Early Tamil Epigraphy: From the Earliest Times to the Sixth Century A.D. c22.s3: 3.3 Indo-Aryan element

Early Tamil Epigraphy: From the Earliest Times to the Sixth Century A.D. c22.s3

Language: English

c22.s3.t1 3.3.1 Phonology: presence of non-Tamil sounds — 2 parts
c22.s3.t2 3.3.2 Orthography — 6 parts
c22.s3.t3 3.3.3 Vocabulary — 26 parts
c22.s3.t4 3.3.4 Prakrit grammatical usages — 6 parts
c22.s3.t5 3.3.5 Prakrit of the cave inscriptions — 19 parts
c22.s3.t6 3.3.6 Lexical items of doubtful etymology — 14 parts
c22.s3.t7 3.3.7 Changeover from Prakrit to Sanskrit — 4 parts

3.3 Indo-Aryan element

3.3.1 Phonology: presence of non-Tamil sounds

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Only two non-Tamil sounds (*dh* and *s*) occur marginally in loanwords in the Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions.² It is significant that these are confined only to the Early Tamil-Brāhmī Period (ca. 2nd century B.C. to 1st century A.D.). Actually, the number and relative frequency of non-Tamil characters in the Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions are far less than those of Grantha letters in the later Tamil inscriptions.

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² See section 5.5 for details. The rarity of non-Tamil sounds in the Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions is by itself a sufficient ground to call into question the earlier theory of a predominant Indo-Aryan element in them.

3.3.2 Orthography

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(i) *Adaptation to Tamil phonetic pattern*

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The proportion of non-Tamil sounds is relatively much less than what one would expect from the Indo-Aryan element present in the Tamil-Brāhmī cave inscriptions as most of the loanwords are adapted to the Tamil phonetic pattern.³

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³ See section 6.21 for details.

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(ii) *Use of single consonants for geminates*

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The employment of single consonants in the Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions to represent the doubled consonants in the language is due to the influence of Prakrit inscriptional orthography. This orthographic feature is seen not only in loanwords but also in native Tamil words. However, unlike in Prakrit inscriptions, the use of single for doubled consonants was optional in the Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions even from the earliest times both in loanwords and native words.⁴

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⁴ See section 6.17 for details.

3.3.3 Vocabulary

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The IA loanwords in the Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions are all nouns.⁵ Apart from personal names, the vocabulary comprises mostly religious or cultural terms. Some of the more interesting items are briefly noticed below.

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⁵ See the Indexes in Appendices V and VI for word lists and the Commentary on the entries for discussion.

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(i) *Religious terms*

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Religious terms especially associated with the Jaina religion are discussed in the sections on Jainism.⁶ The following are some of the other religious terms common to Indian religious tradition.

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⁶ See sections 4.8 to 4.13.

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*atiṭṭāṉam* (Pkt. *adhiṭṭhāna*): lit., 'permanent fixed abode' of the itinerant monk who stayed in the cave during the rainy season. The term occurs in the Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions in the special sense of 'stone beds' carved on the floor of the cave for the use of the monks.

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*tāṇa* (Pkt. *dāna(ṁ)* 'religious gift').

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*dhammam* / *dhamam* (Pkt. *dhamma*) 'charity, religious endowment'.

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(ii) *Cultural terms*

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These comprise mostly titles and names of some professions:

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*kaṇatikaṉ* 'chief of scribes'; cf. Sinh. Pkt. *kaṇa* 'scribe', Pkt. *adhika* 'superintendent'.

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*kaṇaka* (Pkt. *gaṇaka*) 'accountant'.

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*kāviti* 'an ancient title bestowed on Vaiśyas and court officials'. cf. Sinh. Pkt. *gapati* / *gapiti* < Pkt. *gahapati* < Skt. *gṛhapati*, lit., 'householder', a title of merchant classes and landed gentry.

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*kuṭumpikaṉ* (Pkt. *kuṭumbika*) 'householder, husbandman'.

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*ta(c)caṉ* (Pkt. *taccha*) 'carpenter'. The term occurs in the Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions with the meanings 'carpenter, stonemason'.¹

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¹ However, see Commentary (73.8) for possible alternative Dravidian etymology.

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*māraya-* (read *mārāya*) 'an ancient title', probably from Pkt. *mahārāya*.

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*vaṇikaṉ* / *vāṇikaṉ* (Pkt. *vaṇija* / *vāṇija* < Skt. *vaṇik*) 'trader'.

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*siri* (Pkt. *siri* < Skt *śrī* ) 'an auspicious affix to personal names'.

