Vedic Sanskrit

Vedic Sanskrit, also simply referred as the Vedic language, is an ancient language of the Indo-Aryan subgroup of the Indo-European language family. It is attested in the Vedas and related literature[2] compiled over the period of the mid-2nd to mid-1st millennium BCE.[3] It is orally preserved, predating the advent of writing by several centuries.[4][5]

Not to be confused with the Vedda language.
Vedic Sanskrit
Native toPresent-day India, Afghanistan, Nepal and Pakistan
RegionNorthwestern Indian subcontinent
Erac. 1500 – 600 BCE
Language codes
ISO 639-3– (vsn is proposed)[1]
vsn
 qnk Rigvedic
Glottologvedi1234
IETFsa-vaidika

Extensive ancient literature in the Vedic Sanskrit language has survived into the modern era, and this has been a major source of information for reconstructing Proto-Indo-European and Proto-Indo-Iranian history.[6][7]

History

Prehistoric derivation
Further information: Substratum in Vedic Sanskrit

The separation of Proto-Indo-Iranian language into Proto-Iranian and Proto-Indo-Aryan is estimated, on linguistic grounds, to have occurred around or before 1800 BCE.[6][8] The date of composition of the oldest hymns of the Rigveda is vague at best, generally estimated to roughly 1500 BCE.[9] Both Asko Parpola (1988) and J. P. Mallory (1998) place the locus of the division of Indo-Aryan from Iranian in the Bronze Age culture of the Bactria–Margiana Archaeological Complex (BMAC). Parpola (1999) elaborates the model and has "Proto-Rigvedic" Indo-Aryans intrude the BMAC around 1700 BCE. He assumes early Indo-Aryan presence in the Late Harappan horizon from about 1900 BCE, and "Proto-Rigvedic" (Proto-Dardic) intrusion to Punjab as corresponding to the Gandhara grave culture from about 1700 BCE. According to this model, Rigvedic within the larger Indo-Aryan group is the direct ancestor of the Dardic languages.[10]

The early Vedic Sanskrit language was far less homogeneous compared to the language defined by Pāṇini, that is, Classic Sanskrit. The language in the early Upanishads of Hinduism and the late Vedic literature approaches Classical Sanskrit.[11] The formalization of the late form of Vedic Sanskrit language into the Classical Sanskrit form is credited to Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī, along with Patanjali's Mahabhasya and Katyayana's commentary that preceded Patanjali's work.[12][13]

Chronology

Five chronologically distinct strata can be identified within the Vedic language:[14][15][16]

  1. Ṛg-vedic
  2. Mantra
  3. Saṃhitā prose
  4. Brāhmaṇa prose
  5. Sūtras

The first three are commonly grouped together, as the Saṃhitās[upper-alpha 1] comprising the four Vedas:[upper-alpha 2] ṛg, atharvan, yajus, sāman, which together constitute the oldest texts in Sanskrit and the canonical foundation both of the Vedic religion, and the later religion known as Hinduism.[19]

Ṛg-vedic

Many words in the Vedic Sanskrit of the Ṛg·veda have cognates or direct correspondences with the ancient Avestan language, but these do not appear in post-Rigvedic Indian texts. The text of the Ṛg·veda must have been essentially complete by around the 12th century BCE. The pre-1200 BCE layers mark a gradual change in Vedic Sanskrit, but there is disappearance of these archaic correspondences and linguistics in the post-Rigvedic period.[14][15]

Mantra language

This period includes both the mantra and prose language of the Atharvaveda (Paippalada and Shaunakiya), the Ṛg·veda Khilani, the Samaveda Saṃhitā, and the mantras of the Yajurveda. These texts are largely derived from the Ṛg·veda, but have undergone certain changes, both by linguistic change and by reinterpretation. For example, the more ancient injunctive verb system is no longer in use.[14][15]

Sanhitā

An important linguistic change is the disappearance of the injunctive, subjunctive, optative, imperative (the aorist). New innovations in Vedic Sanskrit appear such as the development of periphrastic aorist forms. This must have occurred before the time of Pāṇini because Panini makes a list of those from the northwestern region of India who knew these older rules of Vedic Sanskrit.[14][15]

Brāhmaṇa prose

In this layer of Vedic literature, the archaic Vedic Sanskrit verb system has been abandoned, and a prototype of pre-Panini Vedic Sanskrit structure emerges. The Yajñagāthās texts provide a probable link between Vedic Sanskrit, Classical Sanskrit and languages of the Epics. Complex meters such as Anuṣṭubh and rules of Sanskrit prosody had been or were being innovated by this time, but parts of the Brāhmaṇa layers show the language is still close to Vedic Sanskrit.[20][15]

Sūtra language

This is the last stratum of Vedic literature, comprising the bulk of the Śrautasūtras and Gṛhyasūtras and some Upaniṣads such as the Kaṭha Upaniṣad and Maitrāyaṇiya Upaniṣad.[15] These texts elucidate the state of the language which formed the basis of Pāṇini's codification into Classical Sanskrit.[21]

Phonology

Vedic differs from Classical Sanskrit to an extent comparable to the difference between Homeric Greek and Classical Greek.

