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Sanskrit and Sanskritization

J. F. Staal

The Journal of Asian Studies / Volume 22 / Issue 03 / May 1963, pp 261 - 275DOI: 10.2307/2050186, Published online: 23 March 2011

Link to this article: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0021911800106722

How to cite this article:J. F. Staal (1963). Sanskrit and Sanskritization. The Journal of Asian Studies, 22, pp261-275 doi:10.2307/2050186

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Sanskrit and SanskritizationJ. F. STAAL

Introduction

LANGUAGE, culture, and society can be studied from various points of view.Classical Indology and Indian anthropology have different points of departure,but deal sometimes with the same material; the difference in background has gen-erally prevented close collaboration. Classical Indologists tend to look upon Indiananthropologists as mainly interested in almost inaccessible hill tribes, in village super-stition, and sometimes in contemporary affairs; moreover a synchronistic bias inmethodology has often limited the potential richness of their studies. Anthropologistswho study India, on the other hand, are often inclined to view classical Indologists asbusy with case endings and etymological derivations, or as discussing obscure andlong-forgotten doctrines. Yet neither field has been able to dispense with conceptstraditionally handled by the other; for instance, anthropologists talk about language,and classical Indologists about culture. A recent example is the concept of Sanskritiza-tion, introduced by anthropologists with obvious reference to Sanskrit, the languageto which the main attention of classical Indologists has always been directed. As astudent of Sanskrit and classical Indology, I offer some reflections on Sanskritizationwith the hope that I am not altogether blind to the problems occupying anthropolo-gists.1

i. Sanskritization in Anthropology"Sanskritization" was introduced in 1952 by M. N. Srinivas in his book Religion

and Society among the Coorgs of South India (Oxford, 1952). The term is not de-fined but is used to mean a process by which a lower caste attempts to raise its statusand to rise to a higher position in the caste hierarchy. Sanskritization may take placethrough the adoption of vegetarianism, of teetotalism, of the worship of "Sanskriticdeities," or by engaging the service of Brahmans for ritual purposes. Sanskritizationcan apply to ritual and custom, to ideas and beliefs, or to the pantheon. Its essentialingredient is the imitation of behavior and beliefs associated with ritually high statusgroups. Apart from Sanskritic deities, these imitated elements of "Sanskritic Hin-duism" cover classical ideas and beliefs expressed for example in the Upanisads, thephilosophical schools (especially the Vedanta), the Bhagavad Gita, and the bhakti

The author, formerly Lecturer in Sanskrit at the School of Oriental and African Studies, Universityof London, and Visiting Lecturer in Indian Philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania, is Professor ofGeneral and Comparative Philosophy at the University of Amsterdam.

1This paper was written for the Conference on South Asian Religion sponsored by the Committeeon South Asia of the Association for Asian Studies, and the Center for South Asia Studies, Institute ofInternational Relations, University of California, Berkeley. I am grateful both to these and to the SocialScience Fund for enabling me to participate in this conference. I am also grateful to Professors EdwardHarper (Washington), Dorodiy M. Spencer (Pennsylvania), Dr. H. M. J. Oldewelt (Amsterdam), Dr.Milton Singer (Chicago), and to my wife, Saraswathy, for valuable comments and suggestions.

261

262 J. F. STAAL

movement. The material to which Sanskritization is applied consists of "non-Sanskritic deities" and non-Sanskritic ritual and belieffor example, die worshipof village deities, ancestors, trees, rivers and mountains, and local cults in general.Sanskritization takes place "at the expense of" these non-Sanskritic elements. Inrelation to Hinduism, it possesses two aspects: on the one hand, there is Sanskritiza-tion of groups which are outside Hinduism; on the other hand, there is increasingSanskritization within Hinduism. Srinivas discards the term "Brahmanization" asa substitute for Sanskritization, since some of the Vedic rites are the privilege of theBrahmans and other twice-born castes and therefore cannot be imitated by others.

