S. R?m?nuja T?t?c?rya  
Felicitation Volume. Puri 1988, 1?24. There has been a small  
percentage of people giving Sanskrit as their language in every  
census, but often it seems to be "father tongue" rather than "mother  
tongue".
Regards,
Klaus

Klaus Karttunen, Ph.D.
Professor of South Asian and Indoeuropean Studies
Institute for Asian and African Studies
PL 59 (Unioninkatu 38 B)
00014 University of Helsinki, FINLAND

Tel +358-(0)9-191 22674
  Fax +358-(0)9-191 22094
  Email Klaus.Karttunen at helsinki.fi

On Aug 8, 2008, at 7:31 PM, Dominik Wujastyk wrote:

>
> There's an interesting set of reflections on the topic here:
>
> Journal of Linguistic Anthropology
> June 2008, Vol. 18, No. 1, pp. 24-45
> Posted online on July 28, 2008.
> (doi:10.1111/j.1548-1395.2008.00002.x)
>
> Licked by the Mother Tongue: Imagining Everyday Sanskrit at Home  
> and in the World
> by Adi Hastings
>
> Abstract:
> This paper examines the ways in which Sanskrit revivalists in  
> contemporary India imagine social contexts for the production and  
> reproduction of Sanskrit speech. In contrast to the received view  
> of Sanskrit as being a ritual language par excellence, opposed at  
> every step to the domestic sphere and everyday life, Sanskrit  
> revivalists treat Sanskrit as a ?mother tongue,? figuring the  
> home as the primary site for the creation of an ?everyday  
> Sanskrit? world and the mother as the primary agent of this  
> process of Sanskritizing the domestic sphere. ?Domesticating  
> Sanskrit,? the process of bringing the elevated ritual language  
> down into everyday life, at the very same time ?Sanskritizes the  
> domestic,? that is, ritually transforms or elevates the home into  
> a ?Sanskrit home.? Moving outward from the Sanskritized domestic  
> sphere, activists also imagine other contexts in which one could  
> use Sanskrit, which nonetheless conforms to a notion of a Sanskrit  
> interiority or domesticity.
>
>
>
>
> -- 
> Dr Dominik Wujastyk
> Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
> University College London
>




From jrasik at COLMEX.MX  Mon Aug 11 16:11:17 2008
From: jrasik at COLMEX.MX (Rasik Vihari Joshi Tripathi)
Date: Mon, 11 Aug 08 11:11:17 -0500
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit
Message-ID: <161227083176.23782.4807247549808761561.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Hart,
I am very glad to know that you are also a fluent Sanskrit and Tamil
speaker.yes.There in much similarity with dravidian. If you would be
interested I will send you my Sanskrit Kavya "Satyam". If yes, l. send
me your mailing address.With best regards,
Rasik Vihari Joshi 

-----Mensaje original-----
De: Indology [mailto:INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk] En nombre de George Hart
Enviado el: Lunes, 11 de Agosto de 2008 09:42 a.m.
Para: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
Asunto: Re: Spoken Sanskrit


Dear Rasik Joshi Tripathi,

I myself spoke Sanskrit for a year with pandits from the Sanskrit  
Sanskrit college -- I made sure none of them knew English.  I became  
pretty fluent, and was intrigued to discover that my wife, who is  
Tamil and has studied Tamil literature thoroughly, could understand us  
after a time.  Colloquial Tamil contains thousands of Sanskrit words,  
though of course high Tamil uses pure Dravidian equivalents (e.g.  
tuuymai for suddam < suddha).  Sanskrit syntax has been deeply  
influenced by Dravidian -- and this is even more true of spoken  
Sanskrit (bhavaan aagamisyati vaa, where the vaa replicates the  
Dravidian interrogative -aa).  This no doubt made it easier for her to  
understand.  The Sanskrit used by the pandits had, in my estimation,  
very little in common with the language of the person from the  
Sanskrit village.  They used the language sensitively, creatively, and  
with a full knowledge of all its forms.  I remember once being taken  
to task for using too many bhaave constructions, a convenient  
workaround that, of course, enables one to avoid remembering all the  
various verb conjugations.  It is certainly true that there are many  
like yourself who are well-versed in Sanskrit even today.  A Tamil  
gentleman living in the Bay Area recently presented me with a  
composition -- quite well done -- he had written in Sanskrit on the  
Titanic.  He had truly mastered the language.  George Hart

On Aug 11, 2008, at 7:27 AM, Rasik Vihari Joshi Tripathi wrote:

> Dear Hart,
> Do you know that there are fourteen Sanskrit Vidyapeetha in India, and
> six Sanskrit universities in Varanasi,Tirupati, Delhi,Jaipur etc.   
> where
> sanskrit is the media of teaching and all Professors and students
> speak
> Sanskrit. My mother toung was Sanskrit. My father Pandit Rampratap
> Shastri was Professor and Head of the Departrment of Sanskrit at the
> Nagpur university and I learnt Sanskrit with him as a  child and  
> then at
> Varanasi I studied upto Shastri degree. I took my first Ph.D. in India
> and second at Sorbonne.I have  composed and published 15 Sanskrit  
> Kavyas
> I still speak Sanskrit fluently. My latest Sanskrit Kavya is Satyam
> Universl Truth). I wonder if you have met any Professor or student of
> these institutions? With best regards,
> Rasik Vihari Joshi
>
>
> -----Mensaje original-----
> De: Indology [mailto:INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk] En nombre de George  
> Hart
> Enviado el: Lunes, 11 de Agosto de 2008 09:07 a.m.
> Para: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
> Asunto: Re: Spoken Sanskrit
>
>
> I myself once encountered someone from Karnataka who lived in the
> village where "Sanskrit" is spoken.  It was a dumbed-down language not
> much resembling (in my opinion) the eloquent tongue used by Kalidasa
> and Sankara -- or even the epics.  It dispenses with such frills as
> the dual and many verb forms.  I asked him if he had read Sanskrit
> literature -- poetry, darsana, whatever.  He seemed nonplussed by the
> question -- he spoke Sanskrit; why should he read Kalidasa?  I felt he
> was entirely ignorant of the intellectual grandeur and scope of the
> language and spoke it (or his version of it) merely to make a
> statement.  I would remark parenthetically that the use of Sanskrit in
> a Malayalam historical novel I once read -- including 3-line Sanskrit
> compounds -- was far more sophisticated than this "Sanskrit" speaker
> could have managed.  If he had studied the literature of Kannada --
> which I suspect was his real native language -- his Sanskrit would
> certainly have been much better.  George Hart
>
> On Aug 11, 2008, at 12:47 AM, veeranarayana Pandurangi wrote:
>
>> dear friends,
>> welcome to such new studies.
>> but is is difficult for a naiyayika to imagine ritual transformation
>> of
>> household in the context of modern sanskrit revivalism. Since I know
>> personally many sanskrit families here, it is nothing but some kind  
>> of
>> national revivalism.
>> thanks
>> veeranarayana
>>
>> On Fri, Aug 8, 2008 at 10:01 PM, Dominik Wujastyk
>> <ucgadkw at ucl.ac.uk> wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> There's an interesting set of reflections on the topic here:
>>>
>>> Journal of Linguistic Anthropology
>>> June 2008, Vol. 18, No. 1, pp. 24-45
>>> Posted online on July 28, 2008.
>>> (doi:10.1111/j.1548-1395.2008.00002.x)
>>>
>>> Licked by the Mother Tongue: Imagining Everyday Sanskrit at Home
>>> and in the
>>> World
>>> by Adi Hastings
>>>
>>> Abstract:
>>> This paper examines the ways in which Sanskrit revivalists in
>>> contemporary
>>> India imagine social contexts for the production and reproduction of
>>> Sanskrit speech. In contrast to the received view of Sanskrit as
>>> being a
>>> ritual language par excellence, opposed at every step to the
>>> domestic sphere
>>> and everyday life, Sanskrit revivalists treat Sanskrit as a "mother
>>> tongue,"
>>> figuring the home as the primary site for the creation of an
>>> "everyday
>>> Sanskrit" world and the mother as the primary agent of this process
>>> of
>>> Sanskritizing the domestic sphere. "Domesticating Sanskrit," the
>>> process of
>>> bringing the elevated ritual language down into everyday life, at
>>> the very
>>> same time "Sanskritizes the domestic," that is, ritually transforms
>>> or
>>> elevates the home into a "Sanskrit home." Moving outward from the
>>> Sanskritized domestic sphere, activists also imagine other contexts
>>> in which
>>> one could use Sanskrit, which nonetheless conforms to a notion of a
>>> Sanskrit
>>> interiority or domesticity.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Dr Dominik Wujastyk
>>> Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
>>> University College London
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Veeranarayana N.K. Pandurangi
>> Head, Dept of Darshanas,
>> Yoganandacharya Bhavan,
>> Jagadguru Ramanandacharya Rajasthan Samskrita University, Madau, post
>> Bhankrota, Jaipur, 302026.




From veerankp at GMAIL.COM  Mon Aug 11 07:47:37 2008
From: veerankp at GMAIL.COM (veeranarayana Pandurangi)
Date: Mon, 11 Aug 08 13:17:37 +0530
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <alpine.WNT.1.10.0808081728260.3308@Caraka>
Message-ID: <161227083168.23782.17647470284874426616.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

dear friends,
welcome to such new studies.
but is is difficult for a naiyayika to imagine ritual transformation of
household in the context of modern sanskrit revivalism. Since I know
personally many sanskrit families here, it is nothing but some kind of
national revivalism.
thanks
veeranarayana

On Fri, Aug 8, 2008 at 10:01 PM, Dominik Wujastyk <ucgadkw at ucl.ac.uk> wrote:

>
> There's an interesting set of reflections on the topic here:
>
> Journal of Linguistic Anthropology
> June 2008, Vol. 18, No. 1, pp. 24-45
> Posted online on July 28, 2008.
> (doi:10.1111/j.1548-1395.2008.00002.x)
>
> Licked by the Mother Tongue: Imagining Everyday Sanskrit at Home and in the
> World
> by Adi Hastings
>
> Abstract:
> This paper examines the ways in which Sanskrit revivalists in contemporary
> India imagine social contexts for the production and reproduction of
> Sanskrit speech. In contrast to the received view of Sanskrit as being a
> ritual language par excellence, opposed at every step to the domestic sphere
> and everyday life, Sanskrit revivalists treat Sanskrit as a "mother tongue,"
> figuring the home as the primary site for the creation of an "everyday
> Sanskrit" world and the mother as the primary agent of this process of
> Sanskritizing the domestic sphere. "Domesticating Sanskrit," the process of
> bringing the elevated ritual language down into everyday life, at the very
> same time "Sanskritizes the domestic," that is, ritually transforms or
> elevates the home into a "Sanskrit home." Moving outward from the
> Sanskritized domestic sphere, activists also imagine other contexts in which
> one could use Sanskrit, which nonetheless conforms to a notion of a Sanskrit
> interiority or domesticity.
>
>
>
>
> --
> Dr Dominik Wujastyk
> Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
> University College London
>
>


-- 
Veeranarayana N.K. Pandurangi
Head, Dept of Darshanas,
Yoganandacharya Bhavan,
Jagadguru Ramanandacharya Rajasthan Samskrita University, Madau, post
Bhankrota, Jaipur, 302026.




From christophe.vielle at UCLOUVAIN.BE  Tue Aug 12 14:08:09 2008
From: christophe.vielle at UCLOUVAIN.BE (Christophe Vielle)
Date: Tue, 12 Aug 08 16:08:09 +0200
Subject: Electronic version of Mani's Puranic Encyclopaedia
Message-ID: <161227083178.23782.10316791777404208072.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Colleagues,

on the NITAAI Veda web-site ("The comprehensive Vedic knowledge 
Base", "compiled by devotees of lords Nityananda Gauranga"), there is 
a nearly complete electronic input (without diacritics, and many 
misprints) of the English version of Ve.t.tam Maa.ni's Puranic 
Encyclopaedia (originally published in Malayaa.lam). See
http://nitaaiveda.com/All_Scriptures_By_Acharyas/Puranas/Puranic_Encyclopedia/

With best wishes,
Christophe Vielle

-- 

http://belgianindology.lalibreblogs.be




From ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA  Wed Aug 13 07:49:54 2008
From: ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA (Stella Sandahl)
Date: Wed, 13 Aug 08 03:49:54 -0400
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit and Spoken Sanskrit
Message-ID: <161227083183.23782.9438166417341025163.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

In the current debate about "spoken Sanskrit" I believe we are  
talking about two different things. It is one thing when for example  
a Bengali pandit speaks to Telugu pandit in Sanskrit in order to  
debate finer points in a text, or a philosophical issue, a literary  
allusion and so forth. Sanskrit is then their common language, a  
language of learning, of elegance and wit. And this is quite wonderful.

It is an entirely different matter to try to revive and 'modernize'  
Sanskrit. Lying on a table in our university library I found a  
typical example of the latter. There were new-fangled "Sanskrit"  
words for money order, check-out counter, bus station, bank draft -  
as if one finds these things in classical Sanskrit texts! These  
manuals are quite ridiculous: I found a sentence like ahaM  
sevaphalAni khAdAmi which was supposed to mean 'I eat apples'. First,  
as far as I know there were no apples in classical India (weren't  
they brought in by Babur?), second the word seva is obviously modeled  
on Hindi seb 'apple' from the Persian sib with the same meaning. This  
is exactly in line with the examples given by Professor Nair: "adya  
kati iddali bhakshitam?" "adya chayam piitam kim?", equally  
ridiculous.  My niece in Delhi once asked to help her with her  
Sanskrit homework. She had to translate the sentence "Kings live in  
palaces" into Sanskrit. The word given by the teacher for palace was  
'mahala' !!!  I tried to convince the little girl that there was no  
such word in Sanskrit. In vain. The girl said :"teacher says it is  
mahala", and that was what it had to be.

It is very sad to se how the ignorant Hindutva forces demean and make  
the wonderful classical language into something trivial and  
ridiculous. How do we stop them?
How can we rescue Sanskrit from these vandals? I doubt that the  
sevaphalAni-eating student in his mahala can read and understand even  
one line by Kalidasa or Bana or Jayadeva.
But he can cut the throat of those who cannot speak his so called  
Sanskrit. When he is not busy demolishing mosques and raping nuns.

Stella Sandahl


--
Professor Stella Sandahl
Department of East Asian Studies
130 St. George St. room 14087
Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
ssandahl at sympatico.ca
stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
Tel. (416) 978-4295
Fax. (416) 978-5711




From glhart at BERKELEY.EDU  Wed Aug 13 14:27:43 2008
From: glhart at BERKELEY.EDU (George Hart)
Date: Wed, 13 Aug 08 07:27:43 -0700
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit and Spoken Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <0CA4AC63-7635-4390-81BE-4B28821AEE0E@ocf.berkeley.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083193.23782.7127205309317423436.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Years ago, the late highly learned Sanskrit scholar Dr. Janaki stayed  
at our house.  She showed me a column she had written in Sanskrit  
about the McEnroe - Borg tennis competition.  Her command of the  
language was awesome -- she was capable to expressing just about  
anything, using the full resources of the language.  I still remember  
getting up one morning about 6:00 and encountering a bright-eyed  
Janaki chattering away in fluent (and extremely rapid) Sanskrit, and  
struggling with little success to process what she said in my still  
numbed state.  The problem, I feel, with the kind of spoken Sanskrit  
we're talking about is not that it borrows Hindi words or Tamil  
syntax.  As Adheesh says, Sanskrit has been borrowing or innovating  
since the beginning (many of its most common words are Dravidian).   
The problem is that spoken "Sanskrit" is incapable of expressing a  
complex thought -- "How many Idlis did you eat today" is not exactly a  
profound idea.  Real languages are highly complex because they need to  
be used to express complex ideas.  Sanskrit is no exception.  As Prof.  
Nair notes, languages such as Malayalam can make use of the entire  
Sanskrit vocabulary to express thoughts that are extremely complicated  
(one might also remark that Malayalam, which was a dialect of Tamil  
1000 years ago, also retains a huge inherited Dravidian vocabulary).    
If one goes to a village and encounters the (rare) illiterate  
Malayali, one would discover that while that person might not know all  
the Sanskrit words used in a scholarly essay, he or she can still use  
the language for expressing quite complicated ideas.  Sadly, neo- 
Sanskrit seems incapable of being used this way.  It is a consciously  
dumbed-down language that eschews its own grand tradition.  If people  
enjoy learning it in a rudimentary way to express simple things,  
obviously there's nothing wrong with that.  The problem as I see it  
lies in the fact that these "Sanskrit" speakers often think that just  
because they use the language in a rudimentary way, they are somehow  
connecting with the great intellectual tradition that the language  
contains.  Or, worse, that they are embodiments of some "Hindu-ness"  
that is inherent in the language.  Their rudimentary use of the  
language fosters a kind of arrogance and sense of superiority that is  
unwarranted.  I remember reading the Rasagangadhara with Pandit  
Seshadrinathan and remarking on the breathtaking boldness of the  
beginning verses.  When I suggested that Jagannatha seemed a bit  
arrogant and overbearing, Seshadrinathan remarked "sthaane."  Yes, if  
someone knows Sanskrit 5% as well as Jagannatha, then he or she is  
entitled to be proud.  Saying "How many idlis did you eat today?" in  
neo-Sanskrit may be fun, but it's hardly grounds for the sort of  
overweening pride that such speakers often seem to project.

George Hart


On Aug 13, 2008, at 3:33 AM, adheesh sathaye wrote:

> Dear Profs. Hart, Nair, and Sandahl, and colleagues,
>
> With all due respect, I find it hard to accept that the construction  
> of neologisms like 'seva-phala', 'iDDali' or even misuses like  
> 'mahAla' are in any way indicative of 'ignorant Hindutva forces'. It  
> is not at all uncommon  to see vernacular words or forms used within  
> medieval Sanskrit manuscripts, and particularly when the concept  
> does not occur in classical Sanskrit. Certain MSS of zivadAsa's or  
> jambhaladatta's vetAla-paJcaviMzati, for example, appear to be  
> replete with north Indian vernacular 'loan-words' and shoddy, Hindi-  
> or Marathi-based grammatical forms. This is  just the tip of the  
> iceberg. Moreover, contemporary spoken Sanskrit is quite obviously  
> and self-consciously a simplification of classical Sanskrit, and  
> this has been done in order for the language to be more accessible  
> and appealing to young, twenty-first century students, who WOULD  
> like to express their thoughts about riding the bus, eating apples,  
> using computers, and other modern-day activities. It's actually  
> quite a fun thing to do.
>
> One must, it is true, engage in this linguistic practice knowing  
> full well that what one is speaking is a hybridized and simplified  
> form of the classical parole, and this I think is where some of the  
> Hindu nationalist ideological projects are indeed harmful, as Prof.  
> Nair points out, in representing spoken Sanskrit to the Indian  
> public as being both authentic and Hindu. What's most disturbing to  
> me about the Hindu spoken Sanskrit movement is not how the language  
> is treated, but how many textbooks attempt to naturalize (and  
> nationalize) upper-caste, puritanical Hindu practices through  
> language teaching.
>
> On the other hand, may I respectfully suggest that the idea that the  
> ancientness of Sanskrit somehow debilitates this language from  
> accepting neologisms, or makes it useless for expressing modern  
> ideas, itself might be construed as an act of intellectual violence  
> on par with 'cutting throats', 'demolishing mosques', or 'raping  
> nuns'? Clearly, as scholars of classical Sanskrit, we have an  
> obligation to continue to teach students how to read and understand  
> kAlidAsa, bANa, or perhaps even the magisterial ZrIharSa--but can  
> this teaching not occur side-by-side with an acceptance of a  
> consciously different register of the Sanskrit language, albeit  
> contrived and manufactured, for contemporary, everyday usage?  
> Perhaps the latter might serve as a kind of gateway for the former?
>
> with best regards,
>
> Adheesh
> --
> Dr. Adheesh Sathaye
> Department of Asian Studies
> University of British Columbia
> 408 Asian Centre
> 1871 West Mall
> Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z2
> 604.822.5188
> adheesh at interchange.ubc.ca
>
>
>
> On Aug 13, 2008, at 8:49 , Stella Sandahl wrote:
>
>>
>> It is very sad to se how the ignorant Hindutva forces demean and  
>> make the wonderful classical language into something trivial and  
>> ridiculous. How do we stop them?
>> How can we rescue Sanskrit from these vandals? I doubt that the  
>> sevaphalAni-eating student in his mahala can read and understand  
>> even one line by Kalidasa or Bana or Jayadeva.
>> But he can cut the throat of those who cannot speak his so called  
>> Sanskrit. When he is not busy demolishing mosques and raping nuns.
>>
>> Stella Sandahl
>>
>>
>> --
>> Professor Stella Sandahl
>> Department of East Asian Studies
>> 130 St. George St. room 14087
>> Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
>> ssandahl at sympatico.ca
>> stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
>> Tel. (416) 978-4295
>> Fax. (416) 978-5711
>>




From glhart at BERKELEY.EDU  Wed Aug 13 15:06:47 2008
From: glhart at BERKELEY.EDU (George Hart)
Date: Wed, 13 Aug 08 08:06:47 -0700
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit and Spoken Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <0CA4AC63-7635-4390-81BE-4B28821AEE0E@ocf.berkeley.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083196.23782.1035631072433655791.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Sorry for so many posts, but I think this may be useful to someone.

Years ago, when I was reading from Ramanuja's Sribhasya, I noticed  
that his usages often mirror the Sanskrit that is still spoken by the  
pandits in Chennai.  For example, the word "samiiciina" for "fine,"  
"good," "excellent" is used by that writer.  On the other hand,  
Sankara's Sanskrit does not seem to be connected with the Sanskrit I  
heard in Chennai -- its style and word usage is quite different.  This  
suggests that there is a continuous tradition of spoken Sanskrit that  
developed in Tamil Nadu 1000 years ago and still continues today.  The  
Sanskrit used in Kerala was probably rather different (something also  
suggested by my very superficial acquaintance with the Manipravala  
works of 4 or 500 years ago).  Certainly, in many parts of India and  
Nepal, Sanskrit has been used as a spoken language for a long time.   
It would seem that each area has developed its own style and word  
usage.  As we know, the pandits of one area often look down at the  
Sanskrit (esp. pronunciation) of pandits from other areas.

There is a wonderful sloka that can be used when teaching beginning  
Sanskrit -- but I have forgotten the details of the story that goes  
along with it.  Perhaps someone can recall it.  Someone, wanting to  
show off to Kalidasa how much Sanskrit he knew, said, "bhojanam dehi  
raajendra ghrtasuupasamanvitam."  Kalidasa is supposed to have replied  
"maahiSam ca zaraccandracandrikaadhavalam dadhi."  Of course, the  
first utterance is ungainly and awkward, while the second flows like  
moonlight.  The dhvani, according to my pandit, is that Kalidasa is  
implying that the would-be Sanskrit speaker is stupid and slow, as  
buffalo yogurt is supposed to dull the mind.

George Hart




From hhhock at EXPRESS.CITES.UIUC.EDU  Wed Aug 13 15:31:11 2008
From: hhhock at EXPRESS.CITES.UIUC.EDU (hhhock)
Date: Wed, 13 Aug 08 10:31:11 -0500
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit and Spoken Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <757E4EE5-0F32-4C11-AC7C-B50B7FF56CD9@berkeley.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083198.23782.6149718960873176378.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

The thread on spoken Sanskrit has been very interesting, and some  
points strike me as quite a propos. First, I don't see any problems  
with neologisms. Even if we ignore the sometimes controversial  
examples of supposed Dravidian borrowing in early Vedic and the much  
less controversial ones in later Vedic and post-Vedic (such as  
niira-), or the late borrowings from North Indian languages in late  
Sanskrit texts, there is evidence for borrowing at many other stages,  
and in many different spheres (consider e.g. (tri-)koNa, horaa and  
the like, from Greek). Moreover, if Sanskrit is to be used in a  
modern context, not only to discuss fine points of philosophy or  
grammar, it has to be modernized to make it possible to talk about  
trains, apples, and the like (and hybrids like relayaana strike me as  
much more felicitous than words such as agniratha(...)yaana). There  
is a problem, however, as far as the lexicon goes, namely the whole- 
scale importation of Sanskrit-derived Hindi, Marathi, etc. words into  
Sanskrit, with their modern meanings, rather than the use of  
established Sanskrit words (consider the use of aarambha instead of  
utsava in the Hindi-speaking area). While Sanskrit needs to be  
modernized, it does not need to be intellectualized, thank you; it  
always has been perfectly capable to deal with intellectual issues.

Second, I agree that the kind of spoken Sanskrit that is being  
propagated by Hindutva organizations is grammatically, lexically, and  
intellectually without merit, not far removed from a pidgin form of  
the language. The fact that it does not provide a useful entry to the  
full form of the language, as found in the philosophical, religious,  
and literary tradition of India (not to speak of the vast range of  
technical literature), supports the view that the motivation for this  
enterprise is not to connect modern Indians with their traditions but  
to give Hindus (or better: Hindutvavaadins) a false, manufactured  
sense of identity. (I should add that the founders of this movement,  
such as Krishna Shastri, had a much fuller grasp of the language and  
spoke it very well.)

Best wishes,

Hans


On 13 Aug 2008, at 9:27, George Hart wrote:

> Years ago, the late highly learned Sanskrit scholar Dr. Janaki  
> stayed at our house.  She showed me a column she had written in  
> Sanskrit about the McEnroe - Borg tennis competition.  Her command  
> of the language was awesome -- she was capable to expressing just  
> about anything, using the full resources of the language.  I still  
> remember getting up one morning about 6:00 and encountering a  
> bright-eyed Janaki chattering away in fluent (and extremely rapid)  
> Sanskrit, and struggling with little success to process what she  
> said in my still numbed state.  The problem, I feel, with the kind  
> of spoken Sanskrit we're talking about is not that it borrows Hindi  
> words or Tamil syntax.  As Adheesh says, Sanskrit has been  
> borrowing or innovating since the beginning (many of its most  
> common words are Dravidian).  The problem is that spoken "Sanskrit"  
> is incapable of expressing a complex thought -- "How many Idlis did  
> you eat today" is not exactly a profound idea.  Real languages are  
> highly complex because they need to be used to express complex  
> ideas.  Sanskrit is no exception.  As Prof. Nair notes, languages  
> such as Malayalam can make use of the entire Sanskrit vocabulary to  
> express thoughts that are extremely complicated (one might also  
> remark that Malayalam, which was a dialect of Tamil 1000 years ago,  
> also retains a huge inherited Dravidian vocabulary).   If one goes  
> to a village and encounters the (rare) illiterate Malayali, one  
> would discover that while that person might not know all the  
> Sanskrit words used in a scholarly essay, he or she can still use  
> the language for expressing quite complicated ideas.  Sadly, neo- 
> Sanskrit seems incapable of being used this way.  It is a  
> consciously dumbed-down language that eschews its own grand  
> tradition.  If people enjoy learning it in a rudimentary way to  
> express simple things, obviously there's nothing wrong with that.   
> The problem as I see it lies in the fact that these "Sanskrit"  
> speakers often think that just because they use the language in a  
> rudimentary way, they are somehow connecting with the great  
> intellectual tradition that the language contains.  Or, worse, that  
> they are embodiments of some "Hindu-ness" that is inherent in the  
> language.  Their rudimentary use of the language fosters a kind of  
> arrogance and sense of superiority that is unwarranted.  I remember  
> reading the Rasagangadhara with Pandit Seshadrinathan and remarking  
> on the breathtaking boldness of the beginning verses.  When I  
> suggested that Jagannatha seemed a bit arrogant and overbearing,  
> Seshadrinathan remarked "sthaane."  Yes, if someone knows Sanskrit  
> 5% as well as Jagannatha, then he or she is entitled to be proud.   
> Saying "How many idlis did you eat today?" in neo-Sanskrit may be  
> fun, but it's hardly grounds for the sort of overweening pride that  
> such speakers often seem to project.
>
> George Hart
>
>
> On Aug 13, 2008, at 3:33 AM, adheesh sathaye wrote:
>
>> Dear Profs. Hart, Nair, and Sandahl, and colleagues,
>>
>> With all due respect, I find it hard to accept that the  
>> construction of neologisms like 'seva-phala', 'iDDali' or even  
>> misuses like 'mahAla' are in any way indicative of 'ignorant  
>> Hindutva forces'. It is not at all uncommon  to see vernacular  
>> words or forms used within medieval Sanskrit manuscripts, and  
>> particularly when the concept does not occur in classical  
>> Sanskrit. Certain MSS of zivadAsa's or jambhaladatta's vetAla- 
>> paJcaviMzati, for example, appear to be replete with north Indian  
>> vernacular 'loan-words' and shoddy, Hindi- or Marathi-based  
>> grammatical forms. This is  just the tip of the iceberg. Moreover,  
>> contemporary spoken Sanskrit is quite obviously and self- 
>> consciously a simplification of classical Sanskrit, and this has  
>> been done in order for the language to be more accessible and  
>> appealing to young, twenty-first century students, who WOULD like  
>> to express their thoughts about riding the bus, eating apples,  
>> using computers, and other modern-day activities. It's actually  
>> quite a fun thing to do.
>>
>> One must, it is true, engage in this linguistic practice knowing  
>> full well that what one is speaking is a hybridized and simplified  
>> form of the classical parole, and this I think is where some of  
>> the Hindu nationalist ideological projects are indeed harmful, as  
>> Prof. Nair points out, in representing spoken Sanskrit to the  
>> Indian public as being both authentic and Hindu. What's most  
>> disturbing to me about the Hindu spoken Sanskrit movement is not  
>> how the language is treated, but how many textbooks attempt to  
>> naturalize (and nationalize) upper-caste, puritanical Hindu  
>> practices through language teaching.
>>
>> On the other hand, may I respectfully suggest that the idea that  
>> the ancientness of Sanskrit somehow debilitates this language from  
>> accepting neologisms, or makes it useless for expressing modern  
>> ideas, itself might be construed as an act of intellectual  
>> violence on par with 'cutting throats', 'demolishing mosques', or  
>> 'raping nuns'? Clearly, as scholars of classical Sanskrit, we have  
>> an obligation to continue to teach students how to read and  
>> understand kAlidAsa, bANa, or perhaps even the magisterial  
>> ZrIharSa--but can this teaching not occur side-by-side with an  
>> acceptance of a consciously different register of the Sanskrit  
>> language, albeit contrived and manufactured, for contemporary,  
>> everyday usage? Perhaps the latter might serve as a kind of  
>> gateway for the former?
>>
>> with best regards,
>>
>> Adheesh
>> --
>> Dr. Adheesh Sathaye
>> Department of Asian Studies
>> University of British Columbia
>> 408 Asian Centre
>> 1871 West Mall
>> Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z2
>> 604.822.5188
>> adheesh at interchange.ubc.ca
>>
>>
>>
>> On Aug 13, 2008, at 8:49 , Stella Sandahl wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> It is very sad to se how the ignorant Hindutva forces demean and  
>>> make the wonderful classical language into something trivial and  
>>> ridiculous. How do we stop them?
>>> How can we rescue Sanskrit from these vandals? I doubt that the  
>>> sevaphalAni-eating student in his mahala can read and understand  
>>> even one line by Kalidasa or Bana or Jayadeva.
>>> But he can cut the throat of those who cannot speak his so called  
>>> Sanskrit. When he is not busy demolishing mosques and raping nuns.
>>>
>>> Stella Sandahl
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Professor Stella Sandahl
>>> Department of East Asian Studies
>>> 130 St. George St. room 14087
>>> Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
>>> ssandahl at sympatico.ca
>>> stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
>>> Tel. (416) 978-4295
>>> Fax. (416) 978-5711
>>>




From phmaas at ARCOR.DE  Wed Aug 13 09:03:31 2008
From: phmaas at ARCOR.DE (Philipp Maas)
Date: Wed, 13 Aug 08 11:03:31 +0200
Subject: AW: Spoken Sanskrit and Spoken Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <BLU0-SMTP24A3DC1CAB48932C6A30EFBF730@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <161227083185.23782.17052128396271913397.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Prof. Sandahl,

I think that we should be careful not to be discriminatory against those who
use Sanskrit in a creative, modernist fashion. The use of Sanskrit as a
spoken language, whether as standard Sanskrit or as a vulgarized idiom, is
not per se a political statement and it does not per se reveal a tendency to
approve of or even to commit political violence. In spite of everything that
Sanskrit may symbolize, it remains a language that serves the purpose of
expressing thoughts. And the freedom of thought includes, of course, the
freedom to choose one's language.

