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Fact 1 – We postulate that Sanskrit is at least 6000 years old. We fall on internal evidence presented by writers like Tilak to claim that the R̥g Veda is around 6000 years old. We also use the fact that the Vedic seers devised elaborate schemes, like the various Pāṭhas, to preserve the fidelity of these ancient Vedic texts, rather than just write them down, to claim that the R̥g Veda was composed before writing was invented; again, taking us back to around 6000 years for the language that the Veda was composed in – Sanskrit.

Fact 2 – We then speculate that the Indus-Saraswati civilisation which evolved around 5000 years ago spoke a form of Sanskrit. We speculate that rather than being ‘Dravidians’ speaking a Dravidian language, the Indus-Saraswati people were one and the same as the ‘Aryans’ who were, in the imagination of Western Sanskritists, supposed to have come from far away regions, defeated and disposed of these Dravidians, and settled down in the valley to then composed the Vedas. We therefore say that there is a continuous tradition of the Sanskrit language in the Indus/ Saraswati regions.

Fact 3 – We then look at how Sanskrit evolved from the language used in the Vedas to the language we know now as Classical Sanskrit. We trace the evolution of the language from The R̥g Veda, which represents the earliest phase of the language that we know, through the Yajur and the Atharva Vedas, through the Brāhmaṇas, the Āraṇyakas and the Upaniṣads, then through the various Sūtras, to the Code of Manu which represents the start of the Classical period of the language. While linguists like Yāska and Pāṇini lived during the late evolutionary period, the epics and the Purāṇas were composed completely in the classical language.

Fact 4 – We also then discuss how the so-called Vedic Sanskrit is not very different from Classical Sanskrit. It is important to note that the gap between Vedic and Classical Sanskrit is not as great as is made out by the western authorities. We show that the difference between Vedic Sanskrit and Classical Sanskrit is not as great as between Old English and Modern English, by taking examples from each of the two.

Fact 5 – We then look at how the Sanskrit of the Vedas evolved into some of the so-called Prakrit languages. One of these Prakrit (simplified Sanskrit) languages was the well-known Pali language in which many of Buddhas’ teachings were propagated. Many of these Prakrits evolved into the spoken languages of North and West India. The history of these North and West Indian languages vis a vis Sanskrit is similar to the history of the Romance languages of Europe vis a vis Latin.

Fact 6 – We also look at how Sanskrit came to be the ‘bearer’ of Indian culture. The scriptures of the so-called Sanatana Dharma (which includes tenets of Jainism, Buddhism and other heterodox and orthodox teachings of India) that are widely recognised in the whole of India were written and propagated through the medium of Sanskrit. This was true even for South India which spoke a different language family of languages. It was also clear that all learned discourses across India were conducted in Sanskrit. Thus Sanskrit served as the link language of India.

Fact 7  We then discuss the origin of languages and the concept of language families and how different language families evolved over the world. We list some of the families and speak of Sanskrit, with a continuous tradition of 6000 years, being the oldest known member of the Indo-European family.

Fact 8 – We look at the origin of the concept of language families and establish why Sanskrit, Persian, Latin and Greek are indeed members of this family. We then list all the major subfamilies of the Indo-European family. We then look at how these different languages evolved from an original language by looking at sound shifts among these various languages. We discuss in particular two laws of sound shift of Germanic languages, Grimms and Verner’s law.

Fact 9 – We also look at the intimate relationship between Sanskrit and Avestan (ancient language of Iran in which their scriptures are composed). We use an example to show that there is a close relation between the words and grammatical constructs of the two languages – Vedic and Avestan.

Fact 10 – We then look at how Sanskrit has influenced South Indian languages, and vice-versa. To elaborate on this, we look at the many words that a South Indian language like Tamil has borrowed from Sanskrit over many centuries. We look at two types of borrowings, tadbhava, which are words that have been borrowed in early times and have evolved along with native words, and tatsama, which are borrowings that have stayed as Sanskrit words.  We also look at how language structures and sounds have been borrowed from Tamil into Sanskrit. We also look at some alternative theories to these.

Fact 11 – We then look at how Sanskrit had a deep influence over the whole of Asia, especially places like China, Japan, Indo-China, being carried there as part of Buddhist teaching and by traders and conquerors. We even speculate that Chinese tones may have their origins in the Vedic tones.

Fact 12 and 13 – We then, over two ‘facts’, look at how Sanskrit was used to express the most ordinary as well as the most sublime ideas by quoting some sample verses from the Rg Veda.

Fact 14 – We discuss the alphabet and sound system of Sanskrit and how the alphabet is arranged scientifically based, for one, on the positions of the tongue where the different sounds are articulated. We investigate the different vowel and consonant sounds of the language.

Fact 15 – We look at the writing system used to represent Sanskrit sounds – the Devanāgarī script. We look at the origins and some of the characteristics of Devanāgarī.

Fact 16 – We look at how words are formed in Sanskrit. We look at the fact that every word in Sanskrit is derived from a set of basic atoms called roots. A word is formed by adding primary and secondary suffixes to (maybe modified) roots. We discuss the Indo-European heritage of these roots and suffixes and look at the similarities between word derivations in Sanskrit and other European languages. To contrast this method of forming words (adding suffixes to roots) with another method, we look at how words are formed in Arabic.

Fact 17 – We look at the three types of roots in Sanskrit – verb roots, noun roots and pronominal roots. While verb roots and noun roots give rise to verb, noun and adjective forms, pronominal roots give rise to pronouns and demonstratives. While some grammarians like Yāska maintain that there is no such thing as a noun root, and all verbs, nouns and adjectives can be traced to verb roots, some like Gārgya maintain that some nouns and adjectives cannot be traced back to verb roots.