In a paper of 1955, "The Social System of a Mysore Village,"2 Srinivas adds twoelements to this analysis: an economic factor, which helps to determine who attemptsSanskritization, and a discussion of its efficacy. Sanskritization is attempted especiallyby members of a lower caste who own land. On the other hand, Sanskritization neednot always result in an actual rise of status. The smiths in Mysore and Madras Stateshave adopted Sanskritization, but this has only earned them "the combined hostilityof most of the other castes." Sanskritization is the main topic in an article of 1956entitled "A Note on Sanskritization and Westernization."3 Here the term is usednot only for lower castes in relation to higher castes, but the higher castes themselvesare called more "Sanskritized" than the lower castes. It is not entirely clear whetherthis presupposes a reference to the pasti.e., whether the higher castes are calledSanskritized because of former Sanskritization, or by definition.4 Sanskritization issaid to be facilitated by former Sanskritization, which has taken place "throughoutIndian history." It "is a two-way process, though the local cultures seem to havereceived more than they have given." This use of the term seems to imply thatSanskritization covers two opposite processes: (1) the influence of Sanskritic Hindu-ism on regional cultures; (2) the influence of regional cultures on Sanskritic Hindu-ism. This use seems paradoxical and questionable, as the latter process could for ex-ample consist in "Dravidianization."

A correlation is made between Sanskritization and ritual, economic, and politicalpower. "Occasionally" ritual and economic power do not coincide. A distinction ismade between Sanskritic and Vedic: the reaction against animal sacrifice (for ex-ample, its replacement by a sacrifice of fruit and flowers) is "Sanskritic, thoughpost-Vedic." In certain contexts, the term Brahmanization is preferred to Sanskritiza-tion, though the idea seems to be that both have identical denotations: non-Brah-manical castes adopt Brahmanical institutions and values, e.g., "virginity in brides,chastity in wives, and continence in widows," as well as emphasis on the patriline-age and ancestor cult. It becomes increasingly clear that in many cases Brahmaniza-tion can hardly be distinguished from Sanskritization, even though certain Brah-manical values and practices may be excluded from the process; if the dominatingcaste consists of Brahmans, "Sanskritization will probably be quicker and Brahmanicalvalues will spread, whereas if the dominating caste is a local Kshatriya or Vaishyacaste, Sanskritization will be slower, and the values will not be Brahmanical."

2 In: Village India. Studies in the Little Community, ed. McKim Marriott (Chicago, 1955), pp. 1-35.

3 By M. N. Srinivas in The Far Eastern Quarterly, XV (1955-56), 481-496.

* In a later paper, Sanskritization is also applied to Brahmans: "The Problem of Indian Unity,"The Economic Weekly, 26 April, 1958, pp. 571-577; reprinted in Introduction to the Civilization ofIndia: Developing India, ed. M. Weiner (Chicago, 1961), p. 52.

SANSKRIT AND SANSKRITIZATION 26?Some anthropologists who have used Srinivas' concepts have expressed criticisms,

but the way for adoption was paved by a tentative distinction between "little tradi-tion" and "great tradition," introduced by Robert Redfield, who identified the greattradition in India with the Sanskritic tradition, and predicted in 1955 the fruitful,application of the concepts of great and little tradition to India.5 Redfield also adopted;Milton Singer's distinction between textual and contextual: while the classical In-dologist's approach is textual in that he studies the texts, art, and architecture of thegreat tradition, the anthropologist's approach is contextual in that he relates the greattradition to little traditions. Singer identified the great tradition with Srinivas' San-skritic Hinduism, defined as "the generalized pattern of Brahman practices andbeliefs which have an all-India spread."6 The local forms of Hinduism can be con-sidered little traditions, and Sanskritization becomes the process by which the greattradition spreads to little traditions and absorbs them.

These ideas were further developed in Village India: Studies in the Little Com-munity1 and Traditional India: Structure and Change? In the former, B. S. Cohndescribed the Sanskritization of a depressed caste, die Camars, who attempted toraise their status by adherence to a Sanskritic movement, die Siva Narayan sect.9In the same volume, McKim Marriott reported on deities and festivals in a villagein one of the oldest areas of traditional Sanskritic Hinduism that "if we considerthis same combination of great-and-little traditional rites as representing the extentof the spread of Sanskritic rites, and the increasing Sanskritization of non-Sanskriticrites (Srinivas, 1952, p. 208), then we must conclude that spread and Sanskritizationin Kishan Garhi have scarcely begun, despite their having continued there for somethree thousand years." Marriott also observed that Sanskritization did not take place"at the expense of" the little traditions, as Srinivas had suggested, but that it merelyresulted in the addition of Sanskritic elements to non-Sanskritic elements Lasdy itbecame apparent that the agents of Sanskritization were not necessarily the highercastes, but Sanskritic elements were obtained instead "from itinerant teachers ofexotic cults, from urban-centered associations of recent growth, from new stateschools, or from the market place." Marriott considered the identification of a localdeity widi some more universal deity of die great tradition "the premier technique"of Sanskritization. In Milton Singer's preface to Traditional India, the tentative distinc-tion between great and little tradition is virtually discarded: "The real structure oftradition, in any civilization or part thereof, is an immensely intricate system ofrelationships between die levels or components of tradition, which we enormouslyoversimplify by referring to as 'high' and 'low' or as 'great' and 'litde.'" The distinc-tion between textual and contextual re-appears: "Folklorists and linguists have gen-erally concentrated on textual and diematic analyses. . . . Cultural anthropologistsand ethnologists . . . have tended to describe . . . in die contexts of a functioning

