Dr K.Loganathan. 15-10-10
Dear Friends
While Sumerian literature has been studied for more than a century, it has been a surprise to me that while it was recognized it is neither Indo-European nor Semitic, it has not been recognized as Tamil but certainly an Archaic form of it. This has led to the immense negligence of its relevance to the study of ancient Indian languages and cultures. It has also led to overlooking the fact that Rigkrit ( Sanskrit) is also another variant of this SumeruTamil and hence just as much Dravidian as Tamil is.
After reasonably extensive studies of Sumerian texts and a variety of texts in Rigkrit and Sanskrit I want to put up these claims for the consideration of scholars interested in such topics.
The studies that I want to mention briefly are linguistic where I want developed Aspcets of Evolutionary Linguistics such as Uri Linguistics Viri Linguistics and which are different from the reconstructive linguistics such as PIE.
My First Claim is :
Sumerian is Archaic Tamil and possibly the Tamil of the First Sangkam (Academy).
In order to substantiate this I can site many studies –lexical grammatical and so forth that I have already referred and if necessary I can always repeat, Just to cite a simple example I take the following sentence from Sulgi Hymn B (C. 2000 BC)
13. tur-mu-de e-dub-ba-a-a am ( Since my very youth, I belonged to edubba)
The Tamil reconstruction would be :
Ta. tur-mutee il tubbaiya aa aam ( Since my very youth I attended the tablet house(school))
In this reconstruction , in phonology morphology and semantics and so forth, the basic utti-s constituting the Viri Linguistics are already there. Here let me overlook the problems about transcription of the cuneiform texts where some refinements are required but not a fundamental revision. For example ‘e’ is rewritten as ‘il’ and which can be incorporated in future readings of the Sumerian itself. Leaving aside such issues for the time being, let me come to the discussion of the utti-s relevant to the issue.
1.
The Phonological Utti-s
Here we have ‘mude’ rendered as ‘mutee’ with the mapping of ‘d’ into ‘t” and ‘e’ into ‘ee’ . The root of this could be Su. mus (the foundation, the initial etc) and hence also s > d. t etc.
We have also ‘a’ as > Ta. aa (to become) and am> Ta. aam ( a particle of affirmation etc). Here while the ‘–a’ in e-dub-ba-a’ is rendered as ‘y-a’, the next ‘a’ and ‘am’ are rendered as ‘aa aam’ i.e. with the long vowel. Here we note that ‘y’ might have been present but the script was defective for symbolizing it. It could have been read as such but not rendered accurately in the script.
We notice that ‘tur’ remains the SAME both in phonological shape and meaning
We also have ‘dub’ rendered as ‘tub’ where we have d > t , something we see also in Sumerian itself e.g dug and tuk
2.
The Semantic Utti-s
Now looking at the meanings we see that the meaning of ‘tur’ remains the same as Ta. where tur, tul, tun means ‘small, fine’ and metaphorically ‘evil” etc. The Tamil tur-umbu means something small , tul-li-yam means something fine, minute etc. Tur-neRi is the ‘little way”, the evil way in semantic implications.
The ‘mude’ has become Ta. mutee and mutalee as in ‘akaram mutala ezuttellaam ( KuRal 200 AD). The Mutu also means ancient old etc. The ‘mutal’ also means the foundation, the basis etc. In all these we see a family of semantic relationships that are linked to each with some meanings, perhaps the metaphorical as historically later. The most primordial meaning may be that of Su. mus, the foundation, the basis etc.
3.
The Morphological utti-s
Now we notice that ‘dub’ or ‘dub-ba’ has the Tamil equivalent of Tubbu, the clue, the sign etc that has to be read or deciphered as in tuppu tulangkaL etc. Now we can also see some grammatical operations: dub-ba> bud-da > buddi (Ta. putti) ; intelligence etc. What we have here is metathesis along with the birth of an associated meaning – from a tablet of knowledge to that of intellect of intelligence. We can also see the possible derivation: dub-ba> bud-da> poti and il-dub-ba> poti-il, the famous centre in the ancient Madurai where the Tamil Academy is said to have functioned. The “poti-il’ may actually be ‘il-tub-bu” but distorted or extended somewhat in meaning
Here we also notice the SAMNESS of meaning in relation to ‘tur’ ‘a or aa’ ‘am or aam’ etc.
Thus the Semantic Utti-s bring out both the SAMENESS in meaning as well DIFFERENCE but where the difference can be explained in terms of historical evolution of various kinds.
4.
The Grammatical Utti-s
Now when we take up ‘e-dub-ba-a” and render it as Ta. il tubbaiya we have ‘-a’ as the Tamil genitive. locative suffix “-a” that is also widely present in C. Tamil and with same grammatical function. The ‘am’ and Ta. aam are almost the same in grammatical function – an enclitic of agreement, emphasis etc.