The following differences may be observed in the phonology:

  • Vedic had a voiceless bilabial fricative ([ɸ], called upadhmānīya[lower-roman 1]) and a voiceless velar fricative ([x], called jihvāmūlīya[lower-roman 2])—which used to occur as allophones of visarga ḥ before voiceless labial and velar consonants respectively. Both of them were lost in Classical Sanskrit to give way to the simple visarga. Upadhmānīya occurs before p and ph, jihvāmūlīya before k and kh.[22]
  • Vedic had a retroflex lateral approximant ([ɭ]) [lower-roman 3] as well as its breathy-voiced counterpart ([ɭʱ]),[lower-roman 4] which are not found in classical Sanskrit; Macdonnell suggests these were allophones of the corresponding plosives ḍ (/ɖ/) and ḍh (/ɖʱ/);[23] these units could also function metrically as a cluster, suggesting Proto-Indo-Aryan pronunciations of *[ʐɖ] and *[ʐɖʱ] (see Mitanni-Aryan) before the loss of voiced sibilants, which occurred after the split of Proto-Indo-Iranian.[24]
  • The vowels e and o were realized in Vedic as diphthongs ai and au, but they became monophthongs in later Sanskrit, such as daivá- > devá-and áika->ekā-. However, the diphthongal quality still resurfaces in sandhi.[25]
  • The vowels ai and au were correspondingly realized in Vedic as long diphthongs āi and āu, but they became correspondingly short in Classical Sanskrit: dyā́us > dyáus.[25]
  • The Prātiśākhyas claim that the "dental" consonants were articulated from the teeth ridge (dantamūlīya, alveolar), but they became dentals later, whereas most other authorities including Pāṇini designate them as dentals.[26]
  • The Prātiśākhyas are inconsistent about [r] but generally claim that it was also a dantamūlīya. According to Pāṇini it is a retroflex consonant.[27][26]
  • The pluti (trimoraic) vowels were on the verge of becoming phonemicized during middle Vedic, but disappeared again.
  • Vedic often allowed two like vowels in certain cases to come together in hiatus without merger during sandhi, which has been reconstructed as the influence of an old laryngeal still present in the Proto-Indo-Iranian stage of the language: PIE *h₂weh₁·nt- → va·ata-.[upper-alpha 3][28]

Accent
Main article: Vedic accent

Vedic had a pitch accent[29] which could even change the meaning of the words, and was still in use in Pāṇini's time, as inferred by his use of devices to indicate its position. At some latter time, this was replaced by a stress accent limited to the second to fourth syllables from the end.[lower-alpha 1]

Since a small number of words in the late pronunciation of Vedic carry the so-called "independent svarita" on a short vowel, one can argue that late Vedic was marginally a tonal language. Note however that in the metrically-restored versions of the Rig Veda almost all of the syllables carrying an independent svarita must revert to a sequence of two syllables, the first of which carries an udātta and the second a so-called dependent svarita. Early Vedic was thus definitely not a tonal language like Chinese but a pitch accent language like Japanese, which was inherited from the Proto-Indo-European accent.

Pitch accent was not restricted to Vedic: early Sanskrit grammarian Pāṇini gives both accent rules for the spoken language of his (post-Vedic) time as well as the differences of Vedic accent. However, no extant post-Vedic text with accents are found.

Pluti
Pluta
a3 (अ३)ā3 (आ३)
i3 (इ३)ī (ई३)
u3 (उ३)ū (ऊ३)
a3i (e3) (ए३)ā3i (ऐ३)
a3u (o3) (ओ३)ā3u (औ३)
ṛ3 (ऋ३)ṝ (ॠ३)
ḷ3 (ऌ३)ḹ (ॡ३)
"Pluti" redirects here. For other uses of "pluta", see Pluta.

