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Some aspects of the phonology of the Prakrit underlying the Aśokan inscriptions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 December 2009

K. R. Norman
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Extract

It is a matter of considerable regret that no copy of the Aśokan inscriptions has been found at Pātaliputra. Such a version, inscribed at the capital of Aśoka's empire, might have been expected to be in the language of the capital itself, and therefore by implication in the official language of the court and secretariat. There can be no doubt that many of the difficulties which face us in the task of interpreting the Aśokan inscriptions arise because of errors in the translation from the Pkt. of the original into the Pkts. of the various regions. Possession of the Pātaliputra version would enable us to read the inscriptions free from such translation errors.

Type
Articles and Notes and Communications
Information
Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , Volume 33 , Issue 1 , February 1970 , pp. 132 - 143
Copyright
Copyright © School of Oriental and African Studies 1970

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References

1 Abbreviations: (M)RE = (Minor) Rock Edict; PE = Pillar Edict; SepE = Separate Edict; G = Girnār; K = KālsῙi Dh. = Dhauli; J = Jaugada; M = Mānsehrā; Sh. = Shāhbāzgarhī; S = Sopārā; Y = Yerragudi; Skt. = Sanskrit; Pkt. = Prakrit; BHS = Buddhist Hybrid Skt.; AMg. = Ardha-Māgadhī; PED = Pali Text Society, Pali-English dictionary; Ep. Ind. = Epigraphia Indica.

2 References: Hultzsch = E. Hultzsch, ‘The inscriptions of Aśoka’, Corpus inscriptionum indicarum, I; Bloch = J. Bloch, Les inscriptions d'Asoka; Brough = J. Brough, The Gāndhārī Dharmapada; Lüders = H. Lüders, Beobachtungen über die Sprache des buddhistischen Urkanons; Alsdorf = Alsdorf, L., ‘Contributions to the study of Asoka's inscriptions’, BDCRI, XX, 1960, 249–75Google Scholar; Turner = R. L. Turner, Comparative dictionary of the Indo-Aryan languages; Upasak = C. S. Upasak, The history and palaeography of the Mauryan Brāhmī script.

3 Lüders, 7.

4 e.g. adhigicya, hida-, adha-, vadikā- (see Lüders, 77 ff.).

5 I follow Hultzsch's division into sections.

6 See Hultzsch, p. 13.5, n. I.

7 Woolner (Asoka text and glossary, pt. i, p. XXV) ignores this distinction, and advises students ‘to study the grammar of the language in which the inscriptions seem to have been drafted’, by reading the PEs, etc.

8 Although most scholars would accept this view, e.g. Woolner, (op. cit., p. xx)Google Scholar, Mehendale has taken some features to prove translation from a North-Western Pkt. (see JOI (Baroda), I, 3, 1952, 240–4Google Scholar, and JAS Bombay, NS, XXXI–XXXII, 1956–1957Google Scholar, [pub.] 1959, 155).

9 I use the word ‘scribe’loosely, to denote whoever was responsible for translating and/or inscribing into the local Pkt.

10 See Hultzsch, p. lvii. He made it clear (p. lvi, n. I) that he used ‘Māgadhī’ to denote the language of Aśoka's capital, not the grammarians' language of the same name.

11 BHS grammar, 3.

12 use the word ‘exemplar’to signify the draft from which the scribe made his translation and/or inscription. An exemplar might have been in UPkt., or might already have had some dialect changes introduced into it (see IIJ, X, 2–3, 1967, 170)Google Scholar. Although there are two recensions of PEs I–VI, distinguished by scribal preferences for writing long or short vowels, etc., it is clear that all the versions are copied from an exemplar in which certain translation changes, e.g. the haphazard substitution of relative pronoun forms with y-, had already been made (see also JRAS, 1967, 32). The same is probably true of PE VII, which also has relative pronouns with and without y-. Furthermore, the Pkt. portion of PE VII found at Kandahar (see JA, CCLIV, 3–4, 1966, 437–65)Google Scholar seems to be identical with the Toprā version, although the other Pkt./Aramaic edict found in Afghanistan has North-Western features (see BSOAS, XIII, 1, 1949, 80–8)Google Scholar.

