Re: Asoka pillar

Dear Nina,

Welcome back!

>Dear Jim, in a few weeks I shall see the Asoka pillar at Lumbini. It would
>inspire me very much if you could say something about the Pali text on the
>pillar. A few months ago you mentioned this text. I have the Pali and
>English in an old book we bought in India, by V.A.Smith, Low Price
>Publications. I can type it out if you do not have it at hand, but it would
>be nice if you explain more about it. Lodewijk and I will also visit Kuru,
>the place of the preaching of the satipatthana sutta where there is also a
>stone slab, and New Delhi museum where there is a copy of the stones with
>Asoka's edict.

The Lumbini inscription is as follows:
1. devaana(pi)yena piyadasina laajina viisativasaabhisitena
     atana aagaaca mahiiyite hida budhe jaate sakyamunii ti.
[I have converted it to Pali for comparison as follows:
1. devaanampiyena piyadassinaa lajjinaa viisativassaabhisittena
     attanaa aagaa ca mahiiyate idha buddho jaato sakyamunii ti.]

2. silaa viga.dabhiicaa kaalaapita silaathabhe ca usapaapite
     hida bhagava.m jaate ti;
3. lu.mmininigaame ubalike ka.te a.thabhaagiye ca.

From p.40 of The Moral Edicts of King Asoka, by P.H.L. Eggermont and J.
Hoftijzer (Brill 1962)

As you can see, the dialect is not quite the same as Pali. One could at
least say that it looks a lot more like Pali than it does Sanskrit. I also
have a clear photo of the Lumbini inscription in the Brahmi characters along
with an English translation. I don't know much about this dialect and only
have just a bit of reference material to go on. Past president of PTS, K.R.
Norman is an expert on Asokan inscriptions and I have some of his articles
explaining a few points but nothing on the Lumbini inscription in particular
as far as I can see. Would you like to compare the inscription above with
the one you have in your book to check for any differences. It would also be
good if you could provide the translation you have and I could give the one
I have later. The most difficult words to figure out are 'viga.dabhiicaa'
and 'ubalike'.

>Now back to corrections. Superscript 2,3, this may be because I work from
my
>document (Apple works) and paste it to e mail.
>The accusative and then vuccati which is passive. Still, I think that
>vuccati refers to all those accusatives. Can it be: with reference to?I
>looked at Warder, p. 17. And hotu maybe just in between like va: maybe.
>Yamki~nci I understood: whatever, whatever colour. From the to particle I
>learnt that cases may overlap, not so strict. Because of its purity: could
>extend to all those colours and no colour. Your corrections were very
>helpful as always. Thank you very much. Nina.

Thanks for your comments which I will keep in mind. The sentence with
ya.mki~nci, hotu, and vuccati is still too difficult for me. I'll let you
know if and whenever it becomes clear to me.

Best wishes,
Jim


_________________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com