TRACING VEDIC DIALECTS - People.fas.harvard.edu

The remarkable change of -jm- > -ym-, which occurs in a number of Vedic
texts, is little known, and, if so, thought to be limited to the Kapiṣṭhalas, a
sub-school of the Kaṭhas which has come down to us only in a very
fragmentary state. 174
The peculiarity of a change from -jm- to -ym- (ajman > ayman, yunajmi >
yunaymi, etc.) is found only in a sub-school of the Kaṭhas, the Kapiṣṭhala-
Kaṭhas (KpS); the so-called Caraka-Kaṭhas (KS) do not exhibit this trait. 175
The homeland of the Kap. school seems to be close to that of the Kaṭhas (in E.
Panjab); in the 3rd cent., BC., the Kapiṣṭhalas (Kambistoloi) were found,
according to Arrian, Indikë, in Panjab, at the confluence of the Panjab rivers
with the Ravi.
The change -jm- >-ym- must be comparatively old. It has already been
taken over into the first book of the PB, which contains a small
Mantrasaṃhitā of this SV school. 176 Almost all of these Mantras have been
taken over from KpS, which indicates that both schools were in close
proximity during the period that PB was redacted. 177 This relationship was
also known some early grammarians like Candra, who uses the compound
Kaṭha-Kauthumāḥ, 178 just as Pāṇini used Kaṭha and Caraka in one rule. We
therefore have to look for the origin of the trait during a few centuries before
or after C.E. and in an area not too far from W.Panjab/Rajasthan.
However, a few cases of this rather strange development occur in other texts
as well. There are traces in Maitrāyaṇī Saṃhitā (cf. author, StII 8/9, 175) and
MS 1.3.14 and MŚS 2.4.4.9 (corrected by van Gelder to pṛṇacmi, but var.
have: -pm-, -ṣm-). 179 Furthermore, even the Vulgate of the AV (usually
known as the "Śaunaka") version, i.e., in the form of the text found all over
174
Only parts of its Saṃhitā, virtually identical with KS, and a very short fragment of some
late parts of its Brāhmaṇa, have been found so far. These fragments (see ed. Raghu Vira,
and cf. Schroeder, ed. MS p. XXXVII sqq.) correspond to the Kāṭhaka portion of TB (3.12)
which has been taken over from KathB.
175
See introd., ed. Raghu Vira, p.V; Oertel, on KpS in ŚB München 1934, p.29, Schroeder,
ed. MS I p. XVIII.
176
See Caland, transl. PB XXIV; Parpola, LŚS transl.p.77 sqq., esp. p.88 (PB 1 < RV,AV,
YV, esp. from Kaṭha school). LŚS 2.12.12 also has -ym- in a hapax mantra. - Parpola, LŚS
tr. p. 88 , points out that the Mantra chapter of PB has been added later on, but before the
composition of LŚS. (In the context of a possible redaction of PB in the East see ann. 97,
233, 334 , this would mean an intermediate stage, in the West, unless the chapter came from
the Prācya-Kaṭhas.)
177
Cf. however, ann. 125 on the late Vedic date of the text; it contains some classical forms
like tanūm, dugdhe, etc.; cf. also ann. 250, 125.
178
See Parpola, transl. LŚS/DŚS p.88.
179
For pṛnaymi MS 1.3.14, see StII 8/9 p. 175; cf. Oertel, SB Akad.München 1934
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