Talk:Sanskrit/Archive 5

This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

←

Archive 3

→

The name "Sanskrit"

Hazra, Kanai Lal. Pāli Language and Literature; a systematic survey and historical study. D.K. Printworld Ltd., New Delhi, 1994, page 13 has that Sanskrit "properly got its name after the "refinement" effected by Panini." He holds that Vedic Sanskrit was called (in Pali) "chandaso," "of the hymns." Does anyone have a conflicting source on the origins of the term "Sanskrit"? Mitsube (talk) 02:53, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

This is the generally accepted point of view.Taprobanus (talk) 03:11, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

"chandasi" is actually the locative, literally "in the hymns (chandas)" - it isn't the "name" of any languge, it's Panini's terms for what he considered archaic, unproductive forms. We've been groping about this for weeks now. It is very simple, and the article has been aware of it all the time. The native term for "language" is simply "vaak". "Sanskrit" is the refined register of that language. The term for the historical language in general, including all hypothetical dialects, would be Old Indic. The term "Vedic Sanskrit" can be compared to the term Homeric Greek, the term Classical Sanskrit to "Epic Greek". Homeric or Epic Greek aren't spoken dialects, they are the refined, educated register of speech, showing the influence of many different vernaculars, as employed by professionals as the result of a long education. It is pointless to ask "how many people are native speakers of Epic Greek". There aren't any traces of actual vernacular Old Indic dialects, but that's just a circumstance of attestation, a consequence of the late arrival of writing to India. If the Indians had begun using an alphabet in 700 BC like the Greeks, we would have many vernacular Old Indic inscriptions. We don't, but that doesn't mean Old Indic vernaculars didn't exist. --dab (𒁳) 10:04, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

The term is likely pre-Panini; it seems unlikely that if it were merely a technical term invented by him it would have made its way into the Pali canon. The Aryans were aware of other languages, are you sure that "language" only refers to Old Indic? Mitsube (talk) 00:30, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

Dbachmann is correct in that Chandasi/Chandasa/Chandaso was a dialect, literally "of the metrical hymns i.e the vedic hymns". In India, it is still called "veda vaak" or "vedic speech". Vaak is not language, but speech. Sanskrit/Vedic/Prakrits were all "spoken" dialects known by their own descriptive names. Vedic itself was a vernacular. Classical sanskrit was not just Panini's sanskrit, it includes all post vedic sanskrit whether or not conforming to Panini's grammar. Comparison with Homeric or Attic Greek may not hold, such a comparison is merely a misconception. Vedic and Sanskrit were both Old-Indic vernaculars, simply because all languages before Panini's time were only spoken languages. The reason why Panini himself composed his grammar in sutra(aphorism) form is to keep brevity above all other considerations and aid memorization and oral transfer of its content, as writing had not yet been introduced in India in his time. Kris (talk) 16:42, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Indian Religions ?

Indian Religions includes Sikhism, Ayyavazhi and Jainism and the core texts of these languages are NOT in Sanskrit. A liturgical language, is a language that is cultivated for religious reasons by people who speak another language in their daily life. Sikhism, Ayyavazhi and Jainism do NOT use Sanskrit for religious reasons as in the case of Shlokas, Mantras for Hinduism. Their texts having Sanskrit words does not mean it is in Sanskrit. Even William Shakespeare used Latin phrases in his plays, it does NOT mean that Shakespeare wrote in Latin. STOP enlarging labels to make them look bigger. First, it was POV nuisance with Indian Subcontinent and now it is enlarging the label for religions. Sheer POV nonsense. Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 19:25, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Isn't this patently obvious? Labels are being enlarged to make everything sound bigger? First, it was South Asia vs Indian Subcontinent, next it was Indian Subcontinent vs India, now it is Indian Religions. Why not just say Eastern Hemisphere and religions, instead of being even remotely close to what one would term being specific? Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 19:29, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

The only thing that is obvious is someone is now desperate. Kris (talk) 07:49, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

Of course, someone is desperate, that happens to be you. You started off with South Asia then toned it down to the Indian Subcontinent. This time, why don't you start off with the generic term religion, I mean, you can, by your impossible reasoning, somehow demonstrate that at some point of time the only religion in the world was Hinduism and so by historic geography, Sanskrit was the liturgical language of ALL religions!! Try that for a change. Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 09:58, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

South Asia and Indian Subcontinent are two terms for the same region, and I dont expect someone to understand that using one or the other doesnt mean one has toned down, whatever that means! I dont need to tone down fearing a POV pusher, and the Info-box link which mentions "India" still points to the Indian subcontinent. Now go wild as POV pushers are wont! Kris (talk) 15:42, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

South Asia and Indian Subcontinent seem to include and exclude several entities. If your best bet at enlarging labels was to point the text India to the Indian Subcontinent, and writing that in the edit summary as a copy-edit, then I have to mention that it is a very cheap trick. Infobox updated. Why is it so patently not obvious to someone that enlarging labels is actually the PoV part, not writing facts. Why don't you work for 'Voice of India', seriously, they need hyper-enthusiastic Sanskrit chauvinists like you to write that Australia was once a Vedic Homeland!! The infobox says where it is spoken and the answer is India, period. We cannot include the Americas because there is a spoken Sanskrit class organized by RSS there!! Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 03:52, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Dbachmann is also then your Voice of India worker, look he enlarged it first. Have fun reverting. Kris (talk) 11:33, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

region

Why is Japan, Korea & China not included because after all they were influenced by Buddhist religion ? For example Aum Shinrikyo even has a Sanskrit name. If Mauritious can be included why not Guyana, Surinam, Trinidad and Fiji are not included beacuse people there also chant Sanskrit verses in their rituals ? Taprobanus (talk) 17:20, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

It is not SPOKEN in Greater India, because otherwise we could include any country with 20 Hindu temples to be speaking Sanskrit. It is SPOKEN only by 49,000 speakers in India. It is like this, Latin is NOT spoken by every country with a Catholic church or a huge Catholic presence, it relates only to Vatican City. Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 23:50, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your "points of view". Kris (talk) 23:57, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

It is fairly straightforward, but hey "welcome back". Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 00:35, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

It is not a "point of view" Kris. It is a definition of "Spoken" as opposed to "revered" or "liturgical". Gizza^Discuss ^© 08:11, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

I understand that. The difference is between "was spoken" and "is spoken". Maybe the infobox should also specify the periods when it was spoken between Gandhara and Indonesia Kris (talk) 10:20, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

Changed to Ancient India, which should be acceptable to everyone concerned. Kris (talk) 11:13, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

Ancient India isn't even an article, it's a disambiguation page for various historical periods. Look, this isn't a big deal. Greater India or India (the region, not the Republic!) will do. "Greater India" doesn't have a precise definition, it's "whererver Sanskrit has had some influence". Of course, Sanskrit isn't "spoken" anywhere in the sense of a native language, but it is still fair to indicate the region of its main influence. --dab (𒁳) 13:22, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