Now in the clause ‘tur-mu-de’ we have an identity in grammatical function in the word order: akara mutal, iLamai mutalee etc. Here the “mu-de’ is an adverb of time(?) and the same word order holds in Tamil as well. Now in ‘e-dub-ba’ we see a different word order - in fact the reversal – tubbaiya il etc. This is one of the DIFFERENCES in grammar and which is rule governed. While there is agreement in having the formative ‘-a’ as the adjectival format, ( nall-a maintain ( good man), peri-a viidu ( big house) while in Tamil it is before the Noun in Sumerian it is post the qualified noun. For example e-gal-la > Ta. il kaLLa> kaLLa il etc.
The rule is : N1 ^ N2-a > N2-a ^ N1
Now my second claim is :
Rigkrit(Sanskrit) has Archaic Tamil (SumeruTamil) as it’s base language where we have to apply the various kinds of Utties of Uri Linguistics to recover the base form
The following is an example of it:
This is the second Sloka of Rig Veda 1.1
agnih puurvebhir rishibhir idyo nuutanair uta/ sa devam eha vakshati
May the adorable God, eternally adorned by the seers of times, past and present, be a source of inspiration to wise men of all ages.
The BASE Tamil form is :
*Ta. angki-a: puurvee-ba-ere (e)ri-si-ba-ere iidiyoo nuuta-na-ere uuta/ saa teyvam eeka vaku-si-ati
Oh The adorable (and beautiful) One! Bless the newly emerging bright persons so that they would go ahead in divine pursuits like the bright ones of the ancient times without any disruption ( in this tradition)
Notes: The infixes ‘ba’ and ‘na’ are third person pronominal infixes which are still available in Tamil
Just to give an example of the derivation of Tamil base, we can cite the following derivation:
puurvebhir , rishibhir
The most interesting morphological element here is "bhir" and which is certainly a later development of Su. ba-e-re as in the following lines
Sir
21. ni-me-lam u-lu-da nam-lu-u-lu ( When mankind comes before you)
22. ni-me -gar-hus-bi u-mu-re-gin (In fear and trembling at (your ) tempestuous radiance)
23. me-ta me-hus-bi su ba-e-re-ti (They receive from you their just deserts)
* Ta. nii meLLam vizuta uLuuLunam
* Ta. nooy mey kaal ush(Na)bi uu maar kan(al)
* Ta. meyttu mey ush(Na)bi cuur (av)varee ti
The grammatical complex 'ba-e-re" ( they) is derived from two more basic words 'ba" ( person) and e-ne > e-re( Ta. inam: a group of people or creatures). The 'ba" as meaning a person still exists in Indonesia and in Malay it exists as" bapa" (father) perhaps to be derived from 'ba-apa" where Su 'aba' ( as a variant of ama: mother) and Ta. appaa means 'father'.
In Tolkaappiyam we have '-ba" alone as a plural person marker as Ta. en-ba ( say-they). We also have '-manaar" as in "en-manaar pulavar" ( the scholars say-they ..)
It is clear that Sk -bhir above is a late variant of the more primitive " ba-e-re" that exists also in Tamil as 'peer" meaning people.
We can also mention here that Su. mu-re that occurs in these sentences is of a similar genesis (< mu-e-re) and which exists as Ta. maar, ( and 'manaar") the plural person marker in verb morphology. This also exists in Malay as 'mereka' ( they)
The 'ri-shi" may be taken as a Su. (e)ri-ji or (e)ri-si meaning persons who are illuminated, bright, intelligent and so forth. Perhaps from this original sense emerged the secondary notion of 'seers'.
The "puurvee' can be linked with 'puu-uru-ee" where 'Ta. puu meaning to emerge, flower , arise etc. and hence as secondary sense , the point of origin which is more frequently mentioned in Sumerian as ul-li ( Ta. uuzi). It exists in Ta. as puurvam ( the ancient times) and may also be linked with Ta. puraaNam, mythological tales.( , puur-aaNa- am : ancient tales of gods))
With more stdies such as these we can also identify the various kinds of utties that are listed above for Viri Linguistics making the whole enterprise something scientific, a kind of Utti Science.
For more such studies please see:
https://sites.google.com/site/vedictamil/tamil-the-base-of-sk
Concluding Remarks:
If my claims are acceptable then it would follow that not only Sumerian is Archaic Tamil but also Rigkrit and Sk variants of it where because they have undergone many changes we have to apply the utties of uri Linguistics to recover the BASE form and which is Archaic Tamil. This implies that including Sk as belonging to the Indo-European family of languages is NOT valid and hence also the study of Proto Indo European languages as such . There are NO Indian languages related to the European languages. This may also imply that AIT etc is not valid. It has to be replaced with Sumerian Migration Theory and so forth.