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Indian Epigraphy: A Guide to the Study of Inscriptions in Sanskrit, Prakrit, and the Other Indo-Aryan Languages c8.s1: 3.1 Middle Indo-Aryan ("Prakrit")

Indian Epigraphy: A Guide to the Study of Inscriptions in Sanskrit, Prakrit, and the Other Indo-Aryan Languages c8.s1

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3.1 Middle Indo-Aryan ("Prakrit")

3.1.1 General remarks

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In early Indian inscriptions the Prakrit, or, more precisely, the Middle Indo-Aryan (MIA) languages predominated. Indeed, from about the third to the first century B.C. these were the only languages in epigraphic use, and they continued to predominate for at least two centuries

3.1.2 The Prakrits of the Aśokan inscriptions

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Grammatical descriptions: E. Hultzsch, *Inscriptions of Aśoka*, lvi–cxxxi; J. Bloch, *Les Inscriptions d'Asoka*, 43–88.

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In general, the Prakrits of the Aśokan inscriptions (see 4.³.1.1) represent an early stage of development of MIA, in which, for example, the voicing and elision of intervocalic consonants are only occasional and sporadic, and some archaic features are preserved which are lost in later Prakrits, such as *ātmanepada* verb forms of the present tense (e.g., *karote*, Girnār IX.1–3) and the present participle (*vijinamane* [*sic*], Kālsī XIII.36). Moreover, the resolution of consonantal groups by assimilation or epenthesis (*svarabhakti*) is less advanced, especially in the western and northwestern dialects, than in later literary and inscriptional Prakrits. In these respects, then, the Aśokan Prakrits on the whole (and especially the western dialect of the Girnār and Bombay-Sopārā rock edicts) more closely resemble Pāli than any other of the literary forms of MIA.

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Overall, the Aśokan inscriptions can be said to comprise three main dialects:² the eastern, the western, and the northwestern.

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² Some writers, e.g., Sukumar Sen (*A Comparative Grammar of Middle Indo-Aryan* [Poona: Linguistic Society of India, 1960], 10–11), posit a fourth dialect, the "Middle Eastern," for some of the rock edicts. But on the whole it is preferable to consider the languages of these texts, which show a mixture of eastern and western characteristics, as essentially the eastern dialect with sporadic admixture of westernisms, rather than as a distinct dialect.

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3.1.2.1 The eastern Aśokan dialect

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Among the three Aśokan dialects the eastern dialect³ clearly predominates, as it was the local language of the imperial capital at Pāṭaliputra (whence it is sometimes referred to as the "Chancellery Language"). The original versions of the edicts were drawn up in this dialect, to be translated later into the other dialects where deemed necessary. The majority of the Aśokan inscriptions, including all the pillar edicts and minor rock edicts (MRE),⁴ as well as the rock edicts at Kālsī, Dhaulī, Jaugaḍa, and Erraguḍi, are in this dialect, and in some of them it is obviously being used far beyond its original geographical range.

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³ For a specimen of this dialect see Appendix, no. 1 (Rummindeī minor pillar edict).

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⁴ Though some of the MREs, especially those in the south, show an admixture of western forms, e.g., in preferring *r* to *l*; see n. 2.

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The distinctive features of the eastern dialect include:

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1. The three sibilants of Sanskrit are represented by *s*.⁵
2. The dialect has only *l* for Sanskrit *r* and *l*; e.g., *lājā* = *rājā*.
3. The Sanskrit nasals *ñ*, *ṇ*, and *n* all become *n*.
4. Sanskrit *kṣ* becomes *kh*.
5. Consonantal groups are subject to resolution by *svarabhakti* more frequently than in the other dialects.

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⁵ Rock edicts X–XIII at Kālsī show all three sibilants used indiscriminately (e.g., X.27 has both *yaso* and *yaṣo* for Sanskrit *yaśas-*). Though this peculiarity has never been fully explained, it is evidently a matter of scribal confusion rather than a true dialect feature. The retroflex and palatal sibilants also occur occasionally in the minor rock edicts, sometimes with etymological justification (e.g., Maski 1. 2, *vaṣāni* = Skt. *varṣāṇi*).

