TRACING VEDIC DIALECTS - People.fas.harvard.edu

Gujarat, then the occasional intrusion of a peculiar trait of KpS/PB I into the
other Gujarati traditions (MS, PS, ŚS) would not be too surprising.
Even the singular Nepalese case can perhaps be explained in the same way.
There existed, just as with Kashmir, a connection in trade and religious
affairs between Gujarat and Nepal. A 13th-century MS from Nepal mentions
in its colophona a brāhmaṇo Gurjaradeśād āgataḥ; the Jainas, too, seem to
have had some relation with Nepal. 185 It may be that some such Brahmin
brought with him the Paddhati concerned; Vāj. texts have indeed existed in
Gujarat since at least the 6th cent. AD. 186
To sum up: the early development of this trait is noticeable with the
Kapiṣṭhalas; the pronunciation spread, well before the end of the Vedic
period, to the neighbouring Kauthuma school and its late Vedic Brāhmaṇa
text, PB. 187
It is only in medieval Gujarat (the probable habitat of the Kap. school) that
the substitutional cluster -ym- sporadically influenced other texts as well.
Note that the occurrences of -ym- in these texts (PS, ŚS, MS, MŚS, KauśS) are
very sporadic. That the other texts were indeed influenced is explainable by
the particular state of affairs in Gujarat with regard to the transmission of
the Veda by, among some 100 other Vaidika and non-Vaidik Brahmin
groups, the Moḍhas who are Cāturvedins. 188
This example is useful as a warning post; occurrence of a particular trait in
a number of texts may not indiscriminately be taken as a Vedic development.
Every peculiarity of this sort must be investigated, both comparatively and
historically, down to the Middle Ages and sometimes beyond. This underlines
the necessity of studying the transmission of the various texts more closely
than it has been done thus far. 189
Excursus:
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185
Cf. also E.Bender, "The Nepal Connection," forthc. (Lecture at the Int. Conference-
Seminar of Nepalese Studies, organised by S. Lienhard at Stockholm, June 1987)
186
See the copper plate inscr., cf. author, Beitr.z. Südasienforsch. 104.
187
Cf. also the similar development of intervocalic -j- > -y- in the Caraka school, acc. to VS
Prāt., 4.163 sqq., cf. StII 8/9, p.209.
188
See StII, and Beitr.z. S. As. forsch. 104.
189
For the whole question, see Wack.I §188, Ved. Var. II §192.
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