sanskrit derived languages

8/8/2019 Sanskrit Derived Languages

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"Knowing" Words in

Indo-European Languages

The first systematic theory of the relationships between human languages began when SirWilliam Jones, "Oriental Jones," proposed in 1786 that Greek and Latin, the classical languages

of Europe, and Sanskrit [Sskr.ta, ], the classical language of India, had all descendedfrom a common source. The similarities between the languages had already been noted in 1768by Gaston Curdoux, who informed the French Academy. The evidence for this came from (1)thestructure of the languages -- Sanskrit grammar has detailed similarities to Greek (and, aswould later be seen, Avestan), many similarities to Latin, and none to the Middle Eastern

languages, like Hebrew, Arabic, or Turkish, interposed between Europe and India [note] -- and(2) the vocabulary of the languages. Thus, "father" in English compares to "Vater" in German,"pater" in Latin, "patr" in Greek, "pitr." in Sanskrit, "pedar" in Persian, etc. On the other hand,"father" in Arabic is "ab," which hardly seems like any of the others. This became the theory of"Indo-European" languages, and today the hypothetical language that would be the commonsource for all Indo-European languages is called "Proto-Indo-European." The following tableshows a genealogy for two "knowing" roots, which in modern English turn up as "know" and"wit."


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Words that are related to each other by descent from a common source are called "cognates."English "wise" and Sanskrit "veda" are thus cognates. Note that descent can become confusedwhen words are subsequently borrowed. English has borrowed "idea" and "agnostic" fromGreek, "video," "visa," and "cognition" from Latin, "vista" from Spanish, etc.


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Another striking example of cognates are all the following words for "is" -- modern French andPersian pronunciation is given in parentheses. By a series of simple steps, we see the relationshipbetween "is" in English and"ast" in Persian.

Traditionally, all Indo-European languages weredivided into "centum" and"sat m" languages, afterthe Latin and Avestan words for "100," respectively. This is an "isogloss" (like an "isotherm" or"isobar" in meteorology) that distinguishes languages where, in certain environments, an Indo-European khas remained a kand where it has turned into an s orch (and g toj, etc.), that is,velars are palatalized into sibilants or affricatives (e.g. Latin rex/regis, "king," Sanskrit raja).Most importantly, the Indo-Iranian (Sanskrit, Persian, etc.) and Slavic languages are "sat m"languages. However, this particular isogloss is now no longer taken to reflect a fundamentaldivision in descent. In the chart above, Russian, the principal Slavic language, will be seen to be

more closely related to German and to Latin than to Sanskrit; and Greek, a "centum" language, ismore closely related to Sanskrit (perhaps) than to the others. What has happened is that morefeatures have been taken into account and the overall greater similarities between Greek andSanskrit outweigh a lesser point that Sanskrit seems to share with Slavic languages. On the otherhand, the whole picture of branching descent, while perhaps appropriate for organic evolution,may not be as appropriate for languages, which can borrow features from even unrelatedlanguages in geographical proximity. The Slavic and Indo-Iranian languages, because of theirgeographical proximity (in Southern Russia), thus may well have shared a certain sound change,even while retaining closer affinities to other groups.

The following chart demonstrates a way other than descent to look at the relationships of theselanguages. I originally saw a diagram like this when I took an Indo-European linguistics classwith Raimo Anttila at UCLA in 1970. I recently found a similar diagram in The OxfordIntroduction to Proto-Indo-European andthe Proto-Indo-European Worldby J.P. Mallory and

D.Q. Adams [2006, p.73].Unfortunately, Mallory andAdams actually do notdiscuss the individualisoglosses. The presentdiagram is thus based on oneby Thomas Pyles and JohnAlgeo [1993], though I haveadded the tenth gloss for thereason given below.

