Early Example of Late Middle Indo Aryan Post Position

SR No.: 269115
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Paul Dundas
Publisher: ZZ_Anusandhan
Total Pages: 5
Language: English
Classification: Article & 0_not_categorized
File Size: 90 KB

Page 1

AN EARLY EXAMPLE OF A LATE MIDDLE INDO-ARYAN POSTPOSITION ?
PAUL DUNDAS*
With the death of Professor H.C. Bhayani, Ahmedabad will never be the same again for those foreign visitors who, like me, have in the past sought advice on Prākrit, Apabhramśa, the early forms of the new Indo-Aryan languages and everything connected with Gujarat and Gujarati. At all times an unfailing source of information, good humour and intellectual energy, he is simply irreplaceable.
As I produce this on computer screen, I have beside me some of Bhayani's clear and distinctive work notes, looking at which conjures up his benign presence once again. These notes were written one afternoon in the basement of the Lalbhai Dalpatbhai Institute of Indology as a result of my having the previous day given Professor Bhayani the offprints of some articles of mine. He had not put these aside to be read at some later date, as so many of us do with offprints, but had engaged with them immediately. It transpired that an etymology I had suggested, while worthy, was nonetheless flawed, and he was determined to talk through the derivation and investigate alternative possibilities with me.(1) This, and other occasions like it, represented a tutorial freely offered by a master scholar and it was impossible not to benefit. In writing the following short note relating to an area in which Bhayani's expertise was unrivalled, I am acutely conscious of not having been able to seek his advice about the topic beforehand. But I console myself with imagining him in that heaven where all the great philologists abide, smiling faced and with pen poised, ready to produce a stream of examples and interpretations.