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Indian Palaeography from about B.C. 350 to about A.D. 1300 c6.s5: § 5. — The time and the manner of the borrowing of the Semitic alphabet

Indian Palaeography from about B.C. 350 to about A.D. 1300 c6.s5

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§ 5. — The time and the manner of the borrowing of the Semitic alphabet

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² B. IS. III², 83–91.

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**[17]** According to the preceding discussion, the great majority of the Brāhma letters agree with the oldest types of the North-Semitic signs, which are found in the archaic Phoenician inscriptions and on the stone of Mesa, incised about B. C. 890. But two characters, *ha* and *ta*, are derived from Mesopotamian forms of *He* and *Taw*, which belong to the middle of the eighth century B. C., and two, *sa*-*ṣa* and *śa*, resemble Aramaic signs of the sixth century B. C. As the literary and epigraphic evidence leaves no doubt that the Hindus were not unlettered during the period B. C. 600—500, and as the other signs of the Aramaic alphabet of this period, such as *Beth*, *Daleth*, *Waw*, &c., are too far advanced to be considered as the prototypes of the corresponding Brāhma letters, it becomes necessary to regard the seemingly modern forms of *sa*, *ṣa* and *śa* as the results of an Indian development, analogous to that of the corresponding Aramaic characters. This assumption, of course, remains tenable only as long as the two Aramaic letters are not shown to be more ancient by new epigraphic discoveries, which event, to judge from the results of the Sinjirli finds, does not seem to be impossible. But, for the present, they must be left out of consideration in fixing the *terminus a quo* for the importation of the Semitic alphabet into India; and this *terminus* falls between the time of the incision of Mesa's inscription and of those on the Assyrian weights, from about B. C. 890 to about B. C. 750, probably a little more towards the lower than towards the upper limit, or, roughly reckoning, about B. C. 800. And various circumstances make it probable that this was actually the time when the Semitic letters became known to the Hindus.

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As the *ha* and the *ta* of the Brāhmī are derived from forms of *He* and *Taw* not found in the Phoenician inscriptions but only in Mesopotamia, it appears probable that this is the Semitic country from which the letters were brought over.¹ It agrees with this inference, that the most ancient Indian works speak of sea-voyages in the Indian Ocean at a very early period, and sea-borne trade, carried on by Hindu Vāṇias in the same waters, is mentioned in later, but still ancient, times. The well-known Bāveru Jātaka² bears witness to an early export trade of the Vāṇias to Babylon; and the form of the word, in which the second part *ilu* is represented by *eru*, points to its having arisen in Western India, where *ra* is occasionally substituted for *la*, as in the Girnār and Shāhbāzgarhī form *Turamaya* for *Ptolemaios*. Several other Jātakas, *e. g.* No. 463, which describe sea-voyages, name the ancient ports of Western India, Bharukaccha (the modern Broach) and Śūrpāraka (now Supārā), which were centres of the trade with the Persian Gulf in the first centuries A. D. and much later. As according to the Jātakas the Vāṇias started from these towns, it is probable that these trade-routes were used much earlier. Two of the most ancient Dharmasūtras likewise bear witness to the earlier existence of trade by sea in India and particularly on the western coast. Baudhāyana, II, 2, 2, forbids Brahmans to undertake voyages by sea, and prescribes a severe penance for a breach of the rule. But he admits, 1, 2, 4, that the "Northerners," were not strict in this respect. As the other offences of the "Northerners," mentioned in the same passage, such as dealing in wool, selling animals with two rows of teeth, i. e. horses and mules, show, the term applies to the inhabitants of western and north-western India. It naturally follows that the sea-voyages referred to were made to western Asia. The same author, I, 18, 14, and the still older Gautama Dharmasūtra, 10, 33, mention the duties payable to the king on merchandise imported by sea.³ In accordance with my estimate of the age of the Dharmasūtras and of the materials out of which the Jātakas have been made up, I look upon these statements as referring to the 8th—6th centuries B. C.⁴ From still earlier times dates the well-known Vedic myth of the shipwreck of Bhujyu "in the ocean where there is no support, no rest for the foot or the hand," and of his being saved on the "hundred-oared galley" of the Aśvins.⁵ The scene of action must of course lie in the Indian Ocean, and the story points to the inference [18] that the Hindus navigated these waters during the earliest Vedic period. As, in addition, Semitic legends such as that of the Flood and of Manu's preservation by a miraculous fish occur in the Brāhmaṇas,⁶ we have a sufficient number of facts to furnish some support for the conjecture that Hindu traders, who probably learnt the language of the country, just as their modern descendants learn Arabic and Suahili and other African languages, may have imported from Mesopotamia not only the alphabet, but perhaps also other technical contrivances, such as brick-making which was so important for the construction of the ancient Brahmanical altars. With this assumption, which under the circumstances stated appears at least not quite unfounded, the Indian Vāṇias are credited with having rendered the same service to their countrymen which Sambhoṭa or Thon-mi did to the Tibetans, when he fetched the elements of their alphabet from Magadha, between A. D. 630 and 660.⁷

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¹ According to BENFEY, Indien 254, the Semitic alphabet came to India from Phoenicia; according to A. WEBER, Ind. Skizzen 137, either from Phoenicia or from Babylonia.