Fact 18 – The basic word form in Sanskrit is called a ‘stem’. The stem is formed by adding prefixes and suffixes to (maybe modified) roots. The word stem is then made usable in a sentence (indicating its grammatical function in a sentence) by the addition of declensional (noun and adjective) or conjugational (verb) endings. Most adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, and interjections use word stems without modification by declension or conjugation.

Fact 19 – Nouns in Sanskrit exhibit three different gender forms – called masculine, feminine and neuter. They also exhibit three number forms – singular, dual and plural. Adjectives qualifying these nouns also change their forms according to the corresponding noun form.

Fact 20 – In this ‘fact’, we look at the basics of declension – nouns taking different endings to indicate their grammatical function in a sentence. Is the noun the subject of the action (verb), or object of the action? Is it an instrument used to avail of that action, is it from where or in where the action happens or for who is the action? These are indicated by declensional endings, which vary with the grammatical function. The endings also vary with the number of the noun. These endings are called case endings. While Latin and Greek also employ case endings, Hindi, like French employ prepositions to indicate the function of a noun in a sentence.

Fact 21 – We look at adjectives and state that adjectives change their forms according to the nouns they qualify. They change to indicate their gender, number and case to correspond with the nouns they qualify. We also look at the formation of the comparatives and superlatives of adjectives.

Fact 22 – Verbs too change their forms taking different endings to agree with the nouns they work with. These endings indicate the number and person of the subject noun and also different tenses and modes of the verb.

Fact 23 – Like nouns, pronouns and demonstratives also take different endings (are declined) to indicate their function with respect to the verb in a sentence.

Fact 24 – Not to be left behind, numbers too take different forms in sentences. While ordinal numbers behave like adjectives, cardinal numbers behave inconsistently. Numbers up to twenty behave like adjectives with some even showing differences of gender and number. Numbers beyond twenty behave like nouns.

Fact 25 – Prepositions (to, with etc.), adverbs, conjunctions and interjections show no variation in form.

Fact 26 – We discuss how the well-regarded Western educationist Macaulay decided that India had no literature or history to speak of. This set the tone for the many western so-called orientalists and westernised Indian Sanskritists to look at all Indian writings in a condescending way. In fact, Sanskrit was used by the Westerners to create a divide in Indian society by insisting that it was the Brahminical vehicle for the caste system and all that was bad in Indian society. We discuss that the fault of discrimination in Indian society cannot be laid at Sanskrit’s door, exactly like slavery was not the fault of the English language! We assert that if Sanskrit was a tool for exclusion in earlier times, it should be actively taught to remove any alleged exclusion, like the English language became the great leveller.

We see that during the present period there is a movement to give Sanskrit its right place in Indian studies.

We then touch upon the breadth and depth of literature available in Sanskrit. We talk of the continuous tradition of Sanskrit from the Vedic period to today. We talk of the great Gandhian Dharampal recording how there was a great tradition of Sanskrit based teaching and learning about India (by all sections of society) till the British came and deliberately neglected and then uprooted this system to introduce Western education systems. We again emphasise that there was a continuous tradition of Sanskrit based learning in India from the Vedic period till the coming of the Muslim/ Western rule.

Fact 27 – We look at the Vedic period of the language. This period can be split into three sub periods – 1) that of the creation of the four vedas, 2) that of the creation of the Brāhmaṇas, the Āraṇyakas and the Upaniṣads, and 3) that of the creation of the various Sūtras. In this fact we discuss the first sub period and look at the Vedas in some detail. We discuss some of the commentaries on the Vedas, in particular at Sāyaṇa and following him, Max Mueller. These scholars interpreted the R̥g Veda from a ritualistic angle, and this remained the narrative for a long time till Aurobindo proposed interpreting the R̥g Veda from a spiritual and psychological knowledge angle.

Fact 28 – The second sub period saw the coming together of the Brāhmaṇas, the Āraṇyakas and the Upaniṣads. We discuss how the Brāhmaṇas were some of the earliest of Indian literature to be composed in prose. They serve as a commentary and explain the significance of the different Vedas. They also try to explain the significance and origins of the different sacrifices. Many of the Brāhmaṇas contain numerous myths and legends. Many of the later philosophical schools trace their thoughts to some of these Brāhmaṇas. The Brāhmaṇas transition into the Āraṇyakas (‘forest books’) which are of a more mystic and theosophical character. Then come the Upaniṣads which are theological and philosophical speculations on nature, life, world and things. Many of these Upaniṣads are embedded in a Brāhmaṇa or an Āraṇyaka.

Fact 29 – The third sub period sees the creation of the various Sūtras. The Śrauta Sūtras are manuals for Vedic sacrifice rituals while the Gr̥hya Sūtras are manuals for domestic sacrifice rituals and ceremonies applicable to the domestic life of a man and his family from birth to death. As part of the Śrauta Sūtras, we get the so-called Śulva (or Śulba) Sūtras. They are practical manuals giving the mathematics and measurements for the construction of the sacrificial altars and such other constructions. The Śulva Sūtras are some of the earliest works on mathematics and show an advanced knowledge of geometry (including the earliest form of the Pythagoras theorem), trigonometry and algebra. Another set of Sūtras are the Dharma Sūtras which deal with the ways of everyday life of people. These include the Mānava Dharma Śāstra, called the Manusmr̥ti or the Code of Manu.

The whole area of this Sūtra literature is divided into six classes called Vedāngas. These classes are: phonetics, grammar, etymology, metre, religious practice, and astronomy.