What we see here looks verymuch like a dialect map oflanguages that occur neareach other and so exchangeinfluences with adjacent

English German French Latin Greek Sanskrit Persian

is istest()

est esti astiast()


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languages. The theory that goes with it is called the "wave model," that innovations spread outacross the field like waves in a pond. The line marked #1 in red surrounds the Sat m languages.The line marked #2 in blue surrounds Greek and the Italic languages (like Latin), where we havevoiceless sounds for Indo-European voiced aspirates, i.e. ph in Greek and f in Latin for Indo-European bh (Germanic languages have b). The line marked #3 in light green surrounds the

Italic and Celtic languages, which have passive forms of the verb in -r, e.g. Latin laudor, "I ampraised" (active laud). The line marked #4 in light purple surrounds the "North-West" group oflanguages, which share some common vocabulary that does not occur elsewhere among Indo-European languages. The line marked #5 in dark green surrounds the south-eastern languagesthat have a prefixed vowel in the past tense or aorist, e.g. Greeklipon, "I left" (present lep).The line marked #6 in gray surrounds northern languages where (according to Pyles and Algeo)"medial schwa [an indefinite vowel, traditionally written " "] was lost." The line marked #7 inorange surrounds the western languages that share some common vocabulary not foundelsewhere. The line marked #8 in light blue surrounds northern languages that have a dativeplural in -m, e.g. Gothic dagam, "to/for days" (nominative singulardags, dative singulardaga --Modern German now has -n in the dative plural, den Tagen, but -m in the [masculine/neuter]

singular, dem Tag), or Russian dnyam, "to/for days" (nominative singulardyen [with the final"soft" sign], dative singulardnyu). The line marked #9 in dark purple surrounds the Indo-Iranian languages, i.e. the Indic and Iranian, where (according to Pyles and Algeo) "schwabecame i" -- though there are many features that unite the Indo-Iranian group, includingvocabulary items, e.g. the god Mitra in Sanskrit and Mi ra in Iranian (Avestan, Persian).Finally, the line marked #10 in yellow surrounds Greek and Armenian, where Mallory andAdams say, "[T]here were close contact relations between Greek and Armenian" [p.79].

In a dialect map, we are usually looking at variations across a language that geographically staysin place. With the diagram for the Indo-European languages, we may be looking atfossilevidence of when the languages were dialects of a language in a particular geographical area,probably Eastern Europe, stretching down into the Balkans and out into the Ukraine. From theUkraine, the Indo-Iranian group took off across the Steppe (following Tocharian). Onceseparated, the language groups can experience changes that will not be reflected in any otherrelated languages, for instance that the Indic group acquires the retroflex consonants that figurein the unrelated Dravidian languages but not elsewhere in Indo-European, or thatNew Persian(like Urdu) borrows a large vocabulary from Arabic, a consequence of Iranians converting toIslam. The absence of Tocharian and the Anatolian languages (Hittite, Luvian, etc.) from thediagram is significant. Tocharian, from people who advanced across the Steppe all the way toChina and ultimately show up in India as the Kushans, could be expected to orginate from theeast side of the language community and thus most likely be a Sat m language. But it wasn't. Itthus may well be that Tocharian speakers left the dialect area before palatalization occurred inthe Sat m languages. Hittite, the earliest attested Indo-European language, and its relatedAnatolian languages, seem to have left the dialect area even before Tocharian. Hittite retainsvery archaic features of Indo-European, like laryngeals (or pharyngeals, though exactly whatthese were is still unclear -- they would be like sounds that still exist in Arabic, and are to befound the earliest in Ancient Egyptian), but then it is missing many features that may havedeveloped laterin the dialect area.


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Greek, Sanskrit, and Closely Related Languages

Dialects of Greek

The Pronunciation of Greek

Tense and Aspect in Greek

The Spread of Indo-European and Turkish Peoples off the Steppe

The Germanic Languages

The Slavic Languages

Philosophy of Science, Linguistics

Philosophy of Science

Philosophy of History

History of Philosophy, Indian Philosophy

History of Philosophy

Home Page

Copyright (c) 1998, 2000, 2008, 2010 Kelley L. Ross, Ph.D. All Rights Reserved

Greek, Sanskrit,

and Closely Related Languages

The Sanskrit language whatever be its antiquity, is of a wonderful structure; more

perfect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more exquisitely refined theneither, yet bearing to both of them a stronger affinity, both in the roots of verbs and inthe forms of grammar, than could possibly have been produced by accident; so strong,indeed, that no philosopher could examine them all three, without believing them tohave sprung from some common source, which, perhaps, no longer exists.

Sir William Jones (1746-1794), speaking to the Asiatick Society in Calcutta, February 2, 1786.


