Indian Antiquary Vol 11

SR No.: 032503
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Jas Burgess
Publisher: Swati Publications
Publication Year: 1984
Total Pages: 396
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 19 MB

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178
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
(JULY, 1882.
words of foreign origin. The Shan (and also Khyen, Sgo, and Pg5 Karen) have not admitted cerebrals into their alphabets.
Dentals and labials of a peculiar nature occur in Talaing, Khyen, and Karen; Talaing has invented two letters for labials in addition to the Indian varga; Khyen also requires an extra sign in the labial row.
Sibilants, though numerous in the languages of Further India, have graphically but one re- presentative; it is pronounced in Talaing and Burmese very much like English th in those but in Shan like s aspirated, and in the latter undistinguished in form or sound from the aspirated surd consonant placed in the palatal varga. It has already been intimated that the sounds, arranged as palatals in written language, are in their nature sibilants.
Writing in Talaing, Burmese, and Shan is not the handmaid of speech; orthoepy is but dimly reflected in orthography; "a stranger may acquire the spoken tongue by training of the mouth and ear, or the written by help of grammar and dictionary, and in either case the other tongue will be nearly as strange to him as if it belonged to an unknown race."
Nor do the methods of spelling in these three languages deserve, on historical grounds, the same consideration at the hand of philologists, as antiquated modes of spelling in other languages; in the former the tie between writing and utterance must at all times have been exceedingly loose and indefinite; ancient Talaing and Burmese inscriptions furnish important data for palæography, but philology is unable, from ancient or modern written docu. ments, to unveil important phases of the life and growth of Indo-Chinese languages.
Researches, based upon the evidence of written idioms, into their nature and genetic connection, must prove abortive. A thorough investigation of the physiology of sounds and of their relation to one another, as exhibited in the spoken languages, must precede all other linguistic inquiries.
3. Before we enter upon the exposition of the Indo-Chinese phonetic system, it is incumbent to ascertain, what in these idioms is due to ethnic capacities and what are transmitted habits, arising from the contact with other languages.
Buddhism became established in China at the beginning of the Christian era; it rose by
imperial favour to a high legitimate status; devoted Chinese priests studied, translated, and imitated Buddhistic legendary and controversial literature ; and the Chinese people divided their homage between Con-fu-tze, Lao-tze, and Buddha. In China the Mahâyâna school prevailed : its vehicle was Sanskrit.
In Further India the sacred language of Buddhism is Pali; this idiom began its influence upon Talaing about 2,000 years ago; upon Burmese 900; and upon Shan probably not more than 300 years ago. The Sanskritic tantra School of Northern India left also some traces on the alphabet, literature, and language of the Burmans. The differences subsisting between PAli and Sanskrit are not sufficiently important to produce dissimilar effects in the phonetic habitus or morphological structure of those monosyllabic languages, which they have influenced in common. The latter, however, differ greatly as to the conditions under which they granted citizenship to the long-membered sojourners from India.
The Chinese possessed considerable and varied learning before the advent of Buddhism and the diffusion of its literature in their dominions. Many technical vocables were transferred from Sanskrit, yet Chinese commentators were not at a loss to bring their meaning home to their readers in terms of their own tongue. A written literary language, the regulated medium of the thoughts of the wise, and uninfluenced by Aryan diction, was understood in all corners of China, irrespective of differences in their common dialects.
In Further India, Hindu coloniste imparted the first impulse of culture and development to the life and languages of the natives; they had not yet gathered up and set in order their own legendary lore and poetry; their vulgar tongues had never been the medium for themes of imagination or philosophy. The constant presence and pressure of a learned, highly organised, but uncongenial language upon the undeveloped indigenous idioms, rather retarded and crippled their internal growth, too slow to keep space with the demands made upon its own resources, by the altered material condi. tions, ways of life, and new institutions, social and private. They had recourse to external growth; the technical vocabularies of crafts, arts, and sciences of Hindu origin are decidedly