34 Structure and themes of Panini’s Ashtadhyayi

Before going on to an alternative arrangement of the sutras as found in the Siddhanta-Kaumudi of Bhattoji or the short version, the Laghu- Siddhānta-Kaumudi of Varadarāja, let’s take a look at the general structure and arrangement of themes in the Ashtadhyayi itself (assuming that there is some method in the madness!).

According to Ram Nath Sharma (Vol.I, p.74 onwards, see the References Page), the method in Panini’s arrangement is to group sutras in domains, so as to mark off the range of action of particular directions. He sees another motivation in this, that of developing a metatheory, which to me is seems a bit obscure as a concept. The thematic content is arranged as follows according to Sharma:

Book I:
(a) major definitions and interpretational rules
(b) rules dealing with extensions (atideśa)
(c) rules dealing with ātmanepada nad parasmaipada
(d) rules dealing with the kāraka’s

Book II
(a) rules dealing with compounds
(b)  rules deletion with nominal inflection
(c) rules dealing with number and gender of nouns
(d) rules dealing with replacements relative to roots
(e) rules dealing with deletion by LUK

Book III
(a) rules dealing with roots ending in affixes saN, etc.
(b) rules dealing with derivation of items ending in a Kŗt
(c) rules dealing with derivation of items ending in a tiŊ (basically, verb forms)

And thus it goes on. So basically, the definitions of terms (called saɱjña) and many of the metarules – the conventions about technical terms and operants – is contained in the first quarter of Book I. Because of the “dominance of the terms”, Sharma says that Book I is labeled as saɱjñādhikāra, ‘domain of names’.

One issue with this separation of terms and applications is that we will have to bring together sutras from far corners to make sense. In the last article, I suggested that if we have defined a vŗddham (a word having a long vowel ā or diphthong ai, au as the first of its vowels), it would be nice if we immediately came upon a note at least alluding to its applications. This the grammar does not furnish (no doubt because of the aphoristic character of Panini’s work, essential to fix the sutras in the mind with least difficulty), and it is the commentator who has to supply these cross-references. The sutras are like bare formulae, and the whole exercise of studying them is to remember the cross-references, exceptions and conflicts, prohibitions and hierarchies or orders of precedence in the subsequent applications.

Further discussion on the structure will not make much sense until we have gone through more of the chapters: it will be like those scientific definitions of a common object which fail to strike a bell, but which become obvious once the answer is revealed (this characterizes certain exaggeratedly scholastic works). We will next proceed to the Laghu version of Varadarāja, and see where that leads.

33 Words with long vowels: vŗddham

Before wrapping up Part 1 (Pāda 1) of the first book (adhyāya), let us just look at the final sutras that we summed up in the last post:

1.1.73 vŗddhir yasyācām ādistadvŗddham
Parsing of words:

vŗddhih (1/1, nominative singular: ‘long vowels, vŗddhi’) yasya (6/1, genitive, singular: ‘whose’)  acām (6/3. Genitive, plural: ‘of the vowels, aC’) ādih (1/1, nominative singular: ‘initial, first’) tad (1/1” ‘that’) vŗddham (1/1)

Paraphrase (vŗtti):

Acām (of the vowels, aC) madhye (in the midst of) yasya (whose) vŗddhi-samjñaka (a vŗddhi letter) ādi-bhūtah (first occurring)  tat śabda-rūpam (that word-form) vŗddha- samjñam (a vŗddha-term) bhavati (is).

That is, a word in which a vŗddhi letter (a long vowel ā or diphthong ai or au, see Post 2 here) occurs as the first of its vowels (aC, see the Pratyahara page here), is called a vŗddham. This technical term, or samjñam, is given for convenience in other rules.

Sharma (Vol.2, p. 73):
“That item, the first of whose vowels is a vŗddhi, is termed vŗddha”.

Vasu (Vol.1, p.66):
“That word, among the vowels of which the first is a vŗddhi, is called vŗddham”.

These words may come to have the said vŗddhi letter as a result of a rule application or derivation (tad-bhāvita), or by itself (a- tadbhāvita). Examples of the former (derived forms) include aupagavah, aupagavīyah from upagu, a name. Examples of the latter (naturally occurring) are the words śālīyah (‘that which pertains to a house, śālā’),  and mālīyah (‘that which is found in a garland, mālā’), where the vŗddhi letter ā is already contained. These forms are derived as per sutra 4.2.115, and will come in handy in other rules.

The next is:
1.1.74 tyadādīni ca

Parsing:
Tyad- ādīni (1/3, nominative plural: ‘tyat and following words’) ca (0, particle: ‘and’).
(vŗddham, by anuvŗtti, ellipsis, from #73)

The import is:
Tyad-ādīni (tyat and following) śabda-rūpāņi (word-forms) vŗddha- samjñāni ( vŗddha-terms)  bhavanti (are) ca (also).