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(iii) *Miscellaneous loanwords from Prakrit*

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Selected examples are listed below.

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*āci* (Pkt. *āsi*) 'support, prop'. cf. Ta. *ācu* 'support'. The inscriptional context indicates the meaning of a wooden 'support' for a canopy in front of the cave.

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*kaṭikai* (cf. Skt. *ghaṭikā*) 'an assembly of learned persons or institution of higher learning or the place of such assembly or institution'.

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*nikama-* (Pkt. *nigama*) 'merchant guild'.

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*pāṇita-* (Pkt. *phāṇita*) 'juice of sugar cane, candy, molasses'.

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*sālakaṉ* (Pkt. *sālaka*) 'brother-in-law', but occurs in the Tamil- Brāhmī inscription with the meaning 'sister-in-law's husband' as indicated by the context (cf. Ta. *cālakaṉ*).

3.3.4 Prakrit grammatical usages

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While the grammar of the Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions is almost wholly Tamil, there are a couple of Prakrit grammatical forms occurring in them.

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*-ō*: Nominative case-ending of masculine singular noun in *-putō* 'son' in *satiyaputō*.

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*-sa*: Genitive case-ending of masculine singular noun in *utayaṇasa* 'of Utayaṇaṉ'.²

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² See No. 1, Table 1.6 for the occurrence of the Pkt. genitive ending *-sa* in a coin-legend.

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The relatively higher frequency of causative verb forms in these inscriptions when compared with Literary Tamil appears to be due to the influence of inscriptional Prakrit.¹

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(e.g.) *koṭupitōṉ* 'he who caused to be given'.

3.3.5 Prakrit of the cave inscriptions

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Prakrit, in the widest sense of the term, comprises all Middle Indo-Aryan (MIA) languages including those recorded in the inscriptions of Asoka and the post-Mauryan period, the canonical languages of the Buddhist and Jaina religions, and the Literary Prakrits found in the Sanskrit plays. An attempt has been made in the present study to determine the type of Prakrit from which the loanwords in the cave inscriptions are derived.²

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(i) *Loanwords not derived from Asokan dialects*

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Most of the inscriptions of Asoka are in the Eastern Dialect which was the Mauryan court language. However, such distinctive features of the Eastern Dialect as the substitution of *r* with *l* and the use of the nominative singular ending *-ē* are not found in the loanwords. It is now generally accepted that the Tamil caves were occupied by the Jaina monks and have no Buddhist vestiges.³ Thus, the available evidence indicates that the loanwords in the cave inscriptions are not derived from the language of the Asokan inscriptions, though they share some features common to most dialects.

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(ii) *Loanwords mostly from standard epigraphic Prakrit*

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The data compiled in the Etymological Indexes (Appendices V-VI) indicate clearly that most of the loanwords in the Corpus are derived from standard epigraphic Prakrit based on the dialect of the central and western regions. The circumstances in which this dialect rose to become the common epigraphical language for almost the whole of India in the post-Mauryan period are well brought out by Richard Salomon in his recent book *Indian Epigraphy*:

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The causes of the abrupt dialectal shift from east to west undoubtedly lie in political and historical developments, that is, the decline of Magadha as the center of power in northern India after the collapse of the Mauryan empire and the movement of the center of political power in the following centuries toward the west and northwest. Like the eastern dialect under Aśoka, the central-western dialect of the post-Mauryan era was used far beyond what must have been its original homeland. Thus we find inscriptions in this standard epigraphic Prakrit as far afield as Orissa in the east, for instance, in the Hāthīgumphā inscription, while

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The distinguishing features of standard epigraphic Prakrit as reflected in the loanwords in the Corpus are as follows.

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i) Nominative masculine singular *-ō* (as in *satiyaputō*).

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ii) Retention of the distinction between *r* and *l* (as in *āritaṉ*, *sālakaṉ*, etc.).

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iii) The exclusive use of the sibilant *s*.

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However, the loanwords are radically transformed by the local language, namely Tamil, and adapted to its phonetic pattern as discussed earlier. Further, there are also minimal influences on the loanwords from two other dialects of Prakrit as noticed below.

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(iii) *Loanwords from Jaina Prakrit (Ardhamāgadhī)*

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Considering the exclusive association of Jaina monks with the Tamil caves, it is somewhat surprising that the influence of Ardhamāgadhī (AMg.), the language of the earliest Jaina canonical literature, is minimal on the loanwords occurring in the inscriptions. From among more than a hundred IA stems, only five may be regarded as derived from AMg. based on the special characteristics of that dialect (Table 3.³). The first four loanwords occur in the Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions, and the last in an Early Vaṭṭeluttu inscription.

