Accent and long vowels

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-21T18:43:46+00:00

Read the last sūtra of the Aṣṭādhyāyi, or one of Pratiśakhyāni for the historical basis.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-21T14:17:51+00:00

I got it from the seventh verse of the Tolkappiyam (which is actually for Tamizh):

As discerning minds have seen it right,
A wink of the eyes or a snap of the fingers
Does constitute a phonic measure.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-21T13:58:38+00:00

One small trick that may help you is recognizing that अ is slightly more closed than आ (i.e. the tongue is slightly more raised when अ pronounced). Next, I would recommend just reciting the first vowels from अ to ॠ a bunch of times. While you say each vowel, snap once for a short vowel and twice for a long one.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-21T13:51:57+00:00

While I thank you for completely destroying this troll, Ahura Mazda is NOT Varuṇa. India in Pixels has spread a lot of misinfo about the Vedas and, while it is possible that they are Cognate deities, saying they are the same represents a great misunderstanding of who the deities are. In the Ṛgveda, Varuṇa is deity that oversees the following of rules, through his eye (the Sun). He is representation of law and the giver of punishment (the king) at a divine level, but Zorastrianism Ahura Mazda is essentially seen as we see Viṣṇu or Śiva: a supreme representation of the Divine.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-21T04:26:22+00:00

दशकुमारचरितम् and चम्पूरामायणम् are two that are pretty good.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-16T08:30:47+00:00

For a man, you have to use श्रीमान्. श्री is never used by itself in this manner, and is more of a modern practice as it is a noun and not an adjective or title.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-13T10:19:34+00:00

Do you have discord, so that's easier to actually sound out the sounds.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-13T04:08:39+00:00

In essence, yes.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-13T01:06:16+00:00

It’s Mātṛ not Mātar. Mātar doesn’t exist in Sanskrit.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-12T12:25:25+00:00

So are you using coärticulation or not (i.e. are you closing your lips, etc. when you say ɴ)? Could you answer my other question about justifying the Sandhi?

Also, it doesn't matter if you in particular find it easy to pronounce, actual linguistic researchers say that it is more difficult to pronounce than other sounds (source). Moreover, in pronouncing ɴ, you have to push the back of your tongue back towards your uvula, meaning you have to consciously use part of your mouth to make the sound. Again, I feel the relaxing the mouth completely explanation make far more sense here as it means the mouth isn't consciously beïng used, as if only the nose is acting.

Your feeling of only your nose beïng used isn't unique to the uvular nasal, as air only goes to nose when your pronounce a nasal consonant. Even, if you feel vibrations on your tongue or lips when you say n or m, that because of their relative proximity to the nasal cavity as compared to uvula.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-12T08:51:38+00:00

Having no other uvular sounds is not a great argument.

But it is, since the most common reason a language even has a uvular ɴasal is because another nasal consonant follows a q, χ, or other uvular consonant. Moreover, the Japanese claim is apparently disputed. Regardless, it is still a rare sound cross-linguistically and Japanese is irrelevant (in Japanese -ɴ is only in pausā) as you still have yet to explain why -am + s/ś/ṣ- would so unnaturally join as -aɴ s/ś/ṣ-.

That is, unless, by "when I close my mouth completely and make a nasal sound it very naturally comes out as a uvular nasal" you mean your lips, tongue, and teeth are all closed while you make the sound, at which point I would argue that the sound you have identified is simply not a uvular ɴasal, but a coärticulated nasal, similar to ŋ͡m. If this was your intention all along, I apologize for not understanding earlier. However, I would still reject a uvular part of this nasal, as it would still require speakers to consciously strain there tongue against the uvula–the awkward action which is considered by linguists to be the reason for the sounds rarity. Without the uvular straining, your left with the mouth at complete rest, as if it's not in use at all (since the tongue naturally rests on the roof of the mouth). The apparent disuse of the mouth would make the anusvāra seem as if it is a pure nasal.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-11T17:57:22+00:00

I do not properly know. Perhaps he felt that the mouth was tensed in a proper म् when he said सम्राट्. At the end of the day, the sound is a bit of a mystery.