Sharma (Vol.2, p.74) gives the list of ‘tyad etc.’, which are a part of the sarvādīni (sarva and following) words that were defined as sarvanāman (‘pronoun’), see post 16 here. Some of these are reproduced below, along with the forms derived by rule based on their being defined as vŗddha words (without having a vŗddhi letter as the first among their vowels).

Tyad ‘he, she, it’ → tyadīyam ‘his, etc.’
Tad ‘he, that’ → tadīyam ‘his’
Etat ‘this’ → etadīyam ‘this one’s’
Idam ‘this’ → → idamīyam ‘this one’s’
Adas ‘that’ → adasīyam ‘that one’s’
Yuşmad ‘you’ → tvadīyam ‘yours’
Asmad ‘I’ → → asmadīyam ‘mine’
Bhavat ‘you (polite)’ → bhavadīyah ‘yours (polite)’
Kim ‘what, who’ → kimīyam ‘whose’

The final sutra of part 1 (the first Foot or Quarter, Pāda) of Book 1 is the following:

1.1.75 eŋ prācām deśe
(yasyācām ādistadvŗddham from #73)

This says that
eŋ (1/1, nominative singular: ‘the letters e, o’) yasya ācām (‘of whose vowels’) ādih (‘first’) tat (‘that’) prācām (6/3, possessive, singular: ‘of eastern’) deśe (7/1, locative, singular: ‘in a country’) vŗddha- samjñam (termed vŗddha) bhavati (‘is’).

This extends the vŗddha definition to eastern place-names, that have –e- or –o- as the first of the vowels, rather than the vŗddhi vowels ā or ai, au. Examples include

bhojakața → bhojakațīyah ‘a resident of Bhojakața’

Presumably, these formations will be altered if the place is not in the eastern country. Perhaps a resident of Roma would be a romakah, not a romīyah!

Having worked valiantly through the entire first Pāda, I propose to make a diversion by taking up one of the variations, the Siddhanta-kaumudi of Bhattoji Dikshita or even the light version, the Laghu-siddhanta-kaumudi of Vardaraja. There are at least two incentives to do this. One is to see whther there are alternate arrangements of the ideas presented in the sutras ((and obviously there are); for instance, why doesn’t Panini put the sutras dealt with in this post right after the definition of vŗddhi (the first sutra, 1.1.1, to be exact)? It would be interesting to see what the other authors do: indeed, it will be seen that Panini’s first sutra is not the first sutra in their alternative arrangements.

The second purpose is to re-discover the sutras of Panini’s first quarter, with a fresh insight due to the different sequencing of ideas. A related benefit would be to cover a lot of sutras from different parts of Panini’s work, which will hopefully give an accelerated view of the great grammarian’s opus, and make it that much more enlightening when we come back to Panini.

32 Form versus meaning: what terms represent

We now come upon another metarule, a rule about rules or a convention. This is

1.1.68 svam rūpam śabdasyāśabdasamgῆā

Parsing:

Svam (1/1, nominative singular: ‘own’), rūpam (1/1: ‘form’),  śabdasya (6/1, genitive singular: ‘of a word’), ā-śabda-samgῆā (1/1: ‘not-word-technical term’)

A word occurring in the grammar denotes its form only, and not its meaning or synonyms; except when it is a technical term or name,  samgῆā, in which case it obviously refers to the thing denoted by that term, and not its form or shape. Note the extremely condensed way in which the last word – a phrase in itself – is built up.

In popular speech, a word has some meaning as it refers to a concrete thing or entity that may be referred to by other synonymous names.  This sutra is saying that we should not assume any such equivalence when we see words used in the grammar. Most words refer to some form or shape, rather than to a concrete thing as would be assumed in normal conversation.

Here’s the grammarians’ interpretation or Vŗtti (paraphrase):

Śāstre (‘in the treatise’) svam eva rūpam (‘own form only’) śabdasya grāhyam bodhyam pratyāyyam (‘the word’s significance’) bhavati (‘is’), na bāhyo (a)rthah (‘not any other meaning’) śabda-samgῆām varjayitva (‘technical terms excepted’).

In the above rendering, I have to admit that I have sort of glossed over the word-for-word translation. 

Sharma (Vol.II, p.68) just renders it as follows:

“A word other than one which is a technical term (samgῆā) of the grammar denotes its form only”.

Let’s see whether Vasu makes it any clearer:

“In this Grammar, when an operation is directed with regard to a word, the individual form of the word possessing meaning is to be understood, except with regard to a word which is a definition” (Vol.1, p.61).

Some examples from the literature are then provided. There is a sutra or rule 4.2.33 agner ḍhak. This denotes that after the word agni comes the suffix dhak or ḍhaK, a code or iT, which transforms the word to mean ‘whose deity is’: it makes the form āgneya, ‘belonging to agni’. The rule 1.1.68 says that the transformation will apply only to the specific word form agni, and not to its synonyms (fire). Other examples are given.