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(iv) *Loanwords from Sinhala-Prakrit* While most of the loanwords in the Tamil-Brāhmī cave inscriptions are naturally from Indian Prakrits, there are a couple of items for which Sinhala inscriptional Prakrit seems to be the proximate source.

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*kaṇa-* 'scribe'.¹ In the Early Brāhmī cave inscriptions of Sri Lanka, *kaṇa* occurs with the meaning 'scribe'. It is derived from Skt. *karaṇa*.² The form *kaṇa* does not occur in Indian Prakrits in this sense. In later Tamil inscriptions, the corresponding expressions *karaṇa* (> *karṇam*) are directly borrowed from Sanskrit.

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¹ See Commentary (40.1.a) for discussion.

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² S. Paranavitana 1970: p. xcv.

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*kāviti* 'title of a senior merchant and court official'. This expression is ultimately derived from Skt. *gṛhapati* most probably through Sinh. Pkt.* *kāpiti* (> *kapiti*).³

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³ See Commentary (3.5) for discussion.

3.3.6 Lexical items of doubtful etymology

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There are a few lexical items in the Corpus, whose derivation from Dravidian or Indo-Aryan is in doubt.⁴ Some representative types are noticed below.

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⁴ These are listed separately in the Etymological Index: Doubtful Items (Appendix VI) indicating alternative derivations from both sources. Each lexical item is also discussed in detail in the relevant entry in the Commentary.

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(i) There are a few lexical items where either derivation is equally plausible:

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(e.g.) *aiyaṉ* 'lord, master'; cf. Dr. *ai* (D. 196a); IA *ayya* < *ārya*. *cantaṉ* 'a personal name'; cf. Dr. *cantam* (D. 2328); IA *caṁda* < *candra*.

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Table 3.3. Ardhamāgadhī loanwords in the Corpus.

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Table 3.4. Sanskrit loanwords in Early Vaṭṭeḻuttu inscriptions in the Corpus.

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(ii) There are some items which are generally regarded as derived from IA, but for which plausible Dr. etymologies can be suggested:

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(e.g.) *akaram* 'Brāhman village'; cf. Dr. *nakar* (D. 3568); IA *aggahāra* < *agrahāra*.
*ta(c)caṉ* 'carpenter, mason'; cf. Dr. *tai* / *tacc-* (D. 3473); IA *taccha* < *takshan*.

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(iii) Borrowing and re-borrowing:

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(e.g.) Dr. **catiya* > IA *satiya* > Ta. *atiyaṉ* 'a clan name'.

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(iv) Borrowed into both:

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(e.g.) Dr. *nāka* (IA *nāga*) appears to be the name of an ancient autochthonous race of South Asia borrowed into both Dr. and IA.

3.3.7 Changeover from Prakrit to Sanskrit

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Sanskrit supplanted Prakrit in South Indian inscriptions from about the beginning of the 5th century A.D.¹ This changeover is also reflected in the language of the cave inscriptions in the Tamil country. Thus the loanwords in the Tamil-Brāhmī inscriptions (ca. 2nd century B.C.-4th century A.D.) are invariably from Prakrit, while those in the Early Vaṭṭeḻuttu inscriptions (ca. 5-6 century A.D.) are from Sanskrit or survival of borrowings from Prakrit in the earlier age. The transitional character of the Early Vaṭṭeḻuttu inscriptions is best illustrated by the personal names of two monks, *vaccaṇanti* (< Pkt.) and *cantiraṉanti* (< Skt.) appearing in the Jaina inscriptions of about the same period (ca. 6th century A.D.).²

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¹ The earliest stone inscription in Sanskrit from ancient Tamil country(Tamil Nadu and Kerala) is that of Vishṇuvarman, probably a Kadamba prince, at Edakal in Kerala, assigned on palaeographic evidence to ca. 5th century A.D. E. Hultzsch in F. Fawcett 1901 (Estampage No. 1). See I. Mahadevan 1999 for revised interpretation.

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² Nos. *115* and *116* in the Corpus.

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To illustrate, loanwords occurring in the Early Vaṭṭeḻuttu inscriptions in the Corpus (Table 3.4) appear to be borrowed directly from Sanskrit. The same situation obtains in later Tamil inscriptions and in Literary Tamil, with the earlier layer of borrowings from Prakrit and the later layers increasingly from Sanskrit.