With best regards,

Philipp Maas




> -----Ursprungliche Nachricht-----
> Von: Indology [mailto:INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk]Im Auftrag von Stella
> Sandahl
> Gesendet: Mittwoch, 13. August 2008 09:50
> An: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
> Betreff: Spoken Sanskrit and Spoken Sanskrit
>
>
> In the current debate about "spoken Sanskrit" I believe we are
> talking about two different things. It is one thing when for example
> a Bengali pandit speaks to Telugu pandit in Sanskrit in order to
> debate finer points in a text, or a philosophical issue, a literary
> allusion and so forth. Sanskrit is then their common language, a
> language of learning, of elegance and wit. And this is quite wonderful.
>
> It is an entirely different matter to try to revive and 'modernize'
> Sanskrit. Lying on a table in our university library I found a
> typical example of the latter. There were new-fangled "Sanskrit"
> words for money order, check-out counter, bus station, bank draft -
> as if one finds these things in classical Sanskrit texts! These
> manuals are quite ridiculous: I found a sentence like ahaM
> sevaphalAni khAdAmi which was supposed to mean 'I eat apples'. First,
> as far as I know there were no apples in classical India (weren't
> they brought in by Babur?), second the word seva is obviously modeled
> on Hindi seb 'apple' from the Persian sib with the same meaning. This
> is exactly in line with the examples given by Professor Nair: "adya
> kati iddali bhakshitam?" "adya chayam piitam kim?", equally
> ridiculous.  My niece in Delhi once asked to help her with her
> Sanskrit homework. She had to translate the sentence "Kings live in
> palaces" into Sanskrit. The word given by the teacher for palace was
> 'mahala' !!!  I tried to convince the little girl that there was no
> such word in Sanskrit. In vain. The girl said :"teacher says it is
> mahala", and that was what it had to be.
>
> It is very sad to se how the ignorant Hindutva forces demean and make
> the wonderful classical language into something trivial and
> ridiculous. How do we stop them?
> How can we rescue Sanskrit from these vandals? I doubt that the
> sevaphalAni-eating student in his mahala can read and understand even
> one line by Kalidasa or Bana or Jayadeva.
> But he can cut the throat of those who cannot speak his so called
> Sanskrit. When he is not busy demolishing mosques and raping nuns.
>
> Stella Sandahl
>
>
> --
> Professor Stella Sandahl
> Department of East Asian Studies
> 130 St. George St. room 14087
> Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
> ssandahl at sympatico.ca
> stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
> Tel. (416) 978-4295
> Fax. (416) 978-5711
>




From christophe.vielle at UCLOUVAIN.BE  Wed Aug 13 09:05:30 2008
From: christophe.vielle at UCLOUVAIN.BE (Christophe Vielle)
Date: Wed, 13 Aug 08 11:05:30 +0200
Subject: Good news about Sarasvati Mahal Library, Thanjavur
Message-ID: <161227083187.23782.18182217218558485682.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Look at:
http://www.hindu.com/2008/08/13/stories/2008081354670600.htm

(sad news about Amaravati sculptures in neglect in Madras Museum at:
http://www.hindu.com/2008/08/13/stories/2008081351130500.htm


With best wishes,
Christophe Vielle

-- 

http://belgianindology.lalibreblogs.be




From ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK  Wed Aug 13 10:07:01 2008
From: ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK (Dominik Wujastyk)
Date: Wed, 13 Aug 08 11:07:01 +0100
Subject: Electronic version of Mani's Puranic Encyclopaedia
In-Reply-To: <a06240808c4c7468d542f@[192.168.1.2]>
Message-ID: <161227083189.23782.12631219896521097147.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

The full text of this work has also been digitized (page images) and is 
available as a downloadable, non-searchable PDF.

http://www.archive.org/details/puranicencyclopa00maniuoft



-- 
Dr Dominik Wujastyk
Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
University College London



On Tue, 12 Aug 2008, Christophe Vielle wrote:

> Dear Colleagues,
>
> on the NITAAI Veda web-site ("The comprehensive Vedic knowledge Base", 
> "compiled by devotees of lords Nityananda Gauranga"), there is a nearly 
> complete electronic input (without diacritics, and many misprints) of the 
> English version of Ve.t.tam Maa.ni's Puranic Encyclopaedia (originally 
> published in Malayaa.lam). See
> http://nitaaiveda.com/All_Scriptures_By_Acharyas/Puranas/Puranic_Encyclopedia/
>
> With best wishes,
> Christophe Vielle
>
>




From adheesh at OCF.BERKELEY.EDU  Wed Aug 13 10:33:20 2008
From: adheesh at OCF.BERKELEY.EDU (adheesh sathaye)
Date: Wed, 13 Aug 08 11:33:20 +0100
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit and Spoken Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <BLU0-SMTP24A3DC1CAB48932C6A30EFBF730@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <161227083191.23782.12745221386670307026.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Profs. Hart, Nair, and Sandahl, and colleagues,

With all due respect, I find it hard to accept that the construction  
of neologisms like 'seva-phala', 'iDDali' or even misuses like  
'mahAla' are in any way indicative of 'ignorant Hindutva forces'. It  
is not at all uncommon  to see vernacular words or forms used within  
medieval Sanskrit manuscripts, and particularly when the concept does  
not occur in classical Sanskrit. Certain MSS of zivadAsa's or  
jambhaladatta's vetAla-paJcaviMzati, for example, appear to be  
replete with north Indian vernacular 'loan-words' and shoddy, Hindi-  
or Marathi-based grammatical forms. This is  just the tip of the  
iceberg. Moreover, contemporary spoken Sanskrit is quite obviously  
and self-consciously a simplification of classical Sanskrit, and this  
has been done in order for the language to be more accessible and  
appealing to young, twenty-first century students, who WOULD like to  
express their thoughts about riding the bus, eating apples, using  
computers, and other modern-day activities. It's actually quite a fun  
thing to do.

One must, it is true, engage in this linguistic practice knowing full  
well that what one is speaking is a hybridized and simplified form of  
the classical parole, and this I think is where some of the Hindu  
nationalist ideological projects are indeed harmful, as Prof. Nair  
points out, in representing spoken Sanskrit to the Indian public as  
being both authentic and Hindu. What's most disturbing to me about  
the Hindu spoken Sanskrit movement is not how the language is  
treated, but how many textbooks attempt to naturalize (and  
nationalize) upper-caste, puritanical Hindu practices through  
language teaching.

On the other hand, may I respectfully suggest that the idea that the  
ancientness of Sanskrit somehow debilitates this language from  
accepting neologisms, or makes it useless for expressing modern  
ideas, itself might be construed as an act of intellectual violence  
on par with 'cutting throats', 'demolishing mosques', or 'raping  
nuns'? Clearly, as scholars of classical Sanskrit, we have an  
obligation to continue to teach students how to read and understand  
kAlidAsa, bANa, or perhaps even the magisterial ZrIharSa--but can  
this teaching not occur side-by-side with an acceptance of a  
consciously different register of the Sanskrit language, albeit  
contrived and manufactured, for contemporary, everyday usage? Perhaps  
the latter might serve as a kind of gateway for the former?

with best regards,

Adheesh
--
Dr. Adheesh Sathaye
Department of Asian Studies
University of British Columbia
408 Asian Centre
1871 West Mall
Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z2
604.822.5188
adheesh at interchange.ubc.ca



On Aug 13, 2008, at 8:49 , Stella Sandahl wrote:

>
> It is very sad to se how the ignorant Hindutva forces demean and  
> make the wonderful classical language into something trivial and  
> ridiculous. How do we stop them?
> How can we rescue Sanskrit from these vandals? I doubt that the  
> sevaphalAni-eating student in his mahala can read and understand  
> even one line by Kalidasa or Bana or Jayadeva.
> But he can cut the throat of those who cannot speak his so called  
> Sanskrit. When he is not busy demolishing mosques and raping nuns.
>
> Stella Sandahl
>
>
> --
> Professor Stella Sandahl
> Department of East Asian Studies
> 130 St. George St. room 14087
> Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
> ssandahl at sympatico.ca
> stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
> Tel. (416) 978-4295
> Fax. (416) 978-5711
>




From swantam at ASIANETINDIA.COM  Wed Aug 13 06:42:17 2008
From: swantam at ASIANETINDIA.COM (Maheswaran Nair)
Date: Wed, 13 Aug 08 12:12:17 +0530
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <8D2D141A-D9FE-4EA5-B0B0-ADB53C1A0B7A@berkeley.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083180.23782.8197691578613420219.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Hello,

  In Malayalam, my native tongue, 60 to 70 percent words of the  
language of an educated Malayalee are Sanskrit. In many Indian  
languages the state of this affair will slightly change. Such people  
need not make Sanskrit their spoken language. There is hidden agenda  
behind popularising spoken Sanskrit. Hindu revivalists and  
communalists are popularising it. They have organizations for the  
same. At times of mass murders of people belonging to other religions  
there is need to distinguish them. "Interested parties" have plans to  
make Sanskrit the national language of India. A time may come when  
during purposely created communal riots, the question will be put  
"bhavaan samskrtam janaati kim?" Those who reply in the affirmative in  
Sanskrit will be spared and others will be butchered.
I am also fluent in Sanskrit and have evolved an easy  method for  
teaching Spoken Sanskrit, not the spoken Sanskrit popularised by the  
revivalists which is like "adya kati iddali bhakshitam?" "adya chayam  
piitam kim?".
Regards
K.Maheswaran Nair
Professor of Sanskrit
University of Kerala
India



Quoting George Hart <glhart at BERKELEY.EDU>:

> I myself once encountered someone from Karnataka who lived in the
> village where "Sanskrit" is spoken.  It was a dumbed-down language not
> much resembling (in my opinion) the eloquent tongue used by Kalidasa
> and Sankara -- or even the epics.  It dispenses with such frills as the
> dual and many verb forms.  I asked him if he had read Sanskrit
> literature -- poetry, darsana, whatever.  He seemed nonplussed by the
> question -- he spoke Sanskrit; why should he read Kalidasa?  I felt he
> was entirely ignorant of the intellectual grandeur and scope of the
> language and spoke it (or his version of it) merely to make a
> statement.  I would remark parenthetically that the use of Sanskrit in
> a Malayalam historical novel I once read -- including 3-line Sanskrit
> compounds -- was far more sophisticated than this "Sanskrit" speaker
> could have managed.  If he had studied the literature of Kannada --
> which I suspect was his real native language -- his Sanskrit would
> certainly have been much better.  George Hart
>
> On Aug 11, 2008, at 12:47 AM, veeranarayana Pandurangi wrote:
>
>> dear friends,
>> welcome to such new studies.
>> but is is difficult for a naiyayika to imagine ritual transformation of
>> household in the context of modern sanskrit revivalism. Since I know
>> personally many sanskrit families here, it is nothing but some kind of
>> national revivalism.
>> thanks
>> veeranarayana
>>
>> On Fri, Aug 8, 2008 at 10:01 PM, Dominik Wujastyk <ucgadkw at ucl.ac.uk> wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> There's an interesting set of reflections on the topic here:
>>>
>>> Journal of Linguistic Anthropology
>>> June 2008, Vol. 18, No. 1, pp. 24-45
>>> Posted online on July 28, 2008.
>>> (doi:10.1111/j.1548-1395.2008.00002.x)
>>>
>>> Licked by the Mother Tongue: Imagining Everyday Sanskrit at Home and in the
>>> World
>>> by Adi Hastings
>>>
>>> Abstract:
>>> This paper examines the ways in which Sanskrit revivalists in contemporary
>>> India imagine social contexts for the production and reproduction of
>>> Sanskrit speech. In contrast to the received view of Sanskrit as being a
>>> ritual language par excellence, opposed at every step to the   
>>> domestic sphere
>>> and everyday life, Sanskrit revivalists treat Sanskrit as a   
>>> "mother tongue,"
>>> figuring the home as the primary site for the creation of an "everyday
>>> Sanskrit" world and the mother as the primary agent of this process of
>>> Sanskritizing the domestic sphere. "Domesticating Sanskrit," the process of
>>> bringing the elevated ritual language down into everyday life, at the very
>>> same time "Sanskritizes the domestic," that is, ritually transforms or
>>> elevates the home into a "Sanskrit home." Moving outward from the
>>> Sanskritized domestic sphere, activists also imagine other   
>>> contexts in which
>>> one could use Sanskrit, which nonetheless conforms to a notion of   
>>> a Sanskrit
>>> interiority or domesticity.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Dr Dominik Wujastyk
>>> Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
>>> University College London
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> -- 
>> Veeranarayana N.K. Pandurangi
>> Head, Dept of Darshanas,
>> Yoganandacharya Bhavan,
>> Jagadguru Ramanandacharya Rajasthan Samskrita University, Madau, post
>> Bhankrota, Jaipur, 302026.




From jemhouben at GMAIL.COM  Wed Aug 13 17:42:37 2008
From: jemhouben at GMAIL.COM (Jan Houben)
Date: Wed, 13 Aug 08 19:42:37 +0200
Subject: Modern and Ancient use of Sanskrit
Message-ID: <161227083200.23782.971366349618918328.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

I.
sa.msk.rta-bhaa.saa   m.rta-bhaa.saiveti [-eva!-iti] ke cin manyante /
bhaarata-de;se tu bahava.h ;saastri.no jaina-munaya.h kavayo 'nye ca
sa.msk.rta-vaktaara.h santiiti mayaiva d.r.s.ta.m ca ;sruta.m ca /
tasmaad sa.msk.rta-bhaa.saam.rta-bhaa.seva [-iva!] jiivaty eva, yadi
vaabhii.s.taanabhii.s.taa vaa //

II.
The Atlas des langues du monde by Roland Breton (Paris 2003), small but
unsurpassed (in some respects not even by the World Atlas of Language
Structures), lists sanskrit as "extinct" on page 12, but elsewhere (p. 55)
notes that there are 60.000 speakers (according to the 2001 census). The
online Ethnologue (www.ethnologue.com) of the Summer Institute of
Linguistics (with a staff inspired by Christianity, noting for each language
when the first bible translation was made: for Sanskrit this was 1822)
registers a "population" (sic) of 6106 speakers (based on the 1981 census)
and 194,433 second language speakers. (Less clear to me is that this website
notes for Sanskrit: Literacy rate in first language: 60% to 100%. Literacy
rate in second language: 15% to 25% literate.)

III.
Through the ages Sanskrit has been employed, orally and in writing, in
various ways by learned and less learned speakers. Attempts to
teach "correct" Sanskrit are as old, yes even older than the name Sanskrit
(as "sa.msk.rtam" replaces the earlier name "bhaa.saa") for the language
which in spite of various differences remains largely understandable over
the centuries. From a sociolinguistic point of view there is little reason
to take pride in a half year of speaking ;suddha.m sa.msk.rtam and to look
down on those employing and enjoying, in preceding centuries and at
present, sarala.m sa.msk.rtam, not in order to advertise pedantic erudition
but parasparaabhipraayasammelanaartham ... as little as there is reason to
look down on the expressive popular ("vulgar") latin employed in graffiti in
Pompei or Rome around the time of Cicero. On the contrary: these are
interesting and important subjects for (socio-linguistic) study. When it was
discovered now two centuries ago in "the West" Sanskrit has
inspired generations of linguists, first of all the historical
comparativists (Bopp et al.), next the generative grammarians (see
introductory paragraph of Kiparsky's On the architecture of Panini's
grammar).
The rich treasure grove of Sanskrit literatures has not yet been made use of
from the point of view of other branches of modern language sciences to
which it has a potential to contribute significantly as well. As for
sociolinguistics and sociology of language, see nevertheless
several articles of H.H. Hock (I hope he will bundle them some time), Madhav
Deshpande's Sanskrit & Prakrit (Delhi 1993) and various articles, the book
on Ideology and Status of Sanskrit (edited by me in 1996), and now Pollock's
The Language of the Gods in the World of Men (Univ of California 2006). As
for Sanskrit and cognitive linguistics see my forthcoming article
"Bhartrhari as a cognitive linguist", which implies that Paa.nini's grammar
can in a revolutionary way be seen as a construction grammar; and that there
is NO place for a "structure given before hand", as implied in the famous
words of William Jones: (1786): "The Sanskrit language, whatever may be its
antiquity, is of a wonderful structure.".

IV.
Through the ages Sanskrit has been used to express various extreme and
maadhyamaka messages. In current times Sanskrit has been used to express the
views of various extremities: G.B; Palsule's Vainaayakam: an epic
description of the life of Sarvarkar (Pune, 1998); a certain Padma Sastri's
Leninaamr.tam published at VVRI in Hoshiarpur (1973) etc. Scholarly and
scientific works have currently been published in Sanskrit as well:
Palsule's work on Indo-european linguistics entitled Yubhaata.h sa.msk.rtam
prati; the book Kaa.naada.m paa.niniiya.m ca sarva;saastropakaarakam edited
by Maheswaran Nair. Whether one likes it or not: Sanskrit does have a
sociolinguistic reality, it is, to use a metaphor from biology, a "living"
phenomenon that includes grammar-independent use of the
language. Moreover, as McComas Taylor wrote somewhere on the ANU homepage,
the chance that future generations will understand a thought expressed in
Sanskrit, again whether one likes it or not, is considerably bigger than
that they will understand the same thought expressed in English: "In 1,000
years time, Sanskrit will still be the same, but every other language will
have changed beyond recognition."

V.
As for *spoken* sanskrit, various attempts have been made to teach and
promote it, for instance in the Giirvaa.napadama?jarii and the
Giirvaa.navaa:nma?jarii (prob. early 17th cent.) discussed by A.
Wezler (Ideology and Status of Sanskrit p. 327ff). Teaching material of
Aksara, Bangalore, is interesting as object of study but, if taken in
isolation, not the most suitable for serious Sanskrit students. On the other
hand, Aksara's staff and Svayamsevak funders may have an objectionable
agenda, but their proselytizing may have quite different effects than
foreseen by them. Did Pa.nini plan to help Buddhists and Jainas to get their
message in relatively reliable way across, synchronically and
diachronically? If Panini had any agenda beyond writing his grammar it must
have been to reinforce traditional Brahmanism.
In any case, there are other books for teaching Sanskrit. A praiseworthy
modern attempt is: Sa.msk.rtavyavahaara.h / Spoken Sanskrit by S.S. Janaki
published in Madras at The Kuppuswami Sastri Research Institute, 1990. The
older generations of "Western" Sanskrit teachers could afford to escape
learning spoken Sanskrit, but at present do serious university teachers of
sanskrit have a valid excuse not to master and impart at least some sarala.m
sa.msk.rtam to the students, in addition to the analytical knowledge of the
language derived from the study of sanskrit grammars such as those of ...
(see preceding discussion on this list, and add: J. Gonda's grammar,
available in German, French, English)? At present spoken sanskrit remains a
disputed domain of "symbolic capital" in india and a fascinating hobby for
western students, quite useful for increasing one's grasp of the language.

JH




From s.hodge at PADMACHOLING.PLUS.COM  Thu Aug 14 02:02:45 2008
From: s.hodge at PADMACHOLING.PLUS.COM (Stephen Hodge)
Date: Thu, 14 Aug 08 03:02:45 +0100
Subject: Birds in Sanskrit Literature
Message-ID: <161227083202.23782.1399004103220891416.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Colleagues,

Does anybody have a copy of Dave's "Birds in Sanskrit Literature" to hand" 
?  If so, could you do me a kindness ?

I would like to know what he says about the "kaara.n.dava" and the 
"cakravaaka".  The "kaara.n.dava" is often identified with the "cakravaaka", 
but it also seems to be a different bird on occasion as I have encountered 
the two names side by side in texts.

Many thanks in advance.

Stephen Hodge 




From franco at RZ.UNI-LEIPZIG.DE  Thu Aug 14 06:56:48 2008
From: franco at RZ.UNI-LEIPZIG.DE (franco at RZ.UNI-LEIPZIG.DE)
Date: Thu, 14 Aug 08 08:56:48 +0200
Subject: Birds in Sanskrit Literature
In-Reply-To: <01ea01c8fdb1$d8da19f0$05437257@zen>
Message-ID: <161227083207.23782.14739992369002607299.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

No specific identification with cakravaaka is made, but k. is used as  
a generic term for swans geese and ducks.
With best wishes,
EF

Zitat von Stephen Hodge <s.hodge at PADMACHOLING.PLUS.COM>:

> Dear Colleagues,
>
> Does anybody have a copy of Dave's "Birds in Sanskrit Literature" to
> hand" ?  If so, could you do me a kindness ?
>
> I would like to know what he says about the "kaara.n.dava" and the
> "cakravaaka".  The "kaara.n.dava" is often identified with the
> "cakravaaka", but it also seems to be a different bird on occasion as I
> have encountered the two names side by side in texts.
>
> Many thanks in advance.
>
> Stephen Hodge



----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.




From veerankp at GMAIL.COM  Thu Aug 14 04:01:33 2008
From: veerankp at GMAIL.COM (veeranarayana Pandurangi)
Date: Thu, 14 Aug 08 09:31:33 +0530
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <20080813121217.y1dx70rew40gcccs@webmail.asianetindia.com>
Message-ID: <161227083204.23782.571564069465863729.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

dear friends,
it is too much imaginative to think that one day non sanskritists will be
butchered. you can ask a typical communal riotist for example whether he has
any distant knowledge of sanskrit or not.  No body of these riotors has sent
his son or dauthter to study the sanskrit, I am sure. But many of these
people make a big announcement on sanskrit, of course. but not the really
related with it.


on the contrary those spreading vilolence etc. have different mottos and the
people spreading sanskrit awareness are from really other backgrounds,
mostly from educational. even many people from other communities (christia
etc) are also involved in this kind of creating awareness, many I know from
kerala itself. The sanskrit education itself is for world peace and not for
violence. those doing this kind of propogation get nothing in return
(monitory or otherwise). they are working on the theme to cultural unitary
identity of india just for there interest and nothing else.

one more interesting fact is even sanskrit universities use the spoken
sanskrit program to educate their first year students (from other
background) in sanskrit in initial days. that makes them free to mingle with
sanskrit students easily and understand the classes.
veera
On Wed, Aug 13, 2008 at 12:12 PM, Maheswaran Nair
<swantam at asianetindia.com>wrote:

> Hello,
>
>  In Malayalam, my native tongue, 60 to 70 percent words of the language of
> an educated Malayalee are Sanskrit. In many Indian languages the state of
> this affair will slightly change. Such people need not make Sanskrit their
> spoken language. There is hidden agenda behind popularising spoken Sanskrit.
> Hindu revivalists and communalists are popularising it. They have
> organizations for the same. At times of mass murders of people belonging to
> other religions there is need to distinguish them. "Interested parties" have
> plans to make Sanskrit the national language of India. A time may come when
> during purposely created communal riots, the question will be put "bhavaan
> samskrtam janaati kim?" Those who reply in the affirmative in Sanskrit will
> be spared and others will be butchered.
> I am also fluent in Sanskrit and have evolved an easy  method for teaching
> Spoken Sanskrit, not the spoken Sanskrit popularised by the revivalists
> which is like "adya kati iddali bhakshitam?" "adya chayam piitam kim?".
> Regards
> K.Maheswaran Nair
> Professor of Sanskrit
> University of Kerala
> India
>
>
>
>
> Quoting George Hart <glhart at BERKELEY.EDU>:
>
> I myself once encountered someone from Karnataka who lived in the
>> village where "Sanskrit" is spoken.  It was a dumbed-down language not
>> much resembling (in my opinion) the eloquent tongue used by Kalidasa
>> and Sankara -- or even the epics.  It dispenses with such frills as the
>> dual and many verb forms.  I asked him if he had read Sanskrit
>> literature -- poetry, darsana, whatever.  He seemed nonplussed by the
>> question -- he spoke Sanskrit; why should he read Kalidasa?  I felt he
>> was entirely ignorant of the intellectual grandeur and scope of the
>> language and spoke it (or his version of it) merely to make a
>> statement.  I would remark parenthetically that the use of Sanskrit in
>> a Malayalam historical novel I once read -- including 3-line Sanskrit
>> compounds -- was far more sophisticated than this "Sanskrit" speaker
>> could have managed.  If he had studied the literature of Kannada --
>> which I suspect was his real native language -- his Sanskrit would
>> certainly have been much better.  George Hart
>>
>> On Aug 11, 2008, at 12:47 AM, veeranarayana Pandurangi wrote:
>>
>> dear friends,
>>> welcome to such new studies.
>>> but is is difficult for a naiyayika to imagine ritual transformation of
>>> household in the context of modern sanskrit revivalism. Since I know
>>> personally many sanskrit families here, it is nothing but some kind of
>>> national revivalism.
>>> thanks
>>> veeranarayana
>>>
>>> On Fri, Aug 8, 2008 at 10:01 PM, Dominik Wujastyk <ucgadkw at ucl.ac.uk>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>> There's an interesting set of reflections on the topic here:
>>>>
>>>> Journal of Linguistic Anthropology
>>>> June 2008, Vol. 18, No. 1, pp. 24-45
>>>> Posted online on July 28, 2008.
>>>> (doi:10.1111/j.1548-1395.2008.00002.x)
>>>>
>>>> Licked by the Mother Tongue: Imagining Everyday Sanskrit at Home and in
>>>> the
>>>> World
>>>> by Adi Hastings
>>>>
>>>> Abstract:
>>>> This paper examines the ways in which Sanskrit revivalists in
>>>> contemporary
>>>> India imagine social contexts for the production and reproduction of
>>>> Sanskrit speech. In contrast to the received view of Sanskrit as being a
>>>> ritual language par excellence, opposed at every step to the  domestic
>>>> sphere
>>>> and everyday life, Sanskrit revivalists treat Sanskrit as a  "mother
>>>> tongue,"
>>>> figuring the home as the primary site for the creation of an "everyday
>>>> Sanskrit" world and the mother as the primary agent of this process of
>>>> Sanskritizing the domestic sphere. "Domesticating Sanskrit," the process
>>>> of
>>>> bringing the elevated ritual language down into everyday life, at the
>>>> very
>>>> same time "Sanskritizes the domestic," that is, ritually transforms or
>>>> elevates the home into a "Sanskrit home." Moving outward from the
>>>> Sanskritized domestic sphere, activists also imagine other  contexts in
>>>> which
>>>> one could use Sanskrit, which nonetheless conforms to a notion of  a
>>>> Sanskrit
>>>> interiority or domesticity.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> Dr Dominik Wujastyk
>>>> Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
>>>> University College London
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Veeranarayana N.K. Pandurangi
>>> Head, Dept of Darshanas,
>>> Yoganandacharya Bhavan,
>>> Jagadguru Ramanandacharya Rajasthan Samskrita University, Madau, post
>>> Bhankrota, Jaipur, 302026.
>>>
>>


-- 
Veeranarayana N.K. Pandurangi
Head, Dept of Darshanas,
Yoganandacharya Bhavan,
Jagadguru Ramanandacharya Rajasthan Samskrita University, Madau, post
Bhankrota, Jaipur, 302026.




From meulnbld at XS4ALL.NL  Thu Aug 14 10:00:51 2008
From: meulnbld at XS4ALL.NL (G.J. Meulenbeld)
Date: Thu, 14 Aug 08 12:00:51 +0200
Subject: Birds in Sanskrit Literature
Message-ID: <161227083209.23782.7377625686320097868.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear colleague,

Information on the identities of the kaara.n.dava and cakravaaka is 
available in my "A history of Indian medical literature", vol. IB, p.43, 
n.588 and p.46--47, n.611.

Dave (299--301) identifies it as the coot. The Caraka translations of  the 
Gulabkunverba team and by R.K. Sharma and Bhagwan Dash simply say goose 
without any specification. P.V. Sharma's translation has white-fronted 
goose; the same name is employed by P. Ray and H.N. Gupta in their Caraka 
Sa.mhitaa (A scientific synopsis).
The white-fronted goose, Anser albifrons albifrons (Scopoli), however, is 
described as a sparse and rare winter visitor in northwest and northern 
India by S. Ali and S.D. Ripley in their "Handbook of the birds of India and 
Pakistan" (I, 126--128).

All the sources mentioned on kaara.n.dava agree that the cakravaaka is the 
ruddy sheldrake, Tadorna ferruginea (Pallas), described in vol. 1, 141--144 
of the work by S. Ali and S.D. Ripley.

Caraka regards the two birds as distinct.