Fact 30 – We look at the Prātiśākhyas (also known as a Pārṣada), which are pre-Pāṇini, and which are the oldest books on phonetics and pronunciation in the world. They look at the relationship of the Pada Pāṭha to the actual Veda and look systematically at euphonic combinations and discuss the correct way to recite the Vedas. We see that all the four Vedas, and each of the recensions of them, have one or more Prātiśākhyas associated with them. We discuss the Taittirīya Prātiśākhya as an example.

Fact 31 – We look at the beginnings of the Classical period. This period saw a slow change of the deities worshipped in the subcontinent. The supreme deities that were worshipped seem to have changed from Indra, Varuṇa, Agni and others to Viṣṇu, Śiva and Brahma. The Vedic deities had become secondary. With this also came a big change in the kind of works produced in Sanskrit. The post-Vedic period saw the flowering of many nonreligious works in Sanskrit.

Two of the first works in Classical Sanskrit would be the two great epics–the Rāmāyaṇa and the Mahābhārata. We discuss a few details of these two epics. We also briefly discuss the Bhagavad Gīta, the best known and most famous of Indian philosophical texts with a unique pan-Indian influence, which is a part of the Mahābhārata.

This period also saw the appearance of the various Purāṇas which deal with the origins of the world, the earth, as well as mankind and of the various ages of the universe. There are stories of the exploits of various heroes and gods. Many of them focus on the exploits of the Avatārs of Viṣṇu while a few of them favour Śaiva ideas. The most well-known and popular Purāṇa is the Bhāgavata Purāṇa; its 10th book, which details the story of Kr̥ṣṇa, being especially well-known.

Fact 32 – We now look at the secular literature of India which came immediately after the various Purāṇas. In this ‘fact’ we look at the poems and plays of the great Kālidāsa. Kālidāsa is considered to be the greatest poet and dramatist in all Indian languages. His main contributions were three great poems and three great dramas. The drama Abhijñānaśākuntalam is considered to be his masterpiece. His other plays are Vikramorvaśīyam, Mālavīkāgnimitram. The great epic poems of Kālidāsa are Raghuvaṃśam and Kumārasambhavam. Kālidāsa’s forte was the simile and the metaphor. Kalidāsa is also the author of one of the most famous lyrical poems in Sanskrit–the Meghadūtam.

Fact 33 – We look at some of the other literature in Classical Sanskrit. Some of the well-known epic poets are: Bhartr̥hari, Bhāravi, Māgha Śrīharṣa. Some of the other great poets are Ratnākara, Kavirāja, Padmagupta alias Parimala. There are also many great prose writings. Some of these writers are: Daṇḍin, Subandhu, Bāṇa. Bāṇa’s Kādambarī is a romantic novel started by Bāṇa and completed by his son. It can be considered to be the oldest romantic novel in the world.

There are some historical poetic works in Sanskrit. The earliest during the Classical period is the Mūṣikavaṃśakāvyam by Atula of North Kerala. Another historical work is the Rājataraṃgiṇi of Kalhana of Kashmir.

We look at the meta work on drama, the Nāṭyaśāstra of Bharata. We look at the plays of Bhāsa, Śūdraka, Harṣadeva and others. We also look at some of the other poems and dramas of Sanskrit.

Fact 34 – We discuss another genre of literature in Sanskrit – fairy tales and fables. Most of these are didactic stories with a high moralistic ending. The Pañcatantra is one such collection of fables written in prose. The Pañcatantra has been translated and reworked into many languages. We trace the history of the translations of the Pañcatantra into various languages like Persian, Aramaic, Arabic, Greek, Hebrew, Latin, English etc. These stories were carried far and wide into Western Asia and into Europe. These tales were also taken to the east, China, Japan, Korea and Mongolia by the Buddhist monks.

There are also some other fairy tales in Sanskrit.

Fact 35 – First, we discuss some of the important philosophical works in Sanskrit. There are essentially eleven schools of philosophical thought and all these different schools produced works extolling their philosophies. Then there were précises, commentaries, and explanations of these works as well as commentaries on these commentaries! Many of the works have been lost and are known only from the fact that later authors quote from them.

There are also many law books in Sanskrit. The Code of Manu we saw earlier is one of them. One of the most important law books we discuss is the Arthaśāstra of Kautilya or Chanakya. The Arthaśāstra sets out the duties and obligations of a king and includes books on economics, statecraft, military strategy, law, court systems, running of a government, diplomacy, agriculture, medicine, ethics, social welfare and many other areas. It also gives an account of Indian philosophy. All in all, it is a great compendium of information as it existed then.

Fact 36 – There are many books on grammar in Sanskrit. One of the oldest is, of course, the Aṣṭādhyāyī of Pāṇini. Pāṇini uses and refers to some earlier works which have been lost. There are many explanations, interpretations, and commentaries of Pāṇini. The most well-known is the Mahābhāṣya of Patañjali, which itself has many commentaries. There are many other grammar books also in Sanskrit.

Then there are the thesauri or kośas. These arrange words and group synonyms together. The most ancient of these is the so-called Nighanṭu. It was the subject of the Nirukta, a commentary together with a treatise on etymology, by Yāska.

The most well-known kośa is the Amarakośa or the Nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam of Amarasiṃha. It is certainly the oldest extant thesaurus in the world. The author mentions several previous thesauri but these have been lost.

There are many works on astronomy and mathematics. Some of the great astronomers like Āryabhaṭa, Varāhamihira, Brahmagupta, Bhāskara I, Bhāskara II all produced well-known works in mathematics and astronomy. The Sūryasiddhānta by an unknown author is one of the best works on Indian astronomy. The Kerala School of astronomy and mathematics produced many great works between the 14th and 17th centuries CE.