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6. Final *-as* of Sanskrit (as in the nominative sing. masc. of noun stems in *a*-) becomes *-e*.
7. The locative sing. masc./neut. ends in *-si* (for *-ssi*).
8. The present participle *ātmanepada* often ends in *-mīna* (e.g., *pāyamīnā*, Delhi-Toprā V.8).

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The main features of this dialect—the predominance of *l*, the nominative masculine in *-e*, the loss of *ñ* and *ṇ*, and the sibilant *s*⁶—accord on the whole with the later literary Prakrit known as Ardha-Māgadhī, whence it has been called by Lüders and others⁷ “Old Ardha-Māgadhī.”

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3.1.2.2 The western Aśokan dialect

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The western dialect appears only in the rock edicts of Girnār and the Bombay-Sopārā fragments. Its characteristics include:

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1. The whose graphic peculiarities—particularly the absence of notation of vowel quantity—tend to obscure some of the features of the language. The principal distinctive features of the dialect include:

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1. The three sibilants are maintained, generally as in Sanskrit (but see also item 5).
2. Both *r* and *l* are retained as in Sanskrit.
3. The Sanskrit nasals *ñ*, *ṇ*, and *n* are retained.
4. Sanskrit *kṣ* is apparently retained in the form of a special character (𐨮; see 2.3.4), variously transliterated as *kṣ*, *ch*, *ch’*, and so on, whose precise phonetic value is uncertain.¹¹
5. Many consonantal clusters are retained, especially those with *r*; but the latter are frequently subject to metathesis, for example, in *dhrama* = *dharma* and *krama* = *karma*.¹² Special developments include *ṣy* > *ś* (e.g., *manuśa* = *manuṣya*, Shāhbāzgaṛhī II.4; cf. item 8) and *sv* and *sm* (in the locative sing. ending) > *sp* (e.g., *spagraṃ* = *svargam*, Shāhbāzgaṛhī VI.16).
6. Final *-as* in Sanskrit is represented by *-o* at Shāhbāzgaṛhī, but at Mānsehrā generally by *-e* (see later remarks).
7. The locative sing. ends in *-e* or *-spi* (<* *-smin*; cf. item 5).
8. The future tense affix is *-iśa-* (< *-iṣya-* [see item 5]; e.g., *vaḍhiśati* = *vardhiṣyati*, Shāhbāzgaṛhī IV.9).

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¹¹ H. W. Bailey (BSOAS 11, 1946, 774) suggests the pronunciations */ṭṣ/* or */ṭṣ’/*.

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¹² This metathesis was formerly thought by some (notably Senart; IA 21, 1892, 148–50) to represent merely an orthographic peculiarity of Aśokan Kharoṣṭhī, as seems to be the case with the reversed conjuncts noted in the Girnār Brāhmī inscriptions (see n. 9). But it has been pointed out by Grierson (JRAS 1913, 682–3) and others since him (see discussion and references in von Hinüber, *Das ältere Mittelindisch*, 28–9) that such metatheses are characteristic of the Dardic languages of the northwest to the present day, and that such forms in Aśokan (and in later Gāndhārī/Kharoṣṭhī) inscriptions therefore must reflect actual dialect features.

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The dialects of the two northwestern sets of rock edicts diverge in several respects, notably in the treatment of final *-as* noted earlier (item 6). Thus as the equivalent of Sanskrit *rājñaḥ* (genitive), Shāhbāzgaṛhī has *raño* but Mānsehrā *rajine*, reminiscent of the eastern form *lājine*. Some dialectal peculiarities of Mānsehrā have thus sometimes been dismissed as "Māgadhisms," but this may not be the case; later Gāndhārī/Kharoṣṭhī inscriptions also vary between *-o* and *-e* (CII 2.1, cxii–cxiii), and recent research into the historical grammar of Gāndhārī¹³ has shown that the notation of final vowels is highly inconsistent in Gāndhārī generally.¹⁴

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¹³ Notably G. Fussman, "Gāndhārī écrite, Gāndhārī parlée," 473 and 479–80.

