[INDOLOGY] Short and sweet?

[Dan Lusthaus]

Dear Martin, Walter, and everyone,

The arabic is probably

سام = sublime [sām; the “ah” in the Sanskritized sahm could just signal it is a long-a]

أل سعادة = [al-sa ‘hāda; happiness, joy, beatitude, welfare, sunshine; al- becomes as- due to external sandhi]


So sām = sukṣma and as-sa ‘hāda = svādhu = pleasantness, charm, beauty (MW) [not just “sweetness”]. If so, that would make sūkṣma-svādu a fairly literal translation.

The author probably didn’t differentiate between Arabic and Persian, just as Indians tended to consider Greeks and central Asians viewed as in the Hellenistic orbit as yavana, regardless of actual ethnicity, geography or language. Someone familiar with Arabic/Persian astronomical terms could offer further clarification or suggestions.

Dan


> On Feb 12, 2022, at 1:08 PM, Walter Slaje via INDOLOGY <indology at list.indology.info> wrote:
> 
> Hello Martin,
> 
> even if a concept with an Arabic-language term is hidden behind that, it is by no means certain that the author also understood it in Arabic (unless he was an expert). He could well have associated something Persian with this wording (tājikabhāṣāyāṃ!) and made up a vague meaning, which he then simply translated literally into Sanskrit. Anyway, I would rather understand it as Karmadhāraya, i.e. as a kind of "subtle sweetness". In any case, it is striking that saha-masāda could perhaps conceal a truncated Persian مازه māzah/māze ("taste") as well as a truncated Persian سهل sahl ("soft, easy"). The Persian experts on this list will be able to judge this immediately.
> Suppose this were possible, the sentence could come to mean that in the Tajik language, a wording like saha-masāda (~ ~ "soft taste") is the equivalent of sūkṣma-svādu ("subtle sweetness").
> 
> So much for my amateurish guesswork.
> 
> Best wishes,
> Walter
> 
> 
> Am Sa., 12. Feb. 2022 um 17:12 Uhr schrieb Martin Gansten via INDOLOGY <indology at list.indology.info <mailto:indology at list.indology.info>>:
> In a Sanskrit text probably originating in 13th-century Gujarat, I just came across this line:
> 
> yas tājikabhāṣāyāṃ sūkṣmasvāduś ca sahamasāda iti |
> 
> This is a reference to the Arabic term sahm as-saʿāda (the Lot of Fortune, an astrological concept). But I am puzzled by the designation sūkṣmasvādu, which I have never seen before that I can recall, and certainly not applied to an abstract concept. Does it ring a bell with anyone? Is it an idiomatic expression that I have failed to pick up?
> 
> Thanks in advance,
> Martin Gansten
> 
> 
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