With best wishes and regards,

G. Jan Meulenbeld
De Zwaan 11
9781 JX Bedum
The Netherlands


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Stephen Hodge" <s.hodge at PADMACHOLING.PLUS.COM>
To: <INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk>
Sent: Thursday, August 14, 2008 4:02 AM
Subject: Birds in Sanskrit Literature


> Dear Colleagues,
>
> Does anybody have a copy of Dave's "Birds in Sanskrit Literature" to hand" 
> ?  If so, could you do me a kindness ?
>
> I would like to know what he says about the "kaara.n.dava" and the 
> "cakravaaka".  The "kaara.n.dava" is often identified with the 
> "cakravaaka", but it also seems to be a different bird on occasion as I 
> have encountered the two names side by side in texts.
>
> Many thanks in advance.
>
> Stephen Hodge 




From swantam at ASIANETINDIA.COM  Thu Aug 14 11:00:55 2008
From: swantam at ASIANETINDIA.COM (Maheswaran Nair)
Date: Thu, 14 Aug 08 16:30:55 +0530
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <965fdc5f0808132101p42519b64wb4ae640c2f641a15@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <161227083211.23782.16555608492589668779.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear list,
I agree that Sanskrit teachers and students should surely learn to  
fluently communicate in Sanskrit. The present state (especialyy in  
Kerala)is deplorable.
Objection is against utilising Sanskrit for "other" purposes.  
Hindutvavadins have specific agenda behind popularising Sanskrit. They  
have brought out many books among which a small one entitled  
"Samskrtam vada aadhuniko bhava"(published from Aluva, Kerala)  
contains their sectarian approach.They consider Sanskrit only as the  
cultural language of India which is far from truth. They paste  
everywhere a poster which reads "Samskrtam bharatasya  
samskrtikabhasha". What about other Indian languages? Making use of  
Sanskrit in place of Ramakshetra for demolishing Babrimasjid is  
objectionable.
You know what happened in Gujarat. First the poster containing AUM was  
pasted in front of houses of Hindus as a distinguishing mark for the  
convenience of Hindu rioteers before "action". My humble doubt and  
fear is that Sanskrit will be used as a "marker" in the coming  
years.Let it not happen.
Regards
K.Maheswaran Nair

Quoting veeranarayana Pandurangi <veerankp at GMAIL.COM>:

> dear friends,
> it is too much imaginative to think that one day non sanskritists will be
> butchered. you can ask a typical communal riotist for example whether he has
> any distant knowledge of sanskrit or not.  No body of these riotors has sent
> his son or dauthter to study the sanskrit, I am sure. But many of these
> people make a big announcement on sanskrit, of course. but not the really
> related with it.
>
>
> on the contrary those spreading vilolence etc. have different mottos and the
> people spreading sanskrit awareness are from really other backgrounds,
> mostly from educational. even many people from other communities (christia
> etc) are also involved in this kind of creating awareness, many I know from
> kerala itself. The sanskrit education itself is for world peace and not for
> violence. those doing this kind of propogation get nothing in return
> (monitory or otherwise). they are working on the theme to cultural unitary
> identity of india just for there interest and nothing else.
>
> one more interesting fact is even sanskrit universities use the spoken
> sanskrit program to educate their first year students (from other
> background) in sanskrit in initial days. that makes them free to mingle with
> sanskrit students easily and understand the classes.
> veera




From ganesan at IFPINDIA.ORG  Thu Aug 14 12:06:02 2008
From: ganesan at IFPINDIA.ORG (Ganesan)
Date: Thu, 14 Aug 08 17:36:02 +0530
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit and Spoken Sanskrit
Message-ID: <161227083213.23782.13686396257325944981.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Of course, the spoken Sanskrit courses which serve as introduction to the 
great language and which are mainly aimed to disprove the critics that 
Sanskrit was not and is never a spoken language should lead the learners to 
study the vast corpus of classical texts.
But, the 'agenda' of the so called Hindutvavadi is not to 'demolish mosques 
or to rape nuns'. With all their obvious mistakes in some of their views 
they can not be outrightly condemned and they never resort to such demeaning 
acts.
It is so strange that even after such horrific and barbaric terrorist acts 
being perpetrated in Kashmir still the Hindutvavadi is condemned for those 
crimes ('demolishing mosques or raping nuns') with which he has been proved 
subsequently to be not at all associated. !!

Ganesh

From: "Stella Sandahl" <ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA>
To: <INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk>
Sent: Wednesday, August 13, 2008 1:19 PM
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit and Spoken Sanskrit


> In the current debate about "spoken Sanskrit" I believe we are  talking 
> about two different things. It is one thing when for example  a Bengali 
> pandit speaks to Telugu pandit in Sanskrit in order to  debate finer 
> points in a text, or a philosophical issue, a literary  allusion and so 
> forth. Sanskrit is then their common language, a  language of learning, of 
> elegance and wit. And this is quite wonderful.
>
> It is an entirely different matter to try to revive and 'modernize' 
> Sanskrit. Lying on a table in our university library I found a  typical 
> example of the latter. There were new-fangled "Sanskrit"  words for money 
> order, check-out counter, bus station, bank draft -  as if one finds these 
> things in classical Sanskrit texts! These  manuals are quite ridiculous: I 
> found a sentence like ahaM  sevaphalAni khAdAmi which was supposed to mean 
> 'I eat apples'. First,  as far as I know there were no apples in classical 
> India (weren't  they brought in by Babur?), second the word seva is 
> obviously modeled  on Hindi seb 'apple' from the Persian sib with the same 
> meaning. This  is exactly in line with the examples given by Professor 
> Nair: "adya  kati iddali bhakshitam?" "adya chayam piitam kim?", equally 
> ridiculous.  My niece in Delhi once asked to help her with her  Sanskrit 
> homework. She had to translate the sentence "Kings live in  palaces" into 
> Sanskrit. The word given by the teacher for palace was  'mahala' !!!  I 
> tried to convince the little girl that there was no  such word in 
> Sanskrit. In vain. The girl said :"teacher says it is  mahala", and that 
> was what it had to be.
>
> It is very sad to se how the ignorant Hindutva forces demean and make  the 
> wonderful classical language into something trivial and  ridiculous. How 
> do we stop them?
> How can we rescue Sanskrit from these vandals? I doubt that the 
> sevaphalAni-eating student in his mahala can read and understand even  one 
> line by Kalidasa or Bana or Jayadeva.
> But he can cut the throat of those who cannot speak his so called 
> Sanskrit. When he is not busy demolishing mosques and raping nuns.
>
> Stella Sandahl
>
>
> --
> Professor Stella Sandahl
> Department of East Asian Studies
> 130 St. George St. room 14087
> Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
> ssandahl at sympatico.ca
> stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
> Tel. (416) 978-4295
> Fax. (416) 978-5711
> 




From s.hodge at PADMACHOLING.PLUS.COM  Fri Aug 15 01:11:42 2008
From: s.hodge at PADMACHOLING.PLUS.COM (Stephen Hodge)
Date: Fri, 15 Aug 08 02:11:42 +0100
Subject: Birds in Sanskrit Literature
Message-ID: <161227083215.23782.702612835284775965.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Thanks for the prompt replies.

G.J. Meulenbeld wrote:

> All the sources mentioned on kaara.n.dava agree that the cakravaaka is the 
> ruddy sheldrake, Tadorna ferruginea (Pallas), described in vol. 1, 
> 141--144 of the work by S. Ali and S.D. Ripley.

The information provided tends to confirm my suspicions: the text I am 
studying has multiple authorship, with one person treating kaara.n.dava as a 
distinct bird, and another person who definiteley identifies kaara.n.dava 
with cakravaaka, going so far as to refer to "sa.mvaasa-kaara.n.da" after 
the well-known myth about cakravaalas.

Many thanks,

Stephen Hodge 




From tmahadevan at HOWARD.EDU  Fri Aug 15 07:46:50 2008
From: tmahadevan at HOWARD.EDU (Mahadevan, Thennilapuram)
Date: Fri, 15 Aug 08 03:46:50 -0400
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit and Spoken Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <AE18DE55-7BE7-47D3-B301-947BF92AAB18@berkeley.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083217.23782.2616113432177593707.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

I concur with Professor Hart.  I was at Kanchipuram about ten days ago to attend a sadas (214 particpants from allover South India, mostly from the Tamil country and none from Kerala) of the RV reciters.  The sadas lasted three days, the samhita recitation on the first day, the krama the second day and the gana the third day.  Part of the aim was for the professional vaidikans to raise questions regarding the minutiae of recitation: the questions would be handed overto an MC-like figure who would put it to the sadas and he would invite a known specialist to come forth an answer.  The discussion was all but in Sanskrit with Tamil funcioning to provide a rough syntax.  A Brahmanical coine.
Best wishes,
T. P.  Mahadevan

________________________________________
From: Indology [INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk] On Behalf Of George Hart [glhart at BERKELEY.EDU]
Sent: Wednesday, August 13, 2008 11:06 AM
To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
Subject: Re: Spoken Sanskrit and Spoken Sanskrit

Sorry for so many posts, but I think this may be useful to someone.

Years ago, when I was reading from Ramanuja's Sribhasya, I noticed
that his usages often mirror the Sanskrit that is still spoken by the
pandits in Chennai.  For example, the word "samiiciina" for "fine,"
"good," "excellent" is used by that writer.  On the other hand,
Sankara's Sanskrit does not seem to be connected with the Sanskrit I
heard in Chennai -- its style and word usage is quite different.  This
suggests that there is a continuous tradition of spoken Sanskrit that
developed in Tamil Nadu 1000 years ago and still continues today.  The
Sanskrit used in Kerala was probably rather different (something also
suggested by my very superficial acquaintance with the Manipravala
works of 4 or 500 years ago).  Certainly, in many parts of India and
Nepal, Sanskrit has been used as a spoken language for a long time.
It would seem that each area has developed its own style and word
usage.  As we know, the pandits of one area often look down at the
Sanskrit (esp. pronunciation) of pandits from other areas.

There is a wonderful sloka that can be used when teaching beginning
Sanskrit -- but I have forgotten the details of the story that goes
along with it.  Perhaps someone can recall it.  Someone, wanting to
show off to Kalidasa how much Sanskrit he knew, said, "bhojanam dehi
raajendra ghrtasuupasamanvitam."  Kalidasa is supposed to have replied
"maahiSam ca zaraccandracandrikaadhavalam dadhi."  Of course, the
first utterance is ungainly and awkward, while the second flows like
moonlight.  The dhvani, according to my pandit, is that Kalidasa is
implying that the would-be Sanskrit speaker is stupid and slow, as
buffalo yogurt is supposed to dull the mind.

George Hart




From annamisia at YAHOO.COM  Fri Aug 15 18:16:43 2008
From: annamisia at YAHOO.COM (Anna A. Slaczka)
Date: Fri, 15 Aug 08 11:16:43 -0700
Subject: Help save the Kern Institute Library
Message-ID: <161227083220.23782.12032449092766223959.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

(sorry for crossposting)

Dear Friends and Colleagues,

It is yet another cry for help - we've seen so many of them during the last few years. Please, see the letter of my colleague Dr. Ellen Raven of the Leiden University attached below.

Open and easy access to 'special collections' of manuscripts and microfilms and the possibility just to browse among the shelves of a library are invaluable for students and researchers alike.

This appeal may not help. In fact, there is a great chance it will not. But we should give it a try.

Anna Slaczka
Leiden




This is an urgent appeal for your help


Leiden, August 15, 2008

To colleagues, library visitors and friends of the Kern Institute,

The Leiden University?s Faculty of Arts is presently carrying out a major reorganization of its Department of Asian Studies. The plan proposes a system in which the various subdepartments (including that for South Asia and Tibet) will merge into an Institute of Area Studies. In the new concept India will be included as a regional area, but Indology and Tibetology will no longer exist as independent departments for education and research.

Part of the ongoing changes are plans to dismantle the Institute Kern Library. Many of you have made use of its open-stacks while visiting the library.. Since its foundation in 1925 this form of storage has offered optimum accessibility to the almost unparalleled collection of  monographs and journals on ?every? aspect of South Asia. In the plans the Kern Institute books and journals will become part of a larger library, however, only offering semi-closed stacks facilities.

The plans not only entail closed storage of the books and journals, but also the dividing up the collections. Next to books and journals, the Kern Institute library holds important Tibetan block prints and Indian palm leaf manuscripts and rich collections of archaeological and art historical photographs, slides, microfilms and microfiches. These special collections have always been available for integrated research to students and scholars from all parts of the world. In the plans these special collections are to be moved to the University Library, to be stored in special vaults. Access will thence only be available via application through a digital catalogue (which makes effective browsing practically impossible and excludes direct access)..

The association ?Friends of the Kern Institute? evolved from the original Kern Institute founded by Prof. J.Ph. Vogel in 1925. The association has requested the University to safeguard the uniqueness of the Kern Institute Library and its open-stacks policy, but so far without lasting positive results.

We now turn to you for support and urge you to send a letter (by mail to the head librarian, d.heilijgers at let.leidenuniv.nl) or by snail mail to the Kern Institute Library, Dept. of India and Tibet, POB 9515, 2300 RA Leiden, The Netherlands, preferably to reach before August 31, 2008. The letter is to be addressed to: The Dean of the Faculty of Arts, Leiden University, Prof. W. van den Doel, POB 9515, 2300 RA Leiden, The Netherlands.

In your letter please emphasize the importance of the Kern Institute Library as an unique deposit of scholarship in the multidiscipline of Indology. Throughout the years easy access and a helpful staff have served a multitude of international scholars. Help us to keep this service available and this centre visible! Thank you in advance for your support,

 
Ellen M. Raven
Chairman, Friends of the Kern Institute



      




From rsalomon at U.WASHINGTON.EDU  Fri Aug 15 21:55:00 2008
From: rsalomon at U.WASHINGTON.EDU (Richard Salomon)
Date: Fri, 15 Aug 08 14:55:00 -0700
Subject: Modern and Ancient use of Sanskrit
Message-ID: <161227083222.23782.8905509012493349707.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

May I mention, in connection with this and previous messages, an old article 
in which I addressed these issues, albeit in a summary and preliminary 
fashion? --


"Linguistic Variability in Sanskrit," in Colette Caillat, ed., Dialectes 
dans les litt?ratures indo-aryennes (Paris: Coll?ge de France, 1989 
[Publications de l'Institut de Civilisation Indienne. s?rie in-8?, fascicule 
55]), pp. 275-94.



-Richard Salomon



----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Jan Houben" <jemhouben at GMAIL.COM>
To: <INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk>
Sent: Wednesday, August 13, 2008 10:42 AM
Subject: Modern and Ancient use of Sanskrit


I.
sa.msk.rta-bhaa.saa   m.rta-bhaa.saiveti [-eva!-iti] ke cin manyante /
bhaarata-de;se tu bahava.h ;saastri.no jaina-munaya.h kavayo 'nye ca
sa.msk.rta-vaktaara.h santiiti mayaiva d.r.s.ta.m ca ;sruta.m ca /
tasmaad sa.msk.rta-bhaa.saam.rta-bhaa.seva [-iva!] jiivaty eva, yadi
vaabhii.s.taanabhii.s.taa vaa //

II.
The Atlas des langues du monde by Roland Breton (Paris 2003), small but
unsurpassed (in some respects not even by the World Atlas of Language
Structures), lists sanskrit as "extinct" on page 12, but elsewhere (p. 55)
notes that there are 60.000 speakers (according to the 2001 census). The
online Ethnologue (www.ethnologue.com) of the Summer Institute of
Linguistics (with a staff inspired by Christianity, noting for each language
when the first bible translation was made: for Sanskrit this was 1822)
registers a "population" (sic) of 6106 speakers (based on the 1981 census)
and 194,433 second language speakers. (Less clear to me is that this website
notes for Sanskrit: Literacy rate in first language: 60% to 100%. Literacy
rate in second language: 15% to 25% literate.)

III.
Through the ages Sanskrit has been employed, orally and in writing, in
various ways by learned and less learned speakers. Attempts to
teach "correct" Sanskrit are as old, yes even older than the name Sanskrit
(as "sa.msk.rtam" replaces the earlier name "bhaa.saa") for the language
which in spite of various differences remains largely understandable over
the centuries. From a sociolinguistic point of view there is little reason
to take pride in a half year of speaking ;suddha.m sa.msk.rtam and to look
down on those employing and enjoying, in preceding centuries and at
present, sarala.m sa.msk.rtam, not in order to advertise pedantic erudition
but parasparaabhipraayasammelanaartham ... as little as there is reason to
look down on the expressive popular ("vulgar") latin employed in graffiti in
Pompei or Rome around the time of Cicero. On the contrary: these are
interesting and important subjects for (socio-linguistic) study. When it was
discovered now two centuries ago in "the West" Sanskrit has
inspired generations of linguists, first of all the historical
comparativists (Bopp et al.), next the generative grammarians (see
introductory paragraph of Kiparsky's On the architecture of Panini's
grammar).
The rich treasure grove of Sanskrit literatures has not yet been made use of
from the point of view of other branches of modern language sciences to
which it has a potential to contribute significantly as well. As for
sociolinguistics and sociology of language, see nevertheless
several articles of H.H. Hock (I hope he will bundle them some time), Madhav
Deshpande's Sanskrit & Prakrit (Delhi 1993) and various articles, the book
on Ideology and Status of Sanskrit (edited by me in 1996), and now Pollock's
The Language of the Gods in the World of Men (Univ of California 2006). As
for Sanskrit and cognitive linguistics see my forthcoming article
"Bhartrhari as a cognitive linguist", which implies that Paa.nini's grammar
can in a revolutionary way be seen as a construction grammar; and that there
is NO place for a "structure given before hand", as implied in the famous
words of William Jones: (1786): "The Sanskrit language, whatever may be its
antiquity, is of a wonderful structure.".

IV.
Through the ages Sanskrit has been used to express various extreme and
maadhyamaka messages. In current times Sanskrit has been used to express the
views of various extremities: G.B; Palsule's Vainaayakam: an epic
description of the life of Sarvarkar (Pune, 1998); a certain Padma Sastri's
Leninaamr.tam published at VVRI in Hoshiarpur (1973) etc. Scholarly and
scientific works have currently been published in Sanskrit as well:
Palsule's work on Indo-european linguistics entitled Yubhaata.h sa.msk.rtam
prati; the book Kaa.naada.m paa.niniiya.m ca sarva;saastropakaarakam edited
by Maheswaran Nair. Whether one likes it or not: Sanskrit does have a
sociolinguistic reality, it is, to use a metaphor from biology, a "living"
phenomenon that includes grammar-independent use of the
language. Moreover, as McComas Taylor wrote somewhere on the ANU homepage,
the chance that future generations will understand a thought expressed in
Sanskrit, again whether one likes it or not, is considerably bigger than
that they will understand the same thought expressed in English: "In 1,000
years time, Sanskrit will still be the same, but every other language will
have changed beyond recognition."

V.
As for *spoken* sanskrit, various attempts have been made to teach and
promote it, for instance in the Giirvaa.napadama?jarii and the
Giirvaa.navaa:nma?jarii (prob. early 17th cent.) discussed by A.
Wezler (Ideology and Status of Sanskrit p. 327ff). Teaching material of
Aksara, Bangalore, is interesting as object of study but, if taken in
isolation, not the most suitable for serious Sanskrit students. On the other
hand, Aksara's staff and Svayamsevak funders may have an objectionable
agenda, but their proselytizing may have quite different effects than
foreseen by them. Did Pa.nini plan to help Buddhists and Jainas to get their
message in relatively reliable way across, synchronically and
diachronically? If Panini had any agenda beyond writing his grammar it must
have been to reinforce traditional Brahmanism.
In any case, there are other books for teaching Sanskrit. A praiseworthy
modern attempt is: Sa.msk.rtavyavahaara.h / Spoken Sanskrit by S.S. Janaki
published in Madras at The Kuppuswami Sastri Research Institute, 1990. The
older generations of "Western" Sanskrit teachers could afford to escape
learning spoken Sanskrit, but at present do serious university teachers of
sanskrit have a valid excuse not to master and impart at least some sarala.m
sa.msk.rtam to the students, in addition to the analytical knowledge of the
language derived from the study of sanskrit grammars such as those of ...
(see preceding discussion on this list, and add: J. Gonda's grammar,
available in German, French, English)? At present spoken sanskrit remains a
disputed domain of "symbolic capital" in india and a fascinating hobby for
western students, quite useful for increasing one's grasp of the language.

JH




From tccahill at LOYNO.EDU  Sat Aug 16 01:24:05 2008
From: tccahill at LOYNO.EDU (tccahill)
Date: Fri, 15 Aug 08 19:24:05 -0600
Subject: Kern Institute Library
Message-ID: <161227083224.23782.12307606000712259733.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Anna,

   Nice to hear from you, even in connection with this
less-than-happy news.  I'm back in New Orleans now, getting
ready to slog through another semester of "World Religions".
 Finished up in Pondicherry in early June --far too hot to
be working there, but that's the way it worked out.

   Hope you're work goes well, and good luck with the fight
for open stacks and greater accessibilty!

best,
Tim  

----- Original Message Follows -----
From: "Anna A. Slaczka" <annamisia at YAHOO.COM>
To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
Subject: Help save the Kern Institute Library
Date: Fri, 15 Aug 2008 11:16:43 -0700

> (sorry for crossposting)
> 
> Dear Friends and Colleagues,
> 
> It is yet another cry for help - we've seen so many of
> them during the last few years. Please, see the letter of
> my colleague Dr. Ellen Raven of the Leiden University
> attached below.
> 
> Open and easy access to 'special collections' of
> manuscripts and microfilms and the possibility just to
> browse among the shelves of a library are invaluable for
> students and researchers alike.
> 
> This appeal may not help. In fact, there is a great chance
> it will not. But we should give it a try.
> 
> Anna Slaczka
> Leiden
> 
> 
> 
>




From tccahill at LOYNO.EDU  Sat Aug 16 01:39:29 2008
From: tccahill at LOYNO.EDU (tccahill)
Date: Fri, 15 Aug 08 19:39:29 -0600
Subject: spoken Sanskrit (and a quick straw poll)
Message-ID: <161227083226.23782.13228251087575629137.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Indologists,

   Just a quick survey - how many of you would like me to
switch back to my old email program...?  Please reply to me
directly, via the list if you'd like!

   On the topic on contemporary spoken Sanskrit, some might
be interested in a recent book by Janardana Hegde: 
*BhASApAkah*. It's published by the same group founded by
C.M. Krishna Sastri whose name came up recently. Both these
men hold advanced degrees in Sanskrit and are capable in a
high, nearly literary registe. But they rarely do since they
aim to make themselves understood as widely as possible. I
might also add that both married women on the understanding
that their children would be raised with Sanskrit as their
first language. The book brings up many issues relating to
the ways in which aspiring speakers (mis)use the structures
of (esp. South) Indian languages as they attempt to
communicate in Sanskrit.

best,
Tim Cahill




From dxs163 at CASE.EDU  Sat Aug 16 10:26:03 2008
From: dxs163 at CASE.EDU (Deepak Sarma)
Date: Sat, 16 Aug 08 06:26:03 -0400
Subject: Nagin J. Shah contact info
Message-ID: <161227083228.23782.12758707650234381303.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Greetings:
     I am trying to contact Nagin J. Shah. Does anyone  have his  
email or other contact information?

thanks in advance,

Deepak

Dr. Deepak Sarma

Associate Professor of Religious Studies
Associate Professor of Philosophy
Asian Studies Faculty


Mailing Address:
Department of Religious Studies
111 Mather House
11201 Euclid Avenue
Case Western Reserve University
Cleveland, OH 44106-7112

office: 216-368-4790
fax: 216-368-4681
deepak.sarma at case.edu




From ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA  Sat Aug 16 22:35:08 2008
From: ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA (Stella Sandahl)
Date: Sat, 16 Aug 08 18:35:08 -0400
Subject: Sanskrit speakers in Census of India
Message-ID: <161227083230.23782.8952653921532019882.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

According to the Census of India figures for Sanskrit speakers I have  
collected  there are some strange figures:

1971 Census 2,212  indicated Sanskrit as their mother tongue
1981 Census 6,106
1991 Census 49,736
2001 Census 14,135
The decadal percentage figures are:
1971-81  	176.04 % increase
1981-91 	714.54 % increase
1991-2001 	-71.5 % decrease

How come  35,601 Sanskrit speakers disappeared between 1991 and  
2001?  Does anyone have an idea?

Best regards to all
Stella Sandahl




--
Professor Stella Sandahl
Department of East Asian Studies
130 St. George St. room 14087
Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
ssandahl at sympatico.ca
stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
Tel. (416) 978-4295
Fax. (416) 978-5711




From slaje at T-ONLINE.DE  Sun Aug 17 08:09:00 2008
From: slaje at T-ONLINE.DE (Walter Slaje)
Date: Sun, 17 Aug 08 08:09:00 +0000
Subject: Sanskrit speakers in Census of India
Message-ID: <161227083232.23782.16999101052734205621.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

 "Stella Sandahl" <mailto:ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA> schrieb:

> According to the Census of India figures for Sanskrit speakers I have 
> collected there are some strange figures:

> 1991-2001     -71.5 % decrease

> How come 35,601 Sanskrit speakers disappeared between 1991 and 
> 2001? Does anyone have an idea?

The first thing to do should be to call the statistical evidence into question: The census is a matter of statistics.  What do we know about the methodologically sound background of  the 1991-2001 survey? What gives you implicit trust in those figures? Can manipulation be ruled out with certainty? Seeking the support of an independent social scientist with an intimate knowledge of the survey criteria applied during this period as well as the presentation of some hard facts concerning the actual training, the qualification and the reliability of the staff acting on the spot  / "in the field" and their methods of interpretation would certainly be revealing. Yet, basic prerequisites of that sort are clearly unachievable today, so any "idea" about the alleged "disappearance", which may or may not be true,  means juggling with figures and will remain confined to a sphere of  mere speculation.

Best,

WS

--------------------------------------- 
Prof. Dr. Walter Slaje
Hermann-Loens-Str. 1
D-99425 Weimar (Germany)
Tel/Fax: +49-(0)3643 501391
-----------------------------------------
Seminar f?r Indologie
Institut f?r Altertumswissenschaften
Martin-Luther-Universit?t Halle-Wittenberg
Emil-Abderhalden-Str. 9
D-06108 Halle (Germany)
Tel: +49-(0)345-55-23650
Fax: +49-(0)345-55-27139
walter.slaje at indologie.uni-halle.de
www.indologie.uni-halle.de
-----------------------------------------
Ego ex animi mei sententia spondeo ac polliceor
me studia humanitatis impigro labore culturum et provecturum
non sordidi lucri causa nec ad vanam captandam gloriam,
sed quo magis veritas propagetur et lux eius, qua salus
humani generis continetur, clarius effulgeat.
Vindobonae, die XXI. mensis Novembris MCMLXXXIII.




From ashok.aklujkar at UBC.CA  Mon Aug 18 01:59:52 2008
From: ashok.aklujkar at UBC.CA (Ashok Aklujkar)
Date: Sun, 17 Aug 08 18:59:52 -0700
Subject: Nagin J. Shah contact info
In-Reply-To: <A41FF264-3791-43C2-83CB-E9C38484C504@case.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083235.23782.14480037605831992829.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Deepak,

I do not think that Dr. NaginJ. Shah uses email. If he is still active in
the field (I hope he is), you may be able to reach him by non-email at:
L.D. Institute of Indology
Near Gujarat University, Navarangpura,
Ahmedabad 380 009. 
91-79-2-630 [644?]-2463   Fax  91-79-2-630 [644?]-7326.

Another way would be to request Dr. Jitendra B. Shah, the current director
of the L.D. Institute, to give you Dr. Nagin Shah's contact details (home
address, tel. no.) by emailing at <Jitendrabshah at yahoo.com>.

a.a.




From slaje at T-ONLINE.DE  Mon Aug 18 06:32:00 2008
From: slaje at T-ONLINE.DE (Walter Slaje)
Date: Mon, 18 Aug 08 06:32:00 +0000
Subject: Sanskrit speakers in Census of India (Postscript)
Message-ID: <161227083237.23782.16302181120697571782.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear List,

Arlo Griffiths asked me to forward the lines printed below, which have some bearing on the subject:

"There is an only somewhat useful article on Indian Languages and Censuses by S. Manoharan in Indian Linguistics 62 (2001), 117-140. I cannot send messages to Indology from here in California, so if you think this merits being added to your message by way of appendix, go ahead and forward the information to the list."


Best,

WS

--------------------------------------- 
Prof. Dr. Walter Slaje
Hermann-Loens-Str. 1
D-99425 Weimar (Germany)
Tel/Fax: +49-(0)3643 501391
-----------------------------------------
Seminar f?r Indologie
Institut f?r Altertumswissenschaften
Martin-Luther-Universit?t Halle-Wittenberg
Emil-Abderhalden-Str. 9
D-06108 Halle (Germany)
Tel: +49-(0)345-55-23650
Fax: +49-(0)345-55-27139
walter.slaje at indologie.uni-halle.de
www.indologie.uni-halle.de
-----------------------------------------
Ego ex animi mei sententia spondeo ac polliceor
me studia humanitatis impigro labore culturum et provecturum
non sordidi lucri causa nec ad vanam captandam gloriam,
sed quo magis veritas propagetur et lux eius, qua salus
humani generis continetur, clarius effulgeat.
Vindobonae, die XXI. mensis Novembris MCMLXXXIII.




From slaje at T-ONLINE.DE  Mon Aug 18 07:05:00 2008
From: slaje at T-ONLINE.DE (Walter Slaje)
Date: Mon, 18 Aug 08 07:05:00 +0000
Subject: Sanskrit speakers in Census of India (Postpostscript)
Message-ID: <161227083239.23782.12777059332926428708.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear List,

here is a selection of "Census" hits retrieved from SARDS2 (http://www.indologie.uni-halle.de/Sards2/), judging from their titles articles which adopt a critical attitude:

Chaudhuri, B. L.: Note on a caste of fish-dealers in Bengal not recognized in the Census of 1901. In: JPASBe N.S.6(1910), S. 649-650.

Syam Chaudhri, N. K.: The enumeration and treatment of tribes in the Indian Census: a study in retrospect. In: MiI 32,3(Jul.-Sept.1952), S. 160-166.

Southworth, F. C.: On the need for qualitative data to supplement census language statistics: some proposals based on the Indian census. In: IL 39,1/4(1978), S. 136-154.

