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254
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY,
[SEPTEMBER, 1906.
"A Greek source may be dismissed without serious examination, as it is busot by difficulties, both chronological and phonological, of most formidable nature. Benfey's conjecture that it came direct from the Phænicians is open to fatal objections. The trade of the Phoenicians with India, which commenced in the time of Solomon, ceased as carly as the year 800 B.C. If the alphabet had been coinmanicated at this early period, a variety of Indian Scripts would in all probability have sprung up during the long interval which elapsed before the time of Asoka, whereas, in the third century B. ., & uniform alphabet prevailed over a vast Indian area. A farther difficulty, which seems conclusive, is the want of any appreciable resemblance between the Asoka Characters and the early Phænician types.
"General Cunningham argues that if the Indians did not borrow their alphabet from the Egyptinns, it must have been the local invention of the people themselves, for the simple reason that there was no other people from whom they could have obtained it. Their nearest neighbours were the peoples of Ariana and Persia, of whom the former used a Semitic Character, reading from right to left, and the latter a Cuneiform Character formed of separate detached strokes, which has nothing whatever in common with the compact forms of the Indian Alphabet, Mr. Thomas rejects & Semitic origin for the Asoka Alphabet - (1) because of the different direction of the writing; (2) because of the insuficient resemblance of the forms of the letters; (S) because the Indo-Bactrian, which is of Semitic origin, is inferior to the Asoka for the expression of the sounds of Indian languages. Prof. Dowson, in like manner, boldly challenges those who claim a foreigu origin for the Indian Alphabet 'to show whence it came.'"
Bat in his own view of the matter, Issac Taylor goes as far as any of his colleagues declaring a foreign origin for the Indian Alphabet. He suggests some unknown Sonth Semitic Alphabet as the probable source. He says that, in comparing the Indian and Sabeaa forms, it must be borne in mind that no South Semitic inscriptions have as yet been discovered of a date sufficiently remote to supply the absolute prototypes of the Asoka letters. It must therefore be remembered that it is only possible to compare sister-alphabets derived from a common but unknown source. The actual ancestral type of the Asoke Alphabet is unknown, but there is no reason why it should not be ultimately discovered in the unexplored regions of Oman, or Hadramaut, or ataong the ruins of Ormus, &c.)
While thus Issac Taylor bocame content with only pointing out the probable source of the . Indian Alphabet and did not go so far as to make this or that alphabet the parent of the Indian, Prof. Bühler took the field and marshalled powerful arguments to identify all the twenty-two Somitic letters in the Brabma Alphabet and to explain the formation of the numerous derivative signs which, in his opinion, the Indians were compelled to add. It is merely an appearance of resemblance on which he has based his theories. As to actual resemblance between the North Semitic and the oldest Indian Alphabet, there is none. He thinks that the forms of the alphabet were intentionally modified by the Brâhmang. He attributes these modifications to their pedantie formalism, a desire to have signs well suited for the formation of regular lines, and a strong aversion against all top-heavy characters. He says further on : "The natural result was that a number of the Semitic signs had to be turned topsy-turvy or to be laid on their sides, while the triangle or double angles occurring at the top of others Liad to be got rid of by some contrivance or other. A further change in the position of the signs had to be made when the Hindus began to write from the left to the right, as in Greek. Instances where the oldest position had been preserved are, however, met with both in borrowed and derivative signs."
But the question is whether the desire to have letters well suited for the formation of a regular line precedes or succeeds the introduction of an alphabet. As the hypothesis presupposes
2 Isaac Taylor, The Alphabet, Vol. II, p. 312.
Bühler, The Origin of the Brahms Alphabet, p. 58.