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The following chart zeroes in on the relationship between Greek and Sanskrit [ ], with theclosely related Iranian and other Indo-European steppe languages, and the modern descendantsof them all. Greek can be seen to radiate into a number of dialects, later to be consolidated into

the koin or "common" dialect of the Hellenistic period. The name Yuzhi, "Moon Tribe," wasgiven by the Chinese to an Indo-European group who came off the eastern end of the steppe.Latter, under pressure of Turkish or Mongol peoples -- especially a defeat by the Hsiung-nu in

170 BC -- they fell back into the Tarim Basin (the "Lesser" Yuzhi, ) and

Transoxania (the "Greater" Yuzhi, ). The latter eventually descended into India, asthe Kushans (1st century AD). The texts that survive in the Tarim Basin, in languages usuallycalled "Tocharian," attest this obscure branch of Indo-European [note]. The Iranian group oflanguages also includes that of a people, the Saka, who had previously (1st century BC) also

ended up in India, providing the benchmarkhistorical era for India (79 AD). Otherwise we seeseveral modern descendants of Iranian languages, from Modern Persian and Kurdish all the wayto the unique survivor of the North Eastern group, Ossetian, in the Caucasus (though this is nowNorth West of the others). Iazyges were settled in Britain by Marcus Aurelius, and Alans spreadacross Gaul and Spain after crossing the Rhine in 407 AD. Although students of both Greek andLatin may be impressed with their similarities, Latin does not have a dual number, a middlevoice, or an aorist tense, which both Greek and Sanskrit share. These features, and others, drawGreek away from Latin, to be more closely associated with the Indo-Iranian languages. Ingeneral, this is the most conservative branch of the Indo-European languages. My Indo-Europeanlinguistics professor at UCLA said once that you can get a sort of "instant Proto-Indo-European"by combining Greek vowels and Sanskrit consonants.


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East of the Caspian Sea, the Indo-Iranian group of languages came down into the Middle Eastand India. The furthest penetration west into the Middle East was by the Mitanni, who providethe earliest texts using Vedic gods and other Indo-European words. The Mitanni, however, donot last all that long, and it is Persian and Avestan (the language of the Zoroastrian book, theAvesta) that produce most of the Indo-Iranian inscriptions and literature. A difference inpronunciation of the name of the Vedic godMitra is indicated in the chart, between India, theMitanni, and Persian. Meanwhile, therya had descended into India, c.1500 BC, the first Indo-European group to do so (before the Sakas & Kushans). As discussed elsewhere, the ryaplunged India into its Dark Ages, until around 800 BC, when an alphabet was borrowed from theMiddle East.


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The map shows the present distribution of the Indo-Iranian languages, from Kurdistan to Sri Lanka.Ossetic (Ossetian) is all the remains of the formerIranian presence on the Steppe, being derived fromScythian and Alan, which used to dominate the

European Steppe in and around the Ukraine. TheSakas, who were on the Asiatic Steppe, are long gone,though their invasion of India is remembered there.The Dravidian languages, which are not Indo-European, are shown because their outliers bespeaktheir former presence in the North, as well as the

South, of India, while features of Dravidian languages (like the retroflex sounds) influenced theIndic languages, starting with Sanskrit itself.

The word rya, which later simply meant "noble" in Sanskrit, was of course used in Europeantheories of the "master race," the "Aryans" -- as we even see in the writings ofFriedrich

Nietzsche. This had one curious consequence. Airya was the form of the same word in Avestan,and Irn is its modern Persian descendant. When Shh Rez Pahlavi heard that the "Aryans"were supposed to be the master race, he thought, "Hey! That's us!" The official name of hiscountry was then changed from Persia to Irn. This ended up being an unfortunate move for him.In World War II, he was more than a little sympathetic for the "Aryans" ofNazi Germany, andthe result was that he got overthrown and Irn was occupied by British and Russian forces.

In the Indian Dark Ages, a sacred oral literature developed, the Vedas. The language of theVedas can then be called the Vedic language, and Indian history from c.1500 down to c.400 BCcan be called the Vedic Period. Even though the Vedas could be written down after 800 BC, theyhave always been taught and remembered orally, and have always been thought of as essentiallysound -- in contrast to Jewish beliefs about the Trah and Moslem beliefs about the Qur'n, thatthey were essentially written. The Vedas are still taught orally.

Once the Vedas came to be written, a disturbing thing was soon noticed. The spoken languagewas diverging from the written language. Language, indeed, changes all the time, but this maynot be noticed in an oral tradition. When it was noticed, the reaction was horror, for the beliefwas that the Vedas had to be remembered with absolute accuracy for them to be rituallyeffective. The result was an effort to describe andfix the language of the Vedas so that it wouldnever change again. The process culminated about 400 BC with the grammar ofPn.ini.

