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indic-indx.htm
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indic-indx.htm
1. Asokan Brahmi - the phonetic script - asok.htm - update?
from CORPUS INSCRIPTIONUM INDICARUM, Vol 1, Inscriptions of Asoka
- by A. Cunningham, 1877 .
2.
The Edicts of King Asoka
- Asoka-edicts.htm
by Ven. S. Dhammika, The Wheel Publication No.
386/387, Buddhist Publication Society,
3. Devanagari, for comparison to Pal-Myan -
deva.htm (link chk 160120)
4. Bengali, for comparison to Bur-Myan - bing.htm (link
chk 160120)
5. Tamil, for comparison to Mon-Myan - tami.htm (link
chk 160120)
6. Néwari, for comparison to Bur-Myan -
newar.htm (link chk 160121)
-
http://worldpubliclibrary.org/articles/newar_/_nepal_bhasa_language 160114
The pdf in TIL
SD-Library
-
Cunningham-Asoka-inscrip<Ô> /
bkp<Ô> (link chk 160124)
UKT 140607: Though Bur-Myan (Burmese speech written in Myanmar akshara, is not an Indic script, because it is directly related to Asokan and because I know it so well, I will take many examples from it. I have struck-through many a word in the Unicode text and have inserted a more appropriate word in its place.
The following South Asian scripts are
described in this chapter:
• Devanagari • Bengali • Gurmukhi
• Gujarati • Oriya • Tamil
• Telugu • Kannada • Malayalam
• Sinhala • Tibetan • Limbu
(p.217, pdf 2/47)
The scripts of South Asia share so
many common features that a side-by-side
comparison of a few will often reveal
structural similarities even in the
modern letterforms. With minor historical
exceptions, they are written from left
to right. They are all abugidas
[aka aksharas basis of which
is the syllable. ] in which most
glyphs symbols stand
for a consonant plus an
inherent vowel (usually the
sound /a/ [likened to the English
short vowel <a> /æ/]. [UKT ¶]
UKT: Each akshara glyph is a syllable. e.g.
{ka.} is pronounceable: it has IPA pronunciation /ka/
{pa.} is pronounceable: it has IPA pronunciation /pa/
The reason why
{ta.} and its many variations some of which are not understood by many philologists.
From these syllables a word is formed, e.g.
{pak} 'to throw water'. The word which is also a syllable has the canonical structure of CVÇ, where C is the onset consonant (described below as word-initial), V the nucleus or peak vowel, and Ç the coda consonant which has lost its inherent vowel. It is sometimes described as the word-final.
{a.þût} -->
Notice the "flag" on coda,
{k} showing the /a/ of
Word-initial vowels in many of these scripts have distinct symbols [when they are called vow-let (vowel letter)], and word-internal vowels are usually written by juxtaposing a vowel sign in the vicinity of the affected consonant. Absence of the inherent vowel, when that occurs, is frequently marked with a special sign. [UKT ¶]
UKT: When there is no initial consonant, i.e. C = 0, the structure of the word becomes, VÇ. In which case V is described as in the above para as "Word-initial vowel".
In the Unicode Standard, this sign is
denoted by the Sanskrit word
virāma. In some languages
another designation is preferred. In Hindi,
for example, the word hal refers
to the character itself, and halant
refers to the consonant that has its
inherent vowel killed suppressed
; in Tamil, the word puḷḷi
is used. The virama sign nominally serves
to kill suppress the
inherent vowel of the consonant to which
it is applied; it is a combining character,
with its shape varying from script to
script.
Most of the scripts of South Asia, from
north of the Himalayas to Sri Lanka in
the south, from Pakistan in the west to
the easternmost islands of Indonesia,
are derived from the ancient Asokan
Brahmi script. The oldest
lengthy inscriptions of India, the edicts
of Ashoka from the third century BEC,
were written in two scripts, Kharoshthi
and Asokan Brahmi .
[UKT ¶]
These are both ultimately of Semitic
origin, probably deriving from Aramaic,
which was an important
administrative language of the Middle
East at that time. [UKT ¶]
UKT 140607: Though I have no comment on Kharoshthi, I strongly disagree on Asokan. Many scholars under the influence of the Western philologists are Eurocentric. Many of their theories were based on a time when the West was swallowing up India and Myanmarpré (then known as Burma). They, especially the English (not all British are English) were trying to justify their colonial policy as a "civilizing" influence to supplant the religions and languages of India and Myanmarpré. To them Myanmarpré has to be "liberated" from its rulers. I maintain that Indic languages were Tib-Bur (Tibeto-Burman), long before the Westerners (Brahmin-Poannas included) had tried to destroy our religions (including Buddhism) and our languages. Asokan was a product of Indian rishis or sages. Even the peoples are descended from Homo Erectus and not Homo Sapiens. Recent archeological evidence from the Pondaung-Ponya area on the border of India and Myanmarpré is pointing to our area as the original homeland of a least a part of the human race. See Prehistory -- prehist-indx.htm (link chk 140607)
Kharoshthi, written from right to
left, was supplanted by Asokan
Brahmi and its
derivatives. The descendants of
Asokan Brahmi
spread with myriad changes throughout
the [Indian} subcontinent, [South-east Asia]
and outlying islands. There are said
to be some 200 different scripts
deriving from it. [UKT ¶]
By the eleventh century, the modern script (p217end-p218begin) known as Devanagari was in ascendancy in India proper as the major script of Sanskrit literature. This northern branch includes such modern scripts as Bengali, Gurmukhi, and Tibetan; the southern branch includes scripts such as Malayalam and Tamil. [UKT ¶]
UKT 140607, 160131: Unicode has failed to note the different linguistic groups to which the Indic scripts belong: Bengal and Tibetan are Tib-Bur (Tibeto-Burman), Hindi and Sanskrit are IE (Indo-European), and Tamil and Telugu are Aus-Asi (Austro-Asiatic). Their speeches are very different because their vowel systems are different. They seem to use different sets of vocal muscles (shown below) to articulate them. Some speeches are rhotic and some are non-rhotic, and some are hissing sibilant and some are non-hissing thibilant. Some have inflexions, tense and number, but some like Bur-Myan have no inflexion, no tense, and no number. Yet they can be related to each other because of their phonemic nature - a fact used by the Buddhist emperor Asoka of Magadha kingdom of the Magadha Mahajanapada 'the foot-hold of Magadha culture' to bring harmony among his many subjects speaking different speeches aka spoken languages. From it I have coined the motto: speech divides, script unite -- Asokan
Brahmiscript was the unifying script in the Indian subcontinent during the reign of the Buddhist emperor Asoka the Great. And its direct descendant the Myanmar script is the unifying script of various ethnics living in Myanmarpré.