This is seriously disruptive behavior on Kris's part. In spite of repeated consensus on the usage of India by Dbachmann, Gizza, Mitsube and several other editors, he is repeatedly pushing the same enlarging labels nonsense. He has jumped from South Asia to Indian Subcontinent to Ancient India and to almost anything that makes it bigger. This is all sheer POV nonsense by Kris, every single change made in this article for the past few weeks has been POV and even other editors seem to acknowledge it. This persistent vandalism has to stop. Leave the damn thing alone, at least till the 49,376 speakers die out or switch to using Chinese!! Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 21:06, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

Let me repost the point regarding Greater India. It is not SPOKEN in Greater India, because otherwise we could include any country with 20 Hindu temples to be speaking Sanskrit. It is SPOKEN only by 49,000 speakers in India. It is like this, Latin is NOT spoken by every country with a Catholic church or a huge Catholic presence, it relates only to Vatican City. Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 21:08, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

this is a silly argument, but I'm not going to waste time over the trivial task on spelling it out. Turning your argument on its feet, India has an area of 3,287,240 km². In how many of these km², do you think, are you going to find anyone engaged in chatting away in Sanskrit at any time? Why, you think this is a silly argument? Well, it's the same one you've just been trying to sell us. It's simple. India is not a region (it's the article on the 1947 Republic). If we have no consensus, we'll just have to leave the slot blank for now. --dab (𒁳) 16:29, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

To be concise, it is not spoken anywhere outside India, it used outside of India as a ceremonial language, but is spoke only in the country of India, if there is a census results for Nepal you will see it, it not 'spoken' even there. I would be even more specific, South India. Wikidās ॐ 18:02, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

The debate is not whether India is a region or not, but the countries where it is spoken and as per an official government census, it is spoken by 49,736 speakers as per the 1991 Linguistic census of India and that is a statistic. It is outright silly go back to any census figures from the 5th century AD and include the Eastern Hemisphere. The official government figures are good enough to put it up as an established and cited fact. ALL the population data for even other Indian languages come from that census. I am putting India back in there. There is consensus, it almost looks like it is being intentionally avoided. Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 19:34, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

nonsense. --dab (𒁳) 21:00, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Wikidas, Mitsube, Gizza and I seem to agree exactly on what constitutes a statistic, a 'point of view', an enlargement of the label and a fact. It is spoken by 49000 odd speakers in India, as a cited fact, period!! Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 19:37, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

the "fact" is that 49,000 people thought it would be funny to tick "Sanskrit" in the 1991 census. It's not like anyone checked. You may or may not be interested in the fact that 390,000 Brits adhere to the Jedi religion. --dab (𒁳) 21:04, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

good, we are getting somewhere. So we have the claim that "it is not spoken anywhere outside India". Do we have any reference to back up this claim? I would be satisfied with a credible reference to the effect that "Sanskrit is not spoken anywhere in Pakistan, Nepal or Bangladesh". --dab (𒁳) 21:00, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

We cannot go on a rampage against 49,000 people who 'ticked' Sanskrit in their census questionnaire. If that is what they ticked, that is what we get. If 390,000 Brits adhere to Jedi religion, then they ARE Jedi-ites, or whatever, and it has to be cited. Census figures do not need to convince anyone, it is a statistic. Even I cannot believe that there are just 33 Million people in the whole of the world's second largest country, Canada, where I live, but that's the way it works.

Also, I don't think we can find a statistic or a credible reference that proves a claim contrary to the fact that it is meant to record. Statistics or credible references like the census can only tell us where something is spoken, not where it is NOT spoken. So, we have a statistic for where it is spoken. There cannot be ANY reference which states that Sanskrit is NOT spoken in Pakistan, Nepal or Bangladesh. Regarding the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and a country with Islam as it's state religion, namely Bangladesh, it is more than obvious. The burden of proof would be on those who seek to establish that Sanskrit is spoken in Siberia not on those who state the patent reality.

Regarding this whole business of South Asia, Indian Subcontinent or whatever, this has to be understood: Exceptional claims require exceptional sources. Even Pāṇini was born in Kandahar, however, we cannot say that Sanskrit is spoken in Afghanistan, unless we have an exceptional source. Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 21:52, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

indeed. Compare "eastern Mediterranean" at Ancient Greek. Greater India is really the best we can do here, greater accuracy is neither possible nor desireable. --dab (𒁳) 07:56, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

There are 49,000 speakers, if they all die, we will consider including even the Eastern Hemisphere. India is the best proven fact here, all the rest is a hypothesis. Find some evidence to back your claim that it spoken anywhere outside India, then we can include that. If you want that in, the burden of proof is, obviously, on you. To enlarge this label and include 17 sovereign nations that have literally NOTHING to do with Sanskrit is merely pushing either POV or just a wholesome waste of time!! Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 08:52, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

the 2001 census records 14,000 native speakers. Your behaviour is just disruptive at this point. May I ask you to consider the very first line at the India article? For other uses, see India (disambiguation). By linking to India, you refer to the Republic of India. India (disambiguation) tells you that "India" may also refer to a region, known as (culturally) Greater India or (geologically) Indian subcontinent. --dab (𒁳) 09:39, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

His behaviour was disruptive right from the beginning, just that I tried to prevent it earlier and got labeled by you as his opponent. Now enjoy his company. Kris (talk) 16:48, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Kris, just because Sudharsansn has a problem doesn't mean you're doing great. Conversation on this talkpage has really been very tedious recently. --dab (𒁳) 08:00, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

You missed the wood for the trees, that's all I pointed out. Ultimately I got blocked for trying to protect referenced content from being removed. I have no wish to come between your edit wars. Have fun. Kris (talk) 11:09, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

This is for the Sociolinguistics professor - look who first linked like this to the Indian Subcontinent. Kris (talk) 16:52, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

your point being? I stand by this edit. "Greater India" is fine too. There is room for discussion, but the discussion needs to be informed and conducted in good faith. Instead, it has been uninformed and immature. --dab (𒁳) 08:00, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

The professional linguist said something in your talkpage, remember? Atleast I'm trying to contribute content with the good intent of improving the article (like I did to pronouns section, compounds section etc) much of which were repeatedly reverted in bad faith by you-know-who. Sudharsansn, the sociolinguistics professor, hasnt made a single meaningful contribution to any of the sanskrit-related language articles. Need I then go into the question of who is disruptive and who's not? Kris (talk) 11:09, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

Read WP:SOAP Taprobanus (talk) 15:33, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Tell that to Dbachmann please, he wanted me to indicate "the point" Kris (talk) 16:15, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Srkris, stop acting like you are drunk and berserk. Being a ruthless POV monger does not give you the right to talk about my profession or my field of study again and again. This is your last civility warning, before it is reported and you get blocked once and for all. An Sanskrit-Aryanist clown like you, technically speaking, has no place in any society, leave alone Wikipedia editing.

Greater India or India is a constructive consensus seeking measure going on between Dbachman, other editors and myself. Just because one enlarged label replaces another does not necessarily have to mean that you have to be ecstatic about your POV being in the article.