Sanskrit also produced works of medicine, Caraka. Śuśruta and Vāgbhaṭa being some of the best writers. In addition, there are many works on arts, eroticism, logic, and tantrism. Vātsyayana’s Kāmasūtra is well known and doesn’t need further explanation. There are also panegyrics, works on sculpture and painting as well as music.

Fact 37 – Literature and other works in Sanskrit continued to be produced throughout the Classical period and later. There was no encouragement from the system or the establishment for writers in Sanskrit and one of the key obstacles to the continued production of Sanskrit works is a lack of funding. With all these handicaps there are still many works being composed in Sanskrit. There were more than 400 Sanskrit plays written and published during the 19th and 20th centuries.  52 Sanskrit mahākāvyas were written in a single decade, 1961–1970. It is estimated that in the post-independence era, more than 3,000 high-quality Sanskrit works were composed.

So far from being dead, Sanskrit is a living language kept vibrant by many poets, artists, scholars and researchers. This continuous literature has sustained the continuity of Indian civilisation from the Vedic period to the current time.

Fact 38 – We discuss the contributions of Yāska, the greatest etymologist, who is thought to have lived in the early part of the first millennium BCE. His work is simply called the Nirukta. Yāska applied a practical and scientific method to deriving the origin of words.

The basic premise of Yāska’s study was that all words in a language can be reduced to a set of basic elements called roots. No word in a language is underivable from a root. He enunciated three general principles for deriving words from roots.

He was a secular man and did not ascribe any ritualistic, mystic or supernatural elements to his analysis. Yāska’s Nirukta is the earliest surviving etymological treatise in the world. Yāska was remarkably free of fanaticism and bigotry and followed a very rationalistic approach to his deductions and analyses. There is a well-known commentary on the Nirukta by Durga.

Fact 39 – In this ‘fact’ we discuss the contributions of the great grammarian Pāṇini, who lived around the middle of the first millennium BCE.

His main work, the Aṣṭādhyāyī is written in the Sūtra or aphoristic style with 3,959 Sūtras covering the morphology, linguistics, semantics and syntax of Sanskrit. Pāṇini is considered to be the father of linguistics and grammar.

Pāṇini’s aphorisms are rules that describe facts about the language and how to generate correct grammatical units of the language. The rules are of various kinds: Definition of terms used in the work, general rules that describe how the language is, rules that define exceptions to the previous rules, rules of analogy that talk of how one entity behaves like another, rules that govern a set of following rules and rules for interpreting the rules. The entire structure of the language is defined using these rules.

He employs two main tricks to describe complex grammatical rules using terse aphorisms or Sūtras. 1) He has a system by which a set of logically connected letters can be represented by just two letters. 2)  He has a compact system for indicating the letter that needs to be replaced, the letter that replaces it and the environment in which the letter to be replaced occurs.

Fact 40 – Pāṇini’s grammar is a semi-formal system for generating Sanskrit language constructs. The grammar is represented using rules that remind us of the production rules of formal grammars of modern computation theory. We will look at one of these modern formal

grammar notations–the Pāṇini-Backus Form (PBF)–as a way of understanding by comparing some of the properties of Pāṇini’s system.

We arrive at the conclusion that that Pāṇini’s grammar is clearly a context-sensitive, contracting grammar and not a context-free one.

Fact 41- We discuss the European interest in Sanskrit and look at some of the European Sanskritists and their contributions. The early contributors were missionaries like Heinrich Roth and John Hanxleden. The best-known of the early European Sanskritists is the Anglo-Welsh philologist Sir Willian Jones. He is the first person to have noticed and talked about the connection between Sanskrit, Latin and Greek, and proposed a common ancestry for these languages.

It was interesting that while many Europeans were enamoured by Sanskrit, there were many who thought that Sanskrit was a language made up by the Brahmins in imitation of Latin and Greek, as a hoax, just to make fools of the Europeans!

Some of the other contributors were Colebrooke, Hamilton, Schlegel, Bopp, Burnouf, and others.

The best-known European Sanskrit scholar was Friedrich Max Mueller. He was a German, who spent most of his time in England. He pioneered the European study of Indian and other eastern religions He directed the preparation of the 50-volume Sacred Books of the East.

Some of the other European scholars are Monier Monier-Williams, Ralph T. Griffith, and Arthur B. Keith. There were also others like John Muir, Horace H. Wilson, Hermann Oldenberg, Otto von Bohtlingk, Theodor Aufrecht, George Thibaut, Willem Caland, James Ballantyne, Dwight Whitney (American) and Arthur A. Macdonell. A well-known modern European Sanskrit scholar is the Dutchman Frits Staal. Another modern Sanskritist is the controversial Wendy Doniger (an American).

It is to be noted that while the Europeans who contributed to the study of Sanskrit were undoubtedly great scholars, the objective of some of these people (especially the missionaries and native and adopted Englishmen), but not all, were either spreading Christianity among the ‘natives’ or furthering the colonial cause or both. This is the reason why their contribution and their theories are looked at with suspicion by recent Indian scholars.

Fact 42 – In Sanskrit, like in other languages, when two morphemes, two stems or two words come together internally in a word or externally in a sentence, sound changes occur at the boundaries to make the combined entity sound euphonic (= agreeable sound). This sound change is called sandhi (saṃdhi). In English we say a boy, but an apple. This is an example of an external sandhi.

There are three kinds of boundaries (classed into two types) where these euphonic rules or sandhi rules apply. There are some euphonic rules for the last sound of words standing alone also.

Fact 43 – In this “fact” we will look at permitted finals. Only one consonant is permitted after the last vowel of a word (standing by itself) and this is restricted to a certain narrow set of consonants. Any other consonant occurring at the end of a word is variously altered to a permitted one or dropped altogether.

