Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies - DUBOIS, Abbé Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies, Dubois | Page 467

DIFFERENCES IN WRITTEN CHARACTERS
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from a very remote period. True, some authors assert that
their philosophy was handed down by oral tradition, and
that they never committed anything to writing.
It is,
however, hard to believe that men who gave themselves
up to the study of philosophy and astronomy could have
done so without having recourse to written records.
Be this as it may, I will now briefly describe the present
style of writing among the Hindus, mentioning (1) the
written characters used, (2) the materials on which they
are recorded, (3) the manner in which they are written,
and (4) the shape of their books and of the communications
which they address to each other.
It is generally stated that there are eighteen living
languages in use in India
but as a matter of fact there
All, or at any rate the majority of them,
are many more.
;
have their own distinct alphabetical characters. It is true
that some of these characters, if carefully examined, bear
a very close resemblance to each other but in the majority
of them one can distinguish no similarities.
Yet, however
diversified may be the characters employed in writing,
there are many similarities to be observed in pronuncia-
tion and phraseology.
In all these languages the arrange-
ment of words admits of few changes or differences. In
this particular they differ widely from the European
languages, which, with a general resemblance in their
alphabetical characters, admit of large variations in con-
struction and phraseology.
What resemblance could, for instance, be found between
;
the letters
(a short)
of the
(along)
Tamil language and the
(tha)
letters
e> «
(a short) (a long)
5
(tha)
Telugu language ? And the difference is not less
striking in the other letters of the alphabet.
Yet these
two languages are spoken in countries bordering on each
other, which in other respects present many points of
resemblance. The same diversity with regard to alphabets
is noticeable in other Indian languages.
of the