Guest guest Posted May 2, 2001 Report Share Posted May 2, 2001 jyeSThA's first occurence in Tamil is "tavvai", the ancient name for "elder sister". Much later in bhakti poems, she is also refered as cETTai, (jyeSThA is rendered in Tamil as cETTai). On the Tamil sources of jyeSThA, pl. refer to: CTamil/message/82 CTamil/message/83 CTamil/message/87 CTamil/message/105 She is widely attested in Tamil, for example from TirukkuRaL, CilappatikAram onwards. M-W. dictionary mentions bhAgavathapurANam, padmapurANam. My question is: does jyeSThA myth appear earlier, for example in the Skt. epics? Regards, N. Ganesan INDOLOGY, vvrsps@r... wrote: > <Is the jyeSTA myth (elder sister of zrI) purely a Southern myth?> > 1. The term <jyeSTA>(the Elder one) is clearly Sanskritic. > 2. The goddess is/was the Dravidian (Southern) counterpart of the goddess of > small-pox, etc. in the North. > 3. It would be interesting to trace the word-transition of this very > Sanskrit-sounding name into Tamil culture. > 4. According to one tradition [as reported by Danielou], jyeSTA represents > Consciousness. > VVRaman > May 2, 2001 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted May 11, 2001 Report Share Posted May 11, 2001 > INDOLOGY, vvrsps@r... wrote: > > <Is the jyeSTA myth (elder sister of zrI) purely a Southern myth?> > > 1. The term <jyeSTA>(the Elder one) is clearly Sanskritic. > > 2. The goddess is/was the Dravidian (Southern) counterpart of the > goddess of > > small-pox, etc. in the North. > > 3. It would be interesting to trace the word-transition of this very > > Sanskrit-sounding name into Tamil culture. > > 4. According to one tradition [as reported by Danielou], jyeSTA > represents > > Consciousness. > > VVRaman Dear Professor, The old name for jyeSThA is kETTai, also for a natal star. Given that I. Mahadevan, A. Parpola, N. Gurov, ... theorize that IVC was Dravidic and its religion is astronomical (mIn - fish/star in tamil), I am not sure jyeSThA is tamilized into cETTai. It could be a simple k-/c- alteration occuring within Dravidian. Cf. a) kERaLam/cEralam b) kai/cey 'hand'. kETTai = the one who does 'kETu' (=harm). Regards, N. Ganesan My earlier reply: INDOLOGY, naga_ganesan@h... wrote: > > > jyeSThA's first occurence in Tamil is "tavvai", > the ancient name for "elder sister". > Much later in bhakti poems, she is also > refered as cETTai, (jyeSThA is rendered > in Tamil as cETTai). > On the Tamil sources of jyeSThA, pl. refer to: > CTamil/message/82 > CTamil/message/83 > CTamil/message/87 > CTamil/message/105 > > She is widely attested in Tamil, for example > from TirukkuRaL, CilappatikAram onwards. > M-W. dictionary mentions bhAgavathapurANam, padmapurANam. > > My question is: does jyeSThA myth appear > earlier, for example in the Skt. epics? > > Regards, > N. Ganesan > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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