Pali

[Michael Everson]

Readers of INDOLOGY with an interest in Buddhism and Pali grammar may be
interested in a paper I wrote some time ago:

Some remarks on conceptualization and transcendent experience in the
Theravâda tradition, with two notes on translation

http://www.indigo.ie/egt/misc/vitakka.html

Svasti,
Michael Everson


> From 101621.104 at CompuServe.COM 08 96 Nov EST 15:56:05
Date: 08 Nov 96 15:56:05 EST
From: Anthony P Stone <101621.104 at CompuServe.COM>
Subject: Uniform transliteration of Brahmic scripts

After this summer's discussion on this list and with the expectation of 
further discussion at Bangalore in January (at which I can't be present), 
here is a _brief_ presentation of four *tentative* transliteration 
schemes, for different purposes. They are largely based on existing 
schemes.  I am grateful to Leslaw Borowski, P D ("Das") Menon, and 
Dominik Wujaskyk for input of various sorts; the shortcomings of the 
schemes are my own.
         
                 = Draft 0.2 dated Nov 8, 1996 =  

SCRIPTS covered: Assamese, Bengali, Devanagari (+ extensions), Grantha, 
Gujarati, Gurmukhi, Kannada, Malayalam, Oriya, Tamil, Telugu.  
The question of what belongs to what script is not considered in detail. 

Transliteration SCHEMES:
   P. for print, using the full resources of fonts/type;
Computer storage using 7-bit coding (ISO/IEC 10646, IRV):
  C1. Case insensitive coding (stressing elegance);
  C2. Case sensitive coding (stressing economy);
also variations for use on a typewriter.  

NOTATION for Latin characters with diacritical marks: If L stands for any 
Latin letter and A, B, C, D stand for any diacritics, the expression   
 L(A/B)   denotes the letter L with diacritic A above and B below it, and 
(given here for completeness) the expression    scriptname L(A/B)[C/D]    
denotes the form of L(A/B) in the script 'scriptname', with diacritic C 
above and D below it; where mark A is to replace the dot of a dotted Latin 
letter. (Superfluous elements may be omitted depending on context.) 
Marks which cannot be typed in 7-bit ascii are:
       o = small circle
      ss = small semicircle open upwards [usual short vowel sign]
      cb = candrabindu
      at = acute accent

NOTES are at the end.
===
P:  a a(-/)i i(-/) u u(-/) r(/o) r(-/o) l(/o) l(-/o) e(ss/) e  ai o(ss/)   
C1: a aa   i ii    u uu    r`    r#     l`    l#     :e     e  ai :o     
C2: a A    i I     u U     r`    R`     l`    L`     e      E  ai o (1)
------
P:  o au      e(^/) o(^/)       Mal half-u:    u(ss/)
C1: o au      ^e    ^o                         :u 
C2: O au      ^e    ^o (2)                     :u 
------
  visarga ardhavisarga jihvamuliya upadhmaniya  Tam aytam 
P:  h(/.)     h(./)        h(/-)       h(/..)      k(/-) 
C1: .h        ;h           _h          :h          _k 
C2: H         ;h           _h          :h (3)      K (4) 
------
   anusvara  anunasika    Tel ardhanusvara
P:  m(./)     m(cb/)         n(-/)
C1: .m        =m             -n    
C2: M         =m             -n                  
------
P:  k      kh      g      gh      n(./)      
C1: k      kh      g      gh      ;n      
C2: k      kh      g      gh      G
------
P:  c      ch      j      jh      n(~/)      
C1: c      ch      j      jh      ~n    
C2: c      ch      j      jh      J 
------
P:  t(/.)  t(/.)h  d(/.)  d(/.)h  n(/.)    r(/.) r(/.)h   l(/.)  
C1: .t     .th     .d     .dh     .n       .r    .rh      .l 
C2: T      Th      D      Dh      N        R     Rh       L (5)
------
P,C1,C2:
    t      th      d      dh      n
    p      ph      b      bh      m
    y      r       l      v  (6)  
------       
P:  y(/.)      r(^/)      s(at/)  s(/.)  s    h    
C1: .y         ^r         ;s      .s     s    h    
C2: Y (7)      ^r (8)     C       S      s    h
------
Dravidian: velar fricative      alveolars
P:              z(/.)          r(/-)  n(/-) 
C1:             .z             _r     _n  
C2:             z              _r     _n 
------
P:       k(/.)  k(/.)h  g(/.)  j(/.)  p(/.)h     
C1, C2: .k     .kh     .g     .j     .ph      
------
P,C1,C2:   1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 
------
Accents:          Udatta, stress accent  Svarita  Anudatta
P: (over vowel)          (at/)           ('/)        (`/) 
C1, C2: (after vowel)      /              |            \   
------
Other signs in the original text:
  avagraha, apostrophe   omitted character      
P:     apostrophe         mult. sign           
C1,C2:     '              X                    
------
Other signs not in the original text:
   ambiguous vowel  hyphen at   end of line  word abbreviated at    
   hiatus           line break  in original  beginning or end
P:       _             hyphen       /             (o/) 
C1,C2:   _               --         /              - 
===
VARIATIONS for use with a typewriter:

^    ~     `     |    \    #
*    ?     !     %    &    $ (or pound sign or !!)         
===

NOTES
(1):e, :o are the short Dravidian vowels.
(2)^e, ^o are 'new' Dev vowels, used (e.g.) for English words.
(3)jihvamulia and upadhmaniya each have old forms; ardhavisarga is an 
   old form of both (cf. F. Kittel, A Kannada-English dictionary, 1894).
(4)R. Caldwell distinguishes Tam aytam (velar fricative) from visarga.
(5)Dev .lh may be treated as a ligature, as its graphical form suggests.
(6)Ori has .l here and l later.  Ben, Ori do not distinguish v from b, 
   but Ori has a separate v (pronounced /w/) for Urdu and English words.
(7)Ass, Ben, Ori.  
(8)Mar reph.

Tony Stone