An Encyclopaedia of Indian Archaeology v1.c25.s4.13

v1.c25.s4.13

The Indus inscriptions, according to the Soviet scholars, have certain specific combinations which occur only in Dravidian languages. On the basis of positionalstatistical analysis of the texts of the Indus inscriptions they have divided them into ‘blocks corresponding to definite grammatical units (words and word-combinations)’ (Knorozoy, in Alekseev *et al.*, 1965; Pande, 1969; Knorozov, *et al.*, 1970; Pande, 1973) by establishing ‘the relationship of the formal structure of the Proto-Indian inscriptions with facts of Dravidian morphology’ (Gurov in Knorozov *et al.*, 1970; Pande, 1973, p. 24). The blocks consist of set, semivariant and variant signs. While the set signs are for the root part of the word and contain morphemic signs, syllabic signs, sound confirmations or phonetic complements and root determinatives, the semivariants are used as attributes, usually an adjective or a numeral. The variant signs at the end of the block stand for suffixes—word-forming and word-changing. The inscriptions consist of main blocks and additional main blocks which are syntactically complete and abbreviated inscriptions. The main blocks consist of nouns often accompanied by adjectives and numerals which occupy the position of semivariants at the beginning of the block, and a noun without suffixes occurring before another noun performs the function of an adjective. Like other ancient systemes of writing, homonyms were used in Indus script ‘for conveying the meaning of concepts which were difficult or impossible of depiction, and also for reducing the total number of signs (Knorozov *et al.*, 1970; Pande, 1973) and there are purely phonetic signs as well. On the basis of analysis, the Soviet scholars have divided the inscriptions as sacrificial inscriptions which carry names of gods and names of constellations; protective inscriptions containing names of gods and names of owner of the seal and explanations about him; temple inscriptions and nominal inscriptions (Knorozov *et al.*, 1970; Pande, 1973).