Indian Subcontinent or Greater India is only an enlarged label. In a place that seeks to establish consensus and not the truth, it does not take an academic or a scholar, only a bunch of POV pushers working in collaboration, like yourself. The Sociolinguistic professor, that I am, is interested in correcting connotations and implications of some very simple labels. I am not a chartered accountant, out here on a linguistics POV spree writing about things without the faintest understanding of what they mean, again, like yourself. It is fairly obvious, when one looks at your contribs, how it has basically been a spree of POV edits pushing the Voice of India agenda and nothing worthwhile.

So shut up and get back to the article without poking your nose into what I am doing, again and again. Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 22:24, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Dbachmann: >>the 2001 census records 14,000 native speakers. Your behaviour is just disruptive at this point.

Every editor, apart from yourself and Srkris, are, on the basis of consensus, fine ONLY with India, meaning the Republic of India. It is SPOKEN ONLY in the Republic of India although it may have influenced several cultures in the past. Without data proving that it is spoken outside India, your continued edits would have to be considered just as disruptive as Srkris. CITE and WRITE. Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 22:28, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

User:Sudharsansn has been reported for his disgusting personal attacks. Kris (talk) 08:59, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

It is not even spoken today across the whole of India, but mainly in pockets of South India. That doesn't mean we should specify the region as South India or narrow it down further into the Shimoga district of Karnataka or further down into the village of Mattur, which is where the language is spoken by a majority. The point is, it is not widely regarded as a spoken language for the last 1000 years at least. In its heydays it was spoken all across South-Asia and South-East Asia, not to mention parts of China where the sanskritist Mahayana tradition of Buddhism thrived, and that is the historical extent of its spread. Buddhism as a whole has more works written in Sanskrit than in Pali, which were popular in the Northwestern regions of India and Southwestern parts of China (i.e Tibet) see http://www.uwest.edu/sanskritcanon/romanized_text.html , I am saying all this to merely point at the historical spread of spoken and written Sanskrit across Greater India Kris (talk) 09:20, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

I am amazed how much time can be wasted over a non-issue, even for Wikipedia standards. I am not sure the map of Greater India is contributing anything useful to this article. --dab (𒁳) 17:20, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Does the addition of the yajna picture to the nambudiri article make it more useful? Kris (talk) 23:32, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Does his actions in another article fall within the scope of this? Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 02:11, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

To let a troll like you repeatedly talk about my profession, 1, 2 and 3 which again was inferred from my mention of that in another talk page, and let you bash me is what is actually disgusting. It is nearly pointless to have a system, like Wikipedia, to work on the consensus gained by POV mongers, including having a Wikiquette page in which editors like you, with absolutely no regard for anything in WP, report this here. You just wanted to get me blocked because you were blocked a few days earlier, for edit-warring. This is just nonsense. Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 02:11, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

I agree it has become clear that Skris is a troll. It is time to remember WP:DENY. --dab (𒁳) 11:35, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Finally, there seems to be consensus on that for sure. It is time for other editors to follow WP:DENY and | for Srkris to know this. Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 23:22, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

About being specific, the English article also specifies only countries, not regions like Western Europe, Americas or anything. It states the countries where it is spoken and lists the data. Similarly, Sanskrit is spoken in India and the census data is listed. Whether you like it or disagree it with it not a wikipedia issue, you can start coaching classes and improve the number of Sanskrit speakers to make it cite-able. Sudharsansn (talk · contribs) 02:21, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

lead

please stop the petty edit-warring over the lead. We have huge tasks to address in terms of content, and this silliness needlessly ties resources. How about you try to shine by actually improving our coverage of Sanskrit grammar or literature? Too hard?

Sanskrit is an extremely notable topic, with a history literally spanning millennia. The "classical language of India" fad is an issue of petty communal politics in the modern-day RoI, dating to 2004. There is no way this is WP:LEAD-worthy, please don't try to push it back. --dab (𒁳) 09:14, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Look, it's not a "fad", but rather total ignorance on your part. It is a Classical language and oficially designated as such. Besides, do not mistake it to be just an "honorariam" from one particular country, but factually it is a classical language from what we know as 'ancient India'.

So, I use the official designation to quash the debate about it's classical language status, and I also deliberately mention that it is an Indian classical language because it is from "ancient India" - a known historical region.

And I really want to know how you arrived at the conclusion that it's "communal politics, dating to 2004" !

As far as the Hindu-non Hindu ness of the earliest Sanskrit texts are concerned, it is a ludicrous debate that was whipped up by ultra right-wing liberals and secularists a few years ago. They argued, that the word "hindu" does not even exist any of the Vedas, Upanisads, Puranas and epics. When told about the origin of the word, this point was foregone but they continue to argue that Hinduism as it is known today, never did exist at the time period of Indo-Aryan invasion (when the RV was compiled). At no point in the middle-ages were the Vedas taken off the shelves, dusted off, and pronounced "Hindu texts". The recitation of their Sanskrit shloks or mantras in the typical manner of a purohit presiding over it is unchanged to this day. No matter that temples or Puranic dieties (like Laxmi) were not conjured up in the Vedas. But their primary use i.e. as a 'manual' or as a set of 'incantations' or 'charms' that were to be recited aloud by a priest(s) while conducting rituals (usually fire ones) has NEVER been undermined to this day. There even never was any "revival" movement of sorts to declare them "Hindu" or as such . IAF (talk) 05:25, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

The religion when the earliest texts were composed had a different pantheon and revolved around sacrifice, often bloody, with no concept of reincarnation. So calling these texts "Hindu" is misleading. Mitsube (talk) 07:50, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

The sacrifices have been done away with now for the most part. The vedas are still recited in basically much the same manner now, as they were then with a priest who overlooked and supervised, besides chanting from the vedas. Even during Upanisadic times, there were no temple-dieties, no Diwali (or other modern Hindu festivals). Even the most Puranic gods & goddesses that are at the forefront of worship today, did not exist during the period of the primary Upanisads, and yet the Upanisads are regarded central to Hindu philosophy.

We're talking evolutionary development and not similarities/dissimilarities. IAF (talk) 09:07, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

It is misleading to call them Hindu. If you don't want to call it Vedic religion or Brahmanical religion either that's fine too. Also the government of India is not a reliable source on what is a classical language and what is not. Mitsube (talk) 21:58, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

Note that it's correct --- or more accurately, technical --- term is Vedic religion. It is "Hindu" that is the imposed misnomer.

Dude, get this straight : Rig-Vedic dieties like Indra, Agni, Varuna are quite important in the latter books that you don't have a problem in calling Hindu, namely the Epics and Puranas. It's just that under "classical" Hinduism, these dieties got a raw deal and were deemed secondary to Puranic gods; but they were -- and still are --- worshipped nonetheless. You've attached the characterization of Hindu & non-Hindu to settled civilizations and nomads. It's true the Vedic people were nomads and the Upanisadic period onwards people had pretty much settled down across north India. Still that doesn't matter. What does, is the content of their compositions and their following.