13 See JRAS, 1967, 97.

14 Although Mehendale denies this (JAS Bombay, NS, XXXI–XXXII, 1956–1957, [pub.] 1959, p. 159, n. 9)Google Scholar, it is the view commonly held by scholars, e.g. Sircar (see Ep. Ind., XXXI, 5, 1956, [pub.] 1957, No. 27, p. 209)Google Scholar.

15 Sec IIJ, X, 2–3, 1967, 169–70Google Scholar. Although I suggted there that the UPkt. features were eliminated early in the chain of transmission, I now believe that, for the REs at least, they were removed at regional level.

16 SepE II(H) hidalogam ca palalogam ca.

17 SepE I(G), SepE II(F) and (L) hidalogika-.

18 See PED, s.v.upaka-.

19 See Edgerton, BHS dictionary, s.v. upaka-. Edgerton seems to regard this as the original form, and upaga- as a Middle Indo-Aryan form showing the voicing of -k- > -g-.

20 Brough, 226.

21 For non-Aśokan examples cf. AMg. vijaya- < vicaya- (Uttarajjhayanasutta, XV.7, Ovavāiyasutta, 30 V'); BHS parijaya-, -jita-, -jayati < ci- (see BHS dictionary, s.vv.); Pali sujā- < sruc- (see Geiger, Pāli lit. and lang., § 38); Pali pārājika- < *pārācika-, cf. AMg. pāramciya- (see BHS dictionary, s.v.pārājika-); Pkt. tajā- < tvac- (Deśīnāmamālā, 1.111, 3.24); the word play on vijess- and pacess- in Dhammapada, 44, is more meaningful if it comes from a dialect where -c- > -j- (i.e. vijess-/pajess-), although it could have been in a dialect where -c-/-j- > -y- (e.g. Gāndhārī); perhaps Gāndhārī vijinena is < vicīrnena.

22 See Hultzsch, p. 127, n. 4.

23 See JSAS, 1967, 29.

24 Hyper-forms are found in Pali too, e.g.pāc- < pāj-, and perhaps anuvicca < anuvijja (see Brough, 251).

25 Hultzsch, p. 12, n. 6.

26 Hultzsch, p. lxxxv.

27 Contrast Turner 11208 with 12225.

28 Since these forms from vrac- are peculiar to Sh., replacing forms from yā- in the other versions, we may postulate that there was a North-Western root vrac- ‘to go’, whatever its etymology. It seems unlikely that a dialect word at Sh. would include a hyper-form. If this root was current in a wider area, it could be taken as the basis for the word v(r)aca- in RE VI(D) which would then mean ‘going, journey’(cf. Sircar's translation ‘promenade’ (Ep. Ind., XXXII, 1, 1957, [pub.] 1959, No. 1, p. 13))Google Scholar.

29 See IIJ, X, 2–3, 1967, 164–5Google Scholar.

30 See PED, s.vv. upapātika-, opapātika-. The etymology given there is incorrect (see BHS dictionary, s.v. aupapādulca-).

31 See Aupapātikasūtra (ed. Leuinann, ), p. 1Google Scholar.

32 See IIJ, X, 2–3, 1967, 164–5Google Scholar. For -d- < -t- = -tt-, cf. -dh- < -th- = -tth- in adha-.

33 Turner 13702.

34 See Hultzsch, p. 120, n. 4.

35 Perhaps gevaya- is a miswriting for omaya-: ge and o- could be confused in BrāhmῙ script; for the confusion of ma and va, cf. pakarā va as a mistake for parākama in Rūpnāth 1. 3. For omaya-, cf. Pali, ukkattho majjhimo omako (Vinaya, III, 243, iv, 243)Google Scholar. If this suggestion is correct, then -y- is < -k-.

36 Some other apparent examples of -y- < -k- are probably to be explained (despite Lüders, § 88) as consonant groups containing -y- which have been resolved with an epenthetic vowel, e.g. nilathiya- etc. in RE IX(C) < -aṝthya-, -patiya- in PE IV(D) < -pātya-, -bhāgiya- in RummindeῙ 1. 5 < -bhāgya-.

37 Sircar reads -janiko (Ep. Ind., XXXII, 1, 1957, [pub.] 1959, No. 2, p. 30)Google Scholar, but Alsdorf (p. 250) reads -janikā.