Fact 44 – As a general rule, hiatus is not permitted. That is, all syllables, except the one at the beginning of a sentence or at the beginning of a word or phrase not forming part of a sentence, must start with one or more consonants. (It was different in Vedic Sanskrit, where hiatus was allowed freely). To avoid hiatus, two vowels coming next to each other are fused together into one sound, one of them changed to a semivowel, or a semivowel is introduced between them.

Fact 45 – The whole area of consonant sandhis is very complicated and there are many exceptions to any rule we can make. So, we will not go into too many details in the area of consonant combinations but only state some of the more important rules.

Fact 46 – We discuss the important area of visarga sandhis, or sandhis that involve the visarga (which is only a replacement for final r or s).

Fact 47 – In Sanskrit, especially in Classical Sanskrit, sandhi rules are very rigorously applied and written down. So, the first thing we have to do when analysing a sentence is to resolve the (external) sandhis and get original words. There will be ambiguity in resolving many of the sandhis as many combinations yield the same final form in sandhi. We discuss how we can understand these ambiguities.

Fact 48 – In this fact we discuss the function of cases in Sanskrit. Nouns take on different endings to indicate their function (such as subject, direct object and indirect object) in a sentence. The forms of these different functions with respect to the verb are called grammatical cases. For example, the form used to indicate the subject is called the nominative (prathamā in Sanskrit) case, the form of the object of the verb is called the accusative (dvitīyā) case, the form of the instrument of action is called the instrumental (tr̥tīyā) case and so on. Now, these cases assume many more functions than just being the object or instrument in a sentence. In the main part of the fact we discuss some of the main functions of the various cases.

Fact 49 – We discuss the fact that nouns (and adjectives) in Sanskrit are normally classified based on their endings (the ending of the noun and adjective stems) and on whether they are masculine, feminine or neuter. The normal classes are: Those stems ending in a; those ending in i and u; those ending in ā, ī and ū; those ending in r̥; and those ending in consonants. There are many sub-classifications within these classifications. Nouns of these classifications take different case endings. Now, there is what is called a set of standard case endings. These case endings have been identified and listed by Pāṇini.

We also discuss the fact that the seven cases that exist in Sanskrit are by no means comprehensive. Finnish, for example, has 15 cases. And, Tsez, a North-East Caucasian language is said to have 64 cases!

As a contrast we look at French and Hindi which have completely got rid of cases (except in pronouns). French uses prepositions and Hindi postpositions.

Fact 50, 51 and 52 – In these three ‘facts’ we discuss the declension paradigms of different types of stems ending in vowels and consonants.

Fact 53, 54 – In ‘fact’ 53 we look at declensional endings of pronouns and in 54 we look at the declension of numbers.

Fact 55 – We start looking at conjugation and say that conjugation in Sanskrit recognises distinctions between tense (present, imperfect, perfect, pluperfect, periphrastic perfect, seven types of aorists, future, conditional and periphrastic future), mode or mood (indicative, imperative, optative and subjunctive and precative or benedictive), voice (active, middle), person (first [I], second [you] and third [he/ she/ it]) and number (singular, dual and plural). Along with the conjugation, we also have to recognise participles, infinitives, gerunds (continuatives) and gerundives. There are also a set of secondary conjugations (the passive, the causative, the intensive, the desiderative and the denominative), a set of compound conjugations and a set of periphrastic conjugations. There are also tertiary conjugations that are secondary conjugations of the secondary conjugations.

We also say that primary conjugation can be classified into four distinct tense systems: present, perfect, aorist and future.

Fact 56 – Ancient Indian grammarians divided verbal roots into ten classes based on how the stem of the present system conjugation is derived from the root. Verbs of classes 1, 4, 6 and 10 are called thematic verbs. They have an a added at the end of the stem and the verb stem remains the same throughout the present system conjugation. The other class verbs are called athematic verbs. They do not have this a added at the end of the stem. These stems have two forms–the weak and the strong form.

We also discuss that there are two types of conjugational endings–one for the active voice and one for the middle voice. These two voices exist in ancient Greek also. So, they go a long way back in Sanskrit’s evolution.

Fact 57 – We go into details of the present system.

Fact 58 – We discuss the fact that the class 3 conjugational stem is made by reduplication of the root. Reduplication is a process where a part, or the whole of a root, stem or word is repeated for strengthening them for emphasis, intensification, indicating repetition, or indicating plurality. Reduplication is found in many languages including Hindi, English, and Greek.

Fact 59, 60, 61 – We discuss present and past participles, infinitives, and gerundives.

Fact 62 – In this fact, we discuss the passive voice.

Fact 63 – In this fact, we discuss the perfect system and tense. In Sanskrit, there are three tenses to indicate past action. The imperfect laṅ, the aorist luṅ and the perfect liṭ. According to Sanskrit grammarians, the imperfect is used to denote past action done previous to the current day, the perfect is used to denote past action done previous to the current day but not witnessed by the speaker (parokṣe liṭ) while the aorist is used to denote an indefinite past time. In Classical Sanskrit, in practice, these three tenses seem to be used interchangeably for any past action.

The main characteristic of the formation of the perfect stem is the reduplication of the root.

We also look at the periphrastic perfect.

Fact 64 – We look at aorists of which there are seven types.

Fact 65 – We look at the future systems and the conditional. We also look at the periphrastic perfect.

Fact 66 – We start looking at secondary conjugations. The main secondary conjugations are: the passive, the causative (ṇijanta), the intensive (yaṅanta), the desiderative (sannanta) and the denominative (nāmadhātu). We discuss in detail the causative, which is the most commonly used secondary conjugation after the passive. We discuss two kinds of the causatives: intransitive – transitive pair (where the transitive is like a causative) and transitive – causative pair.

