Base 10 in dravidian

[Guest guest]

Reading E. Bryant's book, The quest for the origins

of Vedic culture, 2002

 

Dr. Bryant makes several observations about Dravidian and draws important

conclusions, tho' he does not cite any references.

 

For example,

p.180

"This would result in the entire Indigenous Aryan position

losing cogency. It is imperative for the entire Indigenous

case that the script be Indo-Aryan. On the other hand, it has

also been argued that it is unlikely that the script is

Dravidian, since it uses a numbering system with a base ten.

Dravidian uses base eight."

 

p. 183

"The same consideration applies to Munda. Moreover, as noted

earlier, the numbering system of the script, which uses

a base of ten, does not appear to correspond to that of

Dravidian, which uses a base of eight."

 

Dravidian, in general, uses a base of ten, and not eight

as claimed by Bryant. The decimal system of old Tamil

texts employs paHtu "10" and nURu "100". Both have

been constructed for Proto-Dravidian (Parpola, 1994 book

has details). nURu-tal and pakuttal/peH- means in Tamil

"to divide, to break" and both 10 & 100 mean "break" points in

Dravidian numerals. Another interesting point is

the Tamil words for 9, 90, 900 & so on.

Since 9 is one less than the important number base 10,

it's called "toNTu" in classical Tamil. toNTu '9',

ton2n2URu '90', toLAyiram '900' have the root,

"toL-" (less, decrease, reduce) which points to

the adjoining "big" number, 10, 100, 1000 respectively.

 

Because old Tamil and proto-dravidian knows

abundantly paHtu 'ten', nURu 'hundred' etc.,

it may not be a valid reason to discount Dravidian

from the Indus culture.

 

Regards,

N. Ganesan

[Guest guest]

INDOLOGY, "naga_ganesan" <naga_ganesan@h...>

wrote:

 

I think the argument may not be that Dravidian uses base 8

exclusively. It is just that some experts (e.g., Dravidianists and

some who think IVC script was used to write a form of PDr) have felt

that PDr might have used base 8 computation.

 

The evidence that they have adduced consist of:

 

1. The PDr word for '8' *eN also means to count, enumerate etc.

2. Some archaeological evidence.

2.1 Seal texts representing numbers show some peculiarities. Sri I

Mahadevan's concordance gives relative frequencies of use of long

strokes for numbers. They are as follows:

 

1 | 149

2 || 365

3 ||| 314

4 |||| 64

5 ||||| 22

6 |||||| 3

7 ||||||| 6

8 0

9 0

10 0

 

But there are also some seal texts wherein a series of short strokes

have been represented as numbers. These do show non zero (but still

low) frequencies for the putative numeral signs '8', '9' and '10'.

 

(From W A Fairservis, The Harappan Civilization and its writing, pp.

61-62).

 

Fairservis Jr concludes with the statement that 'There is evidence

that Dravidian once had a base eight'. Here he cites KV Zvelebil

(Comparative Dr morphology, p. 36).

 

In addition, Fairservis Jr also gives some specific artifactual

evidence in his Scientific American article (Sc Am, March 1983). He

refers to the calendric sticks made of ivory that he excavated in

Allahdino in Sind wherein he found that a symbol looking like a stalk

of grain stands next to 'vertical strokes that range from one to

seven in number and with five other signs.'. He then asks 'What

language has a word for grain that also means month or moon and is

associated with a base-eight numerical system?' He then adds ' Kamil

V Zvelebil has pointed out that the orginal Dravidian number system

was indeed probably to the base eight: the count to 10, used for

conformity with the base-10 number system today, goes literally (in

translation) "one", "two", "three", "four", "five", "six", "seven",

"number", "many minus one", "many" ' etc etc.

 

Hope this helps,

 

Lakshmi Srinivas

[Guest guest]

INDOLOGY, "lsrinivas" <lsrinivas> wrote:

> >

> .... It is just that some experts (e.g., Dravidianists and

> some who think IVC script was used to write a form of PDr) have

felt

> that PDr might have used base 8 computation.

