Re: [INDOLOGY] Nārāyaṇagarta and Kayyaṭa Kashmiri pandits

Sun Feb 9 09:12:13 UTC 2014

Dear Ashok,

thank you for your critical remarks concerning my message. Let me briefly
address these points.

1) > I would be grateful for a specific reference to discussions of the
Sharada script that suggest such a possibility.

On page 56 of my booklet (with the original akṣaras reproduced from a
Śāradā manuscript) you can check this possibility for yourself, the
difference being that a halfcircle below the mātrā is open to the left
(rta) or closed (rbha). This applies of course to actual handwriting only,
but not to the abstracted shapes of Śāradā akṣaras, which is why I did not
categorize such forms under the heading of "Semi-homographe Akṣaras" (pp.
43 ff), where you therefore might have looked in vain.

2) > Srikanth Kaul' himself does not specify that he has emended the text
the way he has because "rbha" could be a miscopying of "rta".

I have quoted Kaul's editorial note verbatim, and he writes indeed:
" (*mislec[tion] for Śār. rtā*)". Kaul considered rbha a Śāradā mislection
for an original -rta and emended his text accordingly.

3) > Sriivara describes an unceremonious funeral, one in which a body
brought in a coffin and covered with a single sheet is simply dumped into a
space that exists in/on the ground, although it is the body of a royal
person

Actually, Śrīvara here solemnly describes a royal funeral in accordance
with Muslim rites. This is the context of the stanza quoted by me:

Ḥasan, Sulṭān Zayn's grandson and heir to his deceased father, buries his
father Sulṭān Ḥaydar Šāh (who unfortunately died of excessive alcoholism).

Regrettably, vocabulary and modes of expression of the largely ignored
post-Kalhaṇian Rājataraṅgiṇīs are nowhere recorded in our standard
dictionaries.

4) > In such a context, "bhuu-garta" conveying the idea of a 'ditch' or
'trench' seems more appropriate than "bhuu-garbha" (which would connote
greater depth).

>From the actual context as given above a different picture emerges. The new
Sulṭān would hardly have dumped his father into a ditch, for he was publicly
buried at the royal cemetery in Śrīnagar.

Śrīvara was a poet and expressed himself as such a one. That he had indeed
a "womb of the earth" in mind when composing his stanza can be seen from a
telling parallel, where he depicts Zayn's burial as an eyewitness, at the
occasion of which he had been present as well:

*yatra suptā ivaikatra bhānti pūrve mahībhujaḥ |*

*bhartṛpremṇā dharaṇy eva nihitā hṛdayāntare* || Zayna-T. 1.7.227 ||
"There, [where] *the Earth had taken them inside* for love of her [royal]
husbands, the previous Sulṭāns appeared to be asleep [together] in the same
place."

That is the way a cremation-accustomed Hindu poet conceived of the strange
impression interments left on his mind, when the earth, who is supposed to
have always only one husband (ruler) at a time, takes them all together
inside herself (hṛdayāntare = bhu-ga*rbh*e), where they now seem to sleep
comfortably side by side.

I am sorry that I had not clarified the full context in my earlier mail and
so unintentionally caused some confusion. I just wanted to be brief in
pointing out the theoretical possibility that -rbha might have been misread
for -rta, and that an early mislection of that sort may have easily
survived in copies made from such an exemplar.

Warm wishes,

Walter

-----------------------------
Prof. Dr. Walter Slaje
Hermann-Löns-Str. 1
D-99425 Weimar
Deutschland

Ego ex animi mei sententia spondeo ac polliceor
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.

2014-02-09 0:29 GMT+01:00 Ashok Aklujkar <ashok.aklujkar at gmail.com>:

> I have a few questions to ask:
>
> Is "garbha" found after a male name in a compound that could serve as
> someone's personal name or epithet?
> (The late grammarian Naage;sa speaks of himself as "satii-garbhaja", but
> in that compound "satii" is his mother's name.)
>
> Dr. Stern observes: "A Google search will give you references for this
> scholar [= Naaraayana-garbha]." I made a Google search in all ways I could
> think of, but did not hit upon anything resembling "Naaraayana-garbha".
> Either Dr. Stern was expressing a hope or I need to get a list of the
> references he found.
> (The reference in the NCC is based on the published edition. It does not
> add to what we know.)
>
> I had checked Prof. Slaje's excellent booklet that introduces the Sharada
> script for the benefit of those who do not know that script, but I did not
> find anything in it that would suggest that "rbha" and "rta"" could be so
> similar as to be mistaken for each other. I would be grateful for a
> specific reference to discussions of the Sharada script that suggest such a
> possibility. Alternatively, a presentation of what the shapes of rbha" and
> "rta"" are according to Prof. Slaje will be useful.
>
> (The details of the book to which I referred in my last post for a
> one-time confusability of "rta" and "rga" are: OJHA, Gaurishankar
> Hirachand. The palaeography of India = Bhaaratiiya praaciina
> lipimaalaa. Delhi : Munshi Ram Manohar Lal, 1959.  Third edition. New Delhi
> 1971.)
>
> It certainly deserves admiration that Prof. Slaje has recollected an
> occurrence that could serve as an exact parallel to what we find in the mss
> of Naaraaya.na's commentary. However, Srikanth Kaul' himself does not
> specify that he has emended the text the way he has because "rbha" could be
> a miscopying of "rta". Therefore, we are free to think that he took the
> editorial action he did only for a semantic reason. At the most we can
> infer that he did not hesitate to emend or did not feel the need to justify
> his action because he was aware of the confusability of "rbha" as "rta" and
> "rta" as "rbha".
>
> What kind of semantic reason? In the passage concerned, ;Sriivara
> describes an unceremonious funeral, one in which a body brought in a coffin
> and covered with a single sheet is simply dumped into a space that exists
> in/on the ground, although it is the body of a royal person (note
> "ak.sipat," note absence of any reference to preparation of the burial
> ground etc.). In such a context, "bhuu-garta" conveying the idea of a
> 'ditch' or 'trench' seems more appropriate than "bhuu-garbha" (which would
> connote greater depth).
>
> (I could not find any occurrences of "bhuu-garbha" in Classical Skt with
> our standard reference tools. Apte's dictionary records the word only as an
> epithet of Vi.s..nu. In many modern Indian languages "bhuu-garbha-;saastra"
> is used for 'geology'.)
>
> Whether we go along with Kaul or view his emendation as unnecessary or as
> an attempt to improve ;Sriivara's original, does it not seem that the
> evidence given for favoring the change of "garta" to "garbha" in the
> pu.spikaa of Naaraaya.na's commentary is not as strong as it may initially
> seem?
>
> I will conclude with a clarification. I take Kayya.ta to be a Kashmirian,
> but Naaraaya.na (= Naaraaya.na-garga, less probably  Naaraaya.na-garbha)
> may be from Kashmir or any part of western India to the south of Kashmir.
> Also, he may not be close to Kayya.ta in time. He could belong to a time
> when the gotra names began to be used after personal names to identify
> oneself.
>
> a.a.
>
>
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