We also discuss a tertiary conjugation like the passive of the causative.

Fact 67 – We discuss the secondary conjugations the intensive, the desiderative and the denominative.

Fact 68 – We look at verbal prefixes which are attached to verb roots to get verbs of different meanings. Verbal prefixes are common in many languages.

Fact 69 – We discuss the continuative which indicates an action prior in time to the action of the main verb of a sentence. A series of continuatives can be used where each continuative is prior in time to the one that immediately follows.

We note that there is no equivalent construction in English or other non-Indian Indo-European languages, but is common in Indian languages like Hindi and Tamil.

Fact 70 – In this fact we look at indeclinables. An indeclinable is a part of speech that always remains the same and is not declined or changed as per its function such as nouns or adjectives. Indeclinables are called avyaya by Sanskrit grammarians. The indeclinables are: Prepositions, adverbs, conjunctions, and interjections.

Fact 71 – We start looking at how stems are formed in Sanskrit. The stem is the basic form of a word like a noun, or a verb, an adjective, a pronoun, a demonstrative, or a numeral. Declensional and conjugational endings are added to these stems to indicate the function of the word in a sentence. Now, these stems themselves are made by adding affixes (including null affixes) to a root.  Here we are talking of the formation of the stems themselves rather than declined or conjugated words.

There are two types of suffixes that are added. Primary suffixes (kr̥t affixes) and secondary suffixes (taddhita affixes). Primary suffixes are added directly to (maybe modified) roots while secondary suffixes are added to derivative stems (and also to pronominal stems and occasionally to particles).

In this fact we look at primary suffixes.

Fact 72 – Here we discuss secondary suffixes.

Fact 73 – We start looking at compound words. Compounding is a process of word formation in which two or more stems (nouns, adjectives, prepositions, or adverbs) are joined together to form compound words which are then treated as if they are simple words with respect to construction and inflection. The meaning of the compound word may be similar to or different from the individual words in the compound. For example, take the word mūṣikaśāvaka ‘mouseling, baby mouse’ which is a compound of the words mūṣika ‘mouse’ and śāvaka ‘young one’. The word mūṣikaśāvaka is then declined like one word. Compounds are called samāsa by Sanskrit grammarians.

Compounds are all formed in generally the same way. The stem forms of the words (nouns, adjectives) or the whole preposition or adverb are put together applying the rules of sandhi. Only the last member of the compound is declined. A compound may, like a simple word, become a member in another compound and this in yet another and so on without any limit.

Sanskrit grammarians recognise four types of compounds – tatpuruṣa (including karmadhāraya), avyayībhāva, dvandva and bahuvrīhi.

Fact 74 – We will deal with dvandva (copulative) compounds here. In this, two or more nouns (and sometimes two or more adjectives) are connected as if by a conjunction like ‘and’.

These compounds fall into two classes: Itaretara and Samāhāra (composite).

Fact 75 – In this fact we discuss tatpuruṣa compounds in detail. Tatpuruṣa compounds fall into two distinct classes–dependent and descriptive compounds. 1. Compounds in which the prior member is a noun, pronoun or adjective used as a noun. These are called dependent Compounds. 2. Compounds in which the prior member is an adjective, adverb, or noun used like an adjective. These are called karmadhāraya or descriptive compounds.

Fact 76 – Here we discuss bahuvrīhi compounds. A bahuvrīhi compound takes a compound which has a noun as a final member and therefore functioning like a noun and uses it with the idea of possessing added, thus turning it into an adjective, which then qualifies another noun taking the gender, number and case of the noun it qualifies. No special suffixes or endings are required to convert the noun ending compound into an adjective.

We note that adverbially used accusative cases of bahuvrīhi adjective compounds, which have an indeclinable or particle as the prior member, are called avyayībhāva by Sanskrit grammarians and bahuvrīhi compounds (especially the ones used as nouns) having a numeral as the prior member are called dvigu by Sanskrit grammarians.

Fact 77 – Syntax deals with the arrangement of words and phrases to create well-formed sentences in a language.  We discuss the fact that Sanskrit generally follows a SOV (subject-object-verb) word order. The main features of Classical Sanskrit style are: The use of the past participle instead of the finite verb; use of the passive rather than active forms; heavy use of compounds; the use of locative absolutes; indeclinable participles instead of subordinate clauses; absence of indirect construction; not using the subjunctive mood; predominance of coordination; and the use of periphrastic verbal forms.

Ancient Sanskrit differed from Classical Sanskrit in that there was more use of the middle voice, fuller use of the tenses, moods, infinitives, inflected participles and genuine prepositions.

We also look at the theory of word order (SOV vs SVO etc.).

Fact 78 – In this fact we look in detail at the uses of the cases of Sanskrit.

Fact 79 – We look at an interesting aspect of Sanskrit called absolute construction. An absolute construction is one standing apart from a normal or usual syntactical relation with other words or sentence elements. It modifies an entire sentence and is not attached to a single element (like a noun–the subject or object) in the sentence.

In Sanskrit absolutes are normally of two types – genitive and locative. English also has absolute constructions but it is in the nominative case.

Fact 80 – The term Vedic Sanskrit refers to the metrical language of the Vedic hymns and the prose of the Brāhmaṇas and the Brāhmaṇa-like portions of the various recensions of the Yajur Veda and the Atharvaveda.