>

> The evidence that they have adduced consist of:

>

> 1. The PDr word for '8' *eN also means to count, enumerate etc.

> 2. Some archaeological evidence.

>

 

What are the different PDr and Tamil words for '5'?

 

In Telugu, the DeSyam Telugu(non-Sanskrit, Non-Prakrit) words

for '5' are 'aidu', and 'enu'. In the same DeSyam Telugu, it

is 'enika/ennika' and 'enchu' for counting.

The word for '8' is enimidi.

 

It is possible that *eN for counting comes from '8'. I would,

however, think it is more likely that it comes

from '5'. A more natural base for a number system would be 5 or 10;

after all, most of the counting/numbering is `digital'.

 

We may cross check this against the archaeological evidence

mentioned above.

 

Regards.

[Guest guest]

INDOLOGY, "lsrinivas" <lsrinivas> wrote:

>I think the argument may not be that Dravidian uses base 8

>exclusively. It is just that some experts (e.g., Dravidianists and

>some who think IVC script was used to write a form of PDr) have felt

>that PDr might have used base 8 computation.

 

I also think Bryant's reasoning about Dravidian history in Indian northwest

to be not correct.

 

Dravidian has both 8 and 10 as important basic numbers.

Parpola, p. 169, Deciphering the Indus script

"Some cultural traits of the Indus civilization have linguistic

implications. Its standardized weights reveal that the numeral

system was a mixed one, binary or octonary plus decimal.

The smaller ratios weigh 1/2, 1/4, 1/6, 1/8 and 1/16 of the

basic unit (13.625 g), the bigger ratios 2, 4, 10, 12.5, 20, 40,

100, 200, 400, 500, 800 times the basic unit. This agrees

with the traditions of classical India, where 8 X 8 = 64,

and 10 X 10 = 100, were considered 'round numbers', not to

mention the former division of the monetary unit, the rupee,

into 16 annas. There is evidence in the numeral system of

Proto-Dravidian for both a decimal and an octonary system.

The numerals for both 'ten' (*paHtu) and 'hundred' (*nURu)

can be reconstructed for Proto-Dravidian. On the other hand,

in Proto-Dravidian the root for 'eight' (*eN) also means

'number' and 'to count', suggesting that this was the

original turning point in counting (once apparently

performed with the help of fingers but excluding the thumbs)."

 

E. Bryantbook, The quest for the origins

of Vedic culture, 2002, p.180

"Dravidian uses base eight." p. 183

"Moreover, as noted earlier, the numbering system of the script, which uses

a base of ten, does not appear to correspond to that of

Dravidian, which uses a base of eight."

 

However, Dravidian uses base 10 also a PDr has them.

 

Regards,

N. Ganesan

[Guest guest]

INDOLOGY, "lsrinivas" <lsrinivas> wrote:

>In addition, Fairservis Jr also gives some specific artifactual

>evidence in his Scientific American article (Sc Am, March 1983). He

>refers to the calendric sticks made of ivory that he excavated in

>Allahdino in Sind wherein he found that a symbol looking like a stalk

>of grain stands next to 'vertical strokes that range from one to

>seven in number and with five other signs.'. He then asks 'What

>language has a word for grain that also means month or moon and is

>associated with a base-eight numerical system?'

 

What is the word that's taken for grain, moon and base-eight number?

 

It's hard to believe W. A. Fairservis' take that "pir" means

"loop". In sangam Tamil, "loop" is "puri". Rather than taking "pir" as

the meaning of the IVC "fish" sign as done by him,

Fr. Heras, Mahadevan, Parpola's "fish" sign as star seems

to be correct. Somewhere I. Mahadevan mentions Fairservis

not knowing and Dravidian langauge.

 

Regards,

N. Ganesan