Indian Epigraphy: A Guide to the Study of Inscriptions in Sanskrit, Prakrit, and the Other Indo-Aryan Languages c12.s5.1

c12.s5.1

Although its relation to epigraphy is of prime importance, linguistics will not be discussed in detail here since the relevant material has already been covered in chapter 3. Suffice it to say that inscriptions provide a vast body of linguistic data which not only supplements but to some degree even supersedes information on the history and dialectology of the Indo-Aryan languages (as well as of the Dravidian and other South Asian language families) derived from noninscriptional, that is, literary, sources. The principal justification for this statement is that inscriptions provide relatively uncontaminated linguistic data, as opposed to literary texts which are often altered and tampered with in various ways in the course of multiple copyings over the centuries. Moreover, inscriptions often provide specimens of otherwise unattested or poorly attested dialects. This is particularly true in connection with the Middle Indo-Aryan languages, as in the case V. S. Agrawal, inscriptions are “[p]erhaps the richest and most authoritative source of Indian geography.”⁷³ Although a complete compilation of the relevant data remains to be achieved, a large amount of material has already been collected in the sources just cited.