One of the key aspects in which Vedic Sanskrit differs from Classical Sanskrit is the use of Accents. The ancient Sanskrit accent is described as being dependent on a variation of pitch or tone. The tones or pitches are called svara in Sanskrit. There are three tones or svaras on vowels. The udātta meaning ‘raised’, the anudātta meaning ‘not raised’ and the svarita meaning ‘sounded’. The udātta is a high tone or pitch, the anudātta is a low tone and the svarita is like a circumflex accent. It is a combination of a high tone and low tone (the tone rises and then falls)

We look in detail at what these accents are and how they are marked in texts.

Fact 81 – We take the study of accents further and look at how accents behave in different situations – accents on single words, double accents, lack of accents and loss of accents. We also look at the behaviour of accents in various grammatical situation.

Fact 82 – We look at how accents behave in compound words.

Fact 83 – We look at the behaviour of accents on verbs and verb forms.

Fact 84 – We discuss the importance of accents in Vedic Sanskrit.

Fact 85 – From accents we move on to the conjugation systems in Vedic Sanskrit. Vedic Sanskrit was a more vibrant and active language as compared to Classical Sanskrit. We look at the conjugational system of Vedic Sanskrit and see how it is different from Classical Sanskrit.

One of the main differences in the present system is the common use of the subjunctive mode in Vedic Sanskrit. This use has been lost in Classical Sanskrit. We look in detail at the subjunctive mode.

We also look at the perfect and aorist systems to note the differences between Vedic and Classical Sanskrit.

Fact 86 – We continue to look at some other differences between Vedic and Classical Sanskrit. We loo at the differences in sandhis, pronouns and in particular at the infinitives. In Vedic Sanskrit, there was a big variety of infinitives while in Classical Sanskrit this variety was reduced to one single type ending.

We also look at the use of secondary conjugations in Vedic Sanskrit.

Fact 87 – In this ‘fact’ we look at the method for analysing Sanskrit texts. We look at all the steps involved. The first step is to know the domain and the cultural context of the text. The step after this is syntactic analysis. The next step is semantic analysis. We also briefly touch upon ‘close reading’. This looks at passages or texts to get a very deep interpretation of them.

Fact 88 – As an example of prose analysis, we take a story from the Hitopadeśa, The Donkey in the Tiger Skin (Hitopadeśa: Book 3 Fable3)  and do a word-by-word analysis of this.

Fact 89 – As an example of verse analysis we take a story, The Naḷopākhyānam (the story of Nala), found in the Vana Parva of the Mahābhārata and do a complete analysis of the first few verses. We also use this opportunity to explain the śloka style of stanza metre.

Fact 90 – As an example of the analysis of verses from the Veda we take the first hymn from the R̥g Veda (RV 1.1) and completely analyse it.

Fact 91 – To understand early prose style, we analyse a verse from a Brāhmaṇa (the Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa 2.2.2.6).

Fact 92 – To understand the beauty of Sanskrit literature we look at a couple of verses from Classical literature (including three gems from Kalidasa).

Fact 93 – In this fact, we look at some of the metres (chandas) employed in Classical and Vedic prosody.

Fact 94 – Semantic analysis is understanding the context of roots, words, phrases, idioms, figurative speech, sentences, paragraphs and relating each of these to the text as a whole to understand the import of the text. There also may be cultural contexts. Interestingly, there were a set of grammarians in India who worked with semantic analysis. The approach of this school of grammarians was to look at language constructions independent of the words used and of the syntax. That is, their approach starts the analysis of a sentence from the semantic (rather than the syntactic) values of it.

We look at a NASA paper entitled ’Knowledge Representation in Sanskrit and Artificial Intelligence’ by Rick Briggs. In it, Briggs argued that natural languages can serve as well as artificial languages for representing knowledge. He uses Sanskrit as an example of a natural language that can be used for this purpose. His main references for this are Sanskrit grammarians of the 17th and 18th century mainly Bhattoji Dikshita, Kaudabhatta and Nagesha. In his paper he says “a typical Knowledge Representation Scheme (using semantic nets) will be laid out, followed by an outline of the method used by the ancient Indian grammarians to analyse sentences unambiguously. Finally, the clear parallelism

between the two will be demonstrated and the theoretical implications of this equivalence will be given.” In the ‘fact’ we discuss details of this and explain the parallelism.

One important aspect we can learn from this paper is that research into languages and grammar, syntax and semantics was being actively done in India even in the 17th and 18th centuries, and very substantial results were being published.

We discuss many aspects of claims about Sanskrit language based on this paper and also look at how we need a method to the validity of such claims.

Fact 95 – How do we recognise the root of a word in Sanskrit? That is, if we see a word, how do we know what root it is derived from? In this ‘fact’ we look at some of the clues we can use to identify the root from which a word originates.

We look at Yāska’s ‘the first principle’ for the derivation of words. (The first principle is: Derive words from roots in the normal fashion modifying the root to get regular grammatical forms). If the first approach fails, we can also use Yāska’s second and third principles to arrive at the root – using the meaning of the word and deriving it from some similarity of form or similarity of letter or syllable; and deriving the word in accordance with its meaning.

Fact 96 – We look at some words in English that have a common ancestor with Sanskrit. The words in English that derive from a common root as Sanskrit may have arrived there through a circuitous route. For example, from Old Germanic to Old English to English; or from Latin to French to Old English to English; or from Latin to French to English; or from Latin or Greek to English; or from Old Norse to Danish to English, etc. We will not trace the whole path but just look at the Sanskrit and the English words.

Fact 97 – We take the story, “The Brahmin and his faithful mongoose”, fable 13 of book 4 of the Hitopadeśa. We then challenge you to solve a crossword based on the words in the story.

Fact 98 – We look at having some fun with the language. We look at an extremely popular exercise in ancient India called Samasyā pūrti (problem solving) which is a class of Sanskrit (and of many other Indian languages) literature where the last line (pāda) of a metrical composition is given. This line will be completely meaningless as is. The solver has to provide the other (previous) lines so that what is stated in the last line makes sense.