B "The Social Organization of Tradition," The Far Eastern Quarterly, XV (195556), 1321. In 1956

he modified this distinction in the light of complexities revealed by research in India, China, and Islam:R. Redfield, Peasant Society and Culture, Ch. Ill, "The Social Organization of Tradition."

6 "The Cultural Pattern of Indian Civilization," The Far Eastern Quarterly, XV, (195556), 2336.

7 See above, note 2.

8 Ed. M. Singer (Philadelphia, 1959).

9 "The Changing Status of a Depressed Caste," Village India, pp. 53-77; cf. "Changing Traditions of

a Low Caste," Traditional India, pp. 207215.

264 J. F. STAAL

society and culture." Singer speaks not only of Sanskritization, but also of de-San-skritization, and he goes a significant step further: "both involve . . . essential refer-ence to . . . cultural norms or values, which take us beyond the temporal dimension."

A more critical attitude may be seen in numerous other publications. In the sameissue of the journal in which Srinivas' paper on Sanskritization and Westernizationappeared, V. Raghavan published an article entitled "Variety and Integration in thePattern of Indian Culture."10 Here the composite character of the great tradition isillustrated by numerous examples of the incorporation of local and regional elementsinto "Sanskritic Hinduism." This article established beyond doubt that Sanskritiza-tion was not only a historical process but that it accounted for many elements of thegreat tradition itself. This had been indicated already by Srinivas, but Raghavan'sstudy gave much more content to the terms Sanskritic Hinduism and great tradition.In 1959 E. B. Harper, in an article entitled "A Hindu Village Pantheon,"11 studiedcertain village deities in Mysore and the distinction between Sanskritic and non-Sanskritic gods. According to him, the distinction could be functional rather thanhistorical. In the same year, L. Dumont and D. Pocock, in a critical study of Srinivas'book and Marriott's paper,12 interpreted Sanskritization "not as the imposition ofa different system upon an old one," but as "the acceptance of a more distinguishedor prestigious way of saying the same things." This resembles Marriott's criticismof "Sanskritization at the expense of" and goes back to the aspect of Srinivas' San-skritization, which Marriott stressed as identification. In 1959 and i960, F. G. Baileydescribed the changes taking place in two distiller castes in Orissa when they ac-quired land and raised their status.13 Srinivas, referring in 1957 to Bailey's field work,used the term Sanskritization.14 Though Bailey does not make much use of the term,he defines it roughly15 as "social climbing by conforming to an all-Indian standardof respectable behaviour," or, for the Konds, as "social climbing by following stand-ard Oriya behaviour."16

2. The Term SanskritizationIt is clear that the term Sanskritization is used to cover a sufficiently large number

of phenomena to justify Bailey's defining die process in a very general way, referringto an all-India standard without explicit reference to either "Sanskritic" or "Brah-manic." For the Konds, a reference to "Oriya behaviour" seems to be sufficient. Thisuse of the term recalls Srinivas' observation that in Mysore not only Brahmans, butalso Lingayats are agents of Sanskritization. The consistent use of the term San-skritic is of paramount importance, since the definition of the great tradition in Indiaas Sanskritic Hinduism depends on it. Yet in usage it is even more ambiguous than"Brahmanical." To die naive observer, the term Sanskritization seems to suggest aprocess either due to an increasing influence of Sanskrit or resulting in an increasingamount of Sanskrit material. Nevertheless the connection between Sanskritization

10 The Far Eastern Quarterly, XV (1955-56), 497-505.

1 1 Southwestern Journal of Anthropology, XV (1959), 227-234.

12 Contributions to Indian Sociology, III (1959), 40-45.

1 3 Caste and the Economic Frontier (Manchester, 1959); Tribe, Caste, and Nation (Manchester, i960).

14 "Caste in Modern India," The Journal of Asian Studies, XVI (1956-57) 531.

"Bailey (i960), p. 188, n. 1.16

Bailey also says, with reference to Sanskritization: "No-one seems to like this term."

