Semantics and Etymology in Yāska’s Nirukta: The meghaḥ … mehati iti sataḥ Type of Etymological Explanation
This paper provides a new interpretation of a type of etymological explanation (T) characteristic of Yāska’s Nirukta. The proposed interpretation sheds light on Yāska’s distinctive ideas on the relation between semantics and etymology. Exemplified by the occurrence meghaḥ … mehati iti sataḥ, T conve...
Main Author: | |
---|---|
Format: | Electronic Article |
Language: | English |
Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
Journals Online & Print: | |
Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
Published: |
Brill
2022
|
In: |
Indo-Iranian journal
Year: 2022, Volume: 65, Issue: 2, Pages: 122-143 |
Further subjects: | B
Nighaṇṭu
B Semantics B Nirukta B Etymology B Yāska |
Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
Summary: | This paper provides a new interpretation of a type of etymological explanation (T) characteristic of Yāska’s Nirukta. The proposed interpretation sheds light on Yāska’s distinctive ideas on the relation between semantics and etymology. Exemplified by the occurrence meghaḥ … mehati iti sataḥ, T conveys the following information: the noun to be explained is a name (nāman-) that denotes a certain thing (sattva-) as characterized by a certain action. In the example, the noun meghaḥ is a name that denotes the thing cloud as emitting rain-water (mehati). T operates with two ideas intersecting semantics and etymology: (1) names denote things in relation to the latter’s association with a name-giving action; (2) one thing can receive various names in relation to various name-giving actions. While (1) underlies Yāska’s etymologies in general, (2) informs T as well as the structural organization of noun groups in the Nighaṇṭu ‘Thesaurus’, the word-list constituting the root-text commented upon in the Nirukta. Recognition that (2) underlies both T and the Nighaṇṭu noun groups is consistent with the observation that most nouns explained with T occur in the Nighaṇṭu. |
---|---|
ISSN: | 1572-8536 |
Contains: | Enthalten in: Indo-Iranian journal
|
Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1163/15728536-06502004 |