--- In Pali@yahoogroups.com, "dkotschessa" <dkotschessa@...> wrote:

>
> Could somebody help me better understand the relationship between

Pali

> and the Sinhala language?

Both belong to the same subfamily of the Indo-European family of
languages. i.e. Indo-Aryan. Pali is a middle Indo-Aryan language,
while Sinhala as a living language is a modern IA Lang. There was a
stage in the development of Sinhala when it was very close to Pali.
That is, the Sinhala langauge as seen in what are called Brahmi
inscriptions, found in lithic records in many places in Sri Lanka.
They begin from about the 3rd century. But Sinhala kept on
developing and after about the 10th century became much more
different from Pali than was the case in the earlier stage.

>
> My impression (perhaps mistaken) is that it's the closest living
> language there is to Pali.

This may not be all that wrong. Sinhala vocabulary contains a lot of
Pali words. It has also borrowed heavily from Sanskrit and Skt is
very close to Pali. Sinh. would certainly be closer to Pali than
Burmese, Thai, or any of the languages of Cambodia and Laos, the
other Theravada countries.

> Would learning Sinhala help one learn Pali?

It may, but S. being a living Language would be even harder to
master than Pali. If you are living in Sri Lanka, it would make
sense. Learning Plai would help you to learn S. and vice versa.

> I am interested in understanding the
> richness of the language rather than just becoming a kind of
> dictionary with feet.

Very true and laudable. And very ambitious.

Good luck and best wishes.

Mahinda