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¹⁴ See also the comments of Brough in GD 115.

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All in all, the Aśokan inscriptions give a broad view of the dialect spectrum of MIA vernaculars in the third century B.C. But it must also be understood that they do not provide anything like a real dialect map of the time. For the geographical distribution of the dialects—especially of the eastern dialect—can hardly correspond with linguistic reality; the eastern dialect was obviously not the mother tongue of residents of the far north and the central south, though it was used for inscriptions (Kālsī, Erraguḍi, etc.) in those regions. Moreover, the languages as they are presented in the inscriptions are surely not exact renditions of the contemporary vernaculars. It has been suggested,¹⁵ for example, that such features as the retention of consonantal clusters reflect orthographic conservatism and the influence of Sanskrit, and that the actual stage of phonetic development of MIA in Aśoka's time could have been further advanced than it would seem from the inscriptions.

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¹⁵ See for example Senart, IA 21, 1892, 146–8.

3.1.3 Other inscriptions of the Mauryan era

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The scanty epigraphic remains of the Mauryan period other than the records of Aśoka (see 4.3.1.2) are all from the northeast, and most of them exhibit the typical Ardha-Māgadhī features of the "Chancellery Language" (-*e* for -*as*, *l* for *r*, *s* for all sibilants, etc.). Some of these inscriptions, notably Mahāsthān (SI I.79–80) and Sohgaurā (SI I.82–3), seem to reflect a more colloquial and/or archaic variety of this dialect.

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The Jogīmāṟā cave inscription (ASIAR 1903–4, 128–31) is the only one from any period preserving what seems to be pure Māgadhī, showing the sibilant *ś* instead of *s* (e.g., *śutanuka . . . devadāśikyi* = *sutanukā devadāsī*) besides the aforementioned characteristic features of Ardha-Māgadhī.¹⁶

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¹⁶ The Nāgārjunī hill inscriptions of Aśoka's grandson Daśaratha (SI I.77–8) have in some places the sibilant *ṣ*, e.g., in the king's name *daṣalatha*, and in others *s*. But this variation may not be dialectally significant; cf. the similar cases in Kālsī and some other Aśokan inscriptions noted previously (3.1.2.1. n. 5).

3.1.4 Later inscriptional Prakrits

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3.1.4.1 Inscriptions in the west-midland dialect

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After the Mauryan period there is a major shift in the linguistic features of the inscriptional Prakrits. The predominance of the eastern dialect of the Aśokan and other inscriptions of the Mauryan period ends abruptly; in fact, not a single inscriptional record in eastern dialect has been found from the post-Mauryan era. The dominant role in all regions except the northwest and Sri Lanka falls hereafter to a variety of Prakrit which most resembles, among the Aśokan dialects, the western dialect of the Girnār rock edicts, and which among literary languages has the most in common with Pāli and archaic forms of Śaurasenī. In other words, this dialect partakes of the typical characteristics of the western and central MIA languages: nominative singular masculine in *-o*, retention of Sanskrit *r* and *l*, predominance of the sibilant *s*, and so on.¹⁷ Like the Aśokan Prakrits, this central-western epigraphic Prakrit is still relatively archaic, with only occasional intervocalic voicing of unvoiced stops and elision of voiced stops. But unlike some of the Aśokan inscriptions, consonant groups from Sanskrit are nearly always assimilated.¹⁸

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¹⁷ For a specimen of this common epigraphic Prakrit, see Appendix, no. 3 (Bhārhut label inscriptions).