Pluti, or prolation, is the term for the phenomenon of protracted or overlong vowels in Sanskrit; the overlong or prolated vowels are themselves called pluta.[30] Pluta vowels are usually noted with a numeral "3" (३) indicating a length of three morae (trimātra).[31][32]

A diphthong is prolated by prolongation of its first vowel.[31] Pāṇinian grammarians recognise the phonetic occurrence of diphthongs measuring more than three morae in duration, but classify them all as prolated (i.e. trimoraic) to preserve a strict tripartite division of vocalic length between hrasva (short, 1 mora), dīrgha (long, 2 morae) and pluta (prolated, 3+ morae).[31][33]

The syllable Aum (ओ३म्) rendered with pluta

Pluta vowels are recorded a total of 3 times in the Rigveda and 15 times in the Atharvaveda, typically in cases of questioning and particularly where two options are being compared.[30][31] For example:[31]

  • adháḥ svid āsî3d upári svid āsī3t
"Was it above? Was it below?"
Rigveda 10.129.5d
  • idáṃ bhûyā3 idâ3miti
"Is this larger? Or this?"
Atharvaveda 9.6.18

The pluti attained the peak of their popularity in the Brahmana period of late Vedic Sanskrit (roughly 8th century BC), with some 40 instances in the Shatapatha Brahmana alone.[34]

Grammar
Main article: Vedic Sanskrit grammar

Literature
Main article: Sanskrit literature § Vedic literature

See also

Notes
  1. Today, the pitch accent can be heard only in the traditional Vedic chantings.

Glossary
  1. 'compiled', 'put together'[17]
  2. from vid-, 'to know', cognate with Eng. 'wit'[18]
  3. vā́ta-, wind


Brahmic notes
Brahmic transliteration
  1. उपध्मानीय
  2. जिह्वामूलीय
  3. ळ
  4. ळ्ह

References
  1. "Change Request Documentation: 2011-041". SIL International.
  2. Burrow, p. 43.
  3. Witzel, Michael (2006). "Early Loanwords in Western Central Asia: Indicators of Substrate Populations, Migrations, and Trade Relations". In Mair, Victor H. (ed.). Contact And Exchange in the Ancient World. University of Hawaii Press. p. 160. ISBN 978-0-8248-2884-4.
  4. Macdonell (1916), §1.2.
  5. Reich, p. 122.
  6. Baldi, Philip (1983). An Introduction to the Indo-European Languages. Southern Illinois University Press. pp. 51–52. ISBN 978-0-8093-1091-3.
  7. Beckwith, Christopher I. (2009). Empires of the Silk Road: A History of Central Eurasia from the Bronze Age to the Present. Princeton University Press. pp. 363–368. ISBN 978-0-691-13589-2.
  8. Mallory, J.P. (1989). In Search of the Indo-Europeans: Language, Archaeology, and Myth. London: Thames & Hudson. p. 38f.
  9. J. P. Mallory; Douglas Q. Adams (1997). Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture. Taylor & Francis. p. 306. ISBN 978-1-884964-98-5.
  10. Parpola, Asko (1999), "The formation of the Aryan branch of Indo-European", in Blench, Roger & Spriggs, Matthew, Archaeology and Language, vol. III: Artefacts, languages and texts, London and New York: Routledge.
  11. Richard Gombrich (2006). Theravada Buddhism: A Social History from Ancient Benares to Modern Colombo. Routledge. pp. 24–25. ISBN 978-1-134-90352-8.
  12. Gérard Huet; Amba Kulkarni; Peter Scharf (2009). Sanskrit Computational Linguistics: First and Second International Symposia Rocquencourt, France, October 29–31, 2007 Providence, RI, USA, May 15–17, 2008, Revised Selected Papers. Springer. pp. v–vi. ISBN 978-3-642-00154-3.
  13. Louis Renou & Jean Filliozat. L'Inde Classique, manuel des etudes indiennes, vol.II pp.86–90, École française d'Extrême-Orient, 1953, reprinted 2000. ISBN 2-85539-903-3.
  14. Michael Witzel 1989, pp. 115–127 (see pp. 26–30 in the archived-url).
  15. Klaus G. Witz (1998). The Supreme Wisdom of the Upaniṣads: An Introduction. Motilal Banarsidass. p. 24 with note 73. ISBN 978-81-208-1573-5.
  16. Burrow, pp. 43.
  17. MWW, p. 1123.
  18. MWW, p.963.
  19. J&B, pp. 1–2.
  20. Michael Witzel 1989, pp. 121–127 (see pp. 29–31 in the archived-url).
  21. Burrow, pp44.
  22. Macdonnell, §43.
  23. Macdonell, 1916, §15.2d.
  24. Macdonnell, §15.
  25. Macdonnell, §4.b.
  26. Deshpande, p. 138.
  27. Whitney, §52.
  28. Clackson, pp. 58–59.
  29. Burrow, §3.24.
  30. Kobayashi (2006), p. 13.
  31. Whitney (1950), pp. 27–28.
  32. Scharf & Hymann (2011), p. 154.
  33. Scharf & Hymann (2011), p. 72.
  34. Strunk, Klaus (1983). Typische Merkmale von Fragesätzen und die altindische "Pluti". München. ISBN 3769615271.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)

Bibliography

Phonology

Other
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