Re: beyond langauges

--- Richard Wordingham <richard@...>
wrote:

> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "mkelkar2003"
> <swatimkelkar@...> wrote:
>
> > Rather, is obvious that the remnants of early IA
> in Mitanni belong to
> > a pre-Rgvedic stage of IA, "
> >
> > So there WAS an EARLY IA before the PROPER IA of
> the Rig Veda.
>
> Are you suggesting that Pali derives from the actual
> language of the
> RV's first authors? Note that Pali cannot derive
> from the language of
> the Rig Veda as now recorded, though of course there
> are severe
> problems with the word for '6' anyway - Sanskrit has
> _SaT_, but the
> word begins with ch- or its reflex in many Indic
> languages.
>
> Richard.
>
>

Which raises a question I made that you still haven't
answered. How much linguistic diversity existed in IA
when the Vedas were written? Obviously Sanskrit is not
directly ancestral to some? most? all? modern IA
languages.
So if there was a fair amount of linguistic diversity
in IA when the Vedas were written, it would suggest
that either Sanskrit is/was an artificial prestige
language based on aesthetic concerns and/or the Vedas
were written long after the IA invasion of India, thus
giving the languages enough time to diversify.



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