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¹⁸ An apparent exception is the Besnagar pillar inscription of Hēliodōros (Appendix, no. 2), which contains conjuncts such as *tr* (*putreṇa*, l. A–3) and *dr* (*bhāgabhadrasa*, l. A–6). But these examples would seem to fall into the category of early orthographic Sanskritisms (see 3.2.3.2) rather than of phonetic archaisms.

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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.¹⁹ 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 (SI I.213–21), while in the south it is abundantly attested in inscriptions from such sites as Nāgārjunakoṇḍa and Amarāvatī. This central-western MIA dialect was, in fact, virtually the sole language in epigraphic use in the period in question, and therefore seems, like Pāli, to have developed into something like a northern Indian lingua franca, at least for epigraphic purposes, in the last two centuries b.c.

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¹⁹ See the comments of Mehendale, HGIP, xxxvii.

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This is not to say that the inscriptions in this dialect, which Senart called “Monumental Prakrit,”²⁰ are totally devoid of local variations. On the contrary, we do occasionally find, in the southern inscriptions, for example, instances of the influence of the local (Dravidian) language, as in *ayira-haghāna* = *ārya-saṅghānām* at Nāgārjunakoṇḍa (*Āyaka*-pillar ins. C–2; SI I, 232, l. 10). There are also considerable variations in orthography, with inscriptions from the later part of the period in question, that is, those of about the third and fourth centuries a.d., showing an increasing precision, most notably in indicating geminate consonants which had hitherto almost always been represented by the corresponding single consonant (see examples cited in SIE 43–4). Stylistically too, there is a considerable range of variation, from the brief and unadorned style of the donative inscriptions from Buddhist *stūpa* sites such as Sāñcī and Bhārhut to the quasi-literary compositions of the Hāthīgumphā inscription of King Khāravela or the Nāsik inscription of the time of Vāsiṣṭhīputra Puḷumāvī (SI I.203–7). But all in all, the standard epigraphic or “Monumental” Prakrit can be treated as essentially a single language whose use spread far beyond its place of origin, and which should not be taken to represent the local vernacular of every region and period where it appears.²¹

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²⁰ IA 21, 1892, 258.

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²¹ For this reason, the methods of analysis followed by Mehendale in HGIP are misleading. His classification of Prakrit inscriptions of the post-Mauryan epoch into geographical groups (western, southern, central, and eastern) is valid only with reference to their findspots; but to trace separate linguistic developments within and influences among the various groups, as Mehendale does, is based on the misconception that each of them constitutes a distinct linguistic entity. As Senart showed in *Les Inscriptions de Piyadassi*, this is not the case, and most of the conclusions drawn by Mehendale concerning the trends and directions of phonetic and morphological change cannot be accepted. A definitive historical linguistic treatment of the post-Aśokan epigraphic Prakrit, bearing in mind the complientire question of the subdialects of Gandhari remains unanswered, due at least in part to the problems of the casual orthography which is characteristic of the Kharosthi/Gandhari inscriptions.

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3.1.4.2 Inscriptions in other MIA dialects

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3.1.4.2.1 *Gāndhārī

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Grammatical descriptions: S. Konow, CII 2.1, xcv–cxv; J. Brough, GD 55–118; G. Fussman, “Gāndhārī écrite, Gāndhārī parlée.”

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In the northwest and adjoining regions, inscriptions of the post-Mauryan era (see 4.3.2) continued to be written in essentially the same language as the Aśokan rock edicts from this area, that is, the MIA dialect which used to be referred to as “Northwestern Prakrit” but which is nowadays more commonly called “Gāndhārī,” following H. W. Bailey’s suggestion.²² The inscriptions in this language are invariably written in Kharoṣṭhī script and are virtually all Buddhist in content. They range in date from approximately the second century B.C. to the third or possibly fourth century A.

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*meridarkha* = μεριδάρχης; Swāt ins., CII 2.1, 4) and Saka (*erjhuṇa* = *alysānaile’ysānai*; Takht-i-bāhī ins., l. 5, CII 2.1, 62 and xcvii).

