TRACING VEDIC DIALECTS - People.fas.harvard.edu

Thus, while the Mantras had already reached a shaky equilibrium and a
certain sanctity, their explanations were developed gradually, to be collected
and codified at first in the extant YV Saṃhitās. There they take the form of
Brāhmaṇa style explanations and discussions (which are not to be confused
with the Brāhmaṇas, the next level of texts). The developments which
characterise the YV-Saṃh.s are: the complete loss of the injunctive as a living
category; the modi of the aorist (subjunctive, optative, imperative) disappear;
of those, only the inj. with mā and the precative remain. 57 Another
innovation is the development of periphrastic aorist forms, both for the aor.
ind. as, very rarely, for the aor. precative. These forms were so curious to
Pāṇini that he made a list of those he knew from the Vedic texts current in his
time and his area of North-Western India. 58
The many tales occuring in the YV-Saṃh.s are told in the imperfect only.
The imperfect expresses, as it is well known, the past action longer separated
from the time of the narrator, while the aor. expresses the immediate past
(just as taught by Pāṇini, 3.2110 sqq.).
§ 4.3.4. BRĀHMAṆA PROSE.
This level of texts comprises the Brāhmaṇas proper, i.e., those of the RV,
YV, SV and AV. Actually, it should be divided into two sub-levels, that of the
earlier and that of the later Brāhmaṇas. On the other hand, the older
Upaniṣads (like BAU, ChU, JUB) should be included here, as well as the
Vādhūla-Anvākhyānas and some of the oldest Śrauta Sūtras, like
Baudhāyana, Vādhūla, and parts of the ŚŚS and JSS. The exact classification
of all of these texts is still a problem, one which has largely been unnoticed.
One should, perhaps, establish yet another sub-level for the Anu-
Brāhmaṇas. Among these are the Vādh.Br (Anvākhyāna), the Gopatha-Br.
(as Anubr. of the lost Paipp.Br.), and the later parts of the KaṭhB, which has
come down to us only in fragments.
Typical for the Brāhmaṇa level of texts is the complete loss of the
periphrastic aorist, interesting in view of Pāṇini's (relative) date.
Compounds like yat-kāma- "having a particular wish" occur for the first
time, and adverbs like sāyam "in the evening" are used as a base to form new
57 No modi of aor., only precative: K.Hoffmann, Aufs., p.469, 502, 587.
58 On the periphr. aor., see K.Hoffmann, p. 469 ann. 5; Pāṇ.'s collection is important for his
date post quem, for he lived after the period of the YV Saṃh.prose; for his lower limit, see
below, ann. 102, 358.
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