We look at a couple of these.

Fact 99 – Sanskrit poets were past-masters at the literary technique called constrained writing, that is writing in which the writer is bound by certain constraints. Many Sanskrit

writers have also used their works to brilliantly display such feats with the language.

We look at one such verse, the 15th verse of the 15th chapter of Kirātārjunīya of Bhāravi uses only the consonant sound n except for the last one! We analyse this verse.

Another verse, which we do not analyse, is from the Śiśupālavadha of Māgha. The 114th verse of the 19th chapter uses only the letter da.

Fact 100 – The sounds l and r are interchangeable in many languages. This is true of Sanskrit also. We look at this phenomenon.

Fact 101 – We look at the allphasyllabic numeral notation system known as the kaṭapayādi system. This system is used to remember numbers easily as words or phrases or verses. The system is supposed to have originated with Vararuci and has been extensively used in the Kerala schools of astronomy and mathematics from around the middle of the first millennium CE. Many of the tables of astronomy have been encoded in this system.

Fact 102 – In this ‘fact’ we look at a few random interesting words in Sanskrit.

Fact 103 – The greatest and most well-known experiment to bring to life an inactive language was when the newly created state of Israel, in 1948, adopted what is called Modern Hebrew as the state language. Hebrew was the language spoken in ancient Israel and surrounding areas till it was replaced by Aramaic in the last centuries BCE. Even though Hebrew was supplanted, like Sanskrit, with more modern languages, it still continued, again like Sanskrit, as the liturgical language of the Jewish faith and as a literary language of the area.

We discuss the possibility that the revival of Hebrew as the language of Israel can be used as a model for the revival of Sanskrit as our national language.

There are a lot of parallels between Hebrew and Sanskrit. Remember that Hebrew was the sacred language of Israel and Sanskrit was the sacred language of India. And remember that both Sanskrit and Hebrew became moribund around the same time–the last half of the first millennium BCE.

Fact 104 – In this ‘fact’, we look at a brief proposal for the revival of Sanskrit as the national language of India to be spoken nation-wide as a first language. After independence, the language of the elite, the link language and the language for international communication in India has been English. But Indians have always keenly felt the need for a language that they can tout within and without India as their language of pride. Hindi could have taken that place but for the fact that many in India do not accept Hindi as a representative language of the whole nation.

The bulk of the ‘fact’ is a proposal to make Sanskrit our national language.

Fact 105 – The Brāhmaṇas were composed to interpret and explain the sacred significance of the Vedas and the significance of the sacrificial rituals. The Brāhmaṇas transition into the Āraṇyakas, which are of a more mystic and theosophical character. Then come the Upaniṣads, which are theological and philosophical speculations on the nature of things.

However, in the 14th century CE, Sāyaṇa wrote a very comprehensive commentary on the Vedas. Sāyaṇa interpreted the R̥g Veda from a ritualistic angle analysing every word of the R̥g Veda in such a way that the meaning of the hymns can be understood for the sake of performing sacrificial rituals. European and later Indian scholars based their work and research on Sāyaṇa’s commentaries. The accepted narrative for the last few hundred years was based on this ritualistic interpretation.

in early 20th century, the Indian spiritual reformer, Aurobindo proposed that the R̥g Veda, in its hymns, which were outwardly materialistic, conceal the spiritual and psychological knowledge of the people of that period. Only initiated deep study reveals this concealed knowledge. He started, in his The Secret of the Veda, to analyse R̥ g Vedic hymns in this light.

Aurobindo said that Vedic utterances have both an outer meaning and an inner meaning. The ancients, who composed the Vedic hymns, may have infused this double meaning into the Vedas so that both the need for ritual and the need for drawing spiritual power could be met. Over time, the outer ritualistic interpretations began to take precedence over the inner spiritual interpretations.

We discuss the possibility that some of the Vedic, especially the R̥g Vedic, hymns conceal references to political situations that obtained during that time. References to situations that the seers did not dare to openly talk about due to the political realities of that time. For example, the Dāśarājñám or the ‘Battle of Ten Kings’, described in the R̥g Veda (RV) hymns 7.18, 7.33 and 7.83, is clearly a historical event. There are other tantalising glimpses of battles.

We discuss the possibility that the reason why there are so few historical references is because we have not interpreted the hymns correctly, with history in mind.

Fact 106 – To justify what we said at the end of the previous ‘fact’, we interpret two Rig Vedic hymns–the Vr̥ṣā́kapi hymn (RV 10.86) and the hymn RV 10.33–looking at them through a historical lens.

The Vr̥ṣā́kapi hymn (RV 10.86) has been claimed by others (see Griffith, O’Flaherty for example) to be a conversation between Índra, the chief of the Gods, Indrāṇī́, his wife and Vr̥ṣā́kapi, Índra’s pet beast. We examine the hymn in detail and feel and conclude that the hymn does indeed describe a historical event–a rebellion against the king that happened in a kingdom of the tribe of Párśu around 3,900 BCE.

Fact 107 – We look at another hymn RV 10.33 and interpret it as a historical event.

Fact 108 – To round off our discussions we discuss the fact that some thing that has caught the fancy of the modern world – mindfulness – has its beginnings in the R̥g Veda. It is important to note that Mindfulness has been practised in India since the Vedic period.

We reinterpret hymn RV 10.58 and one exhorting the listener to bring his or her wandering mind back to the present, the “now”, and take control over it so that he or she can live peacefully. This makes it clear that the Vedic Indians practised a form of Mindfulness as a technique to achieve peace of mind. Another hymn that looks at this is RV 6.9