Citation link:
https://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/taprobanian1887/0041
April, 1887.]
SINHALESE LANGUAGE.
41
Like the ancient people of Chaldea, the Arava
Tamils are to this day named after abstrnse epithets
of the deity. As the Chaldeans worshipped Ann, so
the Tamils worship Siva Somnath, and Minakshi,
the fish goddess.
Still more remarkable is the worship of the Tamil
Mars, the Hindu Skanda, who is termed Muruk-
esan, the Lord Muruk. Mirukh was the ancient
god of war, from whom Meroe takes its name in all
probability, and Murukesan is still a common Tamil
name, while Mirukh is an Arabian name for the
planet Mars. The modern pandits derive Murukesan
as Mriga-esan, lord of deer, but this is apparently
only a recent fiction to account for the obscure name,
as if it were of Sanskrit origin.
Editor.
The Tamil God, Muniandi.
The various lower castes of Tamils all have a
great awe of Muniandi. It is probable he was the
chief male god of the Parear and many other castes.
He is called Muniandi, Mun-andi, and Mun-adiyan.
The sense in each case is that of “ original lord,”
“chief lord;” and the name must be carefully
distinguished from Muniswara of the Vellalars, who is
Muni-iswaran, “ lord of saints.” There can, however
be no reasonable doubt that this Muni-iswaran is a
title made up to prepare the way for absorption of
Munandi into the all-absorbent Siva.
Muniandi is said to have been self-existent and
without parents. He has no sakti or wife, or
children, has never been married.
The Pallar, the Sakkiliyar, the Kallar, the Maravar,
the Ambalar or Valaiyar, the Vedar, the Sanar, the
Kurumbar, and many of the Idaiyar, alike worship
him.
The Vedar often dedicate the game they kill to
him, and sprinkle blood of it in his honour. Offer-
ings to him consist of sheep or fowls, but never of
buffaloes or cattle ; the head of the victim is struck
off and its blood poured on his symbol; flowers,
betel, camphor, and incense, with arrack or other
intoxicating drinks, completing the sacrifice. His
symbol may be a tree, always a conspicuous one,
old and gnarled if possible, or a stone. Sometimes,
but rarely, a bastion outside a fort wall is sacred to
him, but never anything inside a fort or enclosure.
The symbol is usually at a waste place—the more
weird its scenery the greater the god’s favour.
As a rule no temple is erected, but I am told of
one at Ramnathapuram, said to be erected under an
ali tree. This tree has long been held sacred to him
and is famed far and wide, and the erection of a
small temple beneath it is quite exceptional. No
special class of priest is needed for his worship,
anyone who knows suitable mantras and invocations
may conduct it.
Editor.
ON THE DRAVIDIAN STRUCTURE OF THE SINHALESE LANGUAGE.
(Continued from p. 82.)
On the other side we have support from the
fact that the participial mode of expressing the
future is inherent in the language exclusively
or not, and such expressions as ena dawas,
‘ days that will come’ show the present and
distant future may be conveyed by one parti-
ciple, so ena mosam, ‘ coming seasons’ or seasons
that will come. The verb seems here to be
staggering, as it were, out of a purely participial
stage, into its more usual conjugations, and even
the imperative may be regarded as a quasi-
gerundic form, but just emerging into the true
form. Thus the oldest colloquial form seems
only the root, or the root with n added, as gaha,
strike, gahan, strike, which seems very nearly a
gerund, for it is allowable to say gaha to, strike
thou, which it is clear may be a sort of gerund,
as “thou for the striking,” as well as be the true
imperative.
The optional use of gahanda (the infinitive)
which is clearly a gerund, confirms this view, and
I think we may take gaha, g.ah.an, gahanda,
‘ strike,’ the imperatives of gaha c strike/ to be all
adopted gerunds, of original gerundic use. The
later forms such as gahapan, gahapi, gahapalla,
seem to be coalesced with the pronoun, a form
of which we see in umba, nuba, thou, umbala,
or nubala, you, or the vulgar forms, bang,
balang, bolan, which Sinhalese pandits repudiate
as horribly vulgar though continually used, and
wildly conjecture are connected with ‘ balapan/
look. Their use shows the other origin conclu-
sively, for waren bang, come thou, balan bang,
look thou, show they are connected with the
formation of the imperative in—pan,—pi, and—•
pala; thus balan-ban, look thou, balapan ; gaha
balan, strike you, gahapala, The reason the
Sinhalese pandits objected to use or recognise
ban, balan, seems to have been their use to each
other by the conquered races, which gives them,
a low-caste sense, whereas the constant effort of
the schools was to Aryanise the mother-tongue,
and at the same time un-Dravidianise it,
which the frequent use of such words rendered
SINHALESE LANGUAGE.