SANSKRIT AND SANSKRITIZATION 165and Sanskrit is sometimes not very close. In some instances Sanskritization actuallyamounts to a decrease of Sanskrit material and a decreasing influence of Sanskrit.Two such examples occur in Srinivas' and one in Cohn's articles. The last one is themost striking. According to Cohn, the Camars underwent Sanskritization throughadherence to the Siva Narayan sect. He informs us that the roots of this sect go backto the time of Ramananda.17 Half a page further we read: "The influential sectswhich sprang from among Ramananda's followers emphasized the use of vernacularsrather than Sanskrit for religious purposes." The same occurs in Srinivas' attributionof a Sanskritizing influence to the Lingayats18 and to Harikatha.19 Though Lin-gayat ritual is "Sanskritic (though not Vedic)" according to Srinivas, an importantcharacteristic of the sect is that the writings attributed to the founder Basava arein Kannada. Similarly, though Harikatha helps, according to Srinivas, "in spreadingSanskrit stories and ideas," the language used is always a modern language and notSanskrit. The use of the term Sanskritization in these contexts seems inconsistent.

If Sanskritization is used to refer to Sanskrit culture rather than to the language,it could be made to incorporate the literatures of the Siva Narayan sect, of the Lin-gayats, the contents of Harikatha performances, and similar phenomena all overIndia. Sanskrit culture may be defined, for example, as the culture expressed on theliterary side by means of Sanskrit, or by means of any Indian language the materialcontent of which is based upon a Sanskrit source. However, this would result inproblems more serious than the ones we are trying to contend with. Both the Hindiand the Tamil Ramayana are based upon the Sanskrit Ramayana, but both containnumerous new elements. Do these belong to Sanskrit culture? What about furthertransformations of the Ramayana, e.g., in Kathakali? The Alvars composed Tamilhymns which are in many respects similar to Sanskrit devotional literature, but arethey based upon it? The Sanskrit sources in other cases are based upon vernacularsources, while serving themselves again as a source for vernacular literature: Bud-dhism offers examples of this. Is Buddhism to be called part of Sanskrit culture onlywhere a Sanskrit intermediary has been found? An attempt at analysis of the ex-pression "material content" would encounter similar difficulties. We can accept theterm Sanskritization only if it is made clear that its relation to the term Sanskrit isextremely complex. In the following, the term is used to denote the process illustrated,but not defined, in the previous section.

3. The Concept of SanskritizationTwo points are especially relevant here: Singer's distinction between textual and

contextual, and Harper's distinction between functional and historical. Both arerelated to the fundamental distinction between synchronic and diachronic. Thesetwo concepts are complementary in most contexts. However a major trend in modernanthropologyas in modern linguisticsaims specifically at synchronic analysis anddescription. Such a procedure arrives at the study of relations, functions, and struc-

17 Village India, p. 59. According to Cohn, Ramananda became a member of the "South Indian

Ramanuja sect which worshipped Ram, hero of the Ramayana." Ramanuja is the founder of theVisistadvaita school of Vedanta, which has no special connection with Rama or the Ramayana apartfrom being a vaisnava movement.

18 Religion and Society among the Coorgs of South India, p. 225.

19 "A Note on Sanskritization and Westernization," The Far Eastern Qtutrterly, XV (1955-56), 486.

266 J. F. STAAL

tures by abstracting from the historical background. Unsolvable difficulties appearin dealing with problems such as "cultural change" from an exclusively synchronicpoint of view. It should be clear that the concept of Sanskritization describes a proc-ess and is a concept of change. It is not a concept at which synchronic analysis couldever arrive. However, it may be arrived at in order to explain material obtained bysynchronic analysis. Sanskritization is a meta-concept in this sense, and all historicalconcepts are meta-concepts in that they are based upon concepts of synchronic anal-ysis. Hoenigswald, who deals with the same problem in studying language change,states this clearly: "Any historical statement contains, avowedly or otherwise, at leasttwo synchronic statementsone for each of two or more stagesalready."20