The book of explanations (vārttika) gives four exceptions to this principle, as follows. These are words ‘marked’ with the iT-markers S- (sit), P- (pit), J- (jit) and JH (jhit) (Sharma, p.69; Vasu, p.62). The words do not actually carry these letters, but are defined in a virtual manner to be so marked.  There is apparently no uniformity in the way these species behave in rules. One may represent themselves and their synonyms, in which case a rule may extend to their own form (sva-rūpa) as well as the synonyms; another may refer only to synonyms, not themselves. We will not go into these details; let us go forward to some of the subsequent developments.

1.1.69 aņudit savarņasya cāpratyayah

aņudit (1/1, nominative singular) savarņasya (6/1, genitive singular: ‘of similar letters’) ca a-pratyayah (1/1, nominative singular: ‘and not-an-affix’)

The first word is a compound, made up of the terms aņ and ut. The first aņ represents the letters from a to the marker Ņ in the Siva-sutras (look up the Page!). It may be noted that the marker Ņ occurs twice, and this sutra refers to the second of them: this covers the whole range of vowels (a to au) as well as the consonants h, y, v, r, and l. The second component ut or UT represents sounds marked with U. For instance, there is a set marked with U termed kU: these represent the set of velar stops, k kh g gha and ŋ, that is, k and its savarņa’s.

This is apparently an exception (or, one could say, an extension) of the rule 68 which said that a word represents only its own form. Here we are saying that a sound denoted by aŅ (the vowels from a to marker Ņ) will represent not only itself, but also similar letters (those sounded in similar fashion, including long and nasal versions). Further, letters marked by U will also denote all the savarna’s, and not just their own form (svam rūpam). Analogously, the other consonant series are termed cU, ṭU, tU, pU.

This extension does not include sounds which are added as affixes (pratyaya). Obviously, the rule-maker must take care to remember this caveat when formulating his rules!

Here’s one more extension:

1.1.70 taparastatkālasya

Parsing:

Ta-parah (1/1, nominative singular) tat-kālasya (6/1, genitive: ‘of that duuration’) (svam rūpam)

The first word ta-parah can be interpreted as ‘that which is followed by a T’ OR ‘that which follows a T’, a T being a marker (an iT). 

Sharma translates the Vŗtti as follows:

“A vowel followed by by t denotes sounds of the same duration” (p.71).

Vasu has:

“The letter which has t after or before it, besides referring to its own form, refers to those homogeneous letters which have the same prosodial length or time” (p.63). This is obviously a little more forthcoming than Sharma’s rendering!

Thus a form denotes at (aT) will include variants of a, like different tones, and nasalised, but not long a or extra-long a. If there were not the T (before or after the letter), however, all forms would be denoted, as per the preceding sutra about aŅ (see above).

Yet another explanation:

1.1.71 ādir antyena sahetā

Word parsing:

Ādih (1/1, nominative: ‘an initial item’) antyena (3/1, instrumental) saha (0: ‘with a final’) itā (3/1, instrumental: ‘with an iT’) (svam rūpam).

I’m not giving the detailed paraphrase (vŗtti) but going to the translations set forth by Sharma:

“An initial item joined with a final iT denotes not only itself but also all intervening items” (p.72)

And Vasu:

“An initial letter, with a final iT letter as a final, is the name of itself and of the intervening letters” (p.64).

This rule is supposed to be the one which tells us that a pratyāhāra includes all the letters in the range from the initial letter to the final iT.

1.1.72 yena vidhistadantasya

Yena (3/1: ‘by which’) vidhih (1/1: ‘a rule’) tat-antasya (6/1: ‘having that at its end’) (svam rūpam).

Vasu: “An injunction which is made with regard to a particular attribute, applies to words havig that attribute at their end as well as to that attribute itself”.

Sharma: “That (qualifier) by means of which a provision is made (in a rule) denotes an item which ends in it”.

This is understandable: it stretches a denotation to a whole set of similarly ending words. An explanation states that this should not be stretched to compound words with the given ending.

This brings us to the end of the svam rupam series. What is left in this quarter of the first adhyaya are a couple of sutras: 1.1.73 states that words which have a vŗddhi as the first among its vowels will be called vŗddham. Sutra 1.1.74 states that the words tyad etc. are also called  vŗddham. This denotation apparently facilitates the application of certain derivations given in later rules. The last type of vŗddham is in rule 1.1.75, which states that names of Eastern countries with the letter e or o (eŋ) as the first among their vowels, will also be designated as vŗddham.

