Sanskrit Prakrit Jain Vyakaran aur Kosh ki Parampara

Author(s): Chandanmalmuni, Nathmalmuni, Others
Publisher: Kalugani Janma Shatabdi Samaroha Samiti Chapar

Page 526

३४ : संस्कृत-प्राकृत व्याकरण और कोश की परम्परा
includes the Buddhist literature in the gatha dialects and in the hybrid Sanskrit, the Apabhramsa and the Avahattha In a nutshell, it covers all the languages and dialects which lie between the Vedic and classical Sanskrit (OIA) and the New Indo-Aryan (=NIA) languages So linguistically the term Middle Indo-Aryan is wider and appropriate
The etymological meaning of the word Präkṛta is 'natural', 'common' ('Prakrtā svabhāvena siddham) as opposed so 'artificial' which stands for Samskṛta The Prakrit dialects in India have a parallel with the Vulgar Latin in Italy This parallelism is described by Max Muller in the following lines
"Dante ascribed the first attempts at using the vulgar tongue in Italy for literary compositions to the silent influence of ladies who did not understand the Latin language Now this vulgar Italian, before it became the literary language of Italy, held very much the same position there as the so-called Prakrit dialects in India, and these Prakrit dialects first assumed a literary position in the Sanskrit plays where female characters, both high and low, are introduced as speaking Prakrit, instead of the Sanskrit employed by kings, noble men, and priests Here, then, we have the language of women, or, if not of women exclusively, at all, events of women and domestic servants, gradually entering into the literary idiom, and in later times even supplanting it altogether, for it is from the Prakrit, and not from the literary Sanskrit, that the modern vernaculars of India, branched off in course of time Nor is the simultaneous existence of two such representatives of one and the same language as Sanskrit and Prakrit confined to India On the contrary, it has been remarked that several languages divide themselves from the first into two great branches one showing a more manly, the other a more feminine character; one richer in consonants, the other richer in vowels, one more tenacious of the original grammatical terminations, the other more inclined to slur over these terminations, and to simplify grammar by the use of cricumlocutions. Thus we have Greek in its two dialects the Aeolic and the Ionic, with their sub-divisions, the Doric and Attic, In German we find the