Harper's distinction between Sanskritic and non-Sanskritic as functional ratherthan historical means that this distinction should be made only in interpreting ma-terial obtained by purely synchronic analysis. The latter analysis itself would nomore easily lead to the concepts of Sanskritic and non-Sanskritic than, for example,to the interpretation of all goddesses as mother goddesses. A purely structural anal-ysis abstains from such labels. This has been well expressed by Dumont,21 and helias given an example in his study of Aiyanar, where he says that Aiyanar performsin certain contexts a function similar to that of Siva.22 To say that Aiyanar is "San-skritized" would go beyond the structural analysis into a higher level. This couldbe done most profitably on the basis of material obtained by synchronic analysis. Themere occurrence of Sanskrit names, for example, may point in a certain direction butneed not indicate the same things as a contextual analysis of the functions of variousdeities, which may be later grouped together and interpreted in terms of Sanskritiza-tion. For instance, Marriott's statistical analysis of "Sanskritic deities" among differentcastes in Kishan Garhi23 may not imply anything about Sanskritization: a deity witha "non-Sanskritic name" may well be "more Sanskritized" than a deity with a "San-skritic name." This holds a fortiori for the list of deities with Sanskritic names pro-vided by Srinivas: "Bhagavati (Powedi), Chamundi, Chaundi, Kali, Shasta orAyyappa, and Kshetrapala. . . "2i Actually here even the names are only partlySanskrit.

If Sanskritization is not a synchronic but a diachronic concept, each Sanskritizedform implies Sanskritization, and it is unavoidable that the anthropological analysiswill give way to a historical analysis. Srinivas suggested that the local cultures seemto have received more than they have given. It seems in this context that almost allgiving is based upon previous taking. Receiving from Sanskritic Hinduism or fromthe great tradition is not receiving from a static entity, but from a dynamic reality.Raghavan has shown that this reality has a composite structure, and Singer hasstressed the simplification inherent in the terminology of great and little tradition.It seems that one could specify Singer's general description considerably by goingmuch further than Raghavan did. The oldest and apparently most pivotal forms of

20 H. M. Hoenigswald, Language Change and Linguistic Reconstruction (Chicago, i960), p. 3, n. 5.

2 1 L. Dumont, Une sous-caste de I'lnde du sud: Organisation sociale et religion des Pramalai Kallar

(La Haye, 1957). P- 3'5-22

"Definition structural d'un dieu populaire tamoul: Aiyanar, le Maltre," Journal Asiatique, CCXLI(i953). 261-262; Contributions to Indian Sociology, III (1959), 80.

2 3 Village India, p. 209.

2 4 Coorgs, p. 208.

SANSKRIT AND SANSKRITIZATION 267

the great tradition are often of a type which many anthropologists would tend todescribe as "non-Sanskritic," and which are in fact based upon little traditions. Theorigins of the great tradition lie in numerous little traditions, widespread throughoutIndian history and geography. To say that Sanskritization is a process by whichlittle traditions are assimilated to the great tradition is like saying that a book becomesa library book by adding it to a library. The library's first book might well havebeen an insignificant pamphlet, which was soon lost. The bulk of the library is formedby addition.

Anthropologists commonly regard possession as a non-Sanskritic form par excel-lence. Harper, for example, studied possession among a high sudra caste in Mysoreas a typical manifestation of "non-Sanskritic religion" or "popular Hinduism as op-posed to the epic and philosophic Sanskritic tradition.25 A characteristic of possessionis a trembling of the body of the possessed person. Harper did not find this in hisfavourite shaman, but mentions that in Mysore "some familiar spirits cause certainmannerisms in the shamans they possess, such as a trembling of the whole body... ."28Dumont, studying the Kallar in Madras State, describes cases of possession wherethe person is "secoue d'un leger tremblement nerveux,"27 though he wisely abstainsfrom labelling this phenomenon as "non-Sanskritic," "non-Aryan," "Dravidian," or"regional." Among the Nayars of Kerala, according to Kathleen Gough, young menmay be possessed by ghosts, certainly part of a "non-Sanskritic cult"; this is manifestedby a frenzied dance. Such possession is "prevalent among rural Nayars" and is "stillmore common among the lower castes."28

But possession and trembling are in fact part of the Sanskritic great tradition. Inthe language of the Rgveda, the verbal root vip- denotes "trembling, quivering."29This root is etymologically related to the English word "vibration." Heaven andEarth are said to "tremble out of fear." The Maruts "cause the trembling of themountains." Indra's lips tremble when he drinks the soma. Agni and Soma "tremblein their thought." The root vip- is also used to describe the mystical intoxication ofthe Vedic poets, who have been inspired by the gods. An important noun derivedfrom this root is vipra, literally "the quivering one." This denotes the inspired poets,and comes to denote in general diose with insight and wisdom. Later vipra becomesa common term to denote a Brahman. This is widespread in classical Sanskrit andoccurs also in modern Indian languages. In Manusmrti, the terms vipra and Brah-man are related as follows: "by birth he is known as brdhmana; on account of thesacraments he is called twice-born; through knowledge he becomes vipra; on accountof all three he is called srotriya."30 The word vipra continues to suggest that theBrahman is the trembling Vedic seer who is possessed by inspiring gods. Accordinglythis hero of Sanskritization may be part of a picture in no way essentially differentfrom that presented by later phenomena of possession classified by anthropologistsas "non-Sanskritic."