We thus come to the end of the first quarter or chapter of Book One, 1.1, and it’s quite an achievement. Just to vary the pace a bit, I propose to shift to another version of the grammar, the Laghu or Light version of Varadaraja, the Laghu-siddhanta-kaumudi, which itself is an abridgement of the Siddhanta-kaumudi of Bhattoji Dikshita. The arrangement and sequence is different from the Ashtadhyayi, although the material is substantially the same. Let us see whether the cryptic and convoluted structure of the Paniniyam is mitigated at all by the Kaumudi!

31 Metarules: locative, ablative

Here’s two metarules (rules about rules) now; i.e. prescriptions on how certain conventional case forms are to be interpreted (this has already been talked about in the early posts; we will reinforce that here).

1.1.66 tasminniti nirdişţe pūrvasya

Parsing of words:

Tasminn (7/1) (in that) iti (0, so saying) nirdişţe (7/1, in the specification), pūrvasya (6/1, of the preceding)

Vŗtti (paraphrase):

Tasminn iti (saying ‘in that’) saptamyartha- (in the meaning of the saptamī, i.e. seventh or locative, case) nirdeşe (in the specification) pūrvasyaiva (pūrvasya eva) kāryam (operation of the preceding only) bhavati (is, transpires), nottarasya (na uttarasya, not of the following).

“An element which is referred to by a locative (saptamī) form is understood as a right context for an operation on that which preceded it” (Sharma, II.67).

Thus, we may interpret the technical word in the locative case (saptamī) as something like ‘in the case of’, ‘in the context that’. In short, the locative case denotes the ‘if’ part of a ‘if-then’ statement. An interesting feature of the sutra is that it uses the very technical device it is defining, by putting nirdişţe in the locative case: if we translate nirdeşa as ‘specification’, the term reads ‘in the specification in the seventh case’, which we can expand as ‘in the context of a specification in the seventh case’ or ‘in the presence of… etc.’. In simple terms, ‘if there is a (term) specified in the seventh (locative, saptamī) case, then…’.

The ‘…then’ part is given by the last word, pūrvasya, ‘of the previous’, which is in the genitive, sixth case.  We obviously have to supply some words to round out the meaning.  The vŗtti sensibly supplies the term kāryam, ‘operation, work’. That is, if there is a term specified in locative case, then the operation is that of the preceding (term), the term (technical or operative word) that comes before the term in the locative case. Sharma calls the locative word a “right context” for the operation specified previously in the given rule. That is, the ‘if’ portion is given on the right of the operative term, which means that this is a ‘do Y if X’ type of instruction (X being the required condition, the subsequent term in locative case, and Y the antecedent, operation term), rather than ‘if X then Y’.   This is just a convention of ordering the terms, as far as I can make out at this stage.

An example is the already familiar rule  6.1.77 iko yaņ aci, where the last word aci is in the locative case: ‘in (the case of occurrence of a) vowel’; i.e. ‘if there is a vowel aC’. This is the X, the if- condition, but here termed the “right context” not just because it comes at the end of the rule, but implying that the X has to be present to the right, i.e. after the element on which the operation Y is to be performed. And what is the action Y (kāryam) to be performed, the ‘do’ instruction? That is: iko yaņ which uses the genitive case of iK, ‘of the short vowels (iK)’. This genitive (possessive, sixth case) has to be interpreted according to 1.1.49 şaşţhī sthāne-yogā, ‘the possessive case (means, signifies) the replacement-relation’. Or, ‘(in place) of short vowels (iK) (put) semi-vowels (yaŅ), IF there is a vowel aC following (right context)’.

Here’s another case ending which has a specific grammatical interpretation:

1.1.67 tasmād ity uttarasya

Word parsing:

 tasmād (5/1) (‘from that’) iti (0) (‘so saying’) uttarasya (7/1) (‘of the following’)

Sharma (II:68) denotes this as a “left context” of the operation to be carried out as per the following term ‘uttarasya’. Vŗtti (paraphrase):

tasmād  (tasmāt ‘from that’) iti  (‘so saying’) pañcam-artha-nirdeśa (‘fifth case signifying specification’) uttarasya eva kāryam (‘operation only of the following’) na pūrvasya (‘not of the preceding’)

“An element referred to by an ablative form (not otherwise interpretable in a given context) is a left context for an operation on what follows it” (Sharma, II:68).

“An operation caused by the exhibition of a term in the ablative or fifth case, is to be understood to enjoin the substitution of something in the room of that which immediately follows the word denoted by the term” (Vasu, p.60; decidedly a prolix rendering totally at odds with the spirit of the old grammarians!).

 The “left context” implies that the operation prescribed is to be done on the element which follows the instruction: ‘if x then do Y’. I like to look at the ablative as emanating something that affects the target and effects the change: in 8.4.61, for instance, it states that after ud with following sthāna and stambha, substitution of the initial of the second (following) word is done with “a letter belonging to the class of the prior” (Vasu, p.60), i.e. stha- or sta- is replaced with sounds homologous to the –d of ud-, giving forms like utthāna. In this sutra, the ablative case is used for the originating condition: udah. Given ud on he left, stha- is replaced by a sound of the dental class, etc.