And if the Govt. of India is unreliable, then we all pray for Wikipedia's accuracy under the aegis and purview of the highly reliable internet lurker Shri. Mitsube. IAF (talk) 15:08, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

New information about origin of Sanskrit

I would like to present an excerpt of “Emergence of Hinduism from Christianity” (ISBN 1438227310) of M. M. Ninan, pages 45-48. It situates the origin of Sanskrit at a much later date than usually accepted. Only the relevant information with regard to Sanskrit is inserted below.

The word “Sanskrit” (Samskritam) means “that which have been refined” – a language refined from existing languages. That is what the name itself says and evidently it was developed out of common languages by refining them. The main language of North India during the (…) 1st century AD (…) was Pali and Prakrit - the languages used by Buddhism and Jainism. Dravidian language of Tamil already existed in the south. Evidently, Sanskrit language was made by refining all these common languages.

One of the early exhaustive collections of languages can be found in the Buddhist edicts of Emperor Asoka. (268 -233 BC). His aim was to declare the gospel of Buddha to all his subjects and therefore, he presented this gospel in all languages spoken in the empire. It included Greek and even Aramaic (because there was a small group of Jews in the country). However, there was no Sanskrit in the group, indicating that the language Sanskrit did not exist at that time. We know that Buddhism and Jainism used only Pali and Prakrit languages.

In fact, the earliest Sanskrit document ever found dates AD 150. It is evident therefore that Sanskrit came into existence during the period of AD 100 – 150 by refining the existing languages.

It will be interesting to look at the time line of various scriptures. Please note that we are talking about written scriptures. Any one can claim a long period of non-written oral transmission of scriptures for which we have no method of verification. It is only common knowledge that it is the documentation and writing “in black and white", that lead to growth of ideas and literature. We cannot expect scientific thinking or logical thinking and building on ideas of the past without the solid communication medium of writing. Hence, the time line of Scriptures will be revealing.

Notice that the earliest form of written scripture was the Hebrew Torah (14th century BC). Even Egyptian writing did not permit documentation to develop literature, because they were essentially pictograms. Only the phonetic system permitted elaborate conceptual literature. While Zoroastrian Zend Avesta was written in the Sixth Century BC and Buddhist and Jain literature by Fifth Century BC, Aryan Vedas came to be written down only in the Second Century BC. The rest of the Indian Scriptures – the Puranas and the Upanishads and Brahmanas came into existence only after Sanskrit became the language of Gods – the liturgical language and the language of theological studies (much later than the second century AD).

Source: http://www.acns.com/~mm9n/articles/PDF/Emergence%20of%20Hinduism.pdf

--Afopow (talk) 12:08, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Please don't post random nonsense pulled from personal homepages (or self-published fringecruft). See WP:RS and WP:FRINGE. It is true that Classical Sanskrit literature flourished in the AD period, and that Puranic Hinduism originates in the Middle Ages. Sanskrit itself still originates in the BCE period, and had already been perfectly "refined" by 300 BCE. --dab (𒁳) 12:12, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Not a reliable source per WP:V#SELF: the publisher, CreateSpace, advertises "on demand self-publishing" on its homepage. Also WP:FRINGE. Grover cleveland (talk) 17:41, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

I agree with dab and GC, that book is a complete garbage maintaining fringy theories that no sane scholar would support today. As for the relationship of the Christianity and Vedic-influenced Indic religions, suffice is to say that the founder of an atheistic religion came to be celebrated a Christian saint. Sapienti sat. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 19:19, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Reference added to the Phonology And Sandhi section

Salutations,

I am a little unexperienced with Wikipedia. I just added a reference I found on the Internet to a fact here that was needing citations, located at Sanskrit#Phonology_and_Sandhi. the fact was:

The retroflex consonants are somewhat marginal phonemes, often being conditioned by their phonetic environment; they do not continue a PIE series and are often ascribed by some linguists to the substratal influence of Dravidian [...]

and I added a reference to this article I found, because of the following information found in the article:

M. B. Emeneau, in his justly renowned article on "India as a Linguistic Area,"(1) has remarked, following the painstaking work of earlier scholars as well as his own wide field experience, that retroflex consonants are found in most languages of India. Consonants affected include stops, the nasal, in some languages also the sibilants, laterals, tremulants and even others. The linguistic stocks embrace Indo-Aryan, Dravidian, Munda, and Burushaski. So:ra: is stated to lack them, and therefore, according to Burrow, the retroflexes would not be Proto-Munda. Earliest Sanskrit shows them, yet they are certainly not originally Indo-European. However, they are certainly Proto-Dravidian, it is claimed, and "not the result of conditioning circumstances"; south Dravidian is characterized by three distinct points of articulation: dental, alveolar, and retroflex. Therefore, we can safely impute retroflexes to Dravidian.

I'm leaving this here so that a more experienced user can review it and check if there is something wrong.

Thank you in advance. ----Sanscrit1234 (talk) 13:17, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

Regarding the "Writing system" section in infobox

I kept on correcting the grammar of the section to this word:

Devanāgarī (de facto), various Brāhmī-based scripts, and Latin alphabet

and it has been repeatedly reverted to this:

Devanāgarī and other Brāhmī-based scripts, Latin alphabet

Please, if you want to revert my edits because it's inaccurate in any way, at least get your grammar right.

Yours faithfully, kotak kasut 12:25, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Uber bright colors Anyone

I dont know why such a bright green was chosen. Wont something low key equally work well? Just asking...

Vprajkumar (talk) 22:56, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Ooof. If there isn't a good reason for lime being the background for the infobox, I'd advocate a switch to something easier on the eyes as well. Perhaps a light olive or something. --Gimme danger (talk) 23:42, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Basic question

I know nothing about Sanskrit and I wanted to know whether the script is written from right to left or vice versa and whether from top to bottom or vice versa. It is quite possible I missed the answer, but if it's not there, I think it probably should be. hypotaxis (talk) 01:56, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

The information you need is in the most natural section for it: the writing system section says "when it was written, the choice of writing system was influenced by the regional scripts of the scribes. As such, virtually all of the major writing systems of South Asia have been used for the production of Sanskrit manuscripts. Since the late 19th century, Devanagari has been considered as the de facto writing system for Sanskrit" and clicking on Devanagari takes you to the article for that script, which is written from left to right. For what it's worth, left-to-right is what all other Indian scripts use as well (AFAIK). Perhaps there also exist works which have Sanskrit text written in other directions, say in Arabic or Chinese script in their respective regions, but I'm just speculating. Shreevatsa (talk) 02:27, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Ah! Thank you. But it still does seem, from the POV of complete ignorance, that it might be a good idea to have this information on this page as well as the page on Devanagari script page. But then what do I know :) hypotaxis (talk) 05:09, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Sanskrit no more classified as a Indo-Aryan language

Even though Sanskrit has been classified as a Indo-Aryan language by some historians and linguist, recent and more vigorous research in this direction has discredited the Aryan invasion theory (AIT) which also in turn makes classification of Sanskrit into a India-Aryan language redundant. The linguist theory supporting the AIT was based on similar sounding words in other languages with possible roots in Sanskrit was thus derived which again has been further discredited with the exit of Aryan invasion theory.