25 "Shamanism in South India," Southwestern Journal of Anthropology, XIII (1957), 267-287.

26 "Shamanism . . . ," p. 270.

27 Une sous-caste . . . , p. 351.

2 8 Traditional India, pp. 241-243.

2 8 For this and the following see: L. Renou, ttudes sur le vocabttlaire du Rgveda, I (Pondichery,

1958), 29-31; cf. H. Grassmann, Worterbuch zum Rig-Veda (Wiesbaden, 1955), pp. 1282-1283. Othersimilar examples are likely to be found in the Atharvaveda.

s V. S. Apte, Sanscrit-English Dictionary, II (Poona, 1958), 1177.

268 J. F. STAAL

Throughout the great tradition, there are references to the final state of emancipa-tion or samadhi. This concept may denote a reality which is, from a philosophicalpoint of view, quite different from the possession of a shaman by a local spirit, butfrom an anthropological point of view these phenomena are all related. Numerousdescriptions of the state of samadhi could illustrate this. In one late example (1885)Sri Ramakrsna, the Brahman ascetic and mystic, describes his own experience:

There are five kinds of samadhi. First, he feels the Mahavayu (the great nerve currentwhose rising is felt in the spinal column) rise like an ant crawling up. Second, he feelsIt rise like a fish swimming in the water. Third, he feels It rise like a snake wrigglingalong. Fourth, he feels It rise like a bird flyingflying from one branch to another. Fifth,he feels It rise like a monkey making a big jump; the Mahavayu reaches the head withone jump, as it were, and samadhi follows.31

The state of samadhi is the goal of the Yoga system in particular. M. Eliade82has suggested that this system is of non-Aryan or even pre-Aryan origin. Even thewell known Mohenjo-Daro seal representing a cross-legged deity has been referredto in this context. This would amount to an important Sanskritization of widespreadlittle traditions. Actually this thesis is difficult to maintain. Filliozat has shown33that the origins of the Yoga system lie at least partly in the learned traditions ofIndian medicine and are in some respects the natural outcome of the idea that oneentity, the prana, is the cause of both the functions of the body and the operationsof the mind. This would assign a mixed great and little traditional origin to an im-portant aspect of the great tradition. Whatever tradition one studies in the classicalSanskrit sources, almost always there are indications of popular cults, local usages,and little traditions. The extensive Brahmana literature abounds in popular magicalelements, and the Vedic sacrifices themselves are rich in material a modern anthro-pologist would regard as "non-Sanskritic." It is well known that this holds widiregard to animal sacrifice and the drinking of soma. But it is equally manifest inhair-cutting rites, ritual games, ritual identifications, etc.

What holds for the sacrifices of the hauta

SANSKRIT AND SANSKRITIZATION 269Ruben discovered*8 in one of the oldest and most venerable Upanisads, the BrhadAranyaka (4.3.11-13), the "primitive" doctrine that the soul leaves the body andwanders about during dreams. Similar popular elements account for much materialin the Samkhya system, in Buddhism and in Jainism. H. Zimmer accordingly con'sidered these systems as Dravidian.37 It is well known that the original Buddhistand Jain scriptures are available only in Middle Indian vernaculars. In centuries ofcontroversy with Hindu systems, Sanskrit was increasingly adopted38probably themost impressive case of large scale Sanskritization in Indian history. The great schools^of the Vedanta originated in the Dravidian south, though their literature was in the-beginning entirely in Sanskrit. In Visistadvaita, one school stresses the use of San-skrit (Vadagalai), the other the use of Tamil (Tengalai). Much material is agairoof popular origin, for example, in the bha\ti cult which is in the background of muchin Visistadvaita and Dvaita as well as in later Advaita. The non-Sanskritic back--ground of philosophical culture, finding its expression in Sanskrit, has in many casesexerted a civilizing influence. In Dharmasastra, there is a gradual introduction ofnumerous elements of dcara "custom."39 Among contemporary Brahmans the Nam-budiris, rightly famous for their orthodoxy and maintenance of Vedic rites, continueto observe as many as sixty-four andcdrams (non-traditional customs), among themthe well-known marriage customs. Renou, trying to enumerate ways in which Hin-duism differs from the Vedic religion and in which it has incorporated possiblynon-Aryan material, says: "It would have been quicker to enumerate those elementsthat are demonstrably Aryan: they would consist of perhaps a few functional gods(as it is the fashion to describe them), the soma cult and the rudiments of a socialsystem: little enough, in all conscience."40 Even Sanskrit drama has its roots in"magico-religious" customs and rites, and is connected with popular dramas, festivals,and plays.41 The vidusa\a, the jester who is always a Brahman, is connected withthe clown-like figures and thick-bellied dwarfs which are common at vegetationfestivals.

