[INDOLOGY] Sanskrit punctuation

[Brendan Gillon]

Dear colleagues,

I am writing to get advice for a friend who does not have access to
Indology. My friend was asking me about punctuating Sanskrit texts.

The principal questions is:
Is there a reference which gives the general guidelines regarding
punctuation? If so, what would one recommend?



MORE DETAILS FOR THOSE INTERESTED:

For anyone who might be interested, I provide in the balance of this
message the details of the sentence prompting the question. It comes
from a sentence the Zarkarikaa by Bha.t.ta Jayamizra on the
Kumaarila's Zlokavaartika:

na caatraiva.m vikalpaniiyam sahipuru.sa.h puurvamakartravastha
evaasiididaanii.m saavasthotpanaa saa ca tato naavyatiriktaa
tadutpattiprasafgaaya vyatiriktaa tadaa saiva tatra kaarakabhuuteti
puru.sa.h puurvavadakaaraka eva tathaa bhoktravasthaayaamapi
dra.s.tavyam atazca sa eva k.rtanaazaak.rtaagama iti.

The basic frame of the sentence is this:
  na caatraiva.m vikalpaniiyam [ S1 ... S8 ] iti
where S1 through S8 are short independent clauses. The question is:
should any punctuation be used to separate the clauses? And if so,
what kind of punctuation?

Here is the actual sentence in its parsed version.

na caatraiva.m vikalpaniiyam [ [S1 sa hi puru.sa.h puurvamakartravastha
evaasiit ] [S2 idaanii.m saavasthotpanaa ] [S3 saa ca tato
naavyatiriktaa ] [S4 tadutpattiprasafgaaya vyatiriktaa ] [S5 tadaa
saiva tatra kaarakabhuutaa ] [S6 iti puru.sa.h puurvavadakaaraka eva ]
[S7 tathaa bhoktravasthaayaamapi dra.s.tavyam ] [S8 atazca sa eva
k.rtanaazaak.rtaagama ] iti ]


A further question is prompted by how to punctuate "iti", where it could 
be replaced by "evam", as in clause S6 above.


-- 

Brendan S. Gillon                       email: brendan.gillon at mcgill.ca
Department of Linguistics
McGill University                       tel.:  001 514 398 4868
1085, Avenue Docteur-Penfield
Montreal, Quebec                        fax.:  001 514 398 7088
H3A 1A7  CANADA

webpage: http://webpages.mcgill.ca/staff/group3/bgillo/web/