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The Kharoṣṭhī documents from central Asia (see 4.3.7.12) provide specimens of a separate dialect of Gāndhārī used far beyond its native region. These documents show that Gāndhārī became the official language of the Indianized kingdom of Shan-shan or Kroraina in the southeastern Tarim basin in about the third century a.d. (cf. 2.3.1 and 2.3.2). This “Niya Prakrit” or “Kroraina Prakrit,” which was analyzed in detail by T. Burrow in *The Language of the Kharoṣṭhi Documents from Chinese Turkestan*, agrees on the whole fairly closely with the language of the post-Aśokan Gāndhārī inscriptions from India,²⁵ but also differs from Indian Gāndhārī in several significant particulars, such as the following:

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²⁵ See also Burrow, “The Dialectal Position of the Niya Prakrit” (see n. 10), 419–35 (esp. 423–5); and recently, Colette Caillat, “Connections Between Asokan (Shahbazgarhi) and Niya Prakrit?” IIJ 35, 1992, 109–19.

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1. Certain phonetic tendencies, such as a confusion between voiced and unvoiced consonants (more pronounced than in Indian Gāndhārī), and particularly a tendency to deaspirate Indic aspirates, apparently reflecting the phonetic structure of the (unattested) local dialect (Burrow, *Language*, 5 and 9).
2. The loss of distinction between endings for the nominative and accusative endings. The ending is generally *-a*, in both the singular (<*-e* according to Burrow, “The Dialectal Position,” 421 and 424) and the plural (presumably for *-ā*).
3. The use of an ending *-tu* for the second person singular of all tenses of the verb; for example, *labhiśatu* ‘you will get’. According to Burrow (*Language*, 43), this is “probably taken from the 2nd person of the pronoun.”
4. The development of a periphrastic construction for the preterite active, consisting of the past participle plus the personal endings of the present, except for the third-person singular where the ending is omitted; for example, *triṭhemi* = *\*dṛṣṭaḥ* + *-mi* ‘I saw’; *taḍita* = *\*tāḍitaḥ* ‘he beat’ (*Language*, 50–3).
5. The frequent use of the infinitive in *-amnae* (also occasionally found in Indian Gāndhārī; Burrow, *Language*, 49); for example, *karamnae* ‘to do’.
6. The frequent use of postpositions not found in other MIA dialects, such as *prace* ‘concerning’ (<*\*pratyayam*) and *vamti* ‘to, with’ (<*upānte*; *Language*, 42).
7. The extensive use of loanwords from various non-Indic languages, especially from Iranian languages (*Language*, vii–viii), from the local “Krorainic” language which apparently was closely related to Tocharian (*Language*, viii–ix), and occasionally from Greek (e.g., *milima* = μέδιμνος; *Language*, 111).

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3.1.4.2.2 *Sinhalese Prakrit

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Grammatical descriptions: S. Paranavitana, *Inscriptions of Ceylon*, I.xxvii–xlv; Wilhelm Geiger and D. B. Jayatilaka in Jayatilaka et al., eds., *A Dictionary of the Sinhalese Language* (Colombo: The Royal Asiatic Society, Ceylon Branch, 1935), I.1, xxiv–xxvii; Saddhamangala Karunaratne, *EZ* 7, 39–44.

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The language of the Old Sinhalese or Sinhalese Prakrit inscriptions of about the third century b.c. to the third or fourth century a.d. (see 4.3.7.1) is characterized by several unusual phonological features. Palatal *ś* generally predominates over the other sibilants, but Sanskrit sibilants also are frequently reflected by *h*. Sanskrit aspirates are generally represented by the corresponding nonaspirates (e.g., *dama* = *dharma*), but *jh* regularly replaces *j* (e.g., *rajha* = *rājā*; Paranavitana, xxxi; Karunaratne, 9). Otherwise, consonants in intervocalic position are generally preserved as in Sanskrit, though they are often subjected to voicing. Long vowels are commonly shortened, though according to some authorities this is merely a graphic device (Geiger and Jayatilaka, xxv–xxvi; contra, Paranavitana, xxviii).

