--- Ong Yong Peng <ypong001@...> skrev:

> Dear Steven and friends,
>
> yes, the word can refer to either the Ganges, or a
> river.
>
> metta,
> Yong Peng

I don't know which meaning is the oldest one. In
modern Sinhalese, every river is a ganga, however
small; and someone told me it is a very old word,
probably of pre-aryan origin. Perhaps the Ganges,
being the most important river of the subcontinent,
was just called "The River", which was later taken for
a name.

Just as we Europeans, when speaking about "The
Continent", always mean the continental part of Europe
- which isn't even a continent of its own, but just a
part of Eurasia.

Gunnar



=====
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