There is much evidence to show that the origins of the great tradition in Indialie often in little traditions, and that these origins generally remain visible in the laterstages. The new does not replace the old, but the old continues to exist side by sidewith the new.42 This may be related to the relativization of novelty in the theoriesof change evolved by Indian philosophers, who tend to stress continuity. Marriottand Dumont noticed this in contemporary India, as is manifest in their criticism ofSrinivas' "Sanskritization at the expense of."

The great tradition is often characterized by the expression "all-India spread."But any non-Sanskritic element incorporated in the great tradition must have beenincorporated in a given region to start with. The great tradition is considered an all-

86 "Schamanismas im alten Indien," Ada Orientalia, XVIII (1940), 191-194.

37 Philosophies of India (London, 1951), p. 649 s.v. "Dravidian factor."

3 8 This resulted in what Edgerton has called Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit.

89 P. V. Kane, History of Dharmasastra, III (Poona, 1946), 825-973.

40 L. Renou, Religions of Ancient India (London, 1953), pp. 47-48.

4 1 J. Gonda, "Zur Frage nach dem Ursprung und Wesen des indischen Dramas," Ada Orientalia, XIX

(1943), 329-453-42

See: J. F. Staal, "Notes on Some Brahmin Communities of South India," Art and Letters. Journalof the Royal India, Pakistan and Ceylon Society XXXII (1958), 1-7; "Uber die Idee der Toleranz imHinduismus," Kairos, Zeitschrift fur Religionswissenschaft und Theologie, I (1959), 215-218.

270 J. F. STAAL

India phenomenon because of lack of familiarity with what the great tradition reallyconsists of and because of the lack of geographical specifications in many works onclassical Indology. It is obvious that the oldest Vedic literature originated in thenorthwest, the Rgveda among relatively few families in a limited number of clans.The gotra and pravara names give substantial evidence in this respect. The Vedicschools ($a\ha) have in general a limited geographical spread. One of the two sur-viving schools of the Rgveda, Sarikhayana, is now available only in the southwest.The White Yajurveda originated in the north and seems never to have been strongin the south. The Taittiriya school of the Black Yajurveda and the important sutraof Apastamba have been typically southern phenomena for many centuries. TheJaiminiya school of the Samaveda originated in the south and is preserved onlythere. The Atharvaveda, one school of which is known from Kashmir, seems neverto have entered the Dekkan.43

The above data regarding Vedic material, which form only part of what is actu-ally known, can be supplemented by numerous and more specific instances fromclassical Sanskrit sources. The epic has many geographical affiliations, the Mahab-harata with the northwest, die Ramayana with the soudiward spread of Hinduism.Advaita, probably born in Kerala, seems to have penetrated again into the countryof its origin only during the nineteenth century. Sarnkhya was never popular in thesouth, Visistadvaita and Dvaita never in die north, with rare exceptions (e.g., Brin-davan, and of course Banaras, where everything can now be found). The BhagavadGita, the classical Hindu scripture par excellence, has only recently become popularin Bengal and in Kerala. Modern logic on the other hand developed mainly in Bengal.Also in Dharmasastra many law schools were prevalent in specific regions. Not onlythe origins of die elements constituting the great tradition are regional, but also itsdevelopment. For example, the Vedic tradition developed unique forms in Kerala.44The Lingayats, so frequently mentioned as agents of Sanskritization and hence, pre-sumably, as members of the great tradition, rarely spread beyond the boundaries ofMysore and Andhra Pradesh. The Gita Govinda led to entirely dissimilar forms inBengal and in Kerala. This holds even for scientific Sanskrit culture. In grammar,Panini and Patafijali discussed certain regional varieties. The most widespread com-mentary on Panini in the North, the Kasika (a name derived from the place of itsorigin, KasI, or Banaras) was never used in Kerala, where a different commentaryprevailed (die Prakriyasarvasva). The report of die Sanskrit Commission of theGovernment of India (1956-57) gives a detailed account of the present distributionof Sanskrit learning and of various forms of Sanskrit culture in different parts ofthe subcontinent. On the other hand, many so-called non-Sanskritic forms (e.g., diecult of modier goddesses) have an all-India spread.