Here are two gratuitous comments from my side. One is, the nebulous nature of the distinction between the two types of clauses, ‘do Y in case of X obtaining’ using the locative case, and ‘from the influence of X do Y’ using the originator in the ablative. Both pretty much seem to imply ‘if X, Y follows’.   The distinction seems to be mainly that in the first formula, the X is to be verified to the right, after the element operated upon; in the second, the originator is already on the left of the element acted upon. One wonders whether there is not a simpler way of specifying these conditions.

The second comment is that the actual case suffix form (the sUP-antam) of ablative and genitive are often the same, if not also the locative. So in some cases it must be a close call, and the  choice is made probably on some prior external knowledge of the patterns in the language!

Before we leave these two metarules, let’s just take a glimpse of how the Mahābhāşya treats them (Shastri, III:218 to 231). The close parallelism between the two rules is shown by treating them together, quoting them together at the opening.

Patanjali (as per the commentary by Shastri) deals with three aspects. The first is kim udāharaņam, what is the example(s). These are given as the rule iko yaņ aci for tasminn…, leading to the derivation of forms (like) dadhyatra and madhvatra (replacement of I, u by y, v before a vowel aC). For tasmād…, the examples are the derivation of dvīpam, antarīpam for rule 6.3.97 dvyantarupasargebhyo’pa īT, whereby in dvi+ap ‘two waters’, the final sound in the preceding dvi conditions the initial sound in the subsequent ap giving dvi+ip, dvīp (Sharma, II:68). There follows a discussion on the import and effect of the word iti (which I have rendered in my home-spun way as ‘so saying’), when treated as a technical term in the grammar. The commentator says that the word iti “changes the meaning of the word”: tasminn iti means the locative case (rather than ‘inside something’), tasmād iti means ‘the ablative’ (rather than ‘out of something’). Then follows an extended quibble about which is the general class, which is the specific case (example): we can know this “from the desire of the speaker”.

The second issue dealt with is the use of the word nirdişţe in the sutra. Here (as I understand the sentence) the operation takes place on the word (śabda) in locative (saptamī) case, and not on the meaning (artha) denoted by that word, which may the case in certain other rules: in 4.2.81 janapade lup, or  5.3.55 atiśāyane tambişţhnāu, the words in locative case “denote ar tha and not  śabda” (Shastri III:221).

The third issue taken up is kimartham punaridam ucyate ‘what for are these sūtras read?” (Shastri III:222). Since the locative or ablative case ending can apply equally to right-condition or left- condition  (pūrvatva and uttaratva), as I have also hinted above, statement of the two sutras “is for niyama, as in dadhyudakam and pacatyodanam” (I would interpret niyama as rule, constraint). The use of locative or ablative as the case may be will then serve to decide “whether, when both are mentioned in a sutra, the kārya happens to that which precedes or to that which follows”; in case of vipratişedha conflict, the later rule generally prevails (Shastri III:223). There follow a number of applications of these principles in elucidation of various rules.

30 Definitions of final elements in words

The next couple of sutras assign names to certain elements in words.

1.1.64 aco’ ntyādi ti

Acah (6/1) (of the aC range of letters, i.e. vowels) antyādi (1/1) (ādi, beginning with, antya, the last) TI (1/1) (termed TI)

 Vŗtti, paraphrase:

Acām (of the aC, i.e. vowels) sannivişţānām (? Of the entered) yo (yah) antyo (antyah) (which is the final, last) aC tadādi (that beginning with) śabdarūpam (word form) Ți samjñam (element called Ți) bhavati (is).

“That part of an item which begins with its last vowel (aC) is termed  Ți” (Sharma).

“The final portion of a word, beginning with the last among the vowels in the word, is called Ți” (Vasu).

This is therefore a technical definition, rather than a concept: it is a shorthand way of referring to the last segment of any word that starting from the last vowel (aC). The term Ți is an artificial creation, but is indicative of the last vowel; the Ț is an indicator, while the i can be seen as standing in for all vowels aC (one supposes it could also have been called by some other code like Ța or Ģu, but perhaps the grammarians chose Ți as it mimics the common verb ending –ti). The term Ți is used in other rules which prescribe modifications in the last vowel-segment, e.g. change of –ti or –i in a transitive, active (parasmaipada) verb form to –te or –e in the intransitive or reflexive (ātmanepada form,  bhavati versus vartate (is, exists): 3.4.79 Țit ātmanepadānām Ţere.

Incidentally, it is to be noted that even a single-letter word can have a final vowel-segment; this is an application of

1.1.21 ādi-antyavad (-vat) ekasminn (‘in a single(eka)-element, the element may be like (vat) a head (ādi) or a final (antya’).

