Commenting on -
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/10825
I refer to the following note from the reference =
Coningham, Robin. 1999. Anuradhapura: The British-Sri Lankan Excavations at
Anuradhapura Salgaha Watta 2, Volume I (The Site). BAR International Series
824, Society for South Asian Studies Monograph No. 3:Oxford
p. 2 �A further, connected aspect is the evidence at Anuradhapura for the
development of writing systems within South Asia. The earlier prophetic work
of Deraniyagala at Anuradhapura suggested for the first time that Brahmi,
the ancestor of many of South Asia�s vernacular scripts, occurred a number
of centuries earlier than had previously been thought (Deraniyagala 1990a).
It has been generally accepted that the script derived from a Semitic script
developed in northern India under the Buddhist emperor, Asoka, in the third
century BC and had spread southwards through the peninsula until it reached
Sri Lanka....Our own work now supports Deraniyagala�s earlier hypothesis,
and evidence of Brahmi script dating to the beginning of the fourth century
BC is presented in Volume II.�
I suggest you check Volume II yourself to see the methodology which was used
to arrive at this date for the Brahmi inscriptions at Anuradhapura.
The data has been accepted by even conservative archaeologists like
Allchins, and also thence by Kenoyer. The excavations were jointly carried
out by a Sri Lankan-British team (so you cannot accuse them of a Simhala
nationalist bias, and of course the British being Europeans are objective
scholars).
Needless to say, the book of Richard Salomon (I actually possess a copy of
this beautiful book) shows no evidence that he had access to the details of
the archaeological data. So where is the need for an 'independent
assessment'?
Coningham actually argues that the discovery of Brahmi need not presuppose
its presence in N India several centuries earlier because innovations from N
India often leapfrogged the Konkan and Peninsular India in reaching Sri
Lanka because of its trade with Gujarat (which nevertheless took via short
stops along the western coast of India).
[As an aside, the issue of the date of Brahmi script is related not only to
Sri Lankan politics, but also to Indian politics. Dravidian chauvinists (and
Aryan invasionists) want as much gap as possible chronologically between IVC
script and the Brahmi script in order that it becomes more and more
difficult to link the two. As a corrollary, one also sees Dravidian
chauvinists selectively quoting Indologists to post-date the Vedas as much
as possible (referring even to dates as low as 800-900 BCE) so as to delink
them as much as possible from IVC culture. The discovery of more and more
sites in the Indus-Ganga watershed dating to the period hitherto termed as
the 'Vedic Night' (1500 - 1000 BCE) is forcing many chauvinists and even
Indologists to postdate the Vedic texts as much as they can because that is
the only way the 'complex acculturation cum migration' scenarios can hold
ground.]
Sincerely,
Vishal
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