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Līlātilaka: A Sanskrit Tract on Malayalam Grammar and Poetics

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 December 2009

John Brough
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Extract

The recently discovered Līlātilaka, containing as it does the oldest known observations upon the grammar of the Malayalam language, has naturally won for itself a position of importance; and although there has perhaps been a tendency to exaggerate its merits, the evidence which it offers will certainly be of interest and value to students of the history of the Dravidian languages. Nevertheless, although it has quickly achieved fame in its own country, it has remained all but unknown in the west. So far as I can ascertain, only a solitary copy of the edition of the Sanskrit sutras with Malayalam translation of the original Sanskrit commentary, by A. Krsna Pisarati (Trivandrum, 1092 = A.D. 1916) has reached this country; and even this did not reach the British Museum until 1938. The chief aim of the present paper, therefore, is to render accessible the text of the sutras.

Type
Articles
Information
Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , Volume 12 , Issue 1 , February 1947 , pp. 148 - 162
Copyright
Copyright © School of Oriental and African Studies 1947

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References

page 148 note 1 Probably best taken as a samāhāra–dvandva compound, (a string of) jewels and corals." The Lilātilaka commentary understands the jewels" to be the Malayalam element, the corals the Sanskrit, chiefly because in the definition bhāsāsamskrtayōgō manipravālam, the words bhāsā and mani correspond at the beginnings of the compounds. This is of course not conclusive, since in any case Sanskrit would require the shorter word to come first in a compound of this type.

page 148 note 2 A more serious use may be seen in Latin and English carols: in dulci iubilo now sing we all, io! he, my love my wonder, lieth in presepio,

page 149 note 1 With the punning alternative vatur atijalō, a Brahman, but very dull–witted."

page 150 note 1 A pun between, the two languages is probably intended. For the alternative version, we must understand a participle based on the Sanskrit nītā–nunna, dispelled by the girl who has been brought."

page 150 note 2 Kēralapnināyam, 2nd edition, p. 61.

page 151 note 1 Introduction to translation of the commentary, pp. iii ff.

page 151 note 2 Or. 9595

page 151 note 3 Skt. 3874 = Keith, 7915.

page 152 note 1 Cf. Bloch, Ind. Ant, 48, p. 191 ff.

page 157 note 1 Cf. Karnātaka–bhāsā–bhūsana, 121, nō nasya nēna (e.g. kari–nir > kan–nir).

page 157 note 2 Cf. 120, vargē tadvargātyab (anusvāra becomes class–nasal).