hrasva, dirgha, pluta : Siksha Vedanga : वेदाङ्ग शिक्षा

http://www.himalayanacademy.com /resources/books/dws/dws_mandala-27.html

ह्रस्व : hrasva : is 1 mAtra kAla (मात्र काल) in duration

दीर्घ : dirgha : is 2 mAtra kAlAs in duration

प्लुत : pluta : is 3 mAtra kAlAs in duration according to some scholars and 3 or more mAtra kAlAs in duration according to some scholars. (My view is that it is 3 or more mAtrAs just like बहुवचन refers to 3 or more people or things)

pluta occurs occasionally in vedic texts and is marked by a (3) in brackets as shown.

The problem is that devanagari script and the scripts of sevaral modern indian languages when used to indicate sanskrit have forgotten how to show plutas.

We must remember that sanskrit originally was vAcya (spoken) not lEkhika (written).

Now, Panini in his siksha, counts 21 swaras (pANini s’ikSA – 1 to 13 : vaRNAs, swarAs, mAtrAs, kAlAs, sthAyi), If you ignore dirgha and plutas you can never reach a count of 21.

Thus there are 3 each of the following.

अ

इ

उ

ऋ

ए

ओ

and one each of

ऐ (ai)

औ (au)

लृ (lru)

Leading to a total of 21 swaras.

We know how to write the hrasva and dirgha in devanagari and other scripts, but have no symbol for the plutas. Thus instead of 18 we count 15 in some other scripts and only 13 in devanagari.

(Devanagari ignores dirgha of

ए and

ओ but they exist in telugu and kannada scripts).

We must also remember that other scripts eg Brahmi Script were used earlier to write sanskrit.

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Siksha Vedanga

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Written by Satya

October 17, 2010 at 7:02 pm

2 Responses

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Thanks for sharing.

Samsara

October 18, 2010 at 2:11 pm

Reply
- Dear Sri Krishna,
  I am glad to share knowledge.
  Thank you,
  Satya
  
  satyask
  
  October 18, 2010 at 2:14 pm
  
  Reply

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