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² No. 339, FAUSBÖLL, 3, 126; compare also FICK, Die sociale Gliederung im nordöstl. Indien, 173 f.

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³ SBE. 2, 228; 14, 146, 200, 217; comp. MANU, 3, 158; 8, 157, 406, and DAHLMANN, Das Mahābhārata, 176 ff.

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⁴ B.IS. III², 16 ff.

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⁵ ṚV. 1, 116, 5; comprc OLDENBERG, Vedische Religion, 214.

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⁶ OLDENBERG, op. cit. 276.

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⁷ J.ASB. 57, 41 f.

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In any case, it is *a priori* probable that the Vāṇias were the first to adopt the Semitic alphabet;¹ for they, of course, came most into contact with foreigners, and they must have felt most strongly the want of some means for recording their business transactions. The Brahmans wanted the art of writing less urgently, since they possessed, as passages of the Ṛgveda show,² from very early times a system of oral tradition for the preservation of their literary treasures.

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¹ Comp. WESTERGAARD, Zwei Abhandlungen 37 ff.

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² ṚV, 7, 103, 5; comp. M.M.*HASL.* 506.

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Nevertheless, the oldest known form of the Brāhmī is, without a doubt, a script framed by learned Brahmans for writing Sanskrit. This assertion is borne out not only by the remnants of the Gayā alphabet of Aśoka's stone-masons, which must have contained signs for the Sanskrit vowels *AI* and *AU*, and which is arranged according to phonetic principles, but also by the influence of phonetic and grammatical principles which is clearly discernible in the formation of the derivative signs. The hand of the phonologist and grammarian is recognisable in the following points: (1) the development of five nasal letters and of a sign for nasalisation in general from two Semitic signs, as well as of a complete set of signs for the long vowels,³ which latter are very necessary for the phonologist and grammarian, but not for men of business, and are therefore unknown in other ancient alphabets; (2) the derivation of the signs for the phonetically very different, but grammatically cognate, *sa* and *ṣa* from one Semitic sign (Samekh); (3) the notation of *U* by the half of *va*, from which the vowel is frequently derived by *samprasāraṇa*; (4) the derivation of *O* from *U* (*o* being the guṇa-vowel of *u*) by the addition of a stroke; of *I* by a simplification of the sign for its guṇa-vowel *E*; of *AI*, the vṛddhi-vowel, from *E* the guṇa-vowel of *I*; and of *ḷa* from *ḍa*, the former consonant being frequently a substitute for the latter, as in *īḷe* for *īḍe*; (5) the non-expression of medial *a*, in accordance with the teaching of the grammarians who consider it to inhere in every consonant; the expression of medial *ā* by the difference between *A* and *Ā*, and of the remaining medial vowels by combinations of the initial ones, or of cursive simplifications of the same, with the consonants, as well as of the absence of vowels by ligatures of the consonants, which apparently illustrate the grammatical term *saṁyuktākṣara*. All this has so learned an appearance and is so artificial that it can only have been invented by Pandits, not by traders or clerks. The fact that the Vāṇias and the accountants until recent times used to omit all medial vowels in their correspondence and account-books, permits even the inference that an Indian alphabet, elaborated by such men, would not possess any such vowel-signs. And it is immaterial for the correctness of this inference, whether the modern defective writing is a survival from the most ancient period or is due to the introduction of the Arabic alphabet in the middle ages.

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³ Comp. WACKERNAGEL, Altind. Grammatik 1, LVII.

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A prolonged period must, of course, have elapsed between the first introduction of the Semitic alphabet by the merchants, its adoption by the Brahmans which probably did not take place at once, and the elaboration of the 46 radical signs of the Brāhmī together with its system of medial vowels and ligatures.

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As, according to the results of the preceding enquiry, the elaboration of the Brāhmī was completed about B. C. 500, or perhaps even earlier, the *terminus a quo*, about B. C. 800, may be considered as the actual date of the introduction of the Semitic alphabet into India. This estimate is, however, [19] merely a provisional one, which may be modified by the discovery of new epigraphic documents in India or in the Semitic countries. If such a modification should become necessary, the results of the recent finds induce me to believe that the date of the introduction will prove to fall earlier, and that it will have to be fixed perhaps in the tenth century B. C., or even before that.

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