The basic premise being that since there was no existence of an Aryan race and no Aryan invasion ever took place into India, there cannot be a language that can be classified as a Indo-Aryan language.

It is now widely believe that Sanskrit is a language that was developed indigenously along the now extinct Saraswati river during the pre-Vedic and Vedic period. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Vijay shivramiah (talk • contribs) 18:35, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

And we're supposed to believe this because you say so? Shreevatsa (talk) 21:53, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

I never cease to be amazed at the utter twaddle people see fit to dump on this page. --dab (𒁳) 06:41, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

AIT wrong? perhaps; but a "Aryan" migration appears to have occurred. I recommend to the author of this section Asko Parpola's work. Or, if you need something less technical, try Gavin Flood's "An Introduction to Hinduism". There still exist reasons to think Sanskrit came from those who gradually moved into the IVC.richardtgreer (talk) 13:27, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I think there is some truth in above. Āryan as a name for the language is going out of fashion - not that the language has been reclassified but that Indo-Aryan is seen as politically incorrect, especially in India. The connection with the Indus civilisation has been vigorously pursued by Indian linguists, though equally hotly denied by Europeans - German professor of Sanskrit Michael Witzel is the big name on the latter side. While the invasion theory is discredited it is clear (at least to Witzel et al) that the language originated outside of India and at one time there was an Indo-Iranian language, and before that an Indo-European language. However there is also evidence of 'India only' features such as retroflexion (absent in all other IE languages). This is a developing area and general books on India and Indian languages seldom reflect the details of the arguments or the most up to date thinking. Witzel's Electronic Journal of Vedic Studies might be worth a look. http://www.ejvs.laurasianacademy.com/ mahaabaala (talk) 16:59, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

origin of name "Sanskrit"

"Sanskrit" is not the name of language. Original name of this language is "Girvaana"(गीर्वाण). This language is known not to have a script. All the text is handed down only by word of mouth.

Since this was the language of the "cultured" (सुसंस्कृत) this language became known as sanskrit (संस्कृत)

We find the language in almost all known scripts of India at written at different time periods. In later years the populous north India adopted Devanagari script and all the works are written in that script. There are a few vowels in Sanskrit that cannot be 'written' in any known language. These can only be taught by a proper teacher in person. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Aroonpk (talk • contribs) 08:04, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

gIrvANa is the epithet of a deity mentioned in Bhagavata Purana. It is a bahuvrihi translating to "he who has speech for an arrow". The "original" (Vedic period) term for "Sanskrit" was indeed just "speech" (vAk). This is as in any other culture before it develops sophisticated traditions of scholarship, people will just call their language "speech", and the incomprehensible sounds made by other peoples as not-speech. --dab (𒁳) 14:23, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

We seem to have some sectarian ideas about the origins of Sanskrit that have nothing to do with historical linguistics and everything to do with sects - there are no vowels in Sanskrit that cannot be written (though there are words in Vedic that no one understands anymore); it was never generally known as gīrvāṇa etc. The earliest name for the language of Sanskrit (as opposed to speech or vāc generally which included all forms of speech not just Vedic) would seem to be in Pāṇini: he referred to the language of the Vedas and certain other texts as chandas; he referred to the language in newer texts as bhāṣā. What we think of as Classical Sanskrit is bhāṣā. It would be interesting to include something about the history of the word saṃskrita - when was it first used for instance - it post-dates both Pāṇini and (I think) Patañjali. 81.107.45.28 (talk) 16:12, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

etymology of sanskrit w.r.t tamil

i only speak english and french but i know many ppl from south india who speak tamil and sanscrit and i do not think they are lying to me when they tell me that sanskrit is etymologically derived from tamil. or as they put it "all of the

sounds* originate in tamil". please refer to the following URL, as i think this will better explain what i am talking about:

http://www.mayyam.com/hub/viewtopic.php?p=147743

this might be a "political correctness" or "nationalist" issue for some bad acedemics but if you actually listen to the two languages or better yet what native speakers of both languages would tell you i think you can learn that the view being put forward by wikipedia that "tamil is one of 62 other proto-dravidian derived south asian language group languages" and "like all other nearby languages borrows many words from sanscrit". this is completely wrong and also completely ignores this:

http://tamil.berkeley.edu/Tamil%20Chair/TamilClassicalLanguage/TamilClassicalLgeLtr.html

which strangely enough, is linked to as a footnote on the page of Tamil language, but this page nonetheless tells the idea of "proto-dravidian" and tamil being one of all offshoots thereof (albeit one of the only 4 or 5 written). —Preceding unsigned comment added by Reetside (talk • contribs) 15:51, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

I don't see how a native speaker has any authority in determining the history of theirs or others' languages. Not only does it give limited awareness of cognates, but it doesn't help with directionality (that is, we can reasonably guess that English ease and French aise are cognates but we can't tell which is the borrowing language). The second source you cite implies the opposite of what you're saying.

Now, if you're saying that the sounds of Sanskrit (several of which are rare amongst non-Indian Indo-European languages) occurred as a result of influence from Dravidian languages, I don't think that that's too outrageous. However, this doesn't mean that Sanskrit is "derived" from Tamil or that there are a large number of "etymological" cognates. It simply means that the languages have influenced each other. Besides, you'd need to find some reputable scholarly sources that argue this, not random forums on the internet. — Æµ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 19:37, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

see Dravidian substrate in Vedic Sanskrit for an article about the topic your parents' account is a warped, folksy derivation of. --dab (𒁳) 14:16, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Dravidian languages now have a lot of loan words from Sanskrit. So a (naive) speaker of Telugu I know can insist that the two languages are closely related. Untangling the linguistics takes some doing so I would not be too hard on native speakers who have inherited such traditions. They have some cultural validity and interest since the identification with Sanskrit tells us something about how that culture values Sanskrit. That Sanskrit is the language of the Northern peoples who repeatedly attempted to subjugate them by force, and who eventually dominated them culturally (via Sanskrit and the caste system), and therefore represents all that they resisted for many centuries is not an uninteresting fact. 81.107.45.28 (talk) 16:19, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

it should be mentioned that sanscrit is the oldest language

sanscrit is proven to be the oldest language written with an alphabet and grammar on earth. this is not even possible to dispute academically -- as the date of the rig veda is put at 1,500 BC. such a remarkable characteristic of this language deserves some kind of mention on the wikipedia page. i would not want to be so politically incorrect as to suggest that this represents the actual invention of alphabet and grammar and writing from which all other western languages copied but maybe the case that can be made in this respect might be mentioned too. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Reetside (talk • contribs) 16:04, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

That doesn't make sense. How could it be the oldest language written with an alphabet and grammar but not the invention of an alphabet and grammar? History of writing disputes your claim as there were quite a few alphabets developed before 1500 BC. — Æµ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 19:50, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Your assumption that writing is necessary for a language to evolve is highly incorrect. Sanskrit evoloved to the highest form (to be used in today's intelligent computers) by oral transmission. People were trained to use their "non-written" senses to develop Sanskrit. Peoples' brains were evolved enough to develop the language without having to write it down. That is how the "purity" of the language was maintained. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.132.228.1 (talk) 14:09, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Absolute Rubbish. If the Ṛgveda was composed in 1500BC as seems likely, it wasn't written down until about 500AD - since there was a prohibition on writing it. Indians adopted writing from the Achaemanid Persians and the first large scale use of it is associated with King Asoka ca 3rd century BC. Several forms of writing in Mesopotamia predate writing in India by centuries and writing in Egypt predates it by millennia. 81.107.45.28 (talk) 16:36, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Sanskrit is the purest (oldest) and most highly evolved language.

