[INDOLOGY] Spaces between words in Sanskrit manuscripts?

[Andrew Ollett]

Some of the Prakrit manuscripts I've seen---most relatively recent, but
nevertheless pre-print---separate words in the Prakrit text with a dot or
with small daṇḍa-like marks above the line (the latter may have been added
subsequently). Words aren't separated in the accompanying Sanskrit
commentaries to these texts.

There are spaces between (some) words in most versions of Asoka's pillar
edicts, but I'm not sure how frequent interword spacing is in later
inscriptions, if it happens at all.

2018-05-14 23:43 GMT-05:00 Madhav Deshpande via INDOLOGY <
indology at list.indology.info>:

> Dear McComas,
>
>      This must have happened gradually after the Sanskrit Pundits were
> exposed to English printing.  Even the early Sanskrit printed texts in the
> form of pothis did not separate words.  I have many such old printed
> materials.  I have attached a sample page.  If this practice continued into
> early printing, it is simply because the printing style was copying the
> writing style of the manuscripts.  I have photographs of a few texts that
> were hand written by the famous Pandit Vasudeva Shastri Abhyankar where I
> do not see gaps between the words.  Early pothis of Vedic texts printed by
> the Nirnaya Sagara Press also do not show any gaps between words.
>
> Madhav Deshpande
> Campbell, California
>
> On Mon, May 14, 2018 at 9:02 PM, McComas Taylor via INDOLOGY <
> indology at list.indology.info> wrote:
>
>> Dear colleagues
>>
>>
>> A student has asked me a questions I cannot answer:  'When did scribes
>> begin to insert spaces between words in Sanskrit manuscripts?'
>>
>>
>> Can any of you learned folk help us out?
>>
>>
>> Thanks in advance
>>
>>
>> McComas
>>
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> McComas Taylor, SFHEA
>> Associate Professor, Reader in Sanskrit
>> College of Asia and the Pacific
>> The Australian National University, Tel. + 61 2 6125 3179
>> Website: https://sites.google.com/site/mccomasanu/
>>
>> Address: Baldessin Building 4.24, ANU, ACT 0200
>>
>>
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>>
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>>
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>>
>>
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