If the previous sutra gives a technical name to the last vowel-initial segment, the next sutra defines another segment, this time the letter or element just before the final letter:

1.1.65 alo’ntyāt pūrva upadhā

Alah (5/1) antyāt (5/1) pūrva (1/1) upadhā (1/1)

As can be seen from the word parsing above, the first two are in the fifth case (ablative, ‘from’). The first noun aL refers to all the letters in the alphabet, or rather, since it is in singular number, any letter; the second word antyāt (‘last’) is also in ythe ablative, and can be taken as a qualifier, giving the sense of ‘from the last letter’.

Vŗtti (paraphrase):

Dhātvādau varņa-samudāye (in the group of letters, sounds) antyād (antyāt, 5/1) (from the end) alah (5/1) (from the letter, sound, aL) pūrvo (pūrvah) (prior, before) yo (yah) varņah (which letter, sound) so (sah) (that) alopadhā- (aLa upadhā-) (letter, aL) upadhā- samjño (samjñah) (upadhā – term) bhavati (is, constitutes).

“The sound (aL) which precedes the final sound of an item is called upadhā ‘penultimate sound’“ (Sharma).

“The letter immediately preceding the last letter of a word is called the penultimate” (Vasu).

Once again, the term upadhā is a coined name, but a different type from the Ți of the previous sutra in that it is not a marker or labelled term; upadhā is a noun, and may possibly stand for some meaning. The particle upa- denotes a sub-class of its type, dhā may be linked to the verbal root which means ‘to bear, hold’, so that there is a sense of something sub-ordinate, hence pen-ultimate, in contrast to the previous sutra which talked of the ultimate or last, antya. The need to define the penultimate sound will be met with in various other rules (of substitution or elision), such as 7.2.116 ata  upadhāyāh, which directs the replacement of short by long a in pac+aka (Sharma, II:67).  

29 Reducing an element to zero: lopa

Sutra 1.1.60 introduces a concept that has, if I remember right, been made much of in linguistics theory: the ‘zero’ affix or element, which still remains in a hidden form to condition the preceding base. This concept allows many transformations to be carried through in a virtual sense even without an actual element being present, somewhat like scaffolding and centering allows complicated constructions to be erected.   

1.1.60 adarśanam lopah

a-darśanam (1/1) lopah (1/1)

This is a definition of the concept lopah, the paraphrase, vŗtti, being:

a-darśanam (‘non-visiblity’) aśravaņam (‘non-audiblity’) anuccāraņam (‘non-vocalizing’) anupalabdhih (‘non-attainablity’) abhāvo (‘non-existence’) varņavināśa (‘letter or element destruction’) iti (thus, and so on) anarthāntaram (‘converting to non-entity, neutralizing’) etaih śabdaih (‘by such words’) yo’artho (‘this meaning’) (lopah)

 “Non-appearance (adarśana) is termed LOPA” (Sharma).

“The substitution of a blank (lopa)signifies disappearance”, also called ‘elision’ (Vasu).

There is a certain amount of (seemingly pedantic!) discussion to the effect that lopa refers to the concept of adarśanam (‘non-visiblity’) etc., and not the actual sounds represented by the letters. In the absence of this clarification in the commentaries, one may be tempted to substitute the actual letters lopa or adarśana wherever a sutra prescribes it. As put by Sharma (Vol.ii, p.61) “…the term LOPA should be  assigned to the meaning of the word adarśana and not to its form, the word adarśana itself”. It is also noted that lopa is the disappearance of some entity that was in existence in some context, and not merely absence.

The grammarians recognise different types of blank or zero elements:

1.1.61 pratyayasya lukślulupah (#60 adarśanam)

Pratyayasya (6/1) lukślulupah (1/1)

The paraphrase, vŗtti is

Pratyaya-adarśanasya (the non-appearance, disappearance of an affix) luk ślu lup iti (like LUK, ŚLU, LUP) etāh samjñā bhavanti (these are the entities, terms)

“Non-appearance of an affix is termed LUK, ŚLU, or LUP” (Sharma, II.62)

“The disappearance of an affix when it is caused by the words LUK, ŚLU, or LUP are designated by those terms respectively” (Vasu, p.56).

These terms LUK, ŚLU, or LUP are obviously technical codes, samjñā, created by the grammarians to trigger certain routines, and not real words in the language (which is why we have shown them in upper case, as we do markers or iT’s). These samjñā will be provided in other rules dealing with elision operations in certain appropriate contexts. There is again discussion (in my opinion somewhat pedantic) of the chicken-or-egg question of anyony-āśrayitva ‘interdependency’  (we saw this in 1.1.45 ig yaņah samprasāraņam, see post #23): there has to be something for the lopa operation to work on, which means there has to be an assignment of the name LUK or ŚLU  or LUP before the elision can take place. “Commentators resolve this difficulty by stating that whenever these terms are used in ordering the operation of zeroing, the assignment of the name follows zeroing. That  is, assignment of a name (samjñā) is treated as ‘yet to be brought about’ (bhāvinī)” (Sharma, II.63). The three types of elision (zeroing) operations are collectively termed LU-mān, and are marked respectively by K, Ś and P in the connected rules. It is noted that the LU- elisions are applied to affixes (pratyaya) and not to bases.