Horstmann, Monika: Staatsbeschreibung und statistische Erhebungen im vorkolonialen und kolonialen Indien In: Statistik und Staatsbeschreibung in der Neuzeit: vornehmlich im 16. - 18. Jahrhundert: Bericht ?ber ein interdisziplin?res Symposion in Wolfenb?ttel, 25. - 27. September 1978, hrsg. von Mohammed Rassem und J. Stagl. Paderborn 1980 S. 205-216


Best,

WS

--------------------------------------- 
Prof. Dr. Walter Slaje
Hermann-Loens-Str. 1
D-99425 Weimar (Germany)
Tel/Fax: +49-(0)3643 501391
-----------------------------------------
Seminar f?r Indologie
Institut f?r Altertumswissenschaften
Martin-Luther-Universit?t Halle-Wittenberg
Emil-Abderhalden-Str. 9
D-06108 Halle (Germany)
Tel: +49-(0)345-55-23650
Fax: +49-(0)345-55-27139
walter.slaje at indologie.uni-halle.de
www.indologie.uni-halle.de
-----------------------------------------
Ego ex animi mei sententia spondeo ac polliceor
me studia humanitatis impigro labore culturum et provecturum
non sordidi lucri causa nec ad vanam captandam gloriam,
sed quo magis veritas propagetur et lux eius, qua salus
humani generis continetur, clarius effulgeat.
Vindobonae, die XXI. mensis Novembris MCMLXXXIII.




From lmfosse at ONLINE.NO  Mon Aug 18 08:24:12 2008
From: lmfosse at ONLINE.NO (Lars Martin Fosse)
Date: Mon, 18 Aug 08 10:24:12 +0200
Subject: Question
Message-ID: <161227083241.23782.11541651350081131303.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear members of the list,

In his grammar/introduction to Sanskrit (exercise V, sentence 2, p. 99), Jan
Gonda gives the following sentence:

striyo nisargAdeva paNDitAH

Would any of you happen know where this statement comes from? An exact
"chapter and verse" would be very helpful!

Best regards

Lars Martin Fosse


From:
Dr.art. Lars Martin Fosse
Haugerudvn. 76, Leil. 114,
0674 Oslo - Norway
Phone: +47 22 32 12 19 Fax:  +47 850 21 250
Mobile phone: +47 90 91 91 45
E-mail: lmfosse at getmail.no




From jemhouben at GMAIL.COM  Mon Aug 18 09:14:39 2008
From: jemhouben at GMAIL.COM (Jan Houben)
Date: Mon, 18 Aug 08 11:14:39 +0200
Subject: Question
In-Reply-To: <C254D62FB4BB40DAB307BDF93F89F369@Winston>
Message-ID: <161227083243.23782.1470571693564816103.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Lars,

Gonda usually adapts statements from literature to his graded exercises.



The full verse hinted at by him here is:

striyo hi naama khalv etaa.h   nisargaad eva pa.n.ditaa.h /

puru.saa.naa.m tu paa.n.ditya.m   ;saastrair evopadi;syate //

which is found in ;Suudraka's M.rcchaka.tikaa IV;



The same verse is cited by J.S. Speyer in his Sanskrit Syntax p. 340 to
illustrate "antithesis expressed by adversative particles".



Jan


On Mon, Aug 18, 2008 at 10:24 AM, Lars Martin Fosse <lmfosse at online.no>wrote:

> Dear members of the list,
>
> In his grammar/introduction to Sanskrit (exercise V, sentence 2, p. 99),
> Jan
> Gonda gives the following sentence:
>
> striyo nisargAdeva paNDitAH
>
> Would any of you happen know where this statement comes from? An exact
> "chapter and verse" would be very helpful!
>
> Best regards
>
> Lars Martin Fosse
>
>
> From:
> Dr.art. Lars Martin Fosse
> Haugerudvn. 76, Leil. 114,
> 0674 Oslo - Norway
> Phone: +47 22 32 12 19 Fax:  +47 850 21 250
> Mobile phone: +47 90 91 91 45
> E-mail: lmfosse at getmail.no
>



-- 
Prof. Dr. Jan E.M. Houben,
Directeur d Etudes
Chaire: Sources et Histoire de la Tradition Sanskrite
Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, SHP
A la Sorbonne,45-47, rue des Ecoles,
75005 Paris -- France.
JEMHouben at gmail.com
www.ivry.cnrs.fr/iran/Membres/CV/Houben.htm
www.jyotistoma.nl




From lmfosse at GETMAIL.NO  Mon Aug 18 09:22:56 2008
From: lmfosse at GETMAIL.NO (Lars Martin Fosse)
Date: Mon, 18 Aug 08 11:22:56 +0200
Subject: Question
In-Reply-To: <eceac9c00808180214r3397f6b5oaf9a14cde71cec6b@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <161227083245.23782.6741044366189657588.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Thank you, Jan!

This was really helpful! I am supervising a master's thesis, and my student
needed this quote, she is doing a women's study angle on the
Dasakumaracarita and prostitutes. 

All the best,

Lars Martin


From:
Dr.art. Lars Martin Fosse
Haugerudvn. 76, Leil. 114,
0674 Oslo - Norway
Phone: +47 22 32 12 19 Fax:  +47 850 21 250
Mobile phone: +47 90 91 91 45
E-mail: lmfosse at getmail.no


 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Indology [mailto:INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk] On Behalf Of 
> Jan Houben
> Sent: Monday, August 18, 2008 11:15 AM
> To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
> Subject: Re: Question
> 
> Dear Lars,
> 
> Gonda usually adapts statements from literature to his graded 
> exercises.
> 
> 
> 
> The full verse hinted at by him here is:
> 
> striyo hi naama khalv etaa.h   nisargaad eva pa.n.ditaa.h /
> 
> puru.saa.naa.m tu paa.n.ditya.m   ;saastrair evopadi;syate //
> 
> which is found in ;Suudraka's M.rcchaka.tikaa IV;
> 
> 
> 
> The same verse is cited by J.S. Speyer in his Sanskrit Syntax 
> p. 340 to illustrate "antithesis expressed by adversative particles".
> 
> 
> 
> Jan
> 
> 
> On Mon, Aug 18, 2008 at 10:24 AM, Lars Martin Fosse 
> <lmfosse at online.no>wrote:
> 
> > Dear members of the list,
> >
> > In his grammar/introduction to Sanskrit (exercise V, sentence 2, p. 
> > 99), Jan Gonda gives the following sentence:
> >
> > striyo nisargAdeva paNDitAH
> >
> > Would any of you happen know where this statement comes 
> from? An exact 
> > "chapter and verse" would be very helpful!
> >
> > Best regards
> >
> > Lars Martin Fosse
> >
> >
> > From:
> > Dr.art. Lars Martin Fosse
> > Haugerudvn. 76, Leil. 114,
> > 0674 Oslo - Norway
> > Phone: +47 22 32 12 19 Fax:  +47 850 21 250 Mobile phone: 
> +47 90 91 91 
> > 45
> > E-mail: lmfosse at getmail.no
> >
> 
> 
> 
> --
> Prof. Dr. Jan E.M. Houben,
> Directeur d Etudes
> Chaire: Sources et Histoire de la Tradition Sanskrite Ecole 
> Pratique des Hautes Etudes, SHP A la Sorbonne,45-47, rue des Ecoles,
> 75005 Paris -- France.
> JEMHouben at gmail.com
> www.ivry.cnrs.fr/iran/Membres/CV/Houben.htm
> www.jyotistoma.nl




From mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU  Tue Aug 19 13:38:04 2008
From: mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU (mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU)
Date: Tue, 19 Aug 08 08:38:04 -0500
Subject: Kadamba
Message-ID: <161227083248.23782.17994183096773647534.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

The Kadamba tree is identified by Monier-Williams (p. 247)
as Nauclea Cadamba and by Apte (p. 527) as Stephegyne
Parviflora Korth. The comment in Apte's entry that it
"is said to put forth buds at the roaring of thunder-
clouds" precisely fits the context in the passage that
concerns me (Prabodhacandrodaya, 4.13c).

Does anyone have a clue about the correct botanical
identification, and whether there is a familiar 
English name in use?

thanks in advance,
Matthew

Matthew T. Kapstein
Numata Visiting Professor of Buddhist Studies
The University of Chicago Divinity School

Directeur d'?tudes
Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris




From ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA  Tue Aug 19 14:03:09 2008
From: ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA (Stella Sandahl)
Date: Tue, 19 Aug 08 10:03:09 -0400
Subject: Kadamba
In-Reply-To: <20080819083804.BJG28750@m4500-02.uchicago.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083254.23782.17729047442043653857.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Indian Medicinal Plants (published by Orient Longman) Vol. 4, p. 120  
has the following:
Neolamarckia cadamba (Roxb.) Bosser
(=Anthocephalus chinensis (Lam) Rich. ex. Walp.)
(A. cadamba (Roxb) Miq.)
It is said to belong to the Rubiaceae family (ma?jiSTha kulam)
They give the word "Kadam" as the English equivalent (hardly helpful).
IMP also says that it is distributed "throughout the Western Ghats at  
low levels in wet places" which seems wrong, since the kadamba tree  
is found in Sanskrit poetry from elsewhere. It occurs three times in  
the GItagovinda.
Stella Sandahl

--
Professor Stella Sandahl
Department of East Asian Studies
130 St. George St. room 14087
Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
ssandahl at sympatico.ca
stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
Tel. (416) 978-4295
Fax. (416) 978-5711



On 19-Aug-08, at 9:38 AM, mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU wrote:

> The Kadamba tree is identified by Monier-Williams (p. 247)
> as Nauclea Cadamba and by Apte (p. 527) as Stephegyne
> Parviflora Korth. The comment in Apte's entry that it
> "is said to put forth buds at the roaring of thunder-
> clouds" precisely fits the context in the passage that
> concerns me (Prabodhacandrodaya, 4.13c).
>
> Does anyone have a clue about the correct botanical
> identification, and whether there is a familiar
> English name in use?
>
> thanks in advance,
> Matthew
>
> Matthew T. Kapstein
> Numata Visiting Professor of Buddhist Studies
> The University of Chicago Divinity School
>
> Directeur d'?tudes
> Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris




From ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA  Tue Aug 19 15:05:04 2008
From: ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA (Stella Sandahl)
Date: Tue, 19 Aug 08 11:05:04 -0400
Subject: Clarification about Spoken Sanskrit
Message-ID: <161227083258.23782.4234328270384229151.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear all,
I seem to have stepped on many tender toes by making fun of a certain  
type of Spoken Sanskrit.  My main objection is entirely practical.   
Over the years I have noticed that those who have been taught spoken  
Sanskrit seem to have real difficulties reading even simple classical  
Sanskrit such as the Kathasaritsagara and the Hitopadesa, not to  
speak about the epics. It is important that there still are a few  
students who wish to learn the language of Kalidasa et alii - and it  
is a real pity that alamkarashastra is not given much attention among  
scholars of comparative literature to give just one example.

Spoken Sanskrit can be quite an intellectually stimulating pass- 
time.  Like playing chess. But trying to revive a dead language by  
creating words for nuclear submarines, supermarkets, tennis  
tournaments  etc.  is in my view a rather useless enterprise. Mass  
Sanskrit is  of little interest for the large Indian population  
trying to eke out a meagre living to get  one meal a day. Languages  
are living organism that constantly change - bhasha calti nadi.  
Sanskrit has a normative unchangeable grammar since around 400 B.C.  
So can't we let it be what it is, a beautiful dead language?
Nobody has tried to revive Latin in Italy since the days of  
Mussolini.  However, Latin is still used in Western universities to  
harangue recipients of honorary doctorates and such things.
And it is of course used by the Vatican. There is no reason not to  
use Sanskrit in a similar way to inaugurate dams, swearing in  
cabinets, taking ministerial oaths, and of course in solemn rites of  
passage.  But trying to take a bus in Bombay/Mumbai or disputing the  
taxi fare in Sanskrit is probably not going to have much effect  
except amusing the drivers and the ever-present surrounding crowd.

However, I do believe it is important that students do regular  
exercises translating into Sanskrit, not just the other way around.  
At the Sorbonne we did "themes et versions" on alternating weeks (the  
"themes" were Sanskrit texts translated into an often bizarre French  
which we translated back into Sanskrit), and that was very useful.  
More useful than chatting in Sanskrit about tea and iddlis.

Best to all
Stella Sandahl

P.S. I do know how to transliterate - I just do not like the e-mail  
transliteration. And in the few cases above all members of the list  
can surely supply them.
P.P.S. Does anyone have the full text of Sacchidanandan's wonderful  
poem about the dinosaurs who "died out because they spoke Sanskrit"?
--
Professor Stella Sandahl
Department of East Asian Studies
130 St. George St. room 14087
Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
ssandahl at sympatico.ca
stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
Tel. (416) 978-4295
Fax. (416) 978-5711




From hwtull at MSN.COM  Tue Aug 19 15:17:26 2008
From: hwtull at MSN.COM (Herman Tull)
Date: Tue, 19 Aug 08 11:17:26 -0400
Subject: Clarification about Spoken Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <BLU0-SMTP305E30B180FB41829C7A61BF690@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <161227083260.23782.17116355823958150300.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Appropriate to this discussion is Edwin Gerow's  "Primary Education in 
Sanskrit: Methods and Goals" from the Journal of the American Oriental 
Society, Vol. 122, No. 4 (Oct. - Dec., 2002), pp. 661-690

Herman Tull
Princeton, NJ

--------------------------------------------------
From: "Stella Sandahl" <ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA>
Sent: Tuesday, August 19, 2008 11:05 AM
To: <INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk>
Subject: Clarification about Spoken Sanskrit

> Dear all,
> I seem to have stepped on many tender toes by making fun of a certain 
> type of Spoken Sanskrit.  My main objection is entirely practical.   Over 
> the years I have noticed that those who have been taught spoken  Sanskrit 
> seem to have real difficulties reading even simple classical  Sanskrit 
> such as the Kathasaritsagara and the Hitopadesa, not to  speak about the 
> epics. It is important that there still are a few  students who wish to 
> learn the language of Kalidasa et alii - and it  is a real pity that 
> alamkarashastra is not given much attention among  scholars of comparative 
> literature to give just one example.
>
> Spoken Sanskrit can be quite an intellectually stimulating pass- time. 
> Like playing chess. But trying to revive a dead language by  creating 
> words for nuclear submarines, supermarkets, tennis  tournaments  etc.  is 
> in my view a rather useless enterprise. Mass  Sanskrit is  of little 
> interest for the large Indian population  trying to eke out a meagre 
> living to get  one meal a day. Languages  are living organism that 
> constantly change - bhasha calti nadi.  Sanskrit has a normative 
> unchangeable grammar since around 400 B.C.  So can't we let it be what it 
> is, a beautiful dead language?
> Nobody has tried to revive Latin in Italy since the days of  Mussolini. 
> However, Latin is still used in Western universities to  harangue 
> recipients of honorary doctorates and such things.
> And it is of course used by the Vatican. There is no reason not to  use 
> Sanskrit in a similar way to inaugurate dams, swearing in  cabinets, 
> taking ministerial oaths, and of course in solemn rites of  passage.  But 
> trying to take a bus in Bombay/Mumbai or disputing the  taxi fare in 
> Sanskrit is probably not going to have much effect  except amusing the 
> drivers and the ever-present surrounding crowd.
>
> However, I do believe it is important that students do regular  exercises 
> translating into Sanskrit, not just the other way around.  At the Sorbonne 
> we did "themes et versions" on alternating weeks (the  "themes" were 
> Sanskrit texts translated into an often bizarre French  which we 
> translated back into Sanskrit), and that was very useful.  More useful 
> than chatting in Sanskrit about tea and iddlis.
>
> Best to all
> Stella Sandahl
>
> P.S. I do know how to transliterate - I just do not like the e-mail 
> transliteration. And in the few cases above all members of the list  can 
> surely supply them.
> P.P.S. Does anyone have the full text of Sacchidanandan's wonderful  poem 
> about the dinosaurs who "died out because they spoke Sanskrit"?
> --
> Professor Stella Sandahl
> Department of East Asian Studies
> 130 St. George St. room 14087
> Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
> ssandahl at sympatico.ca
> stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
> Tel. (416) 978-4295
> Fax. (416) 978-5711
> 




From mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU  Tue Aug 19 16:57:25 2008
From: mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU (mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU)
Date: Tue, 19 Aug 08 11:57:25 -0500
Subject: Kadamba
Message-ID: <161227083262.23782.243185414440327580.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Thanks to all who answered my query.
There seem to be several Latin designations
for the same plant in this case.

The very useful Pandanus database
suggests "wild cinchona" as the English name,
but I am puzzled by this: "cinchona" generally
names several quinine-yielding species in
South America. Is it possible that, after
the invention of the gin and tonic, drunken
malaria victims began to see quinine bushes
everywhere?

Matthew

Matthew T. Kapstein
Numata Visiting Professor of Buddhist Studies
The University of Chicago Divinity School

Directeur d'?tudes
Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris




From glhart at BERKELEY.EDU  Tue Aug 19 22:56:43 2008
From: glhart at BERKELEY.EDU (George Hart)
Date: Tue, 19 Aug 08 15:56:43 -0700
Subject: Kadamba
In-Reply-To: <20080819115725.BJG56228@m4500-02.uchicago.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083264.23782.6097376833197511252.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Take a look at this:

http://images.google.com/images?q='Anthocephalus%20cadamba'

According to the DED, Skt. kadamba is (not surprisingly) Dravidian --  
Tamil kaTampu, kaTampam, Telugu kaDambamu, etc.  It was worn by the  
veelan, a low-caste priest of Murugan, when he became possessed.  One  
wonders why the retroflex disappeared in Sanskrit -- perhaps the  
voicing of the -T- (stops are voiced in Tamil/Malayalam when they  
appear intervocalically) was heard more prominently than the  
retroflex.  The -T- retroflexed in all the Dravidian languages cited  
by DED.  It also gives a variant Sanskrit form, kalamba.

George Hart

On Aug 19, 2008, at 9:57 AM, mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU wrote:

> Thanks to all who answered my query.
> There seem to be several Latin designations
> for the same plant in this case.
>
> The very useful Pandanus database
> suggests "wild cinchona" as the English name,
> but I am puzzled by this: "cinchona" generally
> names several quinine-yielding species in
> South America. Is it possible that, after
> the invention of the gin and tonic, drunken
> malaria victims began to see quinine bushes
> everywhere?
>
> Matthew
>
> Matthew T. Kapstein
> Numata Visiting Professor of Buddhist Studies
> The University of Chicago Divinity School
>
> Directeur d'?tudes
> Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris




From gruenen at SUB.UNI-GOETTINGEN.DE  Tue Aug 19 14:00:29 2008
From: gruenen at SUB.UNI-GOETTINGEN.DE (Gruenendahl, Reinhold)
Date: Tue, 19 Aug 08 16:00:29 +0200
Subject: AW: Kadamba
Message-ID: <161227083252.23782.18280793941231057828.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

For Anthocephalus Cadamba see Watt's "Dictionary of the Economic Products of
India", vol. I, p. 266 (s.v. A.1192). I recommend the index volume of that
work. All volumes are part of the GRETIL e-library:

www.sub.uni-goettingen.de/ebene_1/fiindolo/gr_elib.htm

Once you have entered the online catalogue, type "Watt" into the search box,
or click the "All titles" button in the left freame and scroll.

 

Best regards

Reinhold Gr?nendahl

 

 
 
 
 
________________________________________________ 
 
Dr. Reinhold Gruenendahl
Niedersaechsische Staats- und Universitaetsbibliothek
Fachreferat sued- und suedostasiatische Philologien
(Dept. of Indology)
 
37070 Goettingen, Germany
Tel (+49) (0)5 51 / 39 52 83
 
gruenen at sub.uni-goettingen.de
 
FACH-INFORMATIONEN INDOLOGIE, GOETTINGEN:
http://www.sub.uni-goettingen.de/ebene_1/fiindolo/fiindolo.htm
In English:
http://www.sub.uni-goettingen.de/ebene_1/fiindolo/fiindole.htm
 
GRETIL - Goettingen Register of Electronic Texts in Indian Languages:
http://www.sub.uni-goettingen.de/ebene_1/fiindolo/gretil.htm
 
GRETIL e-library:
http://www.sub.uni-goettingen.de/ebene_1/fiindolo/gr_elib.htm
 

________________________________

Von: Indology im Auftrag von mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU
Gesendet: Di 19.08.2008 15:38
An: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
Betreff: Kadamba



The Kadamba tree is identified by Monier-Williams (p. 247)
as Nauclea Cadamba and by Apte (p. 527) as Stephegyne
Parviflora Korth. The comment in Apte's entry that it
"is said to put forth buds at the roaring of thunder-
clouds" precisely fits the context in the passage that
concerns me (Prabodhacandrodaya, 4.13c).

Does anyone have a clue about the correct botanical
identification, and whether there is a familiar
English name in use?

thanks in advance,
Matthew

Matthew T. Kapstein
Numata Visiting Professor of Buddhist Studies
The University of Chicago Divinity School

Directeur d'?tudes
Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris




From straube at STAFF.UNI-MARBURG.DE  Tue Aug 19 14:00:58 2008
From: straube at STAFF.UNI-MARBURG.DE (Martin Straube)
Date: Tue, 19 Aug 08 16:00:58 +0200
Subject: Kadamba
In-Reply-To: <20080819083804.BJG28750@m4500-02.uchicago.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083250.23782.2667435509215562491.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Mr. Kapstein,

you could check the Pandanus database

http://iu.ff.cuni.cz/pandanus/

which has a rather long entry of the Kadamba tree.
I hope it will help,

sincerely,
Martin Straube.

Zitat von mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU:

> The Kadamba tree is identified by Monier-Williams (p. 247)
> as Nauclea Cadamba and by Apte (p. 527) as Stephegyne
> Parviflora Korth. The comment in Apte's entry that it
> "is said to put forth buds at the roaring of thunder-
> clouds" precisely fits the context in the passage that
> concerns me (Prabodhacandrodaya, 4.13c).
>
> Does anyone have a clue about the correct botanical
> identification, and whether there is a familiar
> English name in use?
>
> thanks in advance,
> Matthew
>
> Matthew T. Kapstein
> Numata Visiting Professor of Buddhist Studies
> The University of Chicago Divinity School
>
> Directeur d'?tudes
> Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris
>



---
Dr. des. Martin Straube
Fachgebiet Indologie und Tibetologie
Philipps-Universitaet Marburg
Deutschhausstrasse 12
35032 Marburg (Germany)
www.uni-marburg.de/indologie




From christophe.vielle at UCLOUVAIN.BE  Tue Aug 19 14:13:20 2008
From: christophe.vielle at UCLOUVAIN.BE (Christophe Vielle)
Date: Tue, 19 Aug 08 16:13:20 +0200
Subject: Kadamba
In-Reply-To: <20080819083804.BJG28750@m4500-02.uchicago.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083256.23782.12444160207423788065.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

In Viennot, Odette, Le culte de l'arbre dans 
l'Inde ancienne: textes et monuments br?hmaniques 
et bouddhiques, Paris: PUF , 1954, Annales du 
Mus?e Guimet. Biblioth?que d'?tudes no 59
in the Latin index with sanskrit equivalents,
kadamba is given both for
Anthocephallus cadamba (Hook) p. 273 and Nauclea cadamba (Roxb.) p. 274
in the Sanskrit index, only the former is given for kadamba p. 276
and the "French" name given is... Kadamba

In Couture, Andr?, L'enfance de Krishna, Paris - 
Qu?bec: Presses de l'Universit? Laval - Editions 
du Cerf, 1991, "Index des noms de plantes" p. 435:
Kadamba, Antocephalus indicus syn[onyme] A. 
cadamba ou Nauclea kadamba, [HV] 52,22; 
54,7.8.11.33; 55,8.57; 56,1.2; 73,15. Arbre 
r?put? pour ses fleurs orange tr?s odorif?rantes 
qui apparaissent ? l'arriv?e des pluies.


>The Kadamba tree is identified by Monier-Williams (p. 247)
>as Nauclea Cadamba and by Apte (p. 527) as Stephegyne
>Parviflora Korth. The comment in Apte's entry that it
>"is said to put forth buds at the roaring of thunder-
>clouds" precisely fits the context in the passage that
>concerns me (Prabodhacandrodaya, 4.13c).
>
>Does anyone have a clue about the correct botanical
>identification, and whether there is a familiar
>English name in use?
>
>thanks in advance,
>Matthew
>
>Matthew T. Kapstein
>Numata Visiting Professor of Buddhist Studies
>The University of Chicago Divinity School
>
>Directeur d'?tudes
>Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris


-- 

http://belgianindology.lalibreblogs.be




From s.hodge at PADMACHOLING.PLUS.COM  Wed Aug 20 00:42:37 2008
From: s.hodge at PADMACHOLING.PLUS.COM (Stephen Hodge)
Date: Wed, 20 Aug 08 01:42:37 +0100
Subject: Kadamba
Message-ID: <161227083266.23782.12662933267482933509.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Michael,

>There seem to be several Latin designations
>for the same plant in this case.

This is true.  When many plants, especially non-European, were first named, 
sometimes they were inadvertantly named several times by different 
individuals.  Also the allocation of various plants to familes etc has been 
revised over the decades, so they needed to be renamed.  Some may still yet 
be changed with DNA studies.  But, in principle, there is (or should be) 
only one current valid scientific Latin name for each plant which is 
registered.  There is an international database which gives a ful listing 
for the world's entire scientifically known flora -- which also, if memory 
serves me, gives redundant names -- based at Kew Gardens in London.

Depending what your purposes are, you may find it useful to download a copy 
of Hooker's vast Flora Indica, which is very useful as it gives details of 
distribution in the Indian sub-continent.  There are other works available 
for download that are also useful if you are more interested in trees.

Of course, the problem always with many Indian flora (and fauna) names in 
Sanskrit is that one word can often designate several totally separate 
species or lump together distinct members of a family.  Context sometimes 
helps, though.

I too have been having fun and games recently with certain Indian flora in 
texts --- one of mine turned out to be Strychos nux-vomica !  But this, with 
other dats, has helped corroborate evidence for a geographical origin for my 
texts.

Best wishes,
Stephen Hodge 




From wmcox at UCHICAGO.EDU  Wed Aug 20 09:24:39 2008
From: wmcox at UCHICAGO.EDU (Whitney Cox)
Date: Wed, 20 Aug 08 04:24:39 -0500
Subject: Kadamba
Message-ID: <161227083275.23782.429537483973065019.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

As a sidelight to Prof. Hart's comment on Ta. ka.tampu => Skt.
kadamba, it's perhaps worth noting that the southwestern
dynasty that call themselves the Kadambas (with the dental, as
far as I know) are referred to by their contemporaries and
rivals as the Ka.dambas, with the retroflex.  See for instance
the Kauthem plates of Vikramaaditya V (1009 CE, ed. Fleet IA
Jan. 1887), ln. 9: 

kavalitanalalak.smiir durjayaurjityahaarii
vihatap.rthuka.dambaa.dambaro mauryanirjit

A Sanskrit poet of the eleventh century would presumably have
referred to the flower as kadamba, but reserves the more
Dravidian spelling for the proper noun. 


---- Original message ----
>Date: Tue, 19 Aug 2008 15:56:43 -0700
>From: George Hart <glhart at BERKELEY.EDU>  
>Subject: Re: Kadamba  
>To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
>
>Take a look at this:
>
>http://images.google.com/images?q='Anthocephalus%20cadamba'
>
>According to the DED, Skt. kadamba is (not surprisingly)
Dravidian --  
>Tamil kaTampu, kaTampam, Telugu kaDambamu, etc.  It was worn
by the  
>veelan, a low-caste priest of Murugan, when he became
possessed.  One  
>wonders why the retroflex disappeared in Sanskrit -- perhaps
the  
>voicing of the -T- (stops are voiced in Tamil/Malayalam when
they  
>appear intervocalically) was heard more prominently than the  
>retroflex.  The -T- retroflexed in all the Dravidian
languages cited  
>by DED.  It also gives a variant Sanskrit form, kalamba.
>
>George Hart
>
>On Aug 19, 2008, at 9:57 AM, mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU wrote:
>
>> Thanks to all who answered my query.
>> There seem to be several Latin designations
>> for the same plant in this case.
>>
>> The very useful Pandanus database
>> suggests "wild cinchona" as the English name,
>> but I am puzzled by this: "cinchona" generally
>> names several quinine-yielding species in
>> South America. Is it possible that, after
>> the invention of the gin and tonic, drunken
>> malaria victims began to see quinine bushes
>> everywhere?
>>
>> Matthew
>>
>> Matthew T. Kapstein
>> Numata Visiting Professor of Buddhist Studies
>> The University of Chicago Divinity School
>>
>> Directeur d'?tudes
>> Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris




From ashok.aklujkar at UBC.CA  Wed Aug 20 12:23:32 2008
From: ashok.aklujkar at UBC.CA (Ashok Aklujkar)
Date: Wed, 20 Aug 08 05:23:32 -0700
Subject: South Asia: Pre-1800. Position at UC, Irvine
Message-ID: <161227083279.23782.4126996157601964111.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

The following announcement was sent to me yesterday with a request to give
it publicity. It may be of interest to some members of this list. Sorry for
any repeated postings you may receive.

a.a. 


South Asia: Pre-1800.

The Department of History at the University of California, Irvine invites
applications for a position in pre-1800 South Asian history.  The
department will appoint at the tenure track assistant or tenured beginning
associate professor level, contingent upon qualifications.  All research
specializations in Ancient, Medieval, and Early Modern South Asian History
are welcome to apply.  Preference will be given to candidates who can
participate in the department?s World History program.  Start date: July
1, 2009.

Please apply on line at http://recruit.ap.uci.edu and submit a cover
letter and cv.  In addition, please send an article length writing sample
and three letters of recommendation (under separate cover) to:

Vinayak Chaturvedi
Chair, South Asia Search Committee
Department of History
University of California, Irvine
Irvine, CA 92697-3275.

To ensure consideration, materials must be received by November 7, 2008.
Additional information about the UCI Department of History and the School
of Humanities can be found at http://www.humanities.uci.edu/history.

The University of California, Irvine, is an Equal Opportunity Employer
committed to excellence through diversity and has an Advance Program
(http://advance.uci.edu/) for Faculty Equity and Diversity.

Closing Date: November 7, 2008.