38 Sircar assumes that all these words = samgata- ‘intimately associated’ (see Ep. Ind., XXXII, 1, 1957, [pub.] 1959, No. 1, p. 9Google Scholar, n. 1, and xxxv, 6, 1964, No. 39, pp. 287–92), but clearly we have here the common Buddhist phrase sangham upeti (saranani).

38 See Mehendale, , BDCRI, XVII, 2, 1955, [pub.] 1956, p. 86Google Scholar, n. 22, and cf. IIJ, X, 2–3, 1967, 163–4Google Scholar.

40 Gavīmath upeti is assumed by Sir Ralph Turner (Hyderabad Archaeological Series, 10, 1932, p. 16, n. 1) to be a mistake for upete (cf. RE XIV(E) K, Dh., Y, M asamati for asamate).

41 See Bloch, 53, and contrast prayuhotave in RE I(B).

42 Hultzsch, p. 42, n. 26.

43 See IIJ, X, 2–3, 1967, 160–1Google Scholar. This incidentally shows that UPkt. had causatives and denominatives in -ayati, not -eti.

44 See JRAS, 1967, 28.

45 See Ep. Ind., XXXII, 1, 1957, [pub.] 1959, No. 1, p. 23Google Scholar and p. 26, n. 1, and Sircar, D. C. (ed.), Select inscriptions, i, p. 33Google Scholar, n. 6.

48 So Edgerton, (JAOS, LXXII, 3, 1952, 116)Google Scholar, following Senart and Bloch.

47 See Ep. Ind., XXXII, 1, 1957, [pub.] 1959, Xo. 2, p. 30Google Scholar.

48 See Hultzsch, p. lvii.

49 See Hultzsch, pp. lvii, Ixvi, lxxxvi, and xciv.

50 See PED, s.v. ārabhati1.

51 See Hultzsch, p. lvi, and Woolner, Asoka text and glossary, pt. II, s.v. āradhi-.

52 See ‘Middle Indo-Aryan studies VII’, JOI (Baroda), XVIII, 3, 1969, 226Google Scholar.

53 See Hultzsch, p. 8, n. 3.

54 Sārnāth visavesu; the Queen's edict -piyasa and se; Maski vasāni (although Upasak (p. 100) doubts this reading).

55 Maski Budhaśake; Siddāpura śacam; Jatinga-Rāmeśvara ācariyaśa and śa(va); Bairāt śvage. Mehendale, (BDCRI, XVII, 2, 1955, [pub.] 1956, 87)Google Scholar explains these occurrences of śa as hyper-north-westernization.

56 -vaśābhisitena, piyadaśinā.

57 See Bloch, 48; Brough, p. 53, n. 6; and Hultzsch, p. lxxii.

58 See Upasak, 228–30.

59 See Hultzsch, p. 40, n. 4 and 11, p. 42, n. 28, p. 45, n. 1, etc., and Upasak, 100 and 290.

60 Bloch, 48.

61 śanthuta-, śe, paśavati.

62 sahaśe, śata-, pāśamda-, śuvihita-, dāśa-, śamthuta-, viśava-.

63 lekhāpeśāmi.

64 Hultzsch (p. lxxxviii) accepts Michelson's view that epenthetic vowels at Sh. are Māgadhisms.

65 Contrast Ep. Ind., XXXII, 1, 1957, [pub.] 1959, No. 1, p. 7Google Scholar with p. 13.

66 A similar explanation probably lies behind suag(e) in 1. 4 at Sahasrām. The scribe tried to convert suvage > svage, and in his confusion omitted -v- entirely.

67 i.e. the scribe omitted the u-mātrā.

68 Monier-Williams's Skt.-Eng. dictionary quotes it only from Hemacandra’s Pariśistaparvan.

69 One form of śa is identical with a form of ja turned through a right angle (see Upasak, 229 and 289).

70 Sircar (Ep. Ind., XXXII, 1, 1957, [pub.] 1959, No. 1, p. 22, n. 21)Google Scholar says that it is for niciyam, i.e.nīcyam ‘towards the south’, although Monier-Williams quotes Skt. nīcya- only in the sense of ‘name of certain nations in the west’.

71 The reading at Y is unfortunately not certain, Chakravarty reading -yutāye and Sircar -yutānam, (Ep. Ind., XXXII, 1, 1957, [pub.] 1959, No. 1, p. 16, n. 5)Google Scholar.

72 Hultzsch, 124.

73 Hultzsch, 134.

74 Alsdorf, 253.