Here are some examples from Vasu (p.56). Rule 2.4.72 attaches the label LUK to the affix (augment, vikaraņa) śap in forming the present singular from the verb ad, ‘to eat’: ad + śapLUK + ti = ad+ti = atti ‘(3^rd person/1) eats’. The LUK indicates that the śap (which would have introduced –a-) is elided. In forming juhoti ‘(3^rd person/1) invokes’ the śap is elided by the label śLU (2.4.75). Why the same code is not used in both situations is not clear at this point, hopefully it will become clearer as we come across those other sutras.

Here is a further complication or extension dreamed up by our grammarians: certain operations are carried out even under the elision condition (this is the feature so admired by twentieth century linguistics). This gives the grammarian the facility to make general rules of transformation applicable in a wider range of situations.

1.1.62 pratyayalope pratyayalakşaņam

Pratyaya-lope (7/1)  pratyaya-lakşaņam (1/1)

Vŗtti, paraphrase:

Pratyaya-lope kŗte ([even] given affix-elision) pratyaya-lakşaņam (affix-? Indication; “the effect by which an affix could be recognised”, Vasu p.57) pratyaya-hetukam kāryam (operations conditioned by affix) bhavati

“An operation conditioned by an affix applies even if the affix has been replaced by zero” (Sharma).

“When elision of an affix has taken place (lopa), the affix still exerts its influence, and the operations dependant upon it, take place as if it were present” (Vasu).

The repetition of the words pratyaya and lopa indicate that this rule obtains only where the whole affix has been elided, and not if only a part of it has been elided. Only such subsequent operations are allowed as are caused by the affix as such, not orthographic changes due to particular letters etc.

As an example is the word agnicit ‘he who heaped the fire’ or somasut ‘he who pressed soma (the energetic drink of the Vedic priests)’, which have had their final case ending sUP (nominative case, singular, see the Vibhakti Page) elided or lopped off (lopa) . A pada is defined as an entity with a case ending sUP-anta or a verb ending tiŊ-anta (1.4.14 suptiŋantam padam). On this basis, the words cited will not be called pada, so that operations permitted on a pada will be precluded. However by the sutra 1.1. 62 the entity still functions like a pada, as if the elided case ending sUP or  affix (pratyaya) were still visible.  

As is usual, the latitude conferred by #62 is restricted by

1.1.63 na lumatāŋgasya

Na (0)  lumatā (3/1) aŋgasya (7/1) (#62 pratyayalakşaņam)

Vŗtti:

lumatā śabdena (‘by a term which contains [the marker] LU’) lupte pratyaye (given the elision of an affix’) yad aŋgam (‘a pre-suffixal base’) tasya (‘its’) pratyaya-lakşaņam kāryam (‘operation in the presence of the affix’) na bhavati (does not take place’).

“An operation for a pre-suffixal base (aŋga) does not apply (although it would otherwise apply by 1.1.62) if the affix in question is replaced by zero referred to by a term which contains LU (LUK, ŚLU or LUP; see 1.1.62)” (Sharma).

Thus not all elisions to zero preserve the original character of the lopped off (lopa) affix. If the lopping has been the end effect of a LU instruction, then the elided affix’s properties will not persist. The definition of an aŋga, or pre-suffixal base, is the root (dhātu) followed by the affix (pratyaya), before attaching the case-ending (sUP).

28 Substitute treated like the original

The next bunch of sutras talks of the equivalence of the substitute with the original (substituendum) for subsequent operations, with certain qualifications or exceptions. That is, we can do unto the substitute  as we would to the original, under certain conditions.  The first of these sutras is

1.1.56  sthānivad ādeśo’ nalvidhau

The word parsing is as follows:

Sthāni-vat (0) ādeśah (1/1) an-al-vidhau (7/1)

The first term means ‘like the Sthāni, i.e. the original’; being an indeclinable, it is marked (0) as to case and number. The second word, ādeśah, means the ‘substitute’; in the general parlance it means ‘an order, direction’, and is in nominative case, singular number (1,1). The third word is made up of the negative prefix an-, then aL, which is the pratyāhāra or code standing for ‘all letters’ (click on the Pratyahara TAB at top of page for some more info on these!); and vidhau, the seventh case (locative singular, 7/1) of vidhi, which means ‘rule’. The word al-vidhi is ‘a rule (based on) a letter’, or say a ‘letter-rule’; an-al-vidhi would be the ‘negation‘ or ‘absence’ of such a rule. The locative case form an-al-vidhau can be taken to mean ‘in the absence of a letter-rule’.