From glhart at BERKELEY.EDU  Wed Aug 20 14:32:56 2008
From: glhart at BERKELEY.EDU (George Hart)
Date: Wed, 20 Aug 08 07:32:56 -0700
Subject: Kadamba
In-Reply-To: <20080820042439.BDJ16312@m4500-03.uchicago.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083285.23782.9068632447062755849.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Many years ago, Daniel Ingalls remarked that he wished to publish a  
book of plants with their Sanskrit names, giving pictures and the  
like.  I realize we have various databases and books that catalog the  
plants of South Asia, but to my knowledge we still have nothing that  
is meant for the scholar of premodern South Asia that gives the names  
of the plants in classical languages (Sanskrit, Tamil, Prakrit) with  
pictures and citations and identifies the plants.  In translating from  
Tamil, I find many many plant names (and some fauna also) whose  
identification is problematic, and the discussion here on kadamba  
shows the same is true in Sanskrit.  I find myself going on the  
internet and trying to discover what each plant could be and what it  
looks like -- using the Tamil Lexicon for the Latin names.  I remember  
one occurrence in the NaRRiNai that describes a plant (I've forgotten  
which one and don't have time to look it up), saying it makes a sound  
like fingers snapping.  One modern commentator had a completely  
different interpretation, and I followed him in translating it --  
which led a Tamil journal to criticize my translation.  When I  
researched it on the internet I found that indeed the seed pod  
explodes -- which means that fingers snapping is the correct  
translation.  A comprehensive book -- or better on-line database --  
allowing one to look up Sanskrit/Tamil/Prakrit names (and names in  
other South Asian languages) would be invaluable.  If someone is  
looking for a challenging and fascinating project, this would be a  
good one.




From jrasik at COLMEX.MX  Wed Aug 20 14:31:44 2008
From: jrasik at COLMEX.MX (Rasik Vihari Joshi Tripathi)
Date: Wed, 20 Aug 08 09:31:44 -0500
Subject: Clarification about Spoken Sanskrit
Message-ID: <161227083283.23782.783101262835497829.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Lovers of spoken Sanskrit,
I agree with Dr. Ganeshan. Here are in addition to several Sanskrit journals  and even daily Sanskrit News Papers, thereare All India Sanskrit Debates in calcutta, Patna, Jagannatrhpuri, Banaras, Allahabad, Lucknow, Delhi, Jaipur, Tirupati, Bombay etc. Every year where haudreds of participants and the winners get medals, first three speakers.As for modern Sanskrit I give below an example of modern sanskrit poetry. Is it inferior to Kalidasa or Banabhatta. Can we unnderstand it easyly? It does require the sound background of Panini:
"Yaah kundastabakanti shrititate muktaa-kalaapantakii
Svaante yaasca sudhaakarosra-vigalat-piiyuusha-sekantakii,
Kinchaandolita-dugdha-sindhu-laharii-dhaaranukaarantaki
Prodhaastah Vrshabhaanujaa-srtuti-kathaa-garbhaa giro durlabhaah
Rasik Vihari Joshi  

-----Mensaje original-----
De: Indology [mailto:INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk] En nombre de Stella Sandahl
Enviado el: Mi?rcoles, 20 de Agosto de 2008 08:49 a.m.
Para: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
Asunto: Re: Clarification about Spoken Sanskrit


Dear Dr. Ganesan,
Our definition of a 'dead language' is simply not the same. To me a  
language is dead when it has a normative grammar which is  
unchangeable. In that sense Panini, presumably unwittingly,  
assassinated Sanskrit already 500 or 400 B.C.- the most brilliant  
assassination in history!
Jan Houben actually proves the point by his statement that "In 1,000  
years time, Sanskrit will still be the same, but every other language  
will have changed beyond recognition."
A living language changes, a dead one stays the same, regardless how  
many journals, articles, literary works etc. etc. are written in that  
language. The only "new" thing about the so called spoken (and also  
written) Sanskrit is its additional nouns and adjectives such as  
bhUmigatena rathenAgataH  "he arrived by the subway train" or  
paramANuvisphoTa  "nuclear blast" (I am inventing these) - the Hindi   
"paramANu bam" is funnier. Verbal and pronominal endings do not seem  
to change. Mummies do not change much either.
As for the Census figures of people declaring Sanskrit their mother- 
tongue (or is it not rather father-tongue?) it has to be taken with a  
grain of salt. By the way, nobody has so far
explained to me what happened with the 35,601 Sanskrit speakers who  
vanished between 1991-2001. Maybe they, like the Malayali poet  
Sacchidanandan's dinosaurs "died out
because they spoke Sanskrit"? Who knows?
Rest assured of my devotion to and love for teaching classical  
Sanskrit. And please don't accuse me of necrophilia!
Yours
Stella Sandahl
--
Professor Stella Sandahl
Department of East Asian Studies
130 St. George St. room 14087
Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
ssandahl at sympatico.ca
stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
Tel. (416) 978-4295
Fax. (416) 978-5711



On 20-Aug-08, at 5:08 AM, Ganesan wrote:

> Dear Sanskrit Lovers,
> It is so strange that Sanskrit is called a dead language by its own
> student !! It is not at all a dead language as it has been declared  
> as 'mother tongue' by some people though they are very few.  
> Further, other than its liturgical usage literature of big and  
> small sizes is still produced in that language in the Bharatadesa .  
> There are many Sanskrit journals, periodicals and daily newspapers  
> such as SUDHARMAA, AMRITABHAASHAA,etc. which are even now read by  
> many Sanskrit lovers in India.
> A person living in far away europe or America may not be able to  
> understand the situation and much less appreciate.
> Comparison with Latin does not hold good at all as production of  
> literary works in Latin is practically nil now.
> As very strickingly put forth by Jan Houben, "In 1,000
> years time, Sanskrit will still be the same, but every other  
> language will have changed beyond recognition." Sanskrit is  
> chiranaviinaa-ever new and youthful !
>
> Ganesh
>
> Dr.T.Ganesan
> Charg? de Recherches
> French Institute
> 11, St. Louis Street
> PONDICHERRY-605001
> INDIA
>
> Tel: +91 - 413 - 233 4168 ext. 123
> E mail: ganesan at ifpindia.org
> Web: www.ifpindia.org
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Stella Sandahl"
> <ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA>
> To: <INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk>
> Sent: Tuesday, August 19, 2008 8:35 PM
> Subject: Clarification about Spoken Sanskrit
>
>
>> Dear all,
>> I seem to have stepped on many tender toes by making fun of a  
>> certain type of Spoken Sanskrit.  My main objection is entirely  
>> practical.   Over the years I have noticed that those who have  
>> been taught spoken  Sanskrit seem to have real difficulties  
>> reading even simple classical  Sanskrit such as the  
>> Kathasaritsagara and the Hitopadesa, not to  speak about the  
>> epics. It is important that there still are a few  students who  
>> wish to learn the language of Kalidasa et alii - and it  is a real  
>> pity that alamkarashastra is not given much attention among   
>> scholars of comparative literature to give just one example.
>>
>> Spoken Sanskrit can be quite an intellectually stimulating pass-  
>> time. Like playing chess. But trying to revive a dead language by   
>> creating words for nuclear submarines, supermarkets, tennis   
>> tournaments  etc.  is in my view a rather useless enterprise.  
>> Mass  Sanskrit is  of little interest for the large Indian  
>> population  trying to eke out a meagre living to get  one meal a  
>> day. Languages  are living organism that constantly change -  
>> bhasha calti nadi.  Sanskrit has a normative unchangeable grammar  
>> since around 400 B.C.  So can't we let it be what it is, a  
>> beautiful dead language?
>> Nobody has tried to revive Latin in Italy since the days of   
>> Mussolini. However, Latin is still used in Western universities  
>> to  harangue recipients of honorary doctorates and such things.
>> And it is of course used by the Vatican. There is no reason not  
>> to  use Sanskrit in a similar way to inaugurate dams, swearing in   
>> cabinets, taking ministerial oaths, and of course in solemn rites  
>> of  passage.  But trying to take a bus in Bombay/Mumbai or  
>> disputing the  taxi fare in Sanskrit is probably not going to have  
>> much effect  except amusing the drivers and the ever-present  
>> surrounding crowd.
>>
>> However, I do believe it is important that students do regular   
>> exercises translating into Sanskrit, not just the other way  
>> around.  At the Sorbonne we did "themes et versions" on  
>> alternating weeks (the  "themes" were Sanskrit texts translated  
>> into an often bizarre French  which we translated back into  
>> Sanskrit), and that was very useful.  More useful than chatting in  
>> Sanskrit about tea and iddlis.
>>
>> Best to all
>> Stella Sandahl
>>
>> P.S. I do know how to transliterate - I just do not like the e- 
>> mail transliteration. And in the few cases above all members of  
>> the list  can surely supply them.
>> P.P.S. Does anyone have the full text of Sacchidanandan's  
>> wonderful  poem about the dinosaurs who "died out because they  
>> spoke Sanskrit"?
>> --
>> Professor Stella Sandahl
>> Department of East Asian Studies
>> 130 St. George St. room 14087
>> Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
>> ssandahl at sympatico.ca
>> stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
>> Tel. (416) 978-4295
>> Fax. (416) 978-5711




From ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA  Wed Aug 20 13:48:52 2008
From: ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA (Stella Sandahl)
Date: Wed, 20 Aug 08 09:48:52 -0400
Subject: Clarification about Spoken Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <005001c902a4$4295b790$acc809c0@ifpindia.org>
Message-ID: <161227083280.23782.11706713284114907469.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Dr. Ganesan,
Our definition of a 'dead language' is simply not the same. To me a  
language is dead when it has a normative grammar which is  
unchangeable. In that sense Panini, presumably unwittingly,  
assassinated Sanskrit already 500 or 400 B.C.- the most brilliant  
assassination in history!
Jan Houben actually proves the point by his statement that "In 1,000  
years time, Sanskrit will still be the same, but every other language  
will have changed beyond recognition."
A living language changes, a dead one stays the same, regardless how  
many journals, articles, literary works etc. etc. are written in that  
language. The only "new" thing about the so called spoken (and also  
written) Sanskrit is its additional nouns and adjectives such as  
bhUmigatena rathenAgataH  "he arrived by the subway train" or  
paramANuvisphoTa  "nuclear blast" (I am inventing these) - the Hindi   
"paramANu bam" is funnier. Verbal and pronominal endings do not seem  
to change. Mummies do not change much either.
As for the Census figures of people declaring Sanskrit their mother- 
tongue (or is it not rather father-tongue?) it has to be taken with a  
grain of salt. By the way, nobody has so far
explained to me what happened with the 35,601 Sanskrit speakers who  
vanished between 1991-2001. Maybe they, like the Malayali poet  
Sacchidanandan's dinosaurs "died out
because they spoke Sanskrit"? Who knows?
Rest assured of my devotion to and love for teaching classical  
Sanskrit. And please don't accuse me of necrophilia!
Yours
Stella Sandahl
--
Professor Stella Sandahl
Department of East Asian Studies
130 St. George St. room 14087
Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
ssandahl at sympatico.ca
stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
Tel. (416) 978-4295
Fax. (416) 978-5711



On 20-Aug-08, at 5:08 AM, Ganesan wrote:

> Dear Sanskrit Lovers,
> It is so strange that Sanskrit is called a dead language by its own  
> student !! It is not at all a dead language as it has been declared  
> as 'mother tongue' by some people though they are very few.  
> Further, other than its liturgical usage literature of big and  
> small sizes is still produced in that language in the Bharatadesa .  
> There are many Sanskrit journals, periodicals and daily newspapers  
> such as SUDHARMAA, AMRITABHAASHAA,etc. which are even now read by  
> many Sanskrit lovers in India.
> A person living in far away europe or America may not be able to  
> understand the situation and much less appreciate.
> Comparison with Latin does not hold good at all as production of  
> literary works in Latin is practically nil now.
> As very strickingly put forth by Jan Houben, "In 1,000
> years time, Sanskrit will still be the same, but every other  
> language will have changed beyond recognition." Sanskrit is  
> chiranaviinaa-ever new and youthful !
>
> Ganesh
>
> Dr.T.Ganesan
> Charg? de Recherches
> French Institute
> 11, St. Louis Street
> PONDICHERRY-605001
> INDIA
>
> Tel: +91 - 413 - 233 4168 ext. 123
> E mail: ganesan at ifpindia.org
> Web: www.ifpindia.org
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Stella Sandahl"  
> <ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA>
> To: <INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk>
> Sent: Tuesday, August 19, 2008 8:35 PM
> Subject: Clarification about Spoken Sanskrit
>
>
>> Dear all,
>> I seem to have stepped on many tender toes by making fun of a  
>> certain type of Spoken Sanskrit.  My main objection is entirely  
>> practical.   Over the years I have noticed that those who have  
>> been taught spoken  Sanskrit seem to have real difficulties  
>> reading even simple classical  Sanskrit such as the  
>> Kathasaritsagara and the Hitopadesa, not to  speak about the  
>> epics. It is important that there still are a few  students who  
>> wish to learn the language of Kalidasa et alii - and it  is a real  
>> pity that alamkarashastra is not given much attention among   
>> scholars of comparative literature to give just one example.
>>
>> Spoken Sanskrit can be quite an intellectually stimulating pass-  
>> time. Like playing chess. But trying to revive a dead language by   
>> creating words for nuclear submarines, supermarkets, tennis   
>> tournaments  etc.  is in my view a rather useless enterprise.  
>> Mass  Sanskrit is  of little interest for the large Indian  
>> population  trying to eke out a meagre living to get  one meal a  
>> day. Languages  are living organism that constantly change -  
>> bhasha calti nadi.  Sanskrit has a normative unchangeable grammar  
>> since around 400 B.C.  So can't we let it be what it is, a  
>> beautiful dead language?
>> Nobody has tried to revive Latin in Italy since the days of   
>> Mussolini. However, Latin is still used in Western universities  
>> to  harangue recipients of honorary doctorates and such things.
>> And it is of course used by the Vatican. There is no reason not  
>> to  use Sanskrit in a similar way to inaugurate dams, swearing in   
>> cabinets, taking ministerial oaths, and of course in solemn rites  
>> of  passage.  But trying to take a bus in Bombay/Mumbai or  
>> disputing the  taxi fare in Sanskrit is probably not going to have  
>> much effect  except amusing the drivers and the ever-present  
>> surrounding crowd.
>>
>> However, I do believe it is important that students do regular   
>> exercises translating into Sanskrit, not just the other way  
>> around.  At the Sorbonne we did "themes et versions" on  
>> alternating weeks (the  "themes" were Sanskrit texts translated  
>> into an often bizarre French  which we translated back into  
>> Sanskrit), and that was very useful.  More useful than chatting in  
>> Sanskrit about tea and iddlis.
>>
>> Best to all
>> Stella Sandahl
>>
>> P.S. I do know how to transliterate - I just do not like the e- 
>> mail transliteration. And in the few cases above all members of  
>> the list  can surely supply them.
>> P.P.S. Does anyone have the full text of Sacchidanandan's  
>> wonderful  poem about the dinosaurs who "died out because they  
>> spoke Sanskrit"?
>> --
>> Professor Stella Sandahl
>> Department of East Asian Studies
>> 130 St. George St. room 14087
>> Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
>> ssandahl at sympatico.ca
>> stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
>> Tel. (416) 978-4295
>> Fax. (416) 978-5711




From christophe.vielle at UCLOUVAIN.BE  Wed Aug 20 07:56:58 2008
From: christophe.vielle at UCLOUVAIN.BE (Christophe Vielle)
Date: Wed, 20 Aug 08 09:56:58 +0200
Subject: Kadamba
In-Reply-To: <09036ECB-6BDD-4B21-AF5F-C3C1F25151BC@berkeley.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083270.23782.5930923052387326668.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

It remains interesting to note through this 
wonderful tool Pandanus database that

Mitragyna parvifolia Korth. = Stephegyne 
parvifolia [contra parvi"-flora" Apte] S.Vidal, 
same Rubiaceae family as Anthocephalus chinensis 
= skt kadamba but in this case identified with 
Skt vitaana
see: http://images.google.com/images?svnum=10&hl=en&lr=&q=Mitragyna+parvifolia

is identified with Tamil ka.tampai, niirkka.tampu 
(same in Malayaa.lam), ci_n_nakka.tampu, Mal. 
roosu ka.tampu or viimpu,
which means, on the basis of this "sub-variety" 
Dravidian lexical classification, that Apte's 
identification is not wrong at all, and that two 
(close) plants remain possible in this case.

Christophe Vielle




>Take a look at this:
>
>http://images.google.com/images?q='Anthocephalus%20cadamba'
>
>According to the DED, Skt. kadamba is (not 
>surprisingly) Dravidian -- Tamil kaTampu, 
>kaTampam, Telugu kaDambamu, etc.  It was worn by 
>the veelan, a low-caste priest of Murugan, when 
>he became possessed.  One wonders why the 
>retroflex disappeared in Sanskrit -- perhaps the 
>voicing of the -T- (stops are voiced in 
>Tamil/Malayalam when they appear 
>intervocalically) was heard more prominently 
>than the retroflex.  The -T- retroflexed in all 
>the Dravidian languages cited by DED.  It also 
>gives a variant Sanskrit form, kalamba.
>
>George Hart
>
>On Aug 19, 2008, at 9:57 AM, mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU wrote:
>
>>Thanks to all who answered my query.
>>There seem to be several Latin designations
>>for the same plant in this case.
>>
>>The very useful Pandanus database
>>suggests "wild cinchona" as the English name,
>>but I am puzzled by this: "cinchona" generally
>>names several quinine-yielding species in
>>South America. Is it possible that, after
>>the invention of the gin and tonic, drunken
>>malaria victims began to see quinine bushes
>>everywhere?
>>
>>Matthew
>>
>>Matthew T. Kapstein
>>Numata Visiting Professor of Buddhist Studies
>>The University of Chicago Divinity School
>>
>>Directeur d'?tudes
>>Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris


-- 

http://belgianindology.lalibreblogs.be




From glhart at BERKELEY.EDU  Wed Aug 20 18:35:02 2008
From: glhart at BERKELEY.EDU (George Hart)
Date: Wed, 20 Aug 08 11:35:02 -0700
Subject: Kadamba
In-Reply-To: <20080820042439.BDJ16312@m4500-03.uchicago.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083289.23782.14500759221214655684.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Isaac Murchie, a graduate student in our department, was good enough  
to point out what I should have said -- and that of course is the  
Pendanus db (http://iu.ff.cuni.cz/pandanus/database/).  For Tamil, it  
is sometimes quite useful, but it lacks many of the old names (kaLLi,  
vaLLai, veTci to name a few) and seems to be more based on modern  
plant names (e.g. for konRai it gives konnai, which is colloquial).   
Still, it's a good start and a great timesaver when it works.  I  
especially like the links to Google images.  Someday, one hopes, it  
will become more complete and include citations from texts -- and  
discussion where the identification is in doubt.  Meanwhile, it's a  
fine start and represents a lot of work.  George Hart




From christophe.vielle at UCLOUVAIN.BE  Wed Aug 20 09:39:45 2008
From: christophe.vielle at UCLOUVAIN.BE (Christophe Vielle)
Date: Wed, 20 Aug 08 11:39:45 +0200
Subject: Kadamba
In-Reply-To: <a06240800c4d179b70524@[192.168.1.2]>
Message-ID: <161227083276.23782.16229174327648670360.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

For possible common "English" names, one can find kadam and kaim 
according to the choice of one or the other (close) identification.

See:
http://www.flowersofindia.net/catalog/slides/Kadam.html
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dinesh_valke/2078204194/
http://envis.frlht.org.in/botanical_search.php?txtbtname=&gesp=198%7CAnthocephalus+cadamba+MIQ
(in the latter important database, there is also separate entries for 
Anthocephalus chinensis (LAM.) A.RICH. EX WALP., Anthocephalus 
indicus, Nauclea cadamba ROXB., which is taxinomically rather 
confusing)

or
http://www.flowersofindia.net/catalog/slides/Kaim.html
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dinesh_valke/484191208/
http://envis.frlht.org.in/botanical_search.php?txtbtname=Anthocephalus+cadamba+MIQ..&gesp=1442%7CMitragyna+parvifolia+KORTH.
(in the latter, there is also separate entries for  Stephegyne 
parvifolia KORTH.)

beautiful flowers indeed...
CV


>It remains interesting to note through this wonderful tool Pandanus 
>database that
>
>Mitragyna parvifolia Korth. = Stephegyne parvifolia [contra 
>parvi"-flora" Apte] S.Vidal, same Rubiaceae family as Anthocephalus 
>chinensis = skt kadamba but in this case identified with Skt vitaana
>see: http://images.google.com/images?svnum=10&hl=en&lr=&q=Mitragyna+parvifolia
>
>is identified with Tamil ka.tampai, niirkka.tampu (same in 
>Malayaa.lam), ci_n_nakka.tampu, Mal. roosu ka.tampu or viimpu,
>which means, on the basis of this "sub-variety" Dravidian lexical 
>classification, that Apte's identification is not wrong at all, and 
>that two (close) plants remain possible in this case.
>
>Christophe Vielle
>
>

-- 

http://belgianindology.lalibreblogs.be




From glhart at BERKELEY.EDU  Wed Aug 20 20:33:46 2008
From: glhart at BERKELEY.EDU (George Hart)
Date: Wed, 20 Aug 08 13:33:46 -0700
Subject: Kadamba
In-Reply-To: <alpine.WNT.1.10.0808210114150.7564@Caraka>
Message-ID: <161227083300.23782.17222190640466519139.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Thank you, Dominik -- this is just the sort of thing that makes this  
list invaluable.  George

On Aug 20, 2008, at 12:51 PM, Dominik Wujastyk wrote:

> Actually, there's quite a bit of help around.  The publications out  
> of the group at the AVS Kottakkal, including Indira Balachandran, V.  
> V. Sivarajan and others, are excellent, have pictures, are  
> multilingual, and are historically well-informed.  In the  
> introduction to my Roots of Ayurveda book - sorry for mentioning my  
> own work - I discuss these issues of plant identification, and give  
> a condensed reading list of the works I have in my library and that  
> I have found extremely helpful.  Since Roots came out, the website http://botanicus.org 
>  has arisen that offers simply amazing historical resources, and  
> links to nomenclature databases. One can download the whole of  
> Hortus Malabaricus.  It's staggering!
>
> There will always remain some difficult cases, and your "snap"  
> example is wonderful, and just the sort of historical data that  
> needs to be brought to the surface.  There's always more research to  
> be done.  But there is a mass of valuable publications out there  
> already that answer very many questions.  Just Kirtikar and Basu is  
> already a great starting point.
>
> Our colleague Roelf Barkhuis has told me that his company will be  
> publishing something substantial in exactly this area in the not too  
> distant future.
>
> Best,
> Dominik
>
> -- 
> University College London
>
>
>
> On Wed, 20 Aug 2008, George Hart wrote:
>
>> Many years ago, Daniel Ingalls remarked that he wished to publish a  
>> book of plants with their Sanskrit names, giving pictures and the  
>> like.  I realize we have various databases and books that catalog  
>> the plants of South Asia, but to my knowledge we still have nothing  
>> that is meant for the scholar of premodern South Asia that gives  
>> the names of the plants in classical languages (Sanskrit, Tamil,  
>> Prakrit) with pictures and citations and identifies the plants.  In  
>> translating from Tamil, I find many many plant names (and some  
>> fauna also) whose identification is problematic, and the discussion  
>> here on kadamba shows the same is true in Sanskrit.  I find myself  
>> going on the internet and trying to discover what each plant could  
>> be and what it looks like -- using the Tamil Lexicon for the Latin  
>> names. I remember one occurrence in the NaRRiNai that describes a  
>> plant (I've forgotten which one and don't have time to look it up),  
>> saying it makes a sound like fingers snapping.  One modern  
>> commentator had a completely different interpretation, and I  
>> followed him in translating it -- which led a Tamil journal to  
>> criticize my translation.  When I researched it on the internet I  
>> found that indeed the seed pod explodes -- which means that fingers  
>> snapping is the correct translation.  A comprehensive book -- or  
>> better on-line database -- allowing one to look up Sanskrit/Tamil/ 
>> Prakrit names (and names in other South Asian languages) would be  
>> invaluable.  If someone is looking for a challenging and  
>> fascinating project, this would be a good one.




From ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA  Wed Aug 20 17:34:27 2008
From: ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA (Stella Sandahl)
Date: Wed, 20 Aug 08 13:34:27 -0400
Subject: Kadamba
Message-ID: <161227083287.23782.14134414742722448349.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

I stated that the word kadamba occurs 3 times in the GItagovinda.   
However, it means tree in only one instance, viz. in song 5.7: vixada- 
kadamba-tale militam ....harim... smarati mano mama. I suppose that  
the qualifying adjective vizada makes it into a tree with white flowers.
In the other two instances (5.3 and 22.2) kadamba means 'mass,  
multitude' and is simply a pluralizer (see my book Le GItagovinda.  
Tradition et innovation dans le kAvya, Stockholm 1977, p. 29).
Sorry to have been sloppy in the first place.
Best
Stella Sandahl

--
Professor Stella Sandahl
Department of East Asian Studies
130 St. George St. room 14087
Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
ssandahl at sympatico.ca
stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
Tel. (416) 978-4295
Fax. (416) 978-5711




From ganesan at IFPINDIA.ORG  Wed Aug 20 09:08:02 2008
From: ganesan at IFPINDIA.ORG (Ganesan)
Date: Wed, 20 Aug 08 14:38:02 +0530
Subject: Clarification about Spoken Sanskrit
Message-ID: <161227083272.23782.6883193932740334958.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Sanskrit Lovers,
It is so strange that Sanskrit is called a dead language by its own student 
!! It is not at all a dead language as it has been declared as 'mother 
tongue' by some people though they are very few. Further, other than its 
liturgical usage literature of big and small sizes is still produced in that 
language in the Bharatadesa . There are many Sanskrit journals, periodicals 
and daily newspapers such as SUDHARMAA, AMRITABHAASHAA,etc. which are even 
now read by many Sanskrit lovers in India.
A person living in far away europe or America may not be able to understand 
the situation and much less appreciate.
Comparison with Latin does not hold good at all as production of literary 
works in Latin is practically nil now.
As very strickingly put forth by Jan Houben, "In 1,000
years time, Sanskrit will still be the same, but every other language will 
have changed beyond recognition." Sanskrit is chiranaviinaa-ever new and 
youthful !

Ganesh

Dr.T.Ganesan
Charg? de Recherches
French Institute
11, St. Louis Street
PONDICHERRY-605001
INDIA

Tel: +91 - 413 - 233 4168 ext. 123
E mail: ganesan at ifpindia.org
Web: www.ifpindia.org
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Stella Sandahl" <ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA>
To: <INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk>
Sent: Tuesday, August 19, 2008 8:35 PM
Subject: Clarification about Spoken Sanskrit


> Dear all,
> I seem to have stepped on many tender toes by making fun of a certain 
> type of Spoken Sanskrit.  My main objection is entirely practical.   Over 
> the years I have noticed that those who have been taught spoken  Sanskrit 
> seem to have real difficulties reading even simple classical  Sanskrit 
> such as the Kathasaritsagara and the Hitopadesa, not to  speak about the 
> epics. It is important that there still are a few  students who wish to 
> learn the language of Kalidasa et alii - and it  is a real pity that 
> alamkarashastra is not given much attention among  scholars of comparative 
> literature to give just one example.
>
> Spoken Sanskrit can be quite an intellectually stimulating pass- time. 
> Like playing chess. But trying to revive a dead language by  creating 
> words for nuclear submarines, supermarkets, tennis  tournaments  etc.  is 
> in my view a rather useless enterprise. Mass  Sanskrit is  of little 
> interest for the large Indian population  trying to eke out a meagre 
> living to get  one meal a day. Languages  are living organism that 
> constantly change - bhasha calti nadi.  Sanskrit has a normative 
> unchangeable grammar since around 400 B.C.  So can't we let it be what it 
> is, a beautiful dead language?
> Nobody has tried to revive Latin in Italy since the days of  Mussolini. 
> However, Latin is still used in Western universities to  harangue 
> recipients of honorary doctorates and such things.
> And it is of course used by the Vatican. There is no reason not to  use 
> Sanskrit in a similar way to inaugurate dams, swearing in  cabinets, 
> taking ministerial oaths, and of course in solemn rites of  passage.  But 
> trying to take a bus in Bombay/Mumbai or disputing the  taxi fare in 
> Sanskrit is probably not going to have much effect  except amusing the 
> drivers and the ever-present surrounding crowd.
>
> However, I do believe it is important that students do regular  exercises 
> translating into Sanskrit, not just the other way around.  At the Sorbonne 
> we did "themes et versions" on alternating weeks (the  "themes" were 
> Sanskrit texts translated into an often bizarre French  which we 
> translated back into Sanskrit), and that was very useful.  More useful 
> than chatting in Sanskrit about tea and iddlis.
>
> Best to all
> Stella Sandahl
>
> P.S. I do know how to transliterate - I just do not like the e-mail 
> transliteration. And in the few cases above all members of the list  can 
> surely supply them.
> P.P.S. Does anyone have the full text of Sacchidanandan's wonderful  poem 
> about the dinosaurs who "died out because they spoke Sanskrit"?
> --
> Professor Stella Sandahl
> Department of East Asian Studies
> 130 St. George St. room 14087
> Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
> ssandahl at sympatico.ca
> stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
> Tel. (416) 978-4295
> Fax. (416) 978-5711
> 




From mccomas.taylor at ANU.EDU.AU  Wed Aug 20 04:46:13 2008
From: mccomas.taylor at ANU.EDU.AU (McComas Taylor)
Date: Wed, 20 Aug 08 14:46:13 +1000
Subject: position at Seoul National University
Message-ID: <161227083268.23782.11580324323119473689.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Seoul National University

Hinduism

The Department of Religious Studies at Seoul National University (Korea) 
invites applications for an open rank position (tenure-track) in the 
academic field of Hinduism.  While the area of specialization is open, 
the successful applicant will have expert proficiency in reading 
Sanskrit texts and demonstrated ability to teach both early and modern 
Hinduism.  Moreover, the successful applicant will be engaged with the 
wider field of Religious Studies and with relevant theoretical approaches.
Applicants will conduct lectures in English at both undergraduate and 
graduate levels.  Competence in English, both oral and written, is 
essential for this position. Native-level proficiency will be regarded 
as highly desirable in assessing applicants.  Candidates should hold a 
completed Ph.D. degree at the time of appointment (Sept. 1, 2008). A 
demonstrated excellence in teaching and research is expected.
Applicants will be provided with a twelve month based salary with an 
annual increase, campus housing at substantially below market cost, one 
semester paid research leave out of every seven semesters, 
intra-university research grants, reimbursement for relocating expenses, 
and student assistants.
Candidates should submit an application form (available on-line), 
curriculum vitae, and no more than two representative writing samples or 
scholarly publications by E-mail to the Departmental Selection 
Committee, E-mail: center4rs at snu.ac.kr. <mailto:center4rs at snu.ac.kr.> 
Due to procedural matters, it will be advantageous for applicants who 
submit their material earlier.
For more detailed information, visit the departmental homepage, 
(http://religion.snu.ac.kr/~religion/community1_e.html). 
<http://religion.snu.ac.kr/%7Ereligion/community1_e.html%29.>
Seoul National University

-- 
===============================
Dr McComas Taylor
Head, South Asia Centre
Faculty of Asian Studies
The Australian National University
ACTON ACT 0200

Tel: +61 2 6125 3179
Fax: +61 2 6125 8326

Email: mccomas.taylor at anu.edu.au
URL: http://asianstudies.anu.edu.au/wiki/index.php/Dr_McComas_Taylor
Location: Room E4.24 Baldessin Precinct Building 




From ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK  Wed Aug 20 19:35:11 2008
From: ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK (Dominik Wujastyk)
Date: Thu, 21 Aug 08 01:05:11 +0530
Subject: Spoken Sanskrit (fwd)
Message-ID: <161227083291.23782.6829517723255658712.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

The INDOLOGY committee recently received a communication from Naresh 
Cuntoor <nareshpc at gmail.com> in response to the Spoken Sanskrit topic. 
He made several points about the value of Spoken Sanskrit and included 
useful links to web resources.  With his kind permission we reproduce them 
here:


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 20 Aug 2008 13:59:26 -0400
From: Naresh Cuntoor <nareshpc at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: Spoken Sanskrit

> On Thu, 14 Aug 2008, Naresh Cuntoor wrote:

   Dear committee members,

[...]

