[INDOLOGY] Etymology of the word"Devnagari"

[Andrew Ollett]

I am almost certain that we had a discussion on this list about this
question, in the course of which it was mentioned that (1) "Dēvanāgarī" is
a relatively late term, and (2) "Nāgarī" is certainly the earlier term, but
the reason for applying that name to the script is not definitely known. It
seems that the INDOLOGY archives can now only be searched back to 2021 (?).
Anyway, I did not succeed in finding the discussion, but the etymology from
Wikipedia is certainly wrong.

On Fri, Mar 24, 2023 at 10:04 PM Dan Lusthaus via INDOLOGY <
indology at list.indology.info> wrote:

> From Wikipedia:
>
> *Devanāgarī* is a compound of *deva
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deva_(Hinduism)>* (देव) and *nāgarī
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N%C4%81gar%C4%AB_script>* (नागरी). *Deva*
> means "heavenly", "divine", or "deity".[20]
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devanagari#cite_note-monier-21> *Nāgarī*
> comes from नगरम् *nagaram*, a Sanskrit word meaning "town". Hence,
> *devanāgarī* can be translated as “from the abode of divinity"
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devanagari
>
> Dan
>
> On Mar 24, 2023, at 10:41 PM, alakendu das via INDOLOGY <
> indology at list.indology.info> wrote:
>
> Reverred Scholars,
> I was searching about  the etymology of the word'Devnagari".
> Can anybody enlighten me on this .?
> Regards
> Alakendu Das.
>
>
> Sent from RediffmailNG on Android
>
>
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