The Origin and Development of the Bengali Language/Part 1/Signs

by Suniti Kumar Chatterji

SIGNS

> means gives, leads to, results in, is changed to, giving, leading to, etc. : e.g., « hasta > hattha > hātha > hāta ».

< means comes from, is derived from, coming from, beina derived from, etc. : e.g., « hāta < hātha < hattha < hasta ».

= indicates a cognate form, or a source type.

* before a word or affix indicates a hypothetical form not preserved in literature, but reconstructed : e.g., « dīpa-rakṣa-+-uka- > * dīva-rakkh-ua- > *dīa-rakhuā > dērakhō ». This is found with forms in Indo-European, Indo-Iranian and other hypothetical stages of the speech, as well as in intermediate forms in Indo-Aryan.

? before a word or form indicates doubt as to the form proposed, or the form being the source of the word or conneeted with the word under discussion.

√ means root.

‡ before a word means it is dialectal, and not universally recognised.

† before a word indicates that it is obsolete.

+ joins up the component parts which are at the basis of a Modern Indo- Aryan or other word.

-, the hyphen, has been used to analyse words into their roots and affixes. When a word (Sanskrit or Pali or otherwise) is given with a hyphen at the end, it indicates merely the base form, to which other additions of suffixes or inflexions were made. Prefixes similarly have a hyphen after them, and suffixes and inflexions before them.

‘’ : names of books are given within inverted commas.

«» have been used in all transliterated forms, except when they occur by themselves within ordinary brackets ().

[ ] square brackets enclose words in phonetic transcription (and in some cases also ordinary English words, and transliterated forms, occurring within ordinary brackets).

( ) in a transliterated or phonetically transcribed word shows that the letter or sound occurs optionally, and can be omitted either in writing or in pronunciation.