Considering it is used in knowledge representation and machine translation for intelligent computers, it is highly incorrect and improper to call it dead language. The author's knowledge of sanskrit is poor if not biased against it. A pity, another more reasonable wiki is not written for Sanskrit. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.132.228.1 (talk) 14:02, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

you do not actually have the first clue about the topic, do you. --dab (𒁳) 14:13, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

I think I understand where the author is going with this article. BTW What is the first clue? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.132.229.1 (talk) 22:11, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Sounds like me. I am pure, old and highly evolved :) hypotaxis (talk) 05:16, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

A dead language is one not spoken as a mother tongue, and one whose grammar is fixed at a certain date (by Pāṇini in the case of Sanskrit ca 500-400 BC) Sanskrit is spoken only as a second language (and has been for more than 2500 years), but does not, and cannot, change. 81.107.45.28 (talk) 16:36, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Serbian - Sanskrit similarity

I see that it was mentioned briefly that Slavic language had Sanskrit origin. Firstly, which Slavic language is in question? As there is no Slavic language as such, but rather group of Slavic languages. Also, does anyone know anything about similarities between Serbian language (part of Slavic group) and Sanskrit? According to German linguistics from 19th century, Serbian language is the European language with most Sanskrit words still in everyday use. They quoted some 150 Sanskrit words that are being used on a daily basis in Serbian language. i.e - eng. "shoe", in Sanskrit - "upanak", in Serbian "opanak"

   - eng. "two",  in Sanskrit - " dva" in Serbian    "dva"
   - eng. "three",in Sanskrit - "tri", in Serbian    "tri"

and the list goes one...

would appreciate any unbiased comment. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.177.56.25 (talk) 19:50, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Slavic languages are part of the Indo-European family of languages. Of course they will show some similarities - one can even see them in English deva/divine; brother/bhartṛ; mind, manas; etc. It's not that Sanskrit words are used in Serbian (the two cultures have never mixed) but that words from common root language, called Proto-Indo-European, have not changed that much. Compare Serbian to Hindi and you will also find a close match, or Welsh for that matter! Sanskrit dva, btw is pronounced dwa (the v is soft and more like English w). I have seen the same claim on the same basis for Russian also. FYI the word upanak is not in the Sanskrit dictionary. Linguistics has come a long way since the 19th century. 81.107.45.28 (talk) 16:36, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Serbo-Croatian dva and tri are of inherited Proto-Indo-European origin (cf. Wiktionary appendix pages *dwóh₁ and *tréyes), and as for the opanak ( : Sanskrit upānáh "sandal, shoe") - it is of native Common Slavic origin (for a detailed etymology of it see here). The relationship of Serbo-Croatian to Sanskrit which is brought up here is one of those nationalism-induced pseudoscientific theories, in modern Serbia advocated by crackpots such as Branislava Božinović and Olga Luković-Pjanović. If you can read Serbo-Croatian, you can take a look into some of their fairy tales here and here. It's very amusing reading of a very skillfully persuasive pseudoscience. The sad thing is that modern-day Serbian rightist extremist youth (e.g. Obraz) takes it all very seriously, and almost nothing is done in the public to refute it. So you get these posts on the Internet, where "hidden truths" are revealed.. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 19:49, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

I would recommend the wikipeda to remove the dating of Rigveda or add a statement that it is not yet proved. I feel the indian historian to work on the usage of sanskrit words in other languages, where the date of the works are already dated. Even if the Vedas are dated, we cannot take the veda has any historical proof, since it is now widely accepted that most of the verses are added by each and every generation that followed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.136.59.145 (talk) 18:48, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Sanskrit should not be mentioned as the oldest language and i have a valid question that when the grammar was itself written latter, how a language could be older by over one million years. If wikipedia is to go by the claim of the hindu religius people, then there are going to be lot of dispute. For eg. Tamil has been mentioned in the Sangam litrature (oldest tamil litrature), that tamil has been there before the sand has come from the rouck (meaning the the whole world was rock and sand didnot come, when tamil was first spoken), then can the tamil be declared has the oldest language in the world.

Sanskrit is a Finno-Urgic language?

{{editsemiprotected}}

This looks like an uncited and false edit to me.

"Sanskrit (संस्कृता वाक् saṃskṛtā vāk, for short संस्कृतम् saṃskṛtam) Aryan from Nordic region developed Sanskrit in India. They took Finno-ugric language with them. In Finno-ugric language 'Sana' means Word and 'Kirjat' means to write. Therefore, Sanskrit was drived from Finno-ugric word 'SanasKirjat' which means 'Word writings'."

This sentence seems to say that Sanskrit was brought to India by Nordic Aryans who took proto-Finnish with them and Sanskrit was developed out of that language. I've studied Indian History and read about Sanskrit a bit (I've never studied the language though) and have never heard that sort of claim before. Can anyone clarify? It's also not cited. The Finno-Urgic claim is also in the list of language families.

That was vandalism by user GRRE (talk · contribs), which was reverted and the user has been warned. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 19:21, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Changing संस्कृत to संस्कृतम्

In the wikipedia side bar, in the section - articles in other languages, wherever sanskrit comes, it appears as संस्कृत, which is the Hindi name. It should be changed to संस्कृतम्, the sanskrit one. What should be done for this? How can we change the name of language in side bar. Some body help me.. --Bharat Sawant (talk) 03:59, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

संस्कृत is not necessarily the Hindi name; it is also the base (prātipadika) form in Sanskrit (saṃskṛta). That said, undeclined forms aren't normally used in Sanskrit, so I agree with you that using संस्कृतम् would be better. As for how to actually change this, I don't know. :-) Maybe it's necessary to change the "#language" somewhere, possibly on the Sanskrit Wikipedia. Shreevatsa (talk) 04:49, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Read the article and came across a few puzzling areas

I think this is a valuable, helpful article, thanks to all who have contributed to it. While reading it I've noticed a few things that puzzle me.

The side bar states 'Total speakers 14,135 fluent speakers in India as of 2001[1]' the reference given actually counts 'Number of persons who returned the language (and the mother tongues grouped under each) as their mother tongue'. So in 2001 there were 14,135 native speakers in India, thus number of fluent speakers is at least 14,135, and possibly much more. Indeed further down the article states 'The 1991 Indian census reported 49,736 fluent speakers of Sanskrit'.