The language that resulted was tidied up a bit and not precisely identical to the surviving

language of the Vedas. It was called Sam.skr.ta, , Sanskrit, which means "prepared,""cultivated," "polished," "correct." The language based on Pn.ini can be called "ClassicalSanskrit," and that of the Vedas "Vedic Sanskrit." Classical Sanskrit remained the language ofreligion, philosophy, and high literature in India for centuries, and survives today as theindispensible language of religion and serious scholarship.

Meanwhile, the spoken language had not only changed but split up into dialects that eventuallygrew into separate languages. These new spoken languages are called "Prakrits," from Prkr.ta,


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"natural," "ordinary," "common," "vulgar." The first examples of written Prakrit words are inSanskrit texts where someone is speaking, e.g. from a Once Born caste, who is not allowed tospeak Sanskrit. Eventually, however, some Prakrits developed their own literature. When thecanon of essential Buddhist texts was set down in Sri Lanka, the Prakrit Pli was used -- hencethe "Pli Canon." That has suggested to some that the Buddha himself spoke Pli, but this does

not seem to have been the case. The Buddha probably spoke Mgadh.From the Prakrits, most of the modern languages of India are derived. The exceptions are thelanguages of the Dravidian group, largely spoken in the south. Some examples of Dravidianlanguages, and discussion of the relationship of Hindi to Urdu, can be found elsewhere.

The oldest alphabet used in India was the Brhmscript. Later, other alphabets developed, likeKharos.t.hi; but Sanskrit is written in an alphabet especially

designed by the grammarians for

it: Devangar. This is also used with some modernlanguages, like Hindi, and is the source for many more,

including the alphabets forBurmese, Thai, and Cambodian. Actually,Devangar is not a true alphabet but a syllabary. It writes syllables, and it does so on the basis ofa couple of odd conventions. For one thing, even though Sanskrit has many consonant clusters,every syllable is written ending with a vowel. This means that all the consonants, even ones frompreceding words, are piled on to the beginning of the following syllable.

The word Sanskrit itself has three syllables. Most Devangar letters have ahorizontal line on top and a vertical line at the right. The plain form for each letterautomatically is read with the vowel a. In the word at right, therefore, readingfrom left to right, we first have the letters, which is read sa. Over it is a dot,transcribed as an "m" with an underdot, which stands for the nasal sound found as

the "n" in the French word on [//]. This is very common in Sanskrit. The second syllable in theword is skr., where the r is given an underdot to show that it is a vowel. Both "r" and "l" can bevowels in Sanskrit -- though no longer in Hindi (r. is prounced ri). The basic form of the syllableis the letterk. Attached to the front of it is the letters, which we've already seen, without itsvertical stroke, and under it is attached a hook that indicates the vowel r.. For the final syllablewe write t, which is given the vowel a. A short final a, it should be noted, is not pronounced inHindi: thus, Sanskrit words like yoga and names like Arjuna can now actually be foundpronounced yog and Arjun.

Another Sanskrit word to consider might be that for the supreme Being of theUpanishads: Brahman. Here there are two syllables and a final consonant. In

inflection, the final n is ordinarily going to be lost or written with the followingsyllable; but we can add a diacritic to show that it is without a vowel. In the firstsyllable, bra, there is a little complication. R, even when it is a consonant andnot a vowel, is written more like a vowel, with a diacritic. The basic form ofb isa loop with a line through it. The r is indicated with a diagonal stroke attached tothe bottom of the loop. The vowel a is then understood. An r that precedes, rather than follows,another consonant, is written with a hook at the top of the letter. The second syllable, hma, posesanother problem. H is one of the letters that does not have a vertical line at the right, as it is


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shown written independently below Brahman. Combining h with m requires running themtogether, as shown. The form of this combination is conventional and cannot always bepredicted. It must simply be learned. The full form ofm can be seen in the next example, below.Finally, the absence of a vowel on the final n is indicated with the diagonal stroke at the bottomof the vertical line.