As a student of Sanskrit who has participated in Samskrita Bharati (SB)
activities, I would like to highlight a couple of activities that may be
of interest to the list members.

[...]

Under the SB banner, we started a inter-university network of Sanskrit
enthusiasts. The participants are mostly graduate students, recent graduate
students and faculty members. Out of these efforts, we meet to practice,
read, learn, write and appreciate the language. Please visit
http://www.speaksanskrit.org/campus/index.shtml for an overview of recent
efforts.

-- In particular, I invite you to peruse the periodic newsletters called
vishvavaaNi. The pdfs are available here:
http://www.speaksanskrit.org/vishvavani/index.shtml

-- Another effort that began recently is a wiki-style series of posts:
www.speaksanskrit.org/wiki

Clearly, I do not mean to say that any of us is a Kalidasa or a Bana. Just
that, we are students who are learning something for which we share a
passion.

[...]
Regards,

-- 
Naresh P. Cuntoor




From ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK  Wed Aug 20 19:51:49 2008
From: ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK (Dominik Wujastyk)
Date: Thu, 21 Aug 08 01:21:49 +0530
Subject: Kadamba
In-Reply-To: <3358DBB8-6401-4527-A7F2-EE13962A7D6F@berkeley.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083293.23782.12215446799850218198.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Actually, there's quite a bit of help around.  The publications out of the 
group at the AVS Kottakkal, including Indira Balachandran, V. V. Sivarajan 
and others, are excellent, have pictures, are multilingual, and are 
historically well-informed.  In the introduction to my Roots of Ayurveda 
book - sorry for mentioning my own work - I discuss these issues of plant 
identification, and give a condensed reading list of the works I have in 
my library and that I have found extremely helpful.  Since Roots came out, 
the website http://botanicus.org has arisen that offers simply amazing 
historical resources, and links to nomenclature databases. One can 
download the whole of Hortus Malabaricus.  It's staggering!

There will always remain some difficult cases, and your "snap" example is 
wonderful, and just the sort of historical data that needs to be brought 
to the surface.  There's always more research to be done.  But there is a 
mass of valuable publications out there already that answer very many 
questions.  Just Kirtikar and Basu is already a great starting point.

Our colleague Roelf Barkhuis has told me that his company will be 
publishing something substantial in exactly this area in the not too 
distant future.

Best,
Dominik

-- 
University College London



On Wed, 20 Aug 2008, George Hart wrote:

> Many years ago, Daniel Ingalls remarked that he wished to publish a book 
> of plants with their Sanskrit names, giving pictures and the like.  I 
> realize we have various databases and books that catalog the plants of 
> South Asia, but to my knowledge we still have nothing that is meant for 
> the scholar of premodern South Asia that gives the names of the plants 
> in classical languages (Sanskrit, Tamil, Prakrit) with pictures and 
> citations and identifies the plants.  In translating from Tamil, I find 
> many many plant names (and some fauna also) whose identification is 
> problematic, and the discussion here on kadamba shows the same is true 
> in Sanskrit.  I find myself going on the internet and trying to discover 
> what each plant could be and what it looks like -- using the Tamil 
> Lexicon for the Latin names. I remember one occurrence in the NaRRiNai 
> that describes a plant (I've forgotten which one and don't have time to 
> look it up), saying it makes a sound like fingers snapping.  One modern 
> commentator had a completely different interpretation, and I followed 
> him in translating it -- which led a Tamil journal to criticize my 
> translation.  When I researched it on the internet I found that indeed 
> the seed pod explodes -- which means that fingers snapping is the 
> correct translation.  A comprehensive book -- or better on-line database 
> -- allowing one to look up Sanskrit/Tamil/Prakrit names (and names in 
> other South Asian languages) would be invaluable.  If someone is looking 
> for a challenging and fascinating project, this would be a good one.




From ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK  Wed Aug 20 20:14:54 2008
From: ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK (Dominik Wujastyk)
Date: Thu, 21 Aug 08 01:44:54 +0530
Subject: Kadamba
In-Reply-To: <032f01c9025d$a5065700$ef467257@zen>
Message-ID: <161227083296.23782.7145104051989930835.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

The database at Kew Gardens can be helpful, but it is not an international 
centralized solution to problems in botanical nomenclature.  It mainly 
records all the different names that have been used, but doesn't actually 
sort out the problems.  It leaves many major issues for further research.

Hooker is good, but completely a-historical.  Although it's wonderful for 
botanists, I've found it generally unhelpful for the kinds of problems we 
routinely face.

The reason I recommended the Sivarajan/Balachandran works in my last post, 
-- and this also goes for the 5-volume Indian Medicinal Plants volumes by 
Warrier, Nambiar and Ramankutty, that Stella cited -- is that they were 
prepared by collaborations between scholars who are/were 
university-trained botanists, as well as Sanskritists and practicing 
vaidyas in Kerala.  These chaps know their onions, so to speak.

Dominik

-- 
Dr Dominik Wujastyk
University College London



On Wed, 20 Aug 2008, Stephen Hodge wrote:

> Michael,
>
>> There seem to be several Latin designations
>> for the same plant in this case.
>
> This is true.  When many plants, especially non-European, were first named, 
> sometimes they were inadvertantly named several times by different 
> individuals.  Also the allocation of various plants to familes etc has been 
> revised over the decades, so they needed to be renamed.  Some may still yet 
> be changed with DNA studies.  But, in principle, there is (or should be) 
> only one current valid scientific Latin name for each plant which is 
> registered.  There is an international database which gives a ful listing 
> for the world's entire scientifically known flora -- which also, if memory 
> serves me, gives redundant names -- based at Kew Gardens in London.
>
> Depending what your purposes are, you may find it useful to download a copy 
> of Hooker's vast Flora Indica, which is very useful as it gives details of 
> distribution in the Indian sub-continent.  There are other works available 
> for download that are also useful if you are more interested in trees.
>
> Of course, the problem always with many Indian flora (and fauna) names in 
> Sanskrit is that one word can often designate several totally separate 
> species or lump together distinct members of a family.  Context sometimes 
> helps, though.
>
> I too have been having fun and games recently with certain Indian flora in 
> texts --- one of mine turned out to be Strychos nux-vomica !  But this, 
> with other dats, has helped corroborate evidence for a geographical origin 
> for my texts.
>
> Best wishes,
> Stephen Hodge




From ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK  Wed Aug 20 20:27:30 2008
From: ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK (Dominik Wujastyk)
Date: Thu, 21 Aug 08 01:57:30 +0530
Subject: Kadamba
In-Reply-To: <a06240800c4d179b70524@[192.168.1.2]>
Message-ID: <161227083298.23782.15772063433422942148.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

The trouble with Pandanus - which is so excellent in many ways - and with 
many other guides in this area, including the indexes to my own book, is 
that all the thinking that lies behind a choice of plant identification is 
suppressed.  I no longer even look at books that just say X in Sanskrit is 
Y in Latin/English.  There's no point.  If the author doesn't share with 
you the *thinking* process behind the assertion.

Plant identifications can be made on the basis of many different kinds of 
evidence.  There's the anecdotal/historical "snap" kind of evidence, which 
is great when you can get it.  There is the opinion of vaidyas, and this 
can vary from one locality to another.  There are the Sanskrit nighantus, 
and the Amarakosa, that give many useful correspondences and ideas. 
There are the Sanskrit words themselves that sometimes contain clues to 
the shape, colour or other features of the plant.  There are the remarks 
of botanists from Garcia da Orta and van Rheede through Linnaeus, Hooker 
etc. through to ethnopharmacologists like R. N. Chopra.  There is the 
pharmaceutical consideration, as in discussions of Soma and many other 
plants with claimed medicinal effects.  There's the cross-language 
coordination of nomenclature.  It goes on.  In actual practice, one does a 
kind of triangulation from two or three of these types of evidence to 
arrive at an answer.  The good thing is that there's a great deal of 
useful scholarship already out there, some of it quite old, that gives 
lots of historical background.  Dymock is wonderfully discursive and yet 
accurate.  Same for Whitelaw and others.  U C Dutt's little tome is 
extremely valuable, and does a much better job of understanding King's 
data from the Botanical garden in Calcutta than did dear old Monier 
Williams.

So, my point is that producing a database or a book that says "This 
Sanskrit thingy is that Latin thingy" just won't do.  At the very least, 
the *sources* for making any such judgement absolutely must be given. 
Better still, the sources should be summarized and discussed, however 
briefly.  Any other approach just adds to the groaning shelves of works 
that make only raw assertions.  These add to the confusion, rather than 
curing it.

Dominik

-- 
Dr Dominik Wujastyk
University College London



On Wed, 20 Aug 2008, Christophe Vielle wrote:

> It remains interesting to note through this wonderful tool Pandanus 
> database that
>
> Mitragyna parvifolia Korth. = Stephegyne parvifolia [contra parvi"-flora" 
> Apte] S.Vidal, same Rubiaceae family as Anthocephalus chinensis = skt 
> kadamba but in this case identified with Skt vitaana
> see: 
> http://images.google.com/images?svnum=10&hl=en&lr=&q=Mitragyna+parvifolia
>
> is identified with Tamil ka.tampai, niirkka.tampu (same in Malayaa.lam), 
> ci_n_nakka.tampu, Mal. roosu ka.tampu or viimpu,
> which means, on the basis of this "sub-variety" Dravidian lexical 
> classification, that Apte's identification is not wrong at all, and that 
> two (close) plants remain possible in this case.
>
> Christophe Vielle
>
>
>
>
>> Take a look at this:
>> 
>> http://images.google.com/images?q='Anthocephalus%20cadamba'
>> 
>> According to the DED, Skt. kadamba is (not surprisingly) Dravidian -- 
>> Tamil kaTampu, kaTampam, Telugu kaDambamu, etc.  It was worn by the 
>> veelan, a low-caste priest of Murugan, when he became possessed.  One 
>> wonders why the retroflex disappeared in Sanskrit -- perhaps the voicing 
>> of the -T- (stops are voiced in Tamil/Malayalam when they appear 
>> intervocalically) was heard more prominently than the retroflex.  The -T- 
>> retroflexed in all the Dravidian languages cited by DED.  It also gives a 
>> variant Sanskrit form, kalamba.
>> 
>> George Hart
>> 
>> On Aug 19, 2008, at 9:57 AM, mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU wrote:
>> 
>>> Thanks to all who answered my query.
>>> There seem to be several Latin designations
>>> for the same plant in this case.
>>> 
>>> The very useful Pandanus database
>>> suggests "wild cinchona" as the English name,
>>> but I am puzzled by this: "cinchona" generally
>>> names several quinine-yielding species in
>>> South America. Is it possible that, after
>>> the invention of the gin and tonic, drunken
>>> malaria victims began to see quinine bushes
>>> everywhere?
>>> 
>>> Matthew
>>> 
>>> Matthew T. Kapstein
>>> Numata Visiting Professor of Buddhist Studies
>>> The University of Chicago Divinity School
>>> 
>>> Directeur d'?tudes
>>> Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris
>
>
> --
>
> http://belgianindology.lalibreblogs.be
>




From veerankp at GMAIL.COM  Thu Aug 21 04:30:24 2008
From: veerankp at GMAIL.COM (veeranarayana Pandurangi)
Date: Thu, 21 Aug 08 10:00:24 +0530
Subject: Clarification about Spoken Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <EF3838B287B79D47AF84D86AE402C7AD3FBD06@email.colmex.mx>
Message-ID: <161227083303.23782.716034677650131857.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

dear friends,
I certainly agree with Dr. Ganesan's veiws.

further I want to clarify some points here.

The spoken sanskrit is conceived to be a small step to further studies of
kalidasas language. No body, by chatting over idli or coffee, is claiming
that they are far superior to bana or bhasa.

how to introduce sanskrit students in first step? it is the question mostly
encountered by Sanskrit educators today. people and mostly students in
India are afraid of sanskrit becuase of its so called difficulty. Spoken
sanskrit aims to quell this fear by introducing a simple form easy to
understand the sanskrit initially. then they can go to high language of bana
etc.

interestingly sanskrit through ages is spoken/ written in a very simple way
right from vedas to patanjali sabara kalidasa etc. but sometimes the style
had to be somekind of flowerish to attract the selected few, little bit
unnatural. we can not compare the simple language of kalidasa and bana.
there is very much gap in ages. hence it is aimed to bring back to original
state. do not we want to go back to beautifull language of patanjali? or
want to read bana only or else all the unnatural sanskrit of poets in
between? the beauty always lies in simplicity. I am not the person to hate
bana etc. but I admire more patanjali Shabara or vedic sanskrit for its
beauti in simplicity.

moreover mainly it is the question of how to introduce the first time
student indian student to sanskrit? since he already knows many/ or
most words (the european student sitting differently without the smell of
sanskrit (samskrita-gandha-vidhurah) being a diffrent case) it is only a
step to introduce him to syntax of sanskrit and few grammatically correct
words. exactly that what this movement is doing.

why dont we want/ can not revive the spoken sanskrit across the
subcontinent? is not Yehudi a perfect example. nobody of spoken sanskrit
champions wants to destroy all other languages and to introduce the sanskrit
in their place. nobody is dreaming about that. they are creating awareness
of this language.

regarding the the most brilliant assassination in history!

it is strange that still many people seem to be  happy without panini!  is
it? I do not know exactly.  he simply created a much needed grammar of
saskrit of his time. sanskrit vanished from common people for different
reasons (may be invasions of barbarians or others no body know exactly). but
panini survived because of different reasons. (for he was the base of vedic
and classical studies that still continue through the ages). *is it panini's
fault in writing a highly defined grammar that is still ahead in many
themes.  *stella's comments make no sense. sorry.

if sanskrit is changeble and if at all chages in futures, what is the fault?
we welcome it.

veeranaryana pandurangi

  In that sense Panini, presumably unwittingly,
> assassinated Sanskrit already 500 or 400 B.C.- Jan Houben actually proves
> the point by his statement that "In 1,000
> years time, Sanskrit will still be the same, but every other language
> will have changed beyond recognition."
> A living language changes, a dead one stays the same, regardless how
> many journals, articles, literary works etc. etc. are written in that
> language. The only "new" thing about the so called spoken (and also
> written) Sanskrit is its additional nouns and adjectives such as
> bhUmigatena rathenAgataH  "he arrived by the subway train" or
> paramANuvisphoTa  "nuclear blast" (I am inventing these) - the Hindi
> "paramANu bam" is funnier. Verbal and pronominal endings do not seem
> to change. Mummies do not change much either.
> As for the Census figures of people declaring Sanskrit their mother-
> tongue (or is it not rather father-tongue?) it has to be taken with a
> grain of salt. By the way, nobody has so far
> explained to me what happened with the 35,601 Sanskrit speakers who
> vanished between 1991-2001. Maybe they, like the Malayali poet
> Sacchidanandan's dinosaurs "died out
> because they spoke Sanskrit"? Who knows?
> Rest assured of my devotion to and love for teaching classical
> Sanskrit. And please don't accuse me of necrophilia!
> Yours
> Stella Sandahl
> --
> Professor Stella Sandahl
> Department of East Asian Studies
> 130 St. George St. room 14087
> Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
> ssandahl at sympatico.ca
> stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
> Tel. (416) 978-4295
> Fax. (416) 978-5711
>
>
>
>  On 20-Aug-08, at 5:08 AM, Ganesan wrote:
>
> > Dear Sanskrit Lovers,
> > It is so strange that Sanskrit is called a dead language by its own
> > student !! It is not at all a dead language as it has been declared
> > as 'mother tongue' by some people though they are very few.
> > Further, other than its liturgical usage literature of big and
> > small sizes is still produced in that language in the Bharatadesa .
> > There are many Sanskrit journals, periodicals and daily newspapers
> > such as SUDHARMAA, AMRITABHAASHAA,etc. which are even now read by
> > many Sanskrit lovers in India.
> > A person living in far away europe or America may not be able to
> > understand the situation and much less appreciate.
> > Comparison with Latin does not hold good at all as production of
> > literary works in Latin is practically nil now.
> > As very strickingly put forth by Jan Houben, "In 1,000
> > years time, Sanskrit will still be the same, but every other
> > language will have changed beyond recognition." Sanskrit is
> > chiranaviinaa-ever new and youthful !
> >
> > Ganesh
> >
> > Dr.T.Ganesan
> > Charg? de Recherches
> > French Institute
> > 11, St. Louis Street
> > PONDICHERRY-605001
> > INDIA
> >
> > Tel: +91 - 413 - 233 4168 ext. 123
> > E mail: ganesan at ifpindia.org
> > Web: www.ifpindia.org
> > ----- Original Message ----- From: "Stella Sandahl"
> > <ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA>
> > To: <INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk>
> > Sent: Tuesday, August 19, 2008 8:35 PM
> > Subject: Clarification about Spoken Sanskrit
> >
> >
> >> Dear all,
> >> I seem to have stepped on many tender toes by making fun of a
> >> certain type of Spoken Sanskrit.  My main objection is entirely
> >> practical.   Over the years I have noticed that those who have
> >> been taught spoken  Sanskrit seem to have real difficulties
> >> reading even simple classical  Sanskrit such as the
> >> Kathasaritsagara and the Hitopadesa, not to  speak about the
> >> epics. It is important that there still are a few  students who
> >> wish to learn the language of Kalidasa et alii - and it  is a real
> >> pity that alamkarashastra is not given much attention among
> >> scholars of comparative literature to give just one example.
> >>
> >> Spoken Sanskrit can be quite an intellectually stimulating pass-
> >> time. Like playing chess. But trying to revive a dead language by
> >> creating words for nuclear submarines, supermarkets, tennis
> >> tournaments  etc.  is in my view a rather useless enterprise.
> >> Mass  Sanskrit is  of little interest for the large Indian
> >> population  trying to eke out a meagre living to get  one meal a
> >> day. Languages  are living organism that constantly change -
> >> bhasha calti nadi.  Sanskrit has a normative unchangeable grammar
> >> since around 400 B.C.  So can't we let it be what it is, a
> >> beautiful dead language?
> >> Nobody has tried to revive Latin in Italy since the days of
> >> Mussolini. However, Latin is still used in Western universities
> >> to  harangue recipients of honorary doctorates and such things.
> >> And it is of course used by the Vatican. There is no reason not
> >> to  use Sanskrit in a similar way to inaugurate dams, swearing in
> >> cabinets, taking ministerial oaths, and of course in solemn rites
> >> of  passage.  But trying to take a bus in Bombay/Mumbai or
> >> disputing the  taxi fare in Sanskrit is probably not going to have
> >> much effect  except amusing the drivers and the ever-present
> >> surrounding crowd.
> >>
> >> However, I do believe it is important that students do regular
> >> exercises translating into Sanskrit, not just the other way
> >> around.  At the Sorbonne we did "themes et versions" on
> >> alternating weeks (the  "themes" were Sanskrit texts translated
> >> into an often bizarre French  which we translated back into
> >> Sanskrit), and that was very useful.  More useful than chatting in
> >> Sanskrit about tea and iddlis.
> >>
> >> Best to all
> >> Stella Sandahl
> >>
> >> P.S. I do know how to transliterate - I just do not like the e-
> >> mail transliteration. And in the few cases above all members of
> >> the list  can surely supply them.
> >> P.P.S. Does anyone have the full text of Sacchidanandan's
> >> wonderful  poem about the dinosaurs who "died out because they
> >> spoke Sanskrit"?
> >> --
> >> Professor Stella Sandahl
> >> Department of East Asian Studies
> >> 130 St. George St. room 14087
> >> Toronto, ON M5S 3H1
> >> ssandahl at sympatico.ca
> >> stella.sandahl at utoronto.ca
> >> Tel. (416) 978-4295
> >> Fax. (416) 978-5711
>



-- 
Veeranarayana N.K. Pandurangi
Head, Dept of Darshanas,
Yoganandacharya Bhavan,
Jagadguru Ramanandacharya Rajasthan Samskrita University, Madau, post
Bhankrota, Jaipur, 302026.




From veerankp at GMAIL.COM  Thu Aug 21 04:37:20 2008
From: veerankp at GMAIL.COM (veeranarayana Pandurangi)
Date: Thu, 21 Aug 08 10:07:20 +0530
Subject: kalivrttadarshapurana
Message-ID: <161227083305.23782.12241767657455287998.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

dear friends
is any body aware of  a certain purana called Kalpita kalivrttadarshapurana.
I saw it in the collection of my Guru Martanda dikshita recently. it is
printed but no details. it is also purvarddha. is there any uttararddha? It
is critical of colonial practices in nature. I want to translate it.


-- 
Veeranarayana N.K. Pandurangi
Head, Dept of Darshanas,
Yoganandacharya Bhavan,
Jagadguru Ramanandacharya Rajasthan Samskrita University, Madau, post
Bhankrota, Jaipur, 302026.




From scharf at BROWN.EDU  Thu Aug 21 20:32:18 2008
From: scharf at BROWN.EDU (Peter M. Scharf)
Date: Thu, 21 Aug 08 16:32:18 -0400
Subject: Vedic l
In-Reply-To: <006001c8ed1a$287bbe30$cf565f80@allrsdelld8200>
Message-ID: <161227083307.23782.6058888264620966561.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Colleagues,

	I'm describing the phonetic features of Sanskrit sounds for the  
appendix of LInguistic Issues in Encoding Sanskrit my colleague  
Malcolm Hyman and I are putting the finishing touches on.  One I'm a  
bit uncertain about it the so-called Vedic l, sometimes called  
Marathi l, which occurs intervocalically in Rgvedic dialect for  
retroflex d.  I'm unsure whether this is an approximant (like l) or a  
flap like .d (that is the Devanagari d with a dot below as in Modern  
Hindi la.dakaa).  Gujarati also has intervocalic flap developing  
from .d.  These flaps are not l's bur r's.  The question is, "Is (or  
was) the Vedic l a retroflex flap or a retroflex lateral approximant?

	Although Allen mentions flap-articulation, his references are not  
probative.

Allen (1953: 73) "they [our authorities] take note, however, of the  
especially brief and light flap-articulation of intervocalic voiced  
retroflex stops. Note 2
[Note 2:SESirIya-SikzA 22. duspfzwaS ceti vijYeyo qa-QayoH svara- 
maDyayoH (in the RP (see 1.110 above) duHspfzwa = Izatspfzwa and is  
used to describe the articulation of the semivowels).  Cf. also VP  
4.146 qa-QO La-LAv ekezAm; RP 1.52.  For a kymographic study of this  
feature in Gujarati see t. N. Dave BSOAS 6.673ff.

I checked the reference:
Dave, T. N. 1931. "Notes on Gujarati Phonology." Bulletin of the  
School of Oriental and African Studies, vol. 6, no. 3, pp. 673-678.   
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/607202

Dave says only that
Gujarati M.I. .d > G. tapped r.

It seems to me Allen's references weigh against his conclusion that  
Vedic l is a flap, but are not absolutely conclusive.  It may not be  
that all the ancients identified duHspfzwa with Izatspfzwa and the  
former could indicate tap or flap versus approximant.  Alternatively,  
even if the two terms are identical, they need not distinguish tap  
and flap from approximant.

One bit of evidence that might settle the question concerns whether  
there are cases in Indic of the retroflex lateral approximant  
occurring particularly in the intervocalic environment.  Is the Tamil  
retroflex l exclusively or particularly intervocalic?

Your help would be appreciated.
Peter

*********************************************************
Peter M. Scharf                           (401) 863-2720 office
Department of Classics             (401) 863-2123 dept.
Brown University
PO Box 1856                               (401) 863-7484 fax
Providence, RI 02912                Scharf at brown.edu
http://www.brown.edu/Departments/Classics/people/facultypage.php? 
id=10044
http://sanskritlibrary.org/
*********************************************************




From zydenbos at UNI-MUENCHEN.DE  Thu Aug 21 22:01:46 2008
From: zydenbos at UNI-MUENCHEN.DE (Robert Zydenbos)
Date: Fri, 22 Aug 08 00:01:46 +0200
Subject: Spoken / modern Sanskrit
Message-ID: <161227083310.23782.17568598787921896917.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

I have followed the multi-threaded 'modern Sanskrit' discussion with 
interest, and here come my two cents' worth on a few of the issues that 
were raised --

1. Indian census reports: they are certainly useful, but they cannot be 
taken seriously literally (cf. the strangely large number of listed 
languages spoken in India by one single person, or the number of castes 
with only one member). The census merely records what people claim about 
themselves. If someone claims to be a Sanskrit mother tongue speaker, 
nobody will check to see whether this person has made a truthful 
statement. Hence also the bizarre fluctuations in the numbers of 
Sanskrit speakers from one census to the next.

2. Mother tongue speakers of Sanskrit:  I know persons who have claimed 
they are. These persons are simply Kannada speakers with a special love 
of Sanskrit, and they want Sanskrit to figure in the census reports. 
Surely the same applies to the vast majority of others (if not all of 
them) who have claimed the same.

3. The 'Sanskrit-speaking village in Karnataka': this is something of a 
hoax; but as long as wishful thinking among romantics persists, queries 
about the village and claims that it exists will also persist. I know of 
a college teacher of Sanskrit (real Sanskrit) in Bangalore who is from 
that place, and he finds it rather embarrassing to say where he is from.

4. Politics: regrettably, the activities of organizations like Akshara 
have a polarizing effect. Some persons feel attracted, others feel 
repelled by the political message. In one issue of their monthly 
magazine, years back, I read an ultra-short story about a woman who had 
lost her three sons in a war with Pakistan, and when asked whether she 
was sad, she replied: "yes, I am sad that I could not send more sons to 
give their lives for the sake of the motherland". This more or less 
illustrates the general atmosphere.

5. Dead or not: the popularity of Sanskrit as an exam subject in high 
schools, in my own observation, is that it is thought to be (and 
apparently indeed is) a way to score high marks and thus raise the final 
average. And this is precisely because practically nobody (teachers 
included) considers Sanskrit a language of which active mastery is 
required or even desirable. The popular view is that it is quite dead, 
only spoken by respectable priests and pundits, and by a few less 
respectable dazed political right-wingers. I have heard reports of a 
renowned American Sanskritist [name suppressed] who travelled through 
Karnataka and Goa and wanted to speak Sanskrit to just about everybody 
he met. He could; but he was barely understood, and those who could 
answer in Sanskrit could be counted on the fingers of one hand.

6. Eternal intelligibility: the same applies to other dead languages, 
esp. Latin, Europe's equivalent to Sanskrit (for a passionate plea to 
revive the active use of Latin, see the recent bestselling book [!] by 
Wilfried Stroh, _Latein ist tot, es lebe Latein!_).

7. Usefulness: it can be really useful to speak some Sanskrit. More than 
once I have been in a situation where the only language in which I could 
communicate with a person (these persons were always scholars or temple 
priests) was Sanskrit even if in Karnataka it is, let us say, enhanced 
with Kannada, and in Pondicherry with Tamil and Telugu and English. The 
obvious reason for these additions is that Sanskrit is so little spoken 
that no uniform vocabulary for terms from modern and everyday life has 
developed. If one compares bilingual X-Sanskrit dictionaries, one finds 
that the compilers either declare neo-Sanskritic words from language X 
to be Sanskrit, or they think up new words (words that may become 
current in a geographically limited area, if at all).

8. Future: who knows? In the first issue of the M?nchener Indologische 
Zeitschrift (to appear later this year), an interview in Sanskrit will 
appear which I did with a senior scholar in Udupi. This is an 
experiment, and I hope that it will actually be read. The man's Sanskrit 
is delightful: real (not the simplified stuff) and alive. The experiment 
aims at (a) creating an awareness that Sanskrit is still used, (b) 
encouraging people to help revive Sanskrit, so that it may become a 
medium of scholarly communication that eliminates the language barriers 
between various non-Indian and traditional Indian scholars.

Finally, for those who are interested: a few years ago I have written an 
article about the imperishability of Sanskrit, and its modern use: 
"Sanskrit: Ewige Sprache der G?tter, wiedergeboren und noch immer da," 
in P. Schrijver and P. Mumm (eds.), _Sprachtod und Sprachgeburt._ 
Bremen: Hempen Verlag, 2004, pp. 278-300.