So wouldn't it be better if the side bar stated 'Total speakers 49,736 fluent speakers in India as of 1991.'?

Admittedly I haven't looked up the 1991 India census myself to verify the 49,736 number, (can't find the census online, and the '1991 Indian census' reference in the article redirects to the 'Demographics of India' article.

Okay my next stumbling block was the 3rd paragraph which states 'The pre-Classical form of Sanskrit is known as Vedic Sanskrit, with the language of the Rigveda being the oldest and most archaic stage preserved, its oldest core dating back to as early as 1500 BCE.[5] This qualifies Rigvedic Sanskrit as one of the oldest attestations of any Indo-Iranian language, and one of the earliest attested members of the Indo-European language family, the family which includes English and most European languages.[6]'.

Now what puzzles me most here is that the paragraph includes the text 'dating back to as early as 1500 BCE' and completely fails to mention that the dating of the Rigveda is very controversial.

Perhaps the controversial dating issue can be side stepped entirely. Wouldn't it be better to replace the 3rd paragraph with, 'The pre-Classical form of Sanskrit is known as Vedic Sanskrit, with the language of the Rigveda being the oldest and most archaic stage preserved. Rigvedic Sanskrit is one of the oldest attestations of any Indo-Iranian language, and one of the earliest attested members of the Indo-European language family, the family which includes English and most European languages.[6]', any disagreement?

To be consistent the beginning of the 'Vedic Sanskrit' section of the article should also be updated from 'Sanskrit, as defined by Pāṇini, had evolved out of the earlier "Vedic" form. Beginning of Vedic Sanskrit can be traced as early as around 1500 BCE (accepted date of Rig-Veda).^{[citation needed]}' to, how about 'Sanskrit, as defined by Pāṇini, had evolved out of the earlier "Vedic" form. The beginning of Vedic Sanskrit can be traced as early the date of the Rig-Veda'. Sounds OK?

The final 'Dvigu' entry in the 'Compounds' section makes no sense to me, as currently there is no explanatory paragraph for (only) that entry.

That is all that I immediately noticed.ICouldBeWrong (talk) 04:55, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the review. To briefly address your points:

I'll look for more detailed 2001 census data to see if the discrepancy in the number of fluent/native speakers can be resolved.
I think it is important to provide some idea of the dating, since simply saying "oldest" is not too informative for a general reader who likely to wonder if we are taking about 10000, 5000, or 1000 years in the past. The 1500 BCE dating for the oldest core of the Rigveda is well accepted in mainstream scholarship, as long as we allow for a century or two of variance (which is not bad for oral texts that far back).
Not sure what is happening with the 'Dvigu' compound. May be a result of vandalism, but will need to check the article history and/or sources for that.

Feel free to edit/expand the article yourself. If I or anyone else disagrees with your some change, we'll undo that edit, and then we can discuss it here on the talk page (see WP:BRD). Cheers. Abecedare (talk) 05:22, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for your kind reply.

I accept that an oldest dating around 1500 BCE is popularly accepted as a best estimate, at least by many Indologists (with notable exceptions). But this date seems more of a conjecture supported by some linguistic evidence to me, rather than a scientifically verifiable fact.

Additionally, in the context of the paragraph, it's not the oldest possible date that is relevant. Rather the youngest possible date is relevant. (So that Sanskrit qualifies as 'one of the oldest...').

So rather than 'dating back to as early as 1500 BCE', the text 'dating back to at least 500 BCE, and possible much older', would I think be both less controversial, and also eliminate the incorrect logic in the paragraph.

If there are no objections I'll update the article with this change.

Kind regardsICouldBeWrong (talk) 06:30, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, I didn't understand your point about the "youngest possible date is relevant" and am not sure what the 500 BCE date corresponds to. Can you clarify again ? Note that there is a distinction between the oldest possible dates for the Rigveda, and the (generally) accepted dates for the oldest parts of the Rigveda; the former will be around 1700 BCE (or even 2000 BCE), while 1500 BCE corresponds to the latter. Abecedare (talk) 06:51, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Regarding the youngest possible date being relevant. The paragraph under discussion concludes with 'This qualifies Rigvedic Sanskrit as one of the oldest attestations of any Indo-Iranian language, and one of the earliest attested member...'. So what's important isn't the upper bound ('as early as') on how old Sanskrit is but rather the lower bound (i.e. 'at least as old as').

The 500 BCE number I gave, was overly conservative. I think a non-controversial change would be to replace 'its oldest core dating back to as early as 1500 BCE.[5]' with 'the conventionally accepted date of 1200 to 1500 BCE', which is essentially a quote from The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture page 239 as shown on google books.

Personally I'm skeptical of the conventionally accepted date. But what seems clearly wrong is the text 'as early as 1500 BCE'. Looking at page 239 it states 'Witzel even 1900 BCE', so Witzel accepts it could be older, and Witzel is mainstream.

Ideally I'd use text like 'dating back to at least 1200 BCE, and possibly much older', with a couple of references one Bryant (mainstream) and another to Kazanas (not as mainstream, but still, ah, in the river) ICouldBeWrong (talk) 08:51, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

the dating of the Rigveda is in no way controversial. Kazanas is just a crackpot. There is no way this stuff is going to be even alluded to here in the main Sanskrit article, under WP:UNDUE. For this you want the Indigenous Aryans article. The article is fine as it is, there is no call for going into byzantine detail on the Rigveda on this article. This would be like discussing the intricacies of dating Beowulf and the timeline of the Anglo-Saxon invasion of Britain, including cranky notions about the Celts, at the English language article. Remember, just because Wikipedia has an article on it doesn't mean it is in any way sane. --dab (𒁳) 09:47, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

I agree this is a fine article, but I've identified a few areas where it can be improved.

I'm not suggesting that the intricacies of the dating of the Rigveda be discussed in the article, but, as is, the 3rd paragraph of the article contains a non sequitur, specifically the paragraph conclusion requires that terminus ante quem must be established rather than terminus a quo. That is the most recent plausible date of the core of the Rig Veda is relevant, not the most ancient plausible date.

Thus I suggest changing the text from 'its oldest core dating back to as early as 1500 BCE.[5]' to 'dating back to at least roughly 1700-1100 BCE', (this date range is taken from the Rigveda article, and the reference there can be reused. Unfortunately I can't find a more accurate date range for just the 'core dating'),

This solves the problem with the non sequitur logic, and has the additional advantage of not carelessly, and needlessly offending many millions of people, mainly Indians who conventionally have accepted earlier dating of the Vedas than Indologists.

Your statement that 'the dating of the Rigveda is in no way controversial' appears verifiably untrue. As the Rigveda article states 'The dating of Rigveda has been a center of controversies; there is a strong disagreement among scholars'. Even mainstream indologist Bryant has written "In my view, the Indo-Aryan invasion/migration theory, at least in its present forms, as well as the dating of the Vedic texts, remain unresolved issues that invite unbiased fresh scrutiny" (in the Journal of Indo-European Studies). I see little evidence that outside of the Indological community consensus has ever been achieved.

