custom of burying alive with the dead those who had been dear to them; the fully-developed Sindbad tale finds an echo in “Sir John Mandeville.” For the “Old Man of the Sea," in the Fifth Voyage, we may also refer to Al Kazwini, Ibn Al Wardi and the romance of Seyf Zu-l Yezen; Sindbad's tyrannical rider has usually been explained as one of the huge apes of Borneo or Sumatra, improved to make a better story. The account of pepper, somewhat later in this Voyage, has a good deal in common with Idrisi's; Sindbad's pearl-fishing is probably to be located in the famous beds off Ceylon, of which Marco Polo has an excellent description. The romance of Seyf Zu-l Yezen has a voyage along a subterranean river similar to that of Sindbad on his Sixth Voyage; the elephant adventure of the Seventh Voyage adds another to the many stories of the elephant's sagacity which were already told in every southern country, and of which we have many examples in Pliny's Historia Naturalis, and in Aelian's Historia Animalium.
See Richard Hole, Remarks on the Arabian Nights' Entertainments, in which the Origin of Sindbad's Voyages . . . is particularly considered (London, 1797); Eusebius Renaudot's edition of the Two Musulman Travellers (1718, translated into English, 1733, as Ancient Accounts of India and China by two Mahommedan Travellers . . . in the 9th Century); J. T. Reinaud, Relations des voyages faits par les Arabes et les Per sans dans l'Inde et à la Chine dans le IXᵉ siècle (1845); E. W. Lane's translation of the Arabian Nights (London, 1859), especially the notes in vol. iii. pp. 77-108; M. J. de Goeje, La Légende de Saint Brandan (1890); C. R. Beazley, Dawn of Modern Geography (1897), i. 235-238, 438-450. Besides the works noticed in the text of this article, the 12th-century Romance of Duke Ernest of Bavaria, written in German rhyme by Henry of Veldeck about 1160, gives parallels to Sindbad's flight through the air (tied to his rukh) in Voyage II., to the subterranean river-excursion in Voyage VI., and to some other incidents. (C. R. B.)
SINDHI (properly Sindhī, the language of Sindh, i.e. Sind) AND LAHNDA (properly Lahndā or Lahindā, western, or Lahndē-dī bōlī, the language of the west), two closely connected forms of speech belonging, together with Kashmiri (q.v.), to the N.W. group of the outer band of Indo-Aryan languages. In the following pages it will be assumed that the reader is familiar with the main facts stated in the articles Indo-Aryan Languages and Prakrit.
In 1901 Sindhi (including Kachchhī) was spoken by 3,494,971 people, and Lahnda by 3,337,917,—the former in Sind and Cutch, and the latter in the W. Punjab and adjoining tracts (for further details on this point see the article Lahnda). The parent Prakrit, from which Lahnda is sprung, must once have extended over the greater part of the Punjab, but, as explained under Indo-Aryan Languages, the population of the Midland expanded so as to cover the E. and centre of that province, and the language (Panjabi) now there spoken is a mixed one, Midland in its main characteristics, but showing more and more traces of its old Lahnda basis as we go W. The wave of Midland progress exhausted itself in the barren tract of the west-central Punjab, and W. of about the seventy-third degree of E. longitude Lahnda holds decisive sway. The facts are very much the same with regard to the mixed language of Rajputana. Here the expansion of the Midland language was stopped by the desert, beyond which lies Sindhi. Lahnda and Sindhi, the W. outposts of Indo-Aryan speech, have accordingly for centuries occupied a peculiarly isolated position, and have in many respects struck out common lines of independent growth. This process was aided by the presence of Piśāca languages (see Indo-Aryan Languages). In early times there were Piśāca colonies along the Indus, right down to its delta, and both Sindhi and Lahnda have borrowed many peculiarities from their dialects.
Sindhi is directly derived from the Vrācaḍa Apabhraṁśa Prakrit (see Prakrit). The name of the Apabhraṁśa from which Lahnda is derived is not known, but it must have been closely allied to Vrācaḍa. Sindhi has one important dialect, Kachchhī, spoken in Cutch. Here the language has come into contact with Gujarati and is somewhat mixed with that form of speech. For the dialects of Lahnda, and the various names under which that language is known, see the article Lahnda.
Owing to their geographical position both Sind and the W. Punjab were early subject to Mahommedan inroads. The bulk of the population is Mussulman, and their languages make free use of words borrowed from Persian and (through Persian) from Arabic. The written character employed for Lahnda is usually that modification of the Persian alphabet which has been adopted for Hindostani. The same is the case for Sindhi, except that further modifications have been introduced to represent special sounds. In both languages, Hindus also employ a script akin to the well-known Nagari alphabet (see Sanskrit). It is the same as the “Laṇḍā” (a word distinct from “Lahndā”) or “clipped” character current all over the Punjab and is very imperfect, being seldom legible to any one except its original writer, and not always so to him.