Next, we can examine a whole sentence. This is the famous tat tvam asi,"Thou are that," one of the fourGreat Sentences of the Upanishads. Thisconsists of three words, but four syllables, where the final consonant in the firsttwo words is attached to the first syllable of the following word. Ta is familiar.The second syllable, ttva, involves a conventional combination. When two t'sare stacked on each other, one straightens out into a horizonal line. This can beseen in the tta combination given below the sentence. Va itself is just a loop,like b without the line through it (the similarity is no accident; v and b were both recognized as"labials," i.e. letters that use the lips). The third syllable is ma, where we simply write the formform, with the understood vowel. Finally, the form fors is familar, but this time we must

indicate that it has the vowel i rather than the vowel a. This is done by adding another verticalline to the left of the letter and connecting it to the letter with the loop at the top.

Finally, we might consider the sacred syllable Om, as found in theMn.d.kyaUpanis.ad. Here, at left, we have the independent form of the lettera with a diacritic(vertical line and stroke) indicating that it has the vowel o (originally au). M followswith the diacritic indicating no vowel. A more compact form of the word, however,can be written. If the m is considered to be the nasalized m., it cansimply be written with a dot over the o. The m is a real m, buteverybody knows that anyway, so the more compact form can be

written for convenience.

Since the syllable Om is written down frequently, for good luck and as ablessing, it is not surprising that abbreviated forms have developed. In the one at right preservesrecognizable parts of the fully written (though already reduced) form.

Some more examples of Devangar writing can be seen in the essay on karma.

In many Sanskrit words, like the name of theMn.d.kyaUpanis.ad, it will be noticed that the letters t, d, n, and s mayhave underdots (written on the line here, i.e. t., etc.). These are aseparate order of letters from ordinary t, d, n, and s. The ordinaryt, etc. are what in linguistics are called "dentals," because thetongue touches the teeth (#1 in the diagram). The underdot t.,etc., are called "retroflexes," because the tongue curls up towardsthe roof of the mouth (#3 in the diagram). This makes for verydistinctive sounds, which Sanskrit and the descendants of theVedic language share with Dravidian languages, but not with anyother Indo-European languages. Curiously, t, d, and n in Englishare nottrue dentals. The tongue touches thegums above the


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teeth, the alveolus, rather than the teeth (#2 in the diagram). This makes them "alveolars" ratherthan dentals. In India, this sounded to people more like the retroflexes than like the dentals.English words borrowed into Hindi, like "doctor," are thus pronounced with the retroflexes --d.oct.or. At the same time, Hindi has lost separate n. and s. sounds. N. occurs as a dental n, ands. occurs as an ordinary palatal sh (often written for Sanskrit as an "s" with an acute accent on it).

The name of Krishna in Sanskrit is Kr.s.n.a, but this then is just pronounced in Hindi as, of allthings, Krishna.

At right is the entire Devangarsyllabary. In an alphabetinvented by grammarians, it isnot surprising to see it laid outaccording to phonetic principles.Thus, the alphabetical orderbegins with the vowels, then

runs through the diphthongs, thestops, the semi-vowels, thesibilants, and finally h. Thevowels, when syllabic, haveindependent forms; when not,they are, as we have seen,indicated with diacritics.

Thestops, which means soundswhere the vocal tract closes,pose some pronunciationchallenges. Kis pronounced asin English skit, and kh as inEnglish kit. This is thedifference between anunaspiratedand an aspiratedstop -- one has no breath coming out, the other does. Similarly, t is pronounced as in Englishstop, and th as in English top. The "th" sounds in English "thin" or "that" do not occur inSanskrit. P is pronounced as in English spot, and ph as in English pot. "Ph" is never pronouncedf. Sanskrit c is like the ch in English, but is unaspirated, making it unfamiliar. The voicedstops(g, j, d, d., & b), where vocal chords vibrate, all also have their corresponding aspirates. Insounds like gh,jh, etc., however, the breath coming out is also voiced. Consequently, the voiced"aspirates" are also called murmurstops, since the sound is more like murmuring than breathing.These are sounds rarely seen in other world languages.

Several of these phonetic characteristics of Sanskrit can also be found in the(unrelated) Mandarin Chinese. Notice that "swastika" is a word from Sanskrit(svastika). In theNazi version, the top bar points to the right. In India, or inBuddhism, the top bartends to point to the left, but traditionally this is not alwaysthe case and both right and left handed swastikas can be found. It was not just a


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coincidence that the Nazis liked this symbol. They saw themselves as the heirs of the rya.