41
Like the ancient people of Chaldea, the Arava
Tamils are to this day named after abstrnse epithets
of the deity. As the Chaldeans worshipped Ann, so
the Tamils worship Siva Somnath, and Minakshi,
the fish goddess.
Still more remarkable is the worship of the Tamil
Mars, the Hindu Skanda, who is termed Muruk-
esan, the Lord Muruk. Mirukh was the ancient
god of war, from whom Meroe takes its name in all
probability, and Murukesan is still a common Tamil
name, while Mirukh is an Arabian name for the
planet Mars. The modern pandits derive Murukesan
as Mriga-esan, lord of deer, but this is apparently
only a recent fiction to account for the obscure name,
as if it were of Sanskrit origin.
Editor.
The Tamil God, Muniandi.
The various lower castes of Tamils all have a
great awe of Muniandi. It is probable he was the
chief male god of the Parear and many other castes.
He is called Muniandi, Mun-andi, and Mun-adiyan.
The sense in each case is that of “ original lord,”
“chief lord;” and the name must be carefully
distinguished from Muniswara of the Vellalars, who is
Muni-iswaran, “ lord of saints.” There can, however
be no reasonable doubt that this Muni-iswaran is a
title made up to prepare the way for absorption of
Munandi into the all-absorbent Siva.
Muniandi is said to have been self-existent and
without parents. He has no sakti or wife, or
children, has never been married.
The Pallar, the Sakkiliyar, the Kallar, the Maravar,
the Ambalar or Valaiyar, the Vedar, the Sanar, the
Kurumbar, and many of the Idaiyar, alike worship
him.
The Vedar often dedicate the game they kill to
him, and sprinkle blood of it in his honour. Offer-
ings to him consist of sheep or fowls, but never of
buffaloes or cattle ; the head of the victim is struck
off and its blood poured on his symbol; flowers,
betel, camphor, and incense, with arrack or other
intoxicating drinks, completing the sacrifice. His
symbol may be a tree, always a conspicuous one,
old and gnarled if possible, or a stone. Sometimes,
but rarely, a bastion outside a fort wall is sacred to
him, but never anything inside a fort or enclosure.
The symbol is usually at a waste place—the more
weird its scenery the greater the god’s favour.
As a rule no temple is erected, but I am told of
one at Ramnathapuram, said to be erected under an
ali tree. This tree has long been held sacred to him
and is famed far and wide, and the erection of a
small temple beneath it is quite exceptional. No
special class of priest is needed for his worship,
anyone who knows suitable mantras and invocations
may conduct it.
Editor.
ON THE DRAVIDIAN STRUCTURE OF THE SINHALESE LANGUAGE.
(Continued from p. 82.)
On the other side we have support from the
fact that the participial mode of expressing the
future is inherent in the language exclusively
or not, and such expressions as ena dawas,
‘ days that will come’ show the present and
distant future may be conveyed by one parti-
ciple, so ena mosam, ‘ coming seasons’ or seasons
that will come. The verb seems here to be
staggering, as it were, out of a purely participial
stage, into its more usual conjugations, and even
the imperative may be regarded as a quasi-
gerundic form, but just emerging into the true
form. Thus the oldest colloquial form seems
only the root, or the root with n added, as gaha,
strike, gahan, strike, which seems very nearly a
gerund, for it is allowable to say gaha to, strike
thou, which it is clear may be a sort of gerund,
as “thou for the striking,” as well as be the true
imperative.
The optional use of gahanda (the infinitive)
which is clearly a gerund, confirms this view, and
I think we may take gaha, g.ah.an, gahanda,
‘ strike,’ the imperatives of gaha c strike/ to be all
adopted gerunds, of original gerundic use. The
later forms such as gahapan, gahapi, gahapalla,
seem to be coalesced with the pronoun, a form
of which we see in umba, nuba, thou, umbala,
or nubala, you, or the vulgar forms, bang,
balang, bolan, which Sinhalese pandits repudiate
as horribly vulgar though continually used, and
wildly conjecture are connected with ‘ balapan/
look. Their use shows the other origin conclu-
sively, for waren bang, come thou, balan bang,
look thou, show they are connected with the
formation of the imperative in—pan,—pi, and—•
pala; thus balan-ban, look thou, balapan ; gaha
balan, strike you, gahapala, The reason the
Sinhalese pandits objected to use or recognise
ban, balan, seems to have been their use to each
other by the conquered races, which gives them,
a low-caste sense, whereas the constant effort of
the schools was to Aryanise the mother-tongue,
and at the same time un-Dravidianise it,
which the frequent use of such words rendered