RZ

-- 
Prof. Dr. Robert J. Zydenbos
Department fuer Asienstudien - Institut fuer Indologie und Tibetologie
Universitaet Muenchen
Deutschland
Tel. (+49-89-) 2180-5782
Fax  (+49-89-) 2180-5827
http://www.lrz-muenchen.de/~zydenbos




From jrasik at COLMEX.MX  Fri Aug 22 15:23:06 2008
From: jrasik at COLMEX.MX (Rasik Vihari Joshi Tripathi)
Date: Fri, 22 Aug 08 10:23:06 -0500
Subject: None
Message-ID: <161227083316.23782.3153751622201352124.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Members,
I shall very much appreciate if any one of you could kindly explain to
me what is "Suurya-Vijnaana"?
Thanks in advance,
Rasaik Vihari Joshi
 




From hhhock at EXPRESS.CITES.UIUC.EDU  Fri Aug 22 15:28:17 2008
From: hhhock at EXPRESS.CITES.UIUC.EDU (hhhock)
Date: Fri, 22 Aug 08 10:28:17 -0500
Subject: Vedic l
In-Reply-To: <35832AE0-4853-4F18-A741-524425FC3102@brown.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083319.23782.10053479129291059227.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Peter,

Vedic .l will no doubt have to designate some kind of "weakened" form  
of .d and thus would be a parallel to Hindi (etc.) .r . But that  
doesn't clarify its phonetic nature. One would like to think of it as  
some kind of retroflex tap with lateral closure; but I'm not sure  
that the descriptions in the early Vedic phonetic texts will be  
helpful in confirming this.

There is an interesting parallel, which might be worthy of  
consideration: At some stage in late MIAr, intervocalic single n and  
l become sounds that are written .n and .l , contrasting with n and  
l, the regular outcomes of initial n l and intervocalic nn ll. Here  
again there is an indication that .n and .l designate "weaker"  
sounds, since they occur in typical positions of weakening, while n  
and l occur in typically strong positions. Some of the peripheral  
NIAr varieties preserve .n and/or .l from these sources, although  
much of NIAr has lost the contrast, partly in connection with the  
"Gangetic dentalization". (On this matter, you might consult Masica's  
Indo-Aryan languages, following up some of the references. Turner,  
too, had some interesting things to say on this which, I believe,  
appeared in his collected papers.) Unfortunately, I'm not aware of  
any phonetic examination of the realization of .n and .l in the NIAr  
varieties that keep them. However, the pronunciation of .n in  
Sanskritic words in Hindi as nasalized retroflex flap may provide  
some clues.

That's about all that I can think of. Maybe somebody else on the list  
has some other or better ideas and/or access to other or better  
phonetic observations.

All the best,

Hans



On 21 Aug 2008, at 15:32, Peter M. Scharf wrote:

> Dear Colleagues,
>
> 	I'm describing the phonetic features of Sanskrit sounds for the  
> appendix of LInguistic Issues in Encoding Sanskrit my colleague  
> Malcolm Hyman and I are putting the finishing touches on.  One I'm  
> a bit uncertain about it the so-called Vedic l, sometimes called  
> Marathi l, which occurs intervocalically in Rgvedic dialect for  
> retroflex d.  I'm unsure whether this is an approximant (like l) or  
> a flap like .d (that is the Devanagari d with a dot below as in  
> Modern Hindi la.dakaa).  Gujarati also has intervocalic flap  
> developing from .d.  These flaps are not l's bur r's.  The question  
> is, "Is (or was) the Vedic l a retroflex flap or a retroflex  
> lateral approximant?
>
> 	Although Allen mentions flap-articulation, his references are not  
> probative.
>
> Allen (1953: 73) "they [our authorities] take note, however, of the  
> especially brief and light flap-articulation of intervocalic voiced  
> retroflex stops. Note 2
> [Note 2:SESirIya-SikzA 22. duspfzwaS ceti vijYeyo qa-QayoH svara- 
> maDyayoH (in the RP (see 1.110 above) duHspfzwa = Izatspfzwa and is  
> used to describe the articulation of the semivowels).  Cf. also VP  
> 4.146 qa-QO La-LAv ekezAm; RP 1.52.  For a kymographic study of  
> this feature in Gujarati see t. N. Dave BSOAS 6.673ff.
>
> I checked the reference:
> Dave, T. N. 1931. "Notes on Gujarati Phonology." Bulletin of the  
> School of Oriental and African Studies, vol. 6, no. 3, pp.  
> 673-678.  Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/607202
>
> Dave says only that
> Gujarati M.I. .d > G. tapped r.
>
> It seems to me Allen's references weigh against his conclusion that  
> Vedic l is a flap, but are not absolutely conclusive.  It may not  
> be that all the ancients identified duHspfzwa with Izatspfzwa and  
> the former could indicate tap or flap versus approximant.   
> Alternatively, even if the two terms are identical, they need not  
> distinguish tap and flap from approximant.
>
> One bit of evidence that might settle the question concerns whether  
> there are cases in Indic of the retroflex lateral approximant  
> occurring particularly in the intervocalic environment.  Is the  
> Tamil retroflex l exclusively or particularly intervocalic?
>
> Your help would be appreciated.
> Peter
>
> *********************************************************
> Peter M. Scharf                           (401) 863-2720 office
> Department of Classics             (401) 863-2123 dept.
> Brown University
> PO Box 1856                               (401) 863-7484 fax
> Providence, RI 02912                Scharf at brown.edu
> http://www.brown.edu/Departments/Classics/people/facultypage.php? 
> id=10044
> http://sanskritlibrary.org/
> *********************************************************




From jean-luc.chevillard at UNIV-PARIS-DIDEROT.FR  Fri Aug 22 10:04:00 2008
From: jean-luc.chevillard at UNIV-PARIS-DIDEROT.FR (Jean-Luc Chevillard)
Date: Fri, 22 Aug 08 12:04:00 +0200
Subject: Tamil la-La-Za-ra (Re: Vedic l
In-Reply-To: <35832AE0-4853-4F18-A741-524425FC3102@brown.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083312.23782.4501572668208783296.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Peter M. Scharf a ?crit :
> [....] One I'm a bit uncertain about it the so-called Vedic l, 
> sometimes called Marathi l, which occurs intervocalically in Rgvedic 
> dialect for retroflex d. I'm unsure whether this is an approximant 
> (like l) or a flap like .d (that is the Devanagari d with a dot below 
> as in Modern Hindi la.dakaa). Gujarati also has intervocalic flap 
> developing from .d. These flaps are not l's bur r's. The question is, 
> "Is (or was) the Vedic l a retroflex flap or a retroflex lateral 
> approximant?
>
> [...]
>
> One bit of evidence that might settle the question concerns whether 
> there are cases in Indic of the retroflex lateral approximant 
> occurring particularly in the intervocalic environment. Is the Tamil 
> retroflex l exclusively or particularly intervocalic?
In the case of (Classical) Tamil,
there is a group of 4 items to be considered:

la (?): transcribed "la" in Tamil Lexicon and popularly called "small 
la" (ci??a la) {cin_n_a la}

La (?): transcribed "?a" {l.a} in Tamil Lexicon) and popularly called 
"big la" [periya la]

Za (?): transcribed "?a" {l_a} in Tamil Lexicon (BUT a popular way of 
writing it in newspapers is "zh") [[This sound is considered by some as 
unique to Tamil]]

ra (?): transcribed "ra" in Tamil Lexicon and popularly called "small 
ra" (in order to distinguish it from ?a {r_a} (?, popularly called "big ra")

The Tolk?ppiyam, which is the earliest extant Tamil grammar
describes these four items in two s?tra-s: TE95 and TE96

V.S.Rajam, in her 1981 Ph.D. dissertation (under the supervision of 
G.Cardona, U.Pennsylvania)
translates these two s?tras in the following way:

TE95: "As the front tongue rises and scrapes/brushes the palate,
rak?ram (r) and Zak?ram (?) -- these two are born (op.cit. p.101)

TE96: "As the edge of the tongue swells and joins the root of the upper 
teeth
and (as it) strikes and scrapes/brushes the palate in that region,
lakaaram (l) and Lakaaram (L) are born (respectively). (op.cit. p.101)

It is quite difficult to know what the original pronunciation of those was,
at the time of Tolk?ppiyam
because the technical terms used
(varu?al "to scrape, to brush"; o??al "to strike")
are not necessarily well understood nowadays
and because relying on modern Tamil pronunciation
for interpreting them is risky:
some dialects have merged "la" and "La", keeping them separate from "Za"
whereas other dialects have merged "La" and "Za", keeping them separate 
from "la"
(this was already the case in some areas at the time of the 
viiracoozhiyam (v?rac??iyam)
a grammar probably dating back to the 11th cent.)

S?tra TE95 is puzzling because
the same explanation is given for both "ra" and "Za"

Modern linguists usually describe
"ra" as a tap,
"Za" as an approximant,
and "la" and "La" as laterals (see Bh. Krishnamurti, The dravidian 
languages, 2003, p.62).

All of this brings more questions than answers
but the topic is quite interesting
in what it reveals about the genesis of those Tamil texts
(and we might be able to discuss it more at length next week in Potsdam)

-- Jean-Luc Chevillard


P.S. do you know what Renou is referring to
when he talks
about the role of the "extr?mit?s de la langue" (jihvaantau)
in the faulty pronunciation of l
(See: "Terminologie grammaticale du Sanskrit", p.422,
jihvaantau "les deux extr?mit?s de la langue": leur r?le dans la 
prononciation (fautive) de l [R. XIV 27 (785)]. )




From jean-luc.chevillard at UNIV-PARIS-DIDEROT.FR  Fri Aug 22 12:16:15 2008
From: jean-luc.chevillard at UNIV-PARIS-DIDEROT.FR (Jean-Luc Chevillard)
Date: Fri, 22 Aug 08 14:16:15 +0200
Subject: occurrences in intervocalic position (Re: Tamil la-La-Za-ra (Re:              Vedic l
In-Reply-To: <48AE8F10.5090602@univ-paris-diderot.fr>
Message-ID: <161227083314.23782.15355394519427090471.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Peter Scharf,

upon re-reading my message,
I have realized that I had not in fact answered your question
about the various "l" (see the list below) being or not being 
"intervocalic").

(N.B. I call them "la", "La" [?a], "Za" [?a], "ra", rather than "l", "L" 
[?], "Z" [?], "r"
because this is how Tamil grammarians talk ..)

All of them belong to the list of the 18 Tamil consonants.
They are NOT vowels.

la and La can occur singly in intervocalic position, and can also be 
doubled. See Examples:

(N.B.  I mention only one of the possible meanings, for the terms given 
as examples;
I just want to show that these are real examples ...)

alar "rumour"

allar "they-are-not" (negative copula)

aLantu (a?antu) "having measured"

aLLal (a??al) "mud, mire"

la and La can also occur before a stop, as in:

alkul "1. side; 2. waist; 3. pudendum muliebre"

koLvAm (ko?v?m) "we shall take"

Za and ra can occur singly in intervocalic position, BUT cannot be doubled.

aZal [a?al] "to cry"

aritu "is-difficult-NEUTER"

Za and ra can also occur as first component of  various clusters
(but there is a metrical constraint on what precedes the cluster:
see TE49 and TE50)

vAZtal [v??tal] "to live"

vAZkkai [v??kkai] "life"

vArntu [v?rntu] "being in a row"

vArpu [v?rpu] "being full"

I hope this helps

Best

-- Jean-Luc Chevillard (Paris)

***********

Jean-Luc Chevillard a ?crit :
> Peter M. Scharf a ?crit :
>> [....] One I'm a bit uncertain about it the so-called Vedic l, 
>> sometimes called Marathi l, which occurs intervocalically in Rgvedic 
>> dialect for retroflex d. I'm unsure whether this is an approximant 
>> (like l) or a flap like .d (that is the Devanagari d with a dot below 
>> as in Modern Hindi la.dakaa). Gujarati also has intervocalic flap 
>> developing from .d. These flaps are not l's bur r's. The question is, 
>> "Is (or was) the Vedic l a retroflex flap or a retroflex lateral 
>> approximant?
>>
>> [...]
>>
>> One bit of evidence that might settle the question concerns whether 
>> there are cases in Indic of the retroflex lateral approximant 
>> occurring particularly in the intervocalic environment. Is the Tamil 
>> retroflex l exclusively or particularly intervocalic?

In the case of (Classical) Tamil,
there is a group of 4 items to be considered:

la (?): transcribed "la" in Tamil Lexicon and popularly called "small 
la" (ci??a la) {cin_n_a la}

La (?): transcribed "?a" {l.a} in Tamil Lexicon) and popularly called 
"big la" [periya la]

Za (?): transcribed "?a" {l_a} in Tamil Lexicon (BUT a popular way of 
writing it in newspapers is "zh") [[This sound is considered by some as 
unique to Tamil]]

ra (?): transcribed "ra" in Tamil Lexicon and popularly called "small 
ra" (in order to distinguish it from ?a {r_a} (?, popularly called "big ra")

The Tolk?ppiyam, which is the earliest extant Tamil grammar
describes these four items in two s?tra-s: TE95 and TE96




From ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA  Sun Aug 24 14:07:21 2008
From: ssandahl at SYMPATICO.CA (Stella Sandahl)
Date: Sun, 24 Aug 08 10:07:21 -0400
Subject: Census Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <48ADE5CA.3030800@uni-muenchen.de>
Message-ID: <161227083323.23782.800494472908840783.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Robert,

At last something eminently sensible in the debate about living/dead,  
modern spoken/written Sanskrit. Thank you!

Regarding the Census figures I posted a while ago, I was very well  
aware of the fraudulent nature of these figures. As Robert has  
pointed out, nobody will check the claims about mother tongue. Take  
for example the number of Assamese speakers: many Bengali-speakers in  
Assam find it safer for political reasons to declare Assamese as  
their mother tongue instead of Bengali. The high figure for Sanskrit  
speakers  in the 1991 Census can easily be explained by the Hindu  
revivalism taking place in the late 80s with the televised Ramayana  
etc. which ultimately led to the destruction of the Babri Masjid in  
1992. The "missing"  35,601 speakers in the 2001 Census is harder to  
explain, but rather telling after several years of a BJP government  
at the Centre. Was it disenchantment with Hindutva educational  
policies? At any rate the so-called Sanskrit speakers make an  
entirely political statement. Quod erat demonstrandum!
Stella Sandahl

--
Stella Sandahl
ssandahl at sympatico.ca



On 21-Aug-08, at 6:01 PM, Robert Zydenbos wrote:

> I have followed the multi-threaded 'modern Sanskrit' discussion  
> with interest, and here come my two cents' worth on a few of the  
> issues that were raised --
>
> 1. Indian census reports: they are certainly useful, but they  
> cannot be taken seriously literally (cf. the strangely large number  
> of listed languages spoken in India by one single person, or the  
> number of castes with only one member). The census merely records  
> what people claim about themselves. If someone claims to be a  
> Sanskrit mother tongue speaker, nobody will check to see whether  
> this person has made a truthful statement. Hence also the bizarre  
> fluctuations in the numbers of Sanskrit speakers from one census to  
> the next.
>
> 2. Mother tongue speakers of Sanskrit:  I know persons who have  
> claimed they are. These persons are simply Kannada speakers with a  
> special love of Sanskrit, and they want Sanskrit to figure in the  
> census reports. Surely the same applies to the vast majority of  
> others (if not all of them) who have claimed the same.
>
> 3. The 'Sanskrit-speaking village in Karnataka': this is something  
> of a hoax; but as long as wishful thinking among romantics  
> persists, queries about the village and claims that it exists will  
> also persist. I know of a college teacher of Sanskrit (real  
> Sanskrit) in Bangalore who is from that place, and he finds it  
> rather embarrassing to say where he is from.
>
> 4. Politics: regrettably, the activities of organizations like  
> Akshara have a polarizing effect. Some persons feel attracted,  
> others feel repelled by the political message. In one issue of  
> their monthly magazine, years back, I read an ultra-short story  
> about a woman who had lost her three sons in a war with Pakistan,  
> and when asked whether she was sad, she replied: "yes, I am sad  
> that I could not send more sons to give their lives for the sake of  
> the motherland". This more or less illustrates the general atmosphere.
>
> 5. Dead or not: the popularity of Sanskrit as an exam subject in  
> high schools, in my own observation, is that it is thought to be  
> (and apparently indeed is) a way to score high marks and thus raise  
> the final average. And this is precisely because practically nobody  
> (teachers included) considers Sanskrit a language of which active  
> mastery is required or even desirable. The popular view is that it  
> is quite dead, only spoken by respectable priests and pundits, and  
> by a few less respectable dazed political right-wingers. I have  
> heard reports of a renowned American Sanskritist [name suppressed]  
> who travelled through Karnataka and Goa and wanted to speak  
> Sanskrit to just about everybody he met. He could; but he was  
> barely understood, and those who could answer in Sanskrit could be  
> counted on the fingers of one hand.
>
> 6. Eternal intelligibility: the same applies to other dead  
> languages, esp. Latin, Europe's equivalent to Sanskrit (for a  
> passionate plea to revive the active use of Latin, see the recent  
> bestselling book [!] by Wilfried Stroh, _Latein ist tot, es lebe  
> Latein!_).
>
> 7. Usefulness: it can be really useful to speak some Sanskrit. More  
> than once I have been in a situation where the only language in  
> which I could communicate with a person (these persons were always  
> scholars or temple priests) was Sanskrit even if in Karnataka it  
> is, let us say, enhanced with Kannada, and in Pondicherry with  
> Tamil and Telugu and English. The obvious reason for these  
> additions is that Sanskrit is so little spoken that no uniform  
> vocabulary for terms from modern and everyday life has developed.  
> If one compares bilingual X-Sanskrit dictionaries, one finds that  
> the compilers either declare neo-Sanskritic words from language X  
> to be Sanskrit, or they think up new words (words that may become  
> current in a geographically limited area, if at all).
>
> 8. Future: who knows? In the first issue of the M?nchener  
> Indologische Zeitschrift (to appear later this year), an interview  
> in Sanskrit will appear which I did with a senior scholar in Udupi.  
> This is an experiment, and I hope that it will actually be read.  
> The man's Sanskrit is delightful: real (not the simplified stuff)  
> and alive. The experiment aims at (a) creating an awareness that  
> Sanskrit is still used, (b) encouraging people to help revive  
> Sanskrit, so that it may become a medium of scholarly communication  
> that eliminates the language barriers between various non-Indian  
> and traditional Indian scholars.
>
> Finally, for those who are interested: a few years ago I have  
> written an article about the imperishability of Sanskrit, and its  
> modern use: "Sanskrit: Ewige Sprache der G?tter, wiedergeboren und  
> noch immer da," in P. Schrijver and P. Mumm (eds.), _Sprachtod und  
> Sprachgeburt._ Bremen: Hempen Verlag, 2004, pp. 278-300.
>
> RZ
>
> -- 
> Prof. Dr. Robert J. Zydenbos
> Department fuer Asienstudien - Institut fuer Indologie und Tibetologie
> Universitaet Muenchen
> Deutschland
> Tel. (+49-89-) 2180-5782
> Fax  (+49-89-) 2180-5827
> http://www.lrz-muenchen.de/~zydenbos




From yanom at CC.KYOTO-SU.AC.JP  Sun Aug 24 08:26:21 2008
From: yanom at CC.KYOTO-SU.AC.JP (Michio Yano)
Date: Sun, 24 Aug 08 17:26:21 +0900
Subject: Kadamba
Message-ID: <161227083321.23782.824676659915178780.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Although I have missed the beginning part
of this interesting thread, let me quote
a verse from the AryabhaTiiya where the
shape of the earth is compared with the
Kadamba flower:

AB 4.7a/ yad-vat kadamba-puSpa-granthis pracitas samantatas kusumais/
AB 4.7c/ tad-vat hi sarva-sattvais jala-jais sthala-jais ca bhU-golas//

Micho Yano




From peterfriedlander at YAHOO.COM.AU  Mon Aug 25 06:44:25 2008
From: peterfriedlander at YAHOO.COM.AU (Peter Friedlander)
Date: Sun, 24 Aug 08 23:44:25 -0700
Subject: Navarang and the rainbow
In-Reply-To: <INDOLOGY%200808250000190486.1179@LISTSERV.LIV.AC.UK>
Message-ID: <161227083325.23782.8514263838128234926.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear List members,
does anybody out there?know what the nine colours are when in Hindi (and I imagine Sanskrit) people speak of navarang.
My sense is that it is related to the notion of, all the colours of the rainbow, but as far as I know there are only seven, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet.
So what were the classic Indic nine colours?
Regards
Peter
Peter Gerard FRIEDLANDER (Dr) :: Senior Lecturer, Centre for Language Studies and South?Asian Studies Programme?:: Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences :: National University of Singapore :: AS4 9 Arts Link, #02-01 :: Singapore 117570 :: 65-6516 2468 (DID) :: 65-6777 7736 (Fax) :: clspgf at nus.edu.sg (E) :: www.nus.edu.sg (W) :: http://www.fas.nus.edu.sg/cls/ (CLS Website) :: Company Registration No: 200604346E
?


      Win a MacBook Air or iPod touch with Yahoo!7. http://au.docs.yahoo.com/homepageset




From huntington.2 at OSU.EDU  Mon Aug 25 19:04:34 2008
From: huntington.2 at OSU.EDU (John C. Huntington)
Date: Mon, 25 Aug 08 15:04:34 -0400
Subject: Navarang and the rainbow
In-Reply-To: <674805.13186.qm@web65709.mail.ac4.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <161227083330.23782.283531506367637903.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

I know of two major references to the navrang in Hindu symbolism (NOT  
my speciality) and one in Buddhism which is closely related to one of  
the Hindu ones.

In the following I have no sense of the history or evolution of the  
usage

In addition I would be very interested to Learn more for other  
members of the list

John

In Hinduism, the navrang refer to the nine colors of the gemstones   
associated with the Nava graha (nine planets)
these are:
Planet:			modern association			ancient association
Sun Surya 		= Ruby					Ruby
Moon Chandra 		= Pearl					Pearl
Mars Mangala 		= Red Coral				Coral
Mercury Budha 		= Emerald					Emerald
Jupiter Brihaspati (Guru) = Yellow Sapphire		Topaz
Venus Shukra	 	= Diamond				Diamond
Saturn Shani 		= Sapphire					Sapphire
Rahu 			= Garnet (Hessonite)			? probably Lapis Lasuli
Ketu 			= Cat's Eye (Chrysoberyl)		? probably Go-medha Sacrifice  
(essence) of a cow


There is a frequently sought after astrological talisman that has a  
set of all of these stones which is touted heavily by Jewelers all  
over Indic and SE Asia.

A second reference is that the Navratna refers to the beginning of  
the Gayatri Mantra

http://www.indiavilas.com/wldofind/woigp.asp?g=agayatri_aarti

"While Om, Bhuh, Bhuvah, Swaha, Thath, Savithur, Varenyam, Bhargo and  
Devasya are said to be its nine colors or praise of the Divine,  
Dheemahi is related to meditation and Dhiyo, Yo, Nah and  
Prachodayaath are said to be the parts of the prayer aspects of the  
mantra."

The mongol-Tibetan complex of religions reports a similar set to the  
Navagraha given above"

Nine colors in Tibet & Mongolia

?nine gems," gold, silver, coral, pearls, lapis lazuli, turquoise,  
steel, copper, and mother-of-pearl, were ground up for use as  
pigments and the sutra was written in the nine colors on black paper  
in a fine calligraphic hand

Terese Tse Bartholomew: Introduction to the Art of Mongolia (cat no. 59)

A very modern reference that is making its way into the astrological  
dialogue is the following list:
1) Ultraviolet, 2) violet, 3) blue, 4) blue-green, 5) green, 6)  
yellow, 7) orange, 8) red, and 9) infrared.
As is obvious, this is simply the adaptation of modern color theory  
into the ancient art of Astrology

A traditional list of colors as used in Buddhist Iconography:


Shveta/Sita White
Krisna Blue/Black ("dark")
Dhuma Smoke

Nila Blue
Harita Green
Pita Yellow
Rakta Red

Suvarna Gold
Rajata Silver
Sphatika Crystal
? Coral

(Mostly from the Nispannayogavali)


On Aug 25, 2008, at 2:44 AM, Peter Friedlander wrote:

> Dear List members,
> does anybody out there know what the nine colours are when in Hindi  
> (and I imagine Sanskrit) people speak of navarang.
> My sense is that it is related to the notion of, all the colours of  
> the rainbow, but as far as I know there are only seven, red,  
> orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet.
> So what were the classic Indic nine colours?
> Regards
> Peter
> Peter Gerard FRIEDLANDER (Dr) :: Senior Lecturer, Centre for  
> Language Studies and South Asian Studies Programme :: Faculty of  
> Arts & Social Sciences :: National University of Singapore :: AS4 9  
> Arts Link, #02-01 :: Singapore 117570 :: 65-6516 2468 (DID) ::  
> 65-6777 7736 (Fax) :: clspgf at nus.edu.sg (E) :: www.nus.edu.sg  
> (W) :: http://www.fas.nus.edu.sg/cls/ (CLS Website) :: Company  
> Registration No: 200604346E
>
>
>
>       Win a MacBook Air or iPod touch with Yahoo!7. http:// 
> au.docs.yahoo.com/homepageset
>
>
> -- 
> BEGIN-ANTISPAM-VOTING-LINKS
> ------------------------------------------------------
>
> Teach CanIt if this mail (ID 665051649) is spam:
> Spam:        https://antispam.osu.edu/b.php? 
> c=s&i=665051649&m=32e844904d1b
> Not spam:    https://antispam.osu.edu/b.php? 
> c=n&i=665051649&m=32e844904d1b
> Forget vote: https://antispam.osu.edu/b.php? 
> c=f&i=665051649&m=32e844904d1b
> ------------------------------------------------------
> END-ANTISPAM-VOTING-LINKS
>




From athr at LOC.GOV  Mon Aug 25 20:50:49 2008
From: athr at LOC.GOV (Allen W Thrasher)
Date: Mon, 25 Aug 08 16:50:49 -0400
Subject: Baladeva on Gargi: talk by David Buchta, Aug. 28
Message-ID: <161227083333.23782.15903579227379730419.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Asian Division of The Library of Congress
Asian Division Friends Society
Present:

Portraying an Upanisadic Female Sage at the Cusp of Colonialism:
Baladeva Upadhaya on Gargi Vacaknavi

by David Buchta
University of Pennsylvania
2008 Florence Tan Moeson Fellow

The role in religious life allotted to women throughout the history of what is now called Hinduism has been, to various degrees, restricted. This has been especially true for the philosophical school of Vedanta. The premium placed on study of scriptural literature and on asceticism, coupled with the fact that access to both was often prohibited for women and those of lower castes, has precluded the possibility for them to attain liberation. However, Gargi Vacaknavi, a paradigmatic female ascetic, appears as an important interlocutor in a debate narrated in the Brhadaranyaka-Upanisad.  To be sure, traditional exegetes have sometimes downplayed Gargi?s importance. Yet, Baladeva Vidyabhusana,  writing at the cusp of colonialism and its attendant effects on women?s issues, identifies her as having the highest qualification for inquiry into Brahman. Baladeva explicitly mentions her superiority to her male interlocutor, Yajnavalkya. For it is she who controls the discourse, she by whose judgment Yajnavalkya is declared the victor of the debate.

Thursday, August 28, 2008
12:00 ? 1:00 P.M.
Asian Division Conference Room 
Jefferson Building- LJ 149 
1st & Independence Ave., SE
Washington, DC 20540

Feel free to forward this.

Contact: Dr. Allen Thrasher (202) 707-3732 or athr at loc.gov

Request ADA accommodations five business days in advance at (202) 707-6362 
(voice/TTY) or email ADA at loc.gov



From athr at LOC.GOV  Mon Aug 25 21:21:20 2008
From: athr at LOC.GOV (Allen W Thrasher)
Date: Mon, 25 Aug 08 17:21:20 -0400
Subject: Library of Congress Asian Division: Moeson Fellowship Program              Accepting Applications
Message-ID: <161227083335.23782.2010089140155116491.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Florence Tan Moeson Fellowship Program Announced
The Asian Division Friends Society announces the Florence Tan Moeson Research Fellowship for 2009. This fellowship is made possible by a generous donation of Florence Tan Moeson, for 43 years a Chinese Team cataloger in the Regional and Cooperative Cataloging Division before she retired in 2001.
The purpose of the fellowship is to give individuals the opportunity to use the Asian collections in the Library of Congress, which are among the most significant outside of Asia and consist of nearly 2.8 million books, periodicals, newspapers, manuscripts and microforms in the languages of East, South and Southeast Asia.
Researchers wishing to submit applications should go to this Web site: www.lcasianfriends.org/fellowship. The deadline for applying for the 2009 fellowship program is September 30, 2008.
The Florence Tan Moeson Research Fellowship consists of $14,000 each year for 10 years in support of grants for research using the Asian Division?s Reading Room and the Library?s extensive Asian collections. The grants will be awarded upon demonstration of need. Grants are intended to pay for travel to and from Washington, overnight accommodations and photocopying fees. Graduate and upper-level undergraduate students, independent scholars, community college teachers, researchers without regular teaching appointments, and librarians with a demonstrated need for fellowship support are especially encouraged to apply.
The Library?s Asian collection began in 1869 with a gift of 10 works in 933 volumes from the emperor of China to the United States. Spanning a diversity of subjects from China, Japan, Korea, the South Asian subcontinent and Southeast Asia, the Library?s Asian collections have become one of the most accessible and comprehensive sources of Asian language materials in the world.
For further information about the collection, visit the Asian Division?s Web site at www.loc.gov/rr/asian/.

Thank you.

Anchi Hoh, Ph.D.
Co-Chair, Florence Tan Moeson Fellowship Program Committee
Asian Division
Library of Congress
(202) 707-5673
adia at loc.gov

I might add that I can think of some specific proposals much on my mind, notably cataloging Sanskrit, Urdu, and other South Asian language manuscripts.

Allen


Allen W. Thrasher, Ph.D.
Senior Reference Librarian
Team Coordinator
South Asia Team, Asian Division
Library of Congress, Jefferson Building 150
101 Independence Ave., S.E.
Washington, DC 20540-4810
tel. 202-707-3732; fax 202-707-1724; athr at loc.gov
The opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the Library of Congress.




From ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK  Mon Aug 25 15:22:43 2008
From: ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK (Dominik Wujastyk)
Date: Mon, 25 Aug 08 20:52:43 +0530
Subject: Census Sanskrit
In-Reply-To: <BLU0-SMTP804B946817411DD526830BF640@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <161227083327.23782.14579928718557399136.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>



This discussion about Spoken Sanskrit was sparked off by my mention of a 
new article by Adi Hastings on the subject.

That article is thoughtful, careful, and worth a read.  It deals rather 
well with this particular issue, of what it means when a family claims 
that Skt is the language of their home.

