On the minimality of Panini’s Sivasutras

Abstract

Panini’s grammar of Sanskrit is acknowledged to be the culmination point of ancient Indian grammar. It starts with 14 sutras, the so-called Sivasutras. Each single sutra consists of a sequence of sounds which ends in a marker consonant, the so-called anubandha. Together the Sivasutras define a linear order on the sounds of Sanskrit. In the main part of his grammar, Panini uses sound-anubandha pairs (pratyaharas) in order to designate sound classes. Such a pair denotes the continuous sequence of sounds in the interval between the sound and the anubandha. Therefore the order of the Sivasutras must be such that a class of sounds which is needed to formulate a phonological rule forms an interval which ends immediately before an anubandha.

There is a longstanding debate on how Panini developed the Sivasutras and whether he arranged the sounds in the best way possible. Since Panini invented and refined many techniques to improve the compactness of grammatical descriptions, it is commonly agreed on that he aimed at minimizing the length of the Sivasutras. Based on a formal argument it will be shown that there is no shorter solution than the Sivasutras to the problem of ordering the sounds of Sanskrit in a linear, by markers interrupted list with as few repeated sounds as possible such that each sound class which is denoted by a sound-marker pair in Panini’s grammar can be represented by a pratyahara. The argument is based on a strictly set-theoretical point of view depending only on the set of sound classes. It is so general that it allows one to decide for each set of sets whether it can be represented with Panini’s method.

Speaker

Wiebke PETERSEN, Heinrich-Heine University, Düsseldorf, Germany

Organisers

Department of Indology, French Institute of Pondicherry

Venue

Jawaharlal Nehru Conference Hall, French Institute of Pondicherry, 11, Saint Louis Street, Pondicherry - 605 001

Time

3.00 pm