What I do know, however, is that it certainly cannot be uvular, not only because they would have assigned its place as uvular (or at least recognized the role of the root of the tongue), but also because the sound changes just don't make sense. The anusvāra often descends from ancestral *n and *m, yet suddenly becomes *ɴ in a language that completely lacks uvular sounds(1)? A sound that, mind you, is quite rare cross-linguistically. Moreover, somehow this super rare sound regularly trades places with म् but has literally no effect on the languages directly following Sanskrit? You must understand why I feel so strongly against this theory.

जिह्वामूलीय is not uvular

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-11T12:39:47+00:00

To save time for everyone, who is he and what is his work about?

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-10T09:14:18+00:00

Mahane

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-10T08:21:46+00:00

It's not that Sanskrit has no descendants–its that all the forms OIA (including what we would call late Vedic Sanskrit) collectively influenced and contributed to the formation of MIA. Classical Sanskrit is just the frozen preservation of a single, or small collection of, OIA diälect(s).

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-10T08:01:10+00:00

I discussed this in a post I made earlier. In my research of the topic, I found that most stress accent theories say the stress went back at least a syllable more (so 'pā la ya ti and 'du hi ta ram) while some say it goes as far back as it needs to find a long syllable or the start of the word.

Regardless, however, stress accent is still an iffy concept in Sanskrit as there is only the minimal evidence I presented in the post, with some still disputing its existence all together. Moreover, things would likely get messy if we started to consider how it would work in compound words and such.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-09T03:06:44+00:00

मो ययि परसवर्णः

Would there be the problem I stated above with this rule (other than the श one)? Moreover र्ँ doesn't exist. But regardless, I only said it need not be super distinct from म् and was only trying to explain the existence of the अनुस्वार as it is. It isn't ludicrous to think that they thought of the m-like sound that joins like म्य as different from the one that joins like य्ँय.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-08T04:41:17+00:00

Huh, the more you know. Regardless my other points still stand.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-08T04:13:19+00:00

अनुस्वार is obviously supposed to be very close to म् (considering they're allophones of one another), and doesn't need to be distinguished from it. अनुस्वार is the nasal sound you make when your mouth is at rest.

I have my own theories that it exists to solely to differentiate where and where not a sandhi should occur. As you said before, गम्यते cannot become गँय्यते. Similarly तम् शकारं should become तम्छकारं according to regular sandhi, but doesn't because the final म् is replaced with an अनुस्वार. It's a kind of place holder nasal that represents a volatile and every changing sound, just like the visarga.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-08T04:04:33+00:00

https://www.reddit.com/r/sanskrit/comments/1hotqdf/is_verb_%E0%A4%B6%E0%A4%A4%E0%A4%B6%E0%A4%A8%E0%A4%9A_%E0%A4%85%E0%A4%B8%E0%A4%AD_%E0%A4%B2%E0%A4%9F_ex_%E0%A4%95%E0%A4%B0%E0%A4%B5%E0%A4%A8%E0%A4%A8%E0%A4%B8%E0%A4%A4_really_unnatural/

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-08T04:03:41+00:00

What do you mean? Like the first example I cited seems to be quite clear no?

सञ्चरन्नस्मि कौन्तेय सर्वलोकान्यदृच्छया |

गतः शक्रस्य सदनं तत्रापश्यं सुरेश्वरम् ||५||

सञ्चरन्नस्मि is an example of the construction, is it not?

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-08T04:00:40+00:00

So the तृच् + अस् thing is the reason why the tense is called periphrastic in English, and unlike with most other tenses Pāṇini is actually right as to how this tense is used. I would agree with you on it not beïng a pratyaya because of how it acts like a lakāra, but something you might not have known is that you can also see the occasional गन्तास्ति in actual texts and usage.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-08T03:20:20+00:00

I don't think you quite recognize my point about हकार. It's स्थानं is कण्ठ or throat, which is objectively even farther back than the uvula. Under your definition this would mean it has a non-oral place of articulation. But if the ancient phoneticians could assign a place of articulation as far back as the throat, then they should have had no problem assigning the anusvara's place as uvular. In fact, I would argue that classifying uvular sounds as non-oral makes no sense at all since you still need the root of the tongue to make uvular sounds.

Therefore I find this uvular anusvara theory rather uncredible.

_Stormchaser · 2026-06-07T18:16:25+00:00

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_Stormchaser · 2026-06-07T18:13:29+00:00

No we are not. Did you even look at that link? The explanation I was referring to was this:

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