Pali Literature and Language c3: Preface

Pāli Literature and Language c3

Language: English

Preface

c3.1

The following English version of Professor Geiger's "Pāli Literatur und Sprache" offers more than the German original, for much new material, supplied by Professor Geiger himself, has been incorporated into it. Professor Geiger also secured the permission of the German Publishers.

c3.2

I distinctly remember that at the first lecture on Pāli I attended at the Munich University I was taught the Law of Mora, the cornerstone of Pāli Phonology. My astonishment, therefore, can be well imagined when I discovered that many of the Czars of Pāli in India have never even heard of this law! It is all the more remarkable, because Professor Geiger's work is well known in our University and is in fact one of the text-books prescribed for M.A. students in Pāli. On account of the language difficulty, however, our students have not hitherto been able to make full use of it. There was thus a clear case for translating Professor Geiger's work into English.

c3.3

The translation was completed on 29th June, 1937. But the Calcutta University Press, always busy with a thousand things, could not pay undivided attention to printing it. Hence the inordinate delay in bringing out this translation, which at least some students of Pāli are anxiously waiting for.

c3.4

In references to Prose texts, line too has been given throughout; thus A.I.2³ = Aṅguttara-Nikāya, vol. I, p. 2, l. 3.

c3.5

My thanks are due first of all to Professor Geiger, my honoured teacher and my teacher's teacher. I am grateful also to Professors Suniti Kumar Chatterji, Prabodh Chandra Bagchi, Sailendra Nath Mitra and Beni Madhab Barua for the interest they evinced in this translation.

c3.6

31st December, 1942.

c3.7

BATAKRISHNA GHOSH

Linked texts (1)

Aṅguttaranikāya — Pāli