Regarding Kazanas I see no reason to engage in name calling such as 'just a crackpot' due to his dating of the Vedas, surely more polite phrasing could have been used.ICouldBeWrong (talk) 23:01, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

"even mainstream"? I am of course talking about mainstream exclusively. Everything is "controversial" on the internets. The date of the Rigveda is not controversial, it is unknown. It is uncontroversial that 1500-1000 BC fits the bill, and it is also uncontroversial that no more precise statement is possible. Further details aren't necessary for the Sanskrit article. You want to go into details? Come to Talk:Rigveda.

All this revisionism is a result of the BJP interlude in Indian government. Check the publication dates. If by "outside of the Indological community" you mean Voice of India & friends, you are right, the consensus there is that the Vedas are one gazillion years old and were written by magical space Aryans.

I Could Be Wrong, but I suspect foul play here. Perhaps somebody can be kind enough to try checkuser. --dab (𒁳) 23:24, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Regarding the 1500-1000 BC dating of the Rigveda, even the Rigveda article gives a 1700-1000 BC range. I think it should be non-controversial to reuse the Rigveda text and reference for the Rigveda dating in this article, so I've done that.

Now I wrote 'even mainstream indologist' to indicate that at least one mainstream indologist, Bryant, questions the consensus dating of the Vedas. He wrote an entire book about it, The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture, pages 238-246 concern the dating of the vedas (esp. Rigveda page 243), much of the book is available online on google books.

This indicates that even within the indologist community the consensus is questioned by a mainstreamer, (I'm not convinced Bryant accepts a 1500BC or even 1700BC limit on the age of the Rigveda).

More to the point the consensus of the indologist community does not necessarily reflect the consensus of all scholars. The Rigveda article mentions 'strong disagreement' amongst scholars, which suggests a consensus dating of 1500BC-1000BC for the Rigveda is too narrow a range.

Furthermore as mentioned in the Rigveda article and by Bryant (page 252) Astrochronological (Archaeoastronomical) and other types of evidence suggesting great antiquity (pre 1700 BCE) for the Vedic culture have been persistently, repeatedly, and independently (from Herman Jacobi and Bal Gangadhar Tilak to Kazanas) presented for over a century now.

As Bryant writes 'Ultimately, all that can be authoritatively established about the chronology of the Vedic corpus.... is that it preceded the Buddhist literature that refers to it.' (page 249). ICouldBeWrong (talk) 08:09, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

Looking at the Sanskrit compounds page it seems clear there's a problem here. Earlier this Sanskrit article contained a list of all the compounds. But at some point the list seems to have been (accidentally?) truncated. I guess what needs to be done is put back the missing compounds, but preferably summarize rather than just repeat the info in the Sanskrit compounds article. ICouldBeWrong (talk) 06:41, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

I put back the missing compounds and condensed the text a little. I would like to condense it some more. ICouldBeWrong (talk) 05:16, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Now condensed and simplified. ICouldBeWrong (talk) 09:00, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Another problematic area of the article is the syntax subsection of the grammar section. It 'requires expansion'. A suggested source for doing so is chapter 'Section the First' of Sanskrit Syntax, by J.S. Speijer, online. ICouldBeWrong (talk) 09:00, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Do you guys know the difference between official language and scheduled language?

Sanskrit is one of the 22 scheduled languages of India not official you fool!!!!

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.114.172.127 (talk) 15:33, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

निष्ठा धृति: सत्यम्

can somebody please describe निष्ठा धृति: सत्यम्. --Bigsuperindia (talk) 23:20, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

"Adityat Jayate Vrishti" meaning "Sun (Adityat) generates (Jayate) the weather (Vrishti)" is moto of India Meteorological society (IMD). This cold be added to the article. thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bhupendraraut (talk • contribs) 14:51, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

american sanskrit institute

as an external link or whatever. excellent resource - this is english, that is english --> sanskrit transformation. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.35.184.164 (talk) 07:15, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

Yes, there is an external link to academic courses around the world. ASI should be included. I would change this if I had the editing powers currently. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.35.184.164 (talk) 21:26, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Is this article about Sanskrit or India?

this sentence is very controversial and does not belong to this article!!!

Please remove this:

                     It is a classical language of India,others being Tamil, Telugu and Kannada.

Sanskrit is a classical language of whole Indian subcontinent not only India that exist since 1947.

Thank you!!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.254.148.91 (talk) 10:39, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Cases

I'm too lazy to log in and fix this, but the sentence "the number of actual declensions is debatable" is incorrectly placed in the same paragraph as, and preceding, Panini's description of case function. Declension classification is an issue completely separate from case function. Also, the whole mention of Panini's description is just meaningless; it only serves to make Hindu nationalists and PC people happy by emphasizing that "Hindus had definitions of cases long ago, hurrah!". Panini is a great name in the history of linguistics, but linguistics has actually moved on a little since his time, and his description of Sanskrit case is neither sacrosanct nor an alternative to a description in modern terms.--91.148.159.4 (talk) 23:22, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps, but it won't be me that provokes Shiv Sena. Maybe we could just put a link and a note at the top of the section mention saying Panini is obsolete. Maybe not in those words, doesn't have to even mention him, something like "modern cases" la gaie (talk) 08:52, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Tamil, Telegu, Kannada - classical languages?

Can we get some good reference as this looks like someones opinion and nothing else... And why even bring up the classical language reference to sanskrit in the first place? 114.79.131.70 (talk) 19:57, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

Edit request

{{editsemiprotected}}

Update the link

 http://freenet-homepage.de/prilop/sanskrit-alphabet.html

to new location

 http://www.user.uni-hannover.de/nhtcapri/sanskrit-alphabet.html

130.75.6.169 (talk) 17:37, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Done Algebraist 17:51, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Translation please....

Hello!

For a while now, I've a few questions about how to translate a few items into Sanskirt… and was hoping someone here might know or offer their expertise. I have asked my friends but none seem to know with confidence how to translate these words into Sanskirt.

Firstly, I wish to translate first these names into Sanskirt. Secondly, I wish to know how then would the supposential decedent family of these people be translated into Sanskirt.

The male name Jafan… what would his decedent’s family name be rendered?

The female name Kylantha, what about people who support this person's rule?

The name of a river… Solleu. How would people from the Solleu river basin be known as? Sollensians? Sollensinii? But how does that translate into Sanskirt?

Also, the name Naboo. How would people from Naboo be known as? Naboo originates with Nabu.

Any help anyone may offer would be greatly appreciated! ♦Drachenfyre♦·Talk 09:57, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Prateek Mishra says>>>I will be able to help you with the translations once you provide those terms in proper IAST lossless romanization.. for details refer IASt on wikipedia itself >>> creativelipi.prateek @ gmail . com —Preceding unsigned comment added by 123.236.125.158 (talk) 06:11, 21 April 2010 (UTC)