Dominik

-- 
Dr Dominik Wujastyk
Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
University College London



On Sun, 24 Aug 2008, Stella Sandahl wrote:

> Dear Robert,
>
> At last something eminently sensible in the debate about living/dead, modern 
> spoken/written Sanskrit. Thank you!
>
> Regarding the Census figures I posted a while ago, I was very well aware of 
> the fraudulent nature of these figures. As Robert has pointed out, nobody 
> will check the claims about mother tongue. Take for example the number of 
> Assamese speakers: many Bengali-speakers in Assam find it safer for 
> political reasons to declare Assamese as their mother tongue instead of 
> Bengali. The high figure for Sanskrit speakers  in the 1991 Census can 
> easily be explained by the Hindu revivalism taking place in the late 80s 
> with the televised Ramayana etc. which ultimately led to the destruction of 
> the Babri Masjid in 1992. The "missing"  35,601 speakers in the 2001 Census 
> is harder to explain, but rather telling after several years of a BJP 
> government at the Centre. Was it disenchantment with Hindutva educational 
> policies? At any rate the so-called Sanskrit speakers make an entirely 
> political statement. Quod erat demonstrandum!
> Stella Sandahl
>
> --
> Stella Sandahl
> ssandahl at sympatico.ca
>
>
>
> On 21-Aug-08, at 6:01 PM, Robert Zydenbos wrote:
>
>> I have followed the multi-threaded 'modern Sanskrit' discussion with 
>> interest, and here come my two cents' worth on a few of the issues that 
>> were raised --
>> 
>> 1. Indian census reports: they are certainly useful, but they cannot be 
>> taken seriously literally (cf. the strangely large number of listed 
>> languages spoken in India by one single person, or the number of castes 
>> with only one member). The census merely records what people claim about 
>> themselves. If someone claims to be a Sanskrit mother tongue speaker, 
>> nobody will check to see whether this person has made a truthful 
>> statement. Hence also the bizarre fluctuations in the numbers of Sanskrit 
>> speakers from one census to the next.
>> 
>> 2. Mother tongue speakers of Sanskrit:  I know persons who have claimed 
>> they are. These persons are simply Kannada speakers with a special love of 
>> Sanskrit, and they want Sanskrit to figure in the census reports. Surely 
>> the same applies to the vast majority of others (if not all of them) who 
>> have claimed the same.
>> 
>> 3. The 'Sanskrit-speaking village in Karnataka': this is something of a 
>> hoax; but as long as wishful thinking among romantics persists, queries 
>> about the village and claims that it exists will also persist. I know of a 
>> college teacher of Sanskrit (real Sanskrit) in Bangalore who is from that 
>> place, and he finds it rather embarrassing to say where he is from.
>> 
>> 4. Politics: regrettably, the activities of organizations like Akshara 
>> have a polarizing effect. Some persons feel attracted, others feel 
>> repelled by the political message. In one issue of their monthly magazine, 
>> years back, I read an ultra-short story about a woman who had lost her 
>> three sons in a war with Pakistan, and when asked whether she was sad, she 
>> replied: "yes, I am sad that I could not send more sons to give their 
>> lives for the sake of the motherland". This more or less illustrates the 
>> general atmosphere.
>> 
>> 5. Dead or not: the popularity of Sanskrit as an exam subject in high 
>> schools, in my own observation, is that it is thought to be (and 
>> apparently indeed is) a way to score high marks and thus raise the final 
>> average. And this is precisely because practically nobody (teachers 
>> included) considers Sanskrit a language of which active mastery is 
>> required or even desirable. The popular view is that it is quite dead, 
>> only spoken by respectable priests and pundits, and by a few less 
>> respectable dazed political right-wingers. I have heard reports of a 
>> renowned American Sanskritist [name suppressed] who travelled through 
>> Karnataka and Goa and wanted to speak Sanskrit to just about everybody he 
>> met. He could; but he was barely understood, and those who could answer in 
>> Sanskrit could be counted on the fingers of one hand.
>> 
>> 6. Eternal intelligibility: the same applies to other dead languages, esp. 
>> Latin, Europe's equivalent to Sanskrit (for a passionate plea to revive 
>> the active use of Latin, see the recent bestselling book [!] by Wilfried 
>> Stroh, _Latein ist tot, es lebe Latein!_).
>> 
>> 7. Usefulness: it can be really useful to speak some Sanskrit. More than 
>> once I have been in a situation where the only language in which I could 
>> communicate with a person (these persons were always scholars or temple 
>> priests) was Sanskrit even if in Karnataka it is, let us say, enhanced 
>> with Kannada, and in Pondicherry with Tamil and Telugu and English. The 
>> obvious reason for these additions is that Sanskrit is so little spoken 
>> that no uniform vocabulary for terms from modern and everyday life has 
>> developed. If one compares bilingual X-Sanskrit dictionaries, one finds 
>> that the compilers either declare neo-Sanskritic words from language X to 
>> be Sanskrit, or they think up new words (words that may become current in 
>> a geographically limited area, if at all).
>> 
>> 8. Future: who knows? In the first issue of the M?nchener Indologische 
>> Zeitschrift (to appear later this year), an interview in Sanskrit will 
>> appear which I did with a senior scholar in Udupi. This is an experiment, 
>> and I hope that it will actually be read. The man's Sanskrit is 
>> delightful: real (not the simplified stuff) and alive. The experiment aims 
>> at (a) creating an awareness that Sanskrit is still used, (b) encouraging 
>> people to help revive Sanskrit, so that it may become a medium of 
>> scholarly communication that eliminates the language barriers between 
>> various non-Indian and traditional Indian scholars.
>> 
>> Finally, for those who are interested: a few years ago I have written an 
>> article about the imperishability of Sanskrit, and its modern use: 
>> "Sanskrit: Ewige Sprache der G?tter, wiedergeboren und noch immer da," in 
>> P. Schrijver and P. Mumm (eds.), _Sprachtod und Sprachgeburt._ Bremen: 
>> Hempen Verlag, 2004, pp. 278-300.
>> 
>> RZ
>> 
>> -- 
>> Prof. Dr. Robert J. Zydenbos
>> Department fuer Asienstudien - Institut fuer Indologie und Tibetologie
>> Universitaet Muenchen
>> Deutschland
>> Tel. (+49-89-) 2180-5782
>> Fax  (+49-89-) 2180-5827
>> http://www.lrz-muenchen.de/~zydenbos




From fritsstaal at BERKELEY.EDU  Tue Aug 26 15:29:19 2008
From: fritsstaal at BERKELEY.EDU (FRITS STAAL)
Date: Tue, 26 Aug 08 08:29:19 -0700
Subject: Email address of Dr. Lokesh Chandra
In-Reply-To: <B14991097E3349C0A0B1BD3A55B0A10A@Fussman>
Message-ID: <161227083341.23782.15985758461804624003.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Attention Andrea Acri

I do not think LC has ever had an e-mail but I have a telephone number -
perhaps old like yours: 651-5494.


> As far as I know, upt to last week Dr. Lokesh Chandra had no e-mail, nor
> e-mail address. G. Fussman
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Acri, A." <A.Acri at LET.LEIDENUNIV.NL>
> To: <INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk>
> Sent: Tuesday, August 26, 2008 2:49 PM
> Subject: Email address of Dr. Lokesh Chandra
>
>
>> Does anyone have the email address of  Dr. Lokesh Chandra? Possibly,
>> also
>> a (recent) telephone number, as the one I have does not seem to be
>> working.
>>
>> Many thanks in advance.
>>
>> Andrea Acri
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> CNWS-Kern Institute, Leiden University
>> http://web.mac.com/dwipantara
>>
>>
>


Frits Staal

http://philosophy.berkeley.edu/staal




From A.Acri at LET.LEIDENUNIV.NL  Tue Aug 26 12:49:21 2008
From: A.Acri at LET.LEIDENUNIV.NL (Acri, A.)
Date: Tue, 26 Aug 08 14:49:21 +0200
Subject: Email address of Dr. Lokesh Chandra
Message-ID: <161227083337.23782.17729130478893286162.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Does anyone have the email address of  Dr. Lokesh Chandra? Possibly, also a (recent) telephone number, as the one I have does not seem to be working.

Many thanks in advance.

Andrea Acri




CNWS-Kern Institute, Leiden University
http://web.mac.com/dwipantara




From fussman at EXT.JUSSIEU.FR  Tue Aug 26 13:07:08 2008
From: fussman at EXT.JUSSIEU.FR (fussman)
Date: Tue, 26 Aug 08 15:07:08 +0200
Subject: Email address of Dr. Lokesh Chandra
Message-ID: <161227083339.23782.1460190674855382193.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

As far as I know, upt to last week Dr. Lokesh Chandra had no e-mail, nor 
e-mail address. G. Fussman
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Acri, A." <A.Acri at LET.LEIDENUNIV.NL>
To: <INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk>
Sent: Tuesday, August 26, 2008 2:49 PM
Subject: Email address of Dr. Lokesh Chandra


> Does anyone have the email address of  Dr. Lokesh Chandra? Possibly, also 
> a (recent) telephone number, as the one I have does not seem to be 
> working.
>
> Many thanks in advance.
>
> Andrea Acri
>
>
>
>
> CNWS-Kern Institute, Leiden University
> http://web.mac.com/dwipantara
>
> 




From mrinalkaul81 at GMAIL.COM  Tue Aug 26 15:54:38 2008
From: mrinalkaul81 at GMAIL.COM (Mrinal Kaul)
Date: Tue, 26 Aug 08 21:54:38 +0600
Subject: Email address of Dr. Lokesh Chandra
In-Reply-To: <7109.61.19.65.40.1219764559.squirrel@calmail.berkeley.edu>
Message-ID: <161227083344.23782.15172250018559420559.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Attention Andrea Acri
I think Dr Frits Stall is very right. Dr Lokesh Chandra never had an email.
But I have his new contact number. Please note it down; 91-11-26515800. I
hope this works. You may also note down his postal address in case you do
not have it;

Prof Lokesh Chandra
J-22 Hauz Khas Enclave
New Delhi - 110016




From jpo at UTS.CC.UTEXAS.EDU  Wed Aug 27 15:18:36 2008
From: jpo at UTS.CC.UTEXAS.EDU (Patrick Olivelle)
Date: Wed, 27 Aug 08 10:18:36 -0500
Subject: E-text
In-Reply-To: <20080122104709.22A77404@bonito.ulb.ac.be>
Message-ID: <161227083346.23782.5513809634900555938.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Does anyone know an electronic version of Sankara's commentary on the 
Brahma Sutras? Thanks.

Patrick Olivelle




From gruenen at SUB.UNI-GOETTINGEN.DE  Wed Aug 27 15:34:49 2008
From: gruenen at SUB.UNI-GOETTINGEN.DE (Gruenendahl, Reinhold)
Date: Wed, 27 Aug 08 17:34:49 +0200
Subject: AW: E-text
Message-ID: <161227083348.23782.13072019130327215454.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

For what it's worth:
 
http://www.sub.uni-goettingen.de/ebene_1/fiindolo/gretil.htm#BadarBrsBh
 
http://www.sub.uni-goettingen.de/ebene_1/fiindolo/gretil.htm#BrBsSamGov
 
 
R.G.
 
 
 
 
________________________________________________ 
 
Dr. Reinhold Gruenendahl
Niedersaechsische Staats- und Universitaetsbibliothek
Fachreferat sued- und suedostasiatische Philologien
(Dept. of Indology)
 
37070 Goettingen, Germany
Tel (+49) (0)5 51 / 39 52 83
 
gruenen at sub.uni-goettingen.de
 
FACH-INFORMATIONEN INDOLOGIE, GOETTINGEN:
http://www.sub.uni-goettingen.de/ebene_1/fiindolo/fiindolo.htm
In English:
http://www.sub.uni-goettingen.de/ebene_1/fiindolo/fiindole.htm
 
GRETIL - Goettingen Register of Electronic Texts in Indian Languages:
http://www.sub.uni-goettingen.de/ebene_1/fiindolo/gretil.htm
 
GRETIL e-library:
http://www.sub.uni-goettingen.de/ebene_1/fiindolo/gr_elib.htm
 

________________________________

Von: Indology im Auftrag von Patrick Olivelle
Gesendet: Mi 27.08.2008 17:18
An: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
Betreff: E-text



Does anyone know an electronic version of Sankara's commentary on the
Brahma Sutras? Thanks.

Patrick Olivelle




From ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK  Thu Aug 28 13:04:15 2008
From: ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK (Dominik Wujastyk)
Date: Thu, 28 Aug 08 14:04:15 +0100
Subject: E-text
In-Reply-To: <a0624087cc4db20a3705f@[192.168.1.2]>
Message-ID: <161227083350.23782.13326851781081210319.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

and in addition to GRETIL, there's

   http://www.sankara.iitk.ac.in/



-- 
Dr Dominik Wujastyk
Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
University College London



On Wed, 27 Aug 2008, Patrick Olivelle wrote:

> Does anyone know an electronic version of Sankara's commentary on the Brahma 
> Sutras? Thanks.
>
> Patrick Olivelle
>




From J.L.Brockington at ED.AC.UK  Thu Aug 28 16:40:22 2008
From: J.L.Brockington at ED.AC.UK (J L Brockington)
Date: Thu, 28 Aug 08 17:40:22 +0100
Subject: death of Prof. Oscar Botto
In-Reply-To: <alpine.WNT.1.10.0808281404020.3820@Caraka>
Message-ID: <161227083352.23782.17978552750498743971.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Colleagues,

I forward this sad news, announced this afternoon.  Professor Botto  
was a major figure not only within CESMEO, which he led for so long,  
but also in the IASS.

Yours

John Brockington


Professor J. L. Brockington
Secretary General, International Association of Sanskrit Studies
Asian Studies
7-8 Buccleuch Place
Edinburgh EH8 9LW


Subject: Prof. Oscar Botto
Date: Thursday, August 28, 2008 3:07 pm
From: CESMEO <cesme at tin.it>
To: ....

It?s with a great sorrow that I have to communicate you the sad news  
that our beloved Mentor and Cesmeo?s President, Prof.Oscar Botto, has  
passed away last Sunday August 24th. You?ll be informed about the  
events that are to be organized to honour his outstanding and  
prestigious scientific achievements in the field of indological studies.

Very best regards

Irma Piovano
Supervisor of the scientific activities and cultural relations
CESMEO
via Cavour, 17
10123 TORINO - ITALY
tel. +39.011.546564 fax +39.011.545031
cesme at tin.it - www.cesmeo.it <http://www.cesmeo.it>




-- 
The University of Edinburgh is a charitable body, registered in
Scotland, with registration number SC005336.




From ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK  Thu Aug 28 19:31:13 2008
From: ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK (Dominik Wujastyk)
Date: Thu, 28 Aug 08 20:31:13 +0100
Subject: Kadamba
In-Reply-To: <20080824172620.12667345@cc.kyoto-su.ac.jp>
Message-ID: <161227083354.23782.17410841755355476846.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

An excellent listing, perhaps the best, of what botanical identifications
have been proposed for the kadamba is given by Meulenbeld in his 1974 book
The Madhavanidana (Brill 1974, reprinted Motilal Banarsidass 2008),
Appendix 4, pp.  535-6.  Meulenbeld leaves it to the reader to assess the
sources for the identifications (which he gives in extenso).  What is not
stated in Meulenbeld's book is that the various identifications in his
appendix on plant names are arranged broadly in order of his opinion of
their appropriateness.

As with all "bare" identifications, Meulenbeld's list does not provide the
reasoning, similarities, features, locations, historical anecdote or any
of the other bases for decision-making that are essential for thinking
about plant identities in a meaningful manner.  They are there in the
sources he cites, but that's an exercise left to the reader.

Best,
Dominik

NB there's an important addendum to Meulenbeld's Appendix 4, published as
a supplement to the book on Vrksayurveda by R. P. Das.



On Sun, 24 Aug 2008, Michio Yano wrote:

> Although I have missed the beginning part
> of this interesting thread, let me quote
> a verse from the AryabhaTiiya where the
> shape of the earth is compared with the
> Kadamba flower:
>
> AB 4.7a/ yad-vat kadamba-puSpa-granthis pracitas samantatas kusumais/
> AB 4.7c/ tad-vat hi sarva-sattvais jala-jais sthala-jais ca bhU-golas//
>
> Micho Yano
>




From cardonagj at EARTHLINK.NET  Fri Aug 29 10:43:06 2008
From: cardonagj at EARTHLINK.NET (George Cardona)
Date: Fri, 29 Aug 08 06:43:06 -0400
Subject: E-text
Message-ID: <161227083356.23782.11353411224162744774.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Dominik, When I went to the site a few moments ago, all I found is a blank page. Perhaps it's because of my using Safari, but I'd welcome clarification from others.  Thanks, George

-----Original Message-----
>From: Dominik Wujastyk <ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK>
>Sent: Aug 28, 2008 9:04 AM
>To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
>Subject: Re: E-text
>
>and in addition to GRETIL, there's
>
>   http://www.sankara.iitk.ac.in/
>
>
>
>-- 
>Dr Dominik Wujastyk
>Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
>University College London
>
>
>
>On Wed, 27 Aug 2008, Patrick Olivelle wrote:
>
>> Does anyone know an electronic version of Sankara's commentary on the Brahma 
>> Sutras? Thanks.
>>
>> Patrick Olivelle
>>




From fleming_b4 at HOTMAIL.COM  Fri Aug 29 14:00:01 2008
From: fleming_b4 at HOTMAIL.COM (Benjamin Fleming)
Date: Fri, 29 Aug 08 10:00:01 -0400
Subject: E-text
In-Reply-To: <1220011236.5261.15.camel@bibliothek>
Message-ID: <161227083362.23782.4857138460829384499.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

One might also try working out the font corrections through Firefox for Mac,
which at least displays the images and links for the page. I had the same
issue of a blank page when I tried using Safari. I have downloaded and
installed the font suggested by Peter Wyzlic, but have yet to have success
getting it to work. I am still trying to work though the font issue as the
text appears to be garbled, but at least the page structure and links appear
in tact. 

Any further ideas or solutions for mac users would be welcome! This seems
like a great site.

Firefox for Mac can be downloaded here:
http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/

Best,

Benjamin Fleming


On 8/29/08 8:00 AM, "Peter Wyzlic" <pwyzlic at UNI-BONN.DE> wrote:

> Am Freitag, den 29.08.2008, 06:43 -0400 schrieb George Cardona:
> 
> Concerning: http://www.sankara.iitk.ac.in/
> 
>> Dear Dominik, When I went to the site a few moments ago, all I found is a
>> blank page. Perhaps it's because of my using Safari, but I'd welcome
>> clarification from others.  Thanks, George
> 
> You may go to the font troubleshooting page that should be readable for
> all browsers: http://www.sankara.iitk.ac.in/ifont.htm
> There is no hint how to deal with Safari in Mac OS. One solution might
> be you download the Devanagari Truetype font (go to "download fonts" and
> "Linux users") and try to install. The download link is:
> http://www.sankara.iitk.ac.in/ttf/DVYG0ntt.ttf
> 
> This website uses so called "dynamic fonts", this is a technology that
> came up in the nineties and worked with some versions of some web
> browsers but not in others. In my opinion, it becomes more and more
> obsolete. They should switch to Unicode encoding which is more
> state-of-the-art.
> 
> Hope it helps
> Peter Wyzlic




From fleming_b4 at HOTMAIL.COM  Fri Aug 29 14:03:55 2008
From: fleming_b4 at HOTMAIL.COM (Benjamin Fleming)
Date: Fri, 29 Aug 08 10:03:55 -0400
Subject: E-text
In-Reply-To: <1220011236.5261.15.camel@bibliothek>
Message-ID: <161227083366.23782.12048186098616227425.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

I should add that I was successful on accessing the pdf files on my Mac
through Firefox. These pdfs are quite readable!

Best,

B

On 8/29/08 8:00 AM, "Peter Wyzlic" <pwyzlic at UNI-BONN.DE> wrote:

> Am Freitag, den 29.08.2008, 06:43 -0400 schrieb George Cardona:
> 
> Concerning: http://www.sankara.iitk.ac.in/
> 
>> Dear Dominik, When I went to the site a few moments ago, all I found is a
>> blank page. Perhaps it's because of my using Safari, but I'd welcome
>> clarification from others.  Thanks, George
> 
> You may go to the font troubleshooting page that should be readable for
> all browsers: http://www.sankara.iitk.ac.in/ifont.htm
> There is no hint how to deal with Safari in Mac OS. One solution might
> be you download the Devanagari Truetype font (go to "download fonts" and
> "Linux users") and try to install. The download link is:
> http://www.sankara.iitk.ac.in/ttf/DVYG0ntt.ttf
> 
> This website uses so called "dynamic fonts", this is a technology that
> came up in the nineties and worked with some versions of some web
> browsers but not in others. In my opinion, it becomes more and more
> obsolete. They should switch to Unicode encoding which is more
> state-of-the-art.
> 
> Hope it helps
> Peter Wyzlic




From garzilli at ASIATICA.ORG  Fri Aug 29 11:42:57 2008
From: garzilli at ASIATICA.ORG (Enrica Garzilli)
Date: Fri, 29 Aug 08 13:42:57 +0200
Subject: books on Gupta inscriptions, Nepal
Message-ID: <161227083358.23782.12550783986399431492.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Dear Colleagues,

does anybody know titles and biblio of the books on (Gupta) inscriptions by
Baburam Acharya, Yogi Nara Hari Nath e Naya Raj Pant? (perhaps Mahes Pant,
though I don't have his latest email address)

Thanks in advance, please answer me on or off list,

Dr. Enrica Garzilli




From pwyzlic at UNI-BONN.DE  Fri Aug 29 12:00:36 2008
From: pwyzlic at UNI-BONN.DE (Peter Wyzlic)
Date: Fri, 29 Aug 08 14:00:36 +0200
Subject: E-text
In-Reply-To: <11746416.1220006586719.JavaMail.root@elwamui-milano.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <161227083360.23782.7113348271057237758.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Am Freitag, den 29.08.2008, 06:43 -0400 schrieb George Cardona:

Concerning: http://www.sankara.iitk.ac.in/

> Dear Dominik, When I went to the site a few moments ago, all I found is a blank page. Perhaps it's because of my using Safari, but I'd welcome clarification from others.  Thanks, George

You may go to the font troubleshooting page that should be readable for
all browsers: http://www.sankara.iitk.ac.in/ifont.htm
There is no hint how to deal with Safari in Mac OS. One solution might
be you download the Devanagari Truetype font (go to "download fonts" and
"Linux users") and try to install. The download link is:
http://www.sankara.iitk.ac.in/ttf/DVYG0ntt.ttf

This website uses so called "dynamic fonts", this is a technology that
came up in the nineties and worked with some versions of some web
browsers but not in others. In my opinion, it becomes more and more
obsolete. They should switch to Unicode encoding which is more
state-of-the-art.

Hope it helps
Peter Wyzlic

-- 
Abteilung f?r Indologie
Institut f?r Orient- und Asienwissenschaften
Universit?t Bonn
Regina-Pacis-Weg 7
D-53113 Bonn
Deutschland / Germany




From fussman at EXT.JUSSIEU.FR  Fri Aug 29 14:05:11 2008
From: fussman at EXT.JUSSIEU.FR (fussman)
Date: Fri, 29 Aug 08 16:05:11 +0200
Subject: change of e-mail address
Message-ID: <161227083364.23782.3691095972759831628.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Could you send me from now on your mails to the following address: g.fussman at college-de-france.fr. The previous address (fussman at ext.jussieu.fr) will be cancelled very soon .
With thanks and regards
G.Fussman




From ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK  Fri Aug 29 15:37:44 2008
From: ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK (Dominik Wujastyk)
Date: Fri, 29 Aug 08 16:37:44 +0100
Subject: E-text
In-Reply-To: <11746416.1220006586719.JavaMail.root@elwamui-milano.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <161227083369.23782.2255846610132086286.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

As Peter already said, the technology used on this site is now dated.  I 
kept seeing gobbledegook, but after fiddling around for a while with 
encodings and fonts it finally settled down.  It's worth the effort to get 
this site working, since there's a mass of textual material there.  There 
are quite a few typos in the texts, but still it's useful.  And apart from 
displaying on the screen, the site will generate a PDF of the text on the 
fly, either in Devanagari or in roman, that one can download.

I get the feeling that this website was a one-shot effort, and that what's 
done is done, and that's it.  I doubt that we would get any response to 
suggestions of improvement.  However, if someone were to go to Kanpur and 
meet the people, and offer to take the thing over and develop it, that 
might work.

Best,
Dominik

-- 
Dr Dominik Wujastyk
Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
University College London



On Fri, 29 Aug 2008, George Cardona wrote:

> Dear Dominik, When I went to the site a few moments ago, all I found is a blank page. Perhaps it's because of my using Safari, but I'd welcome clarification from others.  Thanks, George
>
> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Dominik Wujastyk <ucgadkw at UCL.AC.UK>
>> Sent: Aug 28, 2008 9:04 AM
>> To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
>> Subject: Re: E-text
>>
>> and in addition to GRETIL, there's
>>
>>   http://www.sankara.iitk.ac.in/
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Dr Dominik Wujastyk
>> Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow
>> University College London
>>
>>
>>
>> On Wed, 27 Aug 2008, Patrick Olivelle wrote:
>>
>>> Does anyone know an electronic version of Sankara's commentary on the Brahma
>>> Sutras? Thanks.
>>>
>>> Patrick Olivelle
>>>
>




From mahesrajpant at HOTMAIL.COM  Sat Aug 30 01:47:28 2008
From: mahesrajpant at HOTMAIL.COM (Mahes Raj Pant)
Date: Sat, 30 Aug 08 01:47:28 +0000
Subject: books on Gupta inscriptions, Nepal
In-Reply-To: <25af6cd10808290442j7d82af0ah70806c2f39152d77@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <161227083373.23782.4879481555095287265.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

None of these scholars has written an independent book on the Licchavi inscriptions. However, there are a lot of publications of theese scholars in now defunct journals, namely Purushartha, Sam.skr.ta-sandesha and Itihaasa-prakaasha and still running PuurNimaa, all published from Kathmandu.
 
Mahes Raj Pant> Date: Fri, 29 Aug 2008 13:42:57 +0200> From: garzilli at ASIATICA.ORG> Subject: books on Gupta inscriptions, Nepal> To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk> > Dear Colleagues,> > does anybody know titles and biblio of the books on (Gupta) inscriptions by> Baburam Acharya, Yogi Nara Hari Nath e Naya Raj Pant? (perhaps Mahes Pant,> though I don't have his latest email address)> > Thanks in advance, please answer me on or off list,> > Dr. Enrica Garzilli
_________________________________________________________________
News, entertainment and everything you care about at Live.com. Get it now!
http://www.live.com/getstarted.aspx




From mahesrajpant at HOTMAIL.COM  Sat Aug 30 01:47:29 2008
From: mahesrajpant at HOTMAIL.COM (Mahes Raj Pant)
Date: Sat, 30 Aug 08 01:47:29 +0000
Subject: books on Gupta inscriptions, Nepal
In-Reply-To: <25af6cd10808290442j7d82af0ah70806c2f39152d77@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <161227083371.23782.4002689967102192737.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

None of these scholars has written an independent book on the Licchavi inscriptions. However, there are a lot of publications of theese scholars in now defunct journals, namely Purushartha, Sam.skr.ta-sandesha and Itihaasa-prakaasha and still running PuurNimaa, all published from Kathmandu.
 
Mahes Raj Pant> Date: Fri, 29 Aug 2008 13:42:57 +0200> From: garzilli at ASIATICA.ORG> Subject: books on Gupta inscriptions, Nepal> To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk> > Dear Colleagues,> > does anybody know titles and biblio of the books on (Gupta) inscriptions by> Baburam Acharya, Yogi Nara Hari Nath e Naya Raj Pant? (perhaps Mahes Pant,> though I don't have his latest email address)> > Thanks in advance, please answer me on or off list,> > Dr. Enrica Garzilli
_________________________________________________________________
Connect to the next generation of MSN Messenger?
http://imagine-msn.com/messenger/launch80/default.aspx?locale=en-us&source=wlmailtagline




From garzilli at ASIATICA.ORG  Sat Aug 30 08:34:04 2008
From: garzilli at ASIATICA.ORG (Enrica Garzilli)
Date: Sat, 30 Aug 08 10:34:04 +0200
Subject: books on Gupta inscriptions, Nepal
In-Reply-To: <BAY107-W20371C52E7DF94A66840BFCF620@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <161227083375.23782.15524593790865851857.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Thank you Mahes, yesterday I checked that (it's easy to find it in
international online libraries, thank God open and public). I need to know
in which books and journals (with biblio of course) they published
inscriptions or studies on them. Titles are a bit too generic.
Perhaps you know at least your father's publications.

All the best, and thank you again,

enrica

ps perhaps, since we know each other, you want to answer to my private
yesterday mail off list?


On Sat, Aug 30, 2008 at 3:47 AM, Mahes Raj Pant <mahesrajpant at hotmail.com>wrote:

> None of these scholars has written an independent book on the Licchavi
> inscriptions. However, there are a lot of publications of theese scholars in
> now defunct journals, namely Purushartha, Sam.skr.ta-sandesha and
> Itihaasa-prakaasha and still running PuurNimaa, all published from
> Kathmandu.
>
> Mahes Raj Pant> Date: Fri, 29 Aug 2008 13:42:57 +0200> From:
> garzilli at ASIATICA.ORG> Subject: books on Gupta inscriptions, Nepal> To:
> INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk> > Dear Colleagues,> > does anybody know titles
> and biblio of the books on (Gupta) inscriptions by> Baburam Acharya, Yogi
> Nara Hari Nath e Naya Raj Pant? (perhaps Mahes Pant,> though I don't have
> his latest email address)> > Thanks in advance, please answer me on or off
> list,> > Dr. Enrica Garzilli
> _________________________________________________________________
> Connect to the next generation of MSN Messenger
>
> http://imagine-msn.com/messenger/launch80/default.aspx?locale=en-us&source=wlmailtagline
>




From Gerard.Huet at INRIA.FR  Sun Aug 31 21:29:40 2008
From: Gerard.Huet at INRIA.FR (=?utf-8?Q?G=C3=A9rard_Huet?=)
Date: Sun, 31 Aug 08 23:29:40 +0200
Subject: Final call, Third Sanskrit Computational Linguistics Symposium
Message-ID: <161227083377.23782.13601044276702273645.generated@prod2.harmonylists.io>

Apologies for duplicate mailings.

Final call for the Third Sanskrit Computational Linguistics Symposium,  
Jan 15-17, 2009, Hyderabad.

September 6th 2008: Final deadline for submission of full papers.

Please visit http://sanskrit.uohyd.ernet.in/Symposium