"Knowing" Words in Indo-European Languages

Dialects of Greek

The Pronunciation of Greek

Tense and Aspect in Greek

The Spread of Indo-European and Turkish Peoples off the Steppe

The Germanic Languages

Philosophy of Science, Linguistics

Philosophy of Science

History of Philosophy, Indian Philosophy

History of Philosophy

Home Page

Copyrigh

t (c

) 2000, 2003, 2005, 2008, 2009, 2010 Kelley L. Ross, Ph

.D. All Righ

ts Reserved

"Knowing" Words in Indo-European Languages, Note

A conspicuous feature of Indo-European grammar is the original extensive inflection of nounsand verbs. In the table are the cases that occur in the inflection of nouns in a selection of Indo-

European languages.

English German Greek Latin Russian Sanskrit

Voc Voc Voc Voc

Nom Nom Nom Nom Nom Nom


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The vocative (Voc) occurs whensomeone is being addressed -- whichis why Shakespeare has Caesar sayBrute rather than Brutus whenaddressing Brutus. The nominative

(Nom) is the subject of a sentence.The genitive (Gen) can meanpossession, "of" or "from." Theaccusative (Acc) is the direct objectof a sentence or motion towards. Thedative (Dat) is the indirect object or

means "to" or "for." The ablative (Abl) means "from" or motion away from. The instrumental(Ins) is the agent for the passive voice or the means. And the locative (Loc) means "at" or thelocation of something.

All these languages actively inflect nouns and adjectives for case, gender, and number, except

English, where there is only a remant of the system, mainly in the pronouns. Thus, he/his/him,she/her/her, and it/its/it, give us the most complete inflection that English still possesses.Sanskrit, on the other hand, retained nearly the full Proto-Indo-European system, includinginflection for the dual number (like Greek) as well as the singular and plural.

Except for the vocative, German still has the same cases as Greek, but there is agreat deal of ambiguity in the case endings, whose identity must often bedetermined from context. See the discussion ofNietzsche's language. Asprepositions come to be used more extensively, they can have different meaningswhen used with different cases, or they can be fixed to take a particular case,which happens a lot in German. In English, all prepositions simply take theaccusative, though in usage people are often confused and use the nominative "I"with prepositions after a conjunction (e.g. "between you and I").

It is always important to keep in mind, not only what something is, but what itisn't. Indo-European languages, with cases like nominative and accusative, are not"ergative" languages, like Basque, languages in the Caucasus, orSumerian (whichbeats out Sanskrit with ten cases for its nouns, as seen at right). In an ergativelanguage, thesubjectof an intransitive verb and the objectof a transitive verb takethe same case, the "absolutive." The subject of a transitive verb then takes theergative case. While this all seems strange, the division is natural enough. Only thesubject of the transitive verb is actually doingsomething (Greekrgon is "work")to something else. The difference between nominative-accusative languages andergative-absolutive serves to mark fundamental differences in language families.

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Gen Gen Gen Gen Gen Gen

Acc Acc Acc Acc Acc Acc

Dat Dat Dat Dat Dat

Abl Abl

Ins Ins

Loc Loc

Sumerian

Absolutive

Ergative

Genitive

Locative

Dative

Comitative

Ablative

Terminative

Directive

Equative


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Greek, Sanskrit, and Closely Related Languages, Note

The word "Tocharian" is often said to be used

"as the result of a mistaken identification"[Winfred P. Lehmann, Historical Linguistics,Third Edition, Routledge, 1992, 1997, p.81].The word was taken from Greek historianswho were talking about a people, theTokharoi, of the Fergana Valley (in theheadwaters of the Jaxartes [Syr Darya] River,between the Pamirs and the Tian Shanmountains) who converted to Buddhism andmigrated to India. This does sound like theKushans, but may have nothing to do either

with them or the LesserYuzhi of the TarimBasin.

Now, however, it turns out that among the Tocharian manuscripts is one written in Uighur,which is close to Turkish and represents the next wave of nomadic migrants into central Asia(c.600 AD). The Uighur text says that it was translated from a language called twghry -- the lackof vowels is an aritfact of Uighur using the alphabet from Syriac, which, like Arabic andHebrew, typically doesn't write vowels. Twghry looks close enough to Tokharoi to now properlymotivate the identification. So it must not have been mistaken after all.

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sanskrit derived languages

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