[INDOLOGY] Antw: Re: Grammatical question

[Harry Spier]

On Tue, Apr 21, 2020 at 4:44 AM Raik Strunz via INDOLOGY <
indology at list.indology.info> wrote:

>
> . . . And *samskr̥ta*-, afaik, would be an outrageous violation of
> articulatory norms and practice in the higher registers of Vedic Sanskrit
> as well as Epic-Classical Sanskrit.
>

About 20 years ago I wanted to check to check how vedic priests of the
taittiriya sakha pronounced classical sanskrit.  I wanted to check this
because in their chanting of the taittiriya-samhita, anusvara in certain
places is pronounced as a kind of "gum" sound.   To do this I collected
examples of taittiriya priests chanting the bhagavad-gita.  What I found
was that in the south (Kerala and Tamil Nadu) taittiriya priests when
chanting the bhagavad-gita pronounced anusvara as the class nasal before
consonents,  but before s ś ṣ y h anusvara was pronounced as "m".  This
agrees with what Chatterji said about pronunciation of anusvara in the
south.

I also checked the pronunciation of anusvara  by taittiriya priests from
Maharashtra  when chanting the bhagavad-gita and there, and the
pronounciation of anusvara befroe s ś ṣ y h was similar to what Dominik
Haas recommended.  I.e. pronouncing an "m" without closing the lips.

Harry Spier


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