The paraphrase,  vŗtti, is:

Sthāni-vat (like a substituendum, i.e. the original) ādeśah (substitute) bhavati (is), āśrayeşu kāryeşu (? in related operations), an-al- āśrayeşu (? in non-letter related) sthāni-al-āśrayāņi (?letter-related) kāryāņi (operations) varjayitvā (having excluded)

“A substitute is treated like a substituendum, except when an operation relative to an original sound (aL) is to be performed” (Sharma, Vol.II, p.56).

“A substitute (ādeśa) is like the former occupant (sthānī), but not in the case of a rule the occasion for the operation of which is furnished by the letters of the original term” (Vasu, p.42).

We understand by this that any (subsequent) operations can be performed on the substituted term just as if it were on the original, except where these subsequent operations are closely linked to the actual letters or types of letters that were replaced. For example, if a vowel were to be replaced by a non-vowel, operations specifically possible on the vowels would obviously not be carried over to the substitute non-vowel. Let’s look at some of the examples provided; here Vasu is the more helpful, as he discusses each type of substitute individually.

According to the śāstrakāra-s then, there are 6 types of substituenda (plural of substituendum, (sthānī): dhātu ‘root’, aŋga ‘pre-suffixal base’, kŗt ‘primary affix’, taddhita ‘secondary affix’, avyaya ‘indeclinable’, sUP ‘nominal ending’ or ‘case affix’, tiŊ ‘verbal ending’ or ‘conjugational affix’, and pada ‘fully inflected word’ (Sharma, p/57; Vasu, p.43). In each case, the substitute orderd by any rule, would get the same treatment as the original it replaces, whatever the type was: substitute of a root (dhātu) is treated as a root, substitute of a case-ending (sUP) is treated as a case-ending, and so on. Let’s take just one example, from the many discussed by Vasu.  

From the table of noun case-endings or sUP (click on ‘Vibhakti’ TAB at top of page to get a tabular statement!), we know that Ŋe (Ŋ is the nasal at the back of the soft palate, ng) is the code for the dative (fourth, caturthī) case, denoting ‘to’ the noun. Obviously the letter Ŋ is just a marker or code provided by the grammarian (which is why it is shown in capitals by convention), and the actual case affix is –e. The marker Ŋ also shows that it is of the type ŊiT (see sutra 1.1.53), which is a grammarian’s contrivance, probably so that it can attract certain other rules with their own specific consequences. Now, as per the example cited by Vasu (p.44), by 7.1.13  ‘ya is the substitute of the sUP-affix Ŋe after an inflexive base ending in short a’. Then the ya is treated just like the original Ŋe, and by another sutra 7.3.102, there is “lengthening of the vowel”, e.g. vŗkşāya, dative of vŗkşa ‘to the tree’.

Now we need an example for the clause na-al-vidhau, ‘not in the presence of a letter-rule’, i.e. if the transformation refers to the particular sound (aL) in the original. Vasu (p.45) gives very briefly the following examples of substitution: of –v by –au in the word div by rule 7.1.84 to give inflected case-form dyauh, -n by -ā in pathin by 7.1.85 to give panthā, -d by –a in tvad by 7.2.102 to give the sah. The point is that of these affixes had been treated just like the originals. Rule 6.1.68 would have applied, “and the case-affix su [sU, the nominative singular] would have been elided”.  

Sharma (Vol.II) gives detailed examples in the Appendix (something which I have only recently realised!), and the an-aL-vidhau rule is illustrated on p.397 onwards in each of four distinct interpretations of the term. Vasu’s examples come under the second variation, “alah vidhih ‘operation obtaining after an item occurring after aL’ ” (Sharma, p.398). As rule 7.1.84 div aut (#1.1.52 alo ‘ntyasya) would require replacement by au of the terminal letter –v, Shrma says that the final s would have to be deleted in the inflected form div + s (U) = diau + s (I am not quite clear why!). Instead, we assume that an-al-vidhau comes into operation, the au is not treated as a v, so that diau+s will yield dyau+s, and by conversion of s into visarga h, dyauh. Similarly or the other examples above.

There are two more sutras in this vein:

1.1.57 acah (6/1) parasmin (7/1) pūrvavidhau (7/1) (#56 sthānivad ādeśah), whose paraphrase is:

Ac ādeśah (aj ādeśah) (substitute for a vowel) paranimittakah (? Conditioned by a right context) pūrvavidhau kartavye (with respect to an operation on a preceding element) sthānivad bhavati (is treated like its substituendum)

Further exceptions to 1.1.57 are given in 1.1.58 and 1.1.59, which I will not go into here at this first reading!