avagraha in Malayalam Manuscript

[Christophe Vielle]

Very interesting. It could be useful to know the 
origin of the KUML L.662 mss. and find other 
examples to check if it comes from the same 
area/milieu as Parpola's ms. from the 
NellikkaaTTu Mana. It could be a local or 
temporally limited use in the history of 
Malayalam scipt.
With best wishes,
Chrsitophe Vielle


>Thanks for bringing back the topic.  I have 
>finally located the sign best interpreted as 
>avagraha in the manuscript(s) I used.  I think I 
>can finally fulfill my promise...
>
>Scans are available at:
>
>http://homepage.mac.com/kengoharimoto/avagraha1.jpg
>"pañcaparvva?o 'vidyÇd¥n kleÊÇn"
>
>http://homepage.mac.com/kengoharimoto/avagraha2.jpg
>"tuÊabdo 'vadh" (this is the end of the line, and continues "Çra?Çrtha?".)
>
>http://homepage.mac.com/kengoharimoto/avagraha3.jpg
>"yogagrah?e 'sati"
>
>The second one is small and ambiguous, but the 
>other two share a distinctive shape; the shape 
>described by Asko Parpola in the post on 
>September 2, 2007.
>
>As I mentioned in an earlier post, these are 
>anomalies.  It turns out that these fragments 
>all come from a single folio (folio 4 of the 
>manuscript of the PÇtañjalayogaÊÇstravivara?a, 
>perserved in the Oriental Manuscript Library, 
>Trivandrum, L. 662).  I could not find any more 
>(although I cannot claim that I have been 
>thorough).
>
>Now that I have scans of the Malayalam 
>manuscripts I have used, I will try to submit 
>them to Indoskript.
>
>--
>kengo harimoto, NGMCP
>
>On Oct 2, 2007, at 12:59 , gruenendahl wrote:



>
>I could also locate my ms and sent yesterday a scan to N. Ganesan with the
>following comment:
>
>"I think that the
>Malayalam script originally did not have an avagraha sign. Some Malayali
>scholars, however, have now and then, though very rarely, used an
>avagraha sign, which they knew from other scripts. In this case, the
>sign has apparently been taken over from the devanagari script. It has been
>made angular, though, to distinguish it from the Malayalam sign for the
>retroflex Ta, which is too close to the devanagari avagraha."
>
>As Kengo Harimoto's scans have the same shape, this sign clearly was more
>widely known and seems to have become a regular (though not original) part
>of the Malayalam script.
>
>Best regards, Asko Parpola