The major official scripts of India proper,
including Devanagari [according to
Brahmin-Poannas it is the script used by
the Deva-gods in their capital - what a
tall claim!], are all encoded according
to a common plan, so that comparable
characters are in the same order and
relative location. This structural
arrangement, which facilitates
transliteration to some degree, is
based on the Indian national standard
(ISCII) encoding for these scripts, and
makes use of a virama
{a.þût}. Sinhala has a
virama-based model, but is not
structurally mapped to ISCII. [UKT ¶]
UKT 160131: Pali is an artificial language formed from Old Magadhi-Asokan and Sihala to serve the Theravada Buddhists, by the Asokan Buddhist missionaries to the island from the Magadha Mahajanapada. The Buddhist missionaries were headed by the son and daughter of Asoka. The present day Pali spoken in Myanmarpré is the Old Magadhi brought over from Magadha Mahajanapada by King Abiraza who first formed the kingdom of Tagaung in northern Myanmarpré and who predates the Gautama Buddha by thousand of years, and by the blood-relatives of the Buddha fleeing the wrath of Prince (king) Viḍūḍabha who dethroned his father King Pasenadi of the kingdom of Kosala.
Tibetan stands apart, using a subjoined consonant model for conjoined consonants, reflecting its somewhat different structure and usage. The Limbu script makes use of an explicit encoding of syllable-final consonants. Many of the character names in this group of scripts represent the same sounds, and naming conventions are similar across the range.
-- UKT 130613
Mnemonic
The Doggie Tale:
Little doggie cringe in fear -- ŋ (velar),
Seeing Ella's flapping ears -- ɲ (palatal)
And, the Shepard's hanging rear -- ɳ (retroflex).
Doggie so sad he can't get it out
What's that Kasha क्ष when there's a Kha ख ?
And when there's Jana ज्ञ
what I am to do with Jha झ?
On top of all there're hissers, Sha श /ʃ/ and Ssa ष /s/,
when I am stuck with Theta स /θ/ !"
Note to digitizer: you can copy and
paste the following:
Ā ā Ē ē Ī ī Ō ō Ū ū
Ḍ ḍ Ḥ ḥ Ḷ ḷ Ḹ
ḹ Ṁ ṁ Ṃ ṃ
Ṅ ṅ
Ñ ñ Ṇ ṇ Ṛ ṛ Ṝ ṝ
Ś ś Ṣ ṣ Ṭ ṭ ɕ ʂ
• Instead of Skt-Dev ः {wic~sa.} use "colon" :
• Avagraha ऽ use apostrophe
• Root sign √ ; approx ≅
• Dev: च «ca» छ «cha» श
ś [ɕ] /ʃ/ ; ष ṣ [ʂ] /s/; स s [s] /θ/ ;
ऋ {iRi.} & ॠ {iRi},
viram ् , rhotic ऋ ृ
• Skt-Dev special phonemes: Ksa
• Undertie in Dev transcription: ‿ U203F
• IPA-, Pali- & Sanskrit nasals: ŋ ṅ ṅ , ñ ñ , ɳ ṇ ṇ, n n n , m m m
Pali- & Skt {þé:þé:ting}: aṁ , aṃ
BHS - Ṃ ṃ Ṇ ṇ
• IPA symbols: ɑ ɒ ə ɛ ɪ ɯ ʌ ʊ ʃ ʧ ʤ θ ŋ ɲ ɳ
ɴ ɔ ɹ ʔ /kʰ/ /ː/
<church> /ʧɜːʧ/ (DJPD16-097)
<success> /sək'ses/ (DJPD16-515)
<thin> /θɪn/ (DJPD16-535), <thorn> /θɔːn/
(DJPD16-535)
circumflex-acute :
ấ U+1EA5 , ế U+1EBF
upsilon-vrachy ῠ
small-u-breve ῠ ŭ
Go back Dog-tale-note-b
End of TIL file