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The morphology of Sinhalese Prakrit is on the whole not much different from that of the other old inscriptional Prakrits. The nominative singular ends in *-e* and the genitive in *-sa*, *-śa*, or *-ha*.²⁶ In these respects, as in others such as the predominance of the palatal sibilants, the dialect appears to have been influenced by the Māgadhī of the Buddhist missionaries sent to Sri Lanka from northeastern India in the Mauryan period (Geiger and Jayatilaka, op. cit., xx).

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²⁶ Due to the brevity and formulaic character of the Sinhalese Prakrit inscriptions, there is almost no material for the study of finite verb morphology; such few verb forms as do appear are nearly all participial.

3.1.5 Literary Middle Indo-Aryan in inscriptions

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3.1.5.1 The literary Prakrits

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The standardized literary Prakrits (mainly Māhārāṣṭrī, sometimes also Śaurasenī and Māgadhī) were occasionally employed in inscriptions of the medieval era,²⁷ either in independent Prakrit inscriptions or within Sanskrit inscriptions. The outstanding example of an independent literary Prakrit inscription is an inscription of the eleventh century a.d. at Dhār consisting of two “centuries” (actually 109 verses each) of Māhārāṣṭrī verses in praise of the tortoise *avatāra* (*avanikūrmaśatam*) (EI 8, 241–60; cf. 4.1.8). Not surprisingly, Prakrit was also sometimes used for Jaina inscriptions, most notably the Ghaṭayāla inscription (JRAS 1895, 513–21), which is composed almost entirely of Āryā verses in Māhārāṣṭrī.

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²⁷ This is of course a purely literary phenomenon, historically unrelated to the use of the MIA vernaculars in early inscriptions.

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The literary Prakrits also occur in the inscriptional dramas (see 4.1.8 and 7.2.2.2.2), where they play their usual role as the language spoken by the lesser characters; thus we find specimens of Māhārāṣṭrī and Śaurasenī in the *Pārijātamañjarī-nāṭikā* at Dhār and the *Harakeli-nāṭaka* at Ajmer, and of these dialects plus Māgadhī in the *Lalitavigraharāja-nāṭaka*, also from Ajmer. Occasionally a Prakrit verse is also included in an ordinary Sanskrit inscription, for instance, verse 12 (in Māhārāṣṭrī) of the Vārāṇasī copper plate inscription of Karṇa (SI II.340).²⁸

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²⁸ For other examples of literary Prakrit together with other languages, see section 3.6.

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3.1.5.2 Pāli

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Inscriptions in canonical Pāli²⁹ from India proper are relatively rare. Those examples which do occur are usually Buddhist inscriptions of cultic content (cf. 4.1.7), such as the two Sārnāth stone inscriptions (EI 9, 291–3) recording the “Four Noble Truths” and the “Buddhist creed.” Other Indian inscriptions in Pāli or closely related dialects include the *Pratītya-samutpāda* formulae on the Devnīmorī casket and in a Ratnagiri inscription.³⁰

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²⁹ It should be noted that in some early (and even some more recent) epigraphic publications the term “Pāli” has been inaccurately used to refer to various other MIA dialects.

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³⁰ See O. von Hinüber, “Epigraphical Varieties of Continental Pāli from Devnimori and Ratnagiri,” in *Buddhism and Its Relation to Other Religions* [for full reference see Index of Inscriptions Cited s.v. Devnīmorī], 185–200 for these and for references to other Pāli inscriptions.

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Unlike in India, Pāli inscriptions are found in large numbers in some Buddhist countries of Southeast Asia, especially Burma and Thailand, and also in smaller numbers in Sri Lanka and Cambodia (see 4.3.7.1 and 4.3.7.5–4.3.7.7).

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