Phonetics.[1]—The phonetic system of both languages in most respects resembles that of other Indo-Aryan vernaculars. Space will not allow us to do more than draw attention to the main points of difference. In other Indo-Aryan languages a final short vowel is generally elided. This rule is also followed in Lahnda, but the genius of Sindhi requires every word to end in a vowel, and hence these short vowels are still retained. Thus, Skr. naras, a man, Pr. narō, Ap. naru, L. nar, but S. narᵘ. In Sindhi these final short vowels are, as in Kashmiri, very lightly pronounced, so that they are hardly audible to a person unacquainted with the language. They are therefore printed in these pages as small letters above the line. In the cognate Kashmiri a short i or u affects by epenthesis the pronunciation of a preceding vowel, just as in English the silent vowel e added to “mar” changes its pronunciation to “mare.” So, in Kashmiri, marᵘ is pronounced mor. Lahnda, especially when dropping the final short vowel, has similar epenthetic changes. Thus chōhar(u), a boy, becomes chōhur; shāhar(u), a city, becomes first shāhur and then, further, shåhur (å like the a in “all”); while chōhar(i), a girl, becomes chōhir. The oblique singular (see below) of chōhur is chōhar, for chohar(a) with a final a instead of a final u, and hence the vowel of the second syllable is unchanged. Similarly, the oblique form of shåhur is shāhar, while the oblique form of chōhir is still chōhir, because it also originally ended in i. Similar epenthetic changes have not been noted in Sindhi. In that language and in Lahnda the short vowel i, when preceded or followed by h, or at the end of a word, is pronounced as a short e. Thus S. kiharō, of what kind, and S. mihitⁱ, a mosque, are respectively pronounced kehaṛō and mehetᵉ. When i is so pronounced, it will be written as e or ᵉ in the following pages.
In Prakrit almost the only consonants which had survived were double letters, and in most of the Indo-Aryan vernaculars these have been simplified, the preceding vowel being lengthened in compensation. Thus, Ap. kammu, a work, Hindostani, kām. In Panjabi and Lahnda the double consonant is generally retained, as in kamm, but in Sindhi, while the double consonant is simplified, the vowel, as in the Piśāca languages, remains short; thus, kamᵘ. This nonlengthening of the vowel in such cases is typical of Sindhi, words like S. āgᵉ, fire, from Ap. aggi, being quite exceptional. It even happens that an original long vowel coming before a conjunct consonant is shortened when the conjunct is simplified. Thus, Skr. tūryam, S. turī, a trumpet.
In Sindhi, as in Piśāca, a sibilant is liable to be changed into h. Thus, Skr. māṁsaṁ, S. māsᵘ or māhᵘ, flesh; Skr. dēśas, S. dēsᵘ or dēhᵘ, a country. In L. the s is generally, but not always, preserved. As in most Indo-Aryan languages a medial ḍ becomes the hard ṛ; thus, S. juṛaṇᵘ, to join; L. ghōṛā, a horse. As in the Piśāca languages, there is great confusion between cerebrals and dentals. There was the same tendency in Vracaḍa Apabhraṁśa, and it is more common in Sindhi than in Lahnda. Thus, Skr. tāmrakas, S. ṭ̄āmō, copper; Skr. daṇḍas, S. ḍ̄aṇḍᵘ, a staff. Moreover, in Sindhi, t and d become regularly cerebralized before r, as in Ap. putru, S. puṭrᵘ, a son; Ap. drākhā, S. ḍrākhᵃ, a vine. The cerebral l does not appear in Sindhi, but it has survived from Prakrit in Lahnda, being subject to the same rules as in Marathi (q.v.). When l represents a Prakrit single l, it becomes ḷ, but if it represents a Prakrit ll, it remains a simple dental l. It may be remarked that the same rule seems to have applied in the Prakrit spoken by the Piśācas.
Sindhi has a series of strengthened consonants—ḡ, j̄, ḍ̄, and b̄. They are pronounced “with a certain stress in prolonging and somewhat strengthening the contact of the closed organ, as if one tried to double the sound at the beginning of a word.” They often, but not always, represent an original double letter. Thus, Ap. laggau, S. laḡō, applied; Ap. garuau, S. ḡarō, heavy, but S. garō, mangy; Ap. vijjā S. vij̄ā, science; L. jaṭ ,S. j̄aṭᵘ, a Jat; Ap. vaḍḍau, S. vaḍō, great; Ap. ḍōliā, S. ḍ̄ōlī, a sedan-chair; Ap. dubbalu, S. ḍ̄ab̄alᵘ, weak; S. bābō, a father, but b̄āb̄ō, a father's brother.
Declension.—Both languages have lost the neuter gender, all nouns being either masculine or feminine. The rules for distinguishing gender are much as in Hindostani. As in other Indo-Aryan languages, nouns may be either strong or weak, the strong forms being derived from nouns with the pleonastic Sanskrit suffix ka (see Hindostani and Marathi), In Sindhi a masculine weak form
- ↑ Abbreviations: Skr. = Sanskrit; Pr. = Prakrit; Ap. = Apabhraṁśa; L. = Lahnda; S. = Sindhi.