Even if the concept of Sanskritization can cover only a particular type of change,its implied reference to Sanskrit points at something relatively permanent in the sub-continent. It may be possible to evolve new conceptual tools to effect a more ordereddescription of the many processes at work alongside Sanskritization. The study ofIndian languages may lead to results which can be generalized because the linguisticprocesses, though complex, are nevertheless more similar in structure than the ex-ceedingly complicated processes operating in India's cultural and religious history.

43 Cf. J. F. Staal, Nambudiri Veda Recitation, VGravenhage, 1961.

** See previous note.

SANSKRIT AND SANSKRITIZATION 2714. Sansfy-itization in the Study of Indian Languages**

A. SanscritThe oldest form of Sanskrit or Old Indo-Aryan is the language of the Rgveda.

From a dialect of this language classical Sanskrit developed. Already the languageof the Rgveda contains non-Indo-European elementsinnovations possibly due toinfluences of other languages spoken in India at the time of the Aryan invasion, i.e.,in particular (Pre-)Dravidian and (Pre-)Munda. The continued existence of a Dra-vidian language, Brahul, in Balucistan, and of two Dravidian islands, Kurukh andMalto, in north India, may be significant in this connexion. While a few Dravidianwords have been found in the Rgveda, the main Dravidian influence on the vocabu-lary seems to have taken place between the late Vedic period and the formation ofclassical Sanskrit. A more limited number of words in the Rgveda and in later San-skrit are probably of Munda origin. Many proper names, including names of rsis andof deities, are probably non-Indo-European. In the eighth book of the Rgveda, whichis particularly rich in "non-Sanskritic" names, a Dasa chief who patronized a Brahman(referred to as vipra) is mentioned by name: Balbutha Taruksa.48 This may be theoldest mention of an indigenous non-Aryan Indian who had "Sanskritized" his ways.In later Vedic all such influences increase. In the Jaiminlya Samaveda, the Dravidiansound 1 occurs, which remains a characteristic mark confined to this school.47

In classical Sanskrit, alien influences are more apparent. The non-Brahmanicallevels of society contribute to the vocabulary, which results in Middle Indo-Aryanforms. For instance, the well-known name for Krsna, Govinda, is a Middle Indo-Aryan form adopted in Sanskrit, where the equivalent form is Gopendra. Manyoriginally Middle Indo-Aryan words were Sanskritized, i.e., transformed into San-skrit in accordance with known phonetic correlations.48 The Dravidian element con-tinues to increase. The philosopher Kumarila (eighth century) sanctions such bor-rowings, provided a Sanskrit termination is added. Not only are words incorporatedfrom Dravidian, but also syntactic structures, for example in the late grhya-sutra ofthe Vaikhanasa (? fourth century A.D.), a Vedic school which developed into aSouth Indian sect, as well as in the South Indian Advaita philosopher Sankarananda(fourteenth century). The Sanskrit grammarians discussed not only regional usagebut also popular usage. Panini, Patafijali, and numerous later grammarians give awealth of detail. With Panini, grammatical research turns to the analysis of thespoken language (bhdsd),M and the rules of grammar are based upon common usage

o

4 5 For the following see: J. Wackernagel, Altindischc Grammatik I: Introduction generale par L.

Renou (Gottingen, 1957); L. Renou, Histoire de la langue sanskfite (Paris, 1956); T. Burrow, TheSanskrit Language (London, n.d.).

4 6 Rksarnhita 8.46.32, referred to in A. L. Basham, The Wonder That Was India (New York, 1954),

P- 32-47

Cf. Staal, Nambudiri Veda Recitation, pp. 70, 78-83.4 8

"transform^ en Sanskrit sur la base des correlations phone'tiques connues": Wackernagel-Renou,p. 30.

49 Cf. L. Renou, La Durghataurtti de iaranadeva I, 1 (Paris, 1940), 8; L. Renou, Terminohgie

grammatical du Sanskrit (Paris, 1957), s.v. bhasa; V. S. Agrawala, India as Known to Panini (Lucknow,1953). PP- 348-350, passim.

60 Cf. J. F. Staal, "The Theory of Definition in Indian Logic," Journal of the American Oriental

Society, LXXXI (1961), 122-126.

272 J. F. STAAL

B. Modern Indo-Aryan51

The modern Indo-Aryan languages begin to take shape roughly around the endof the first millenium A.D. Yet Sanskrit remained the most important language ofthe literate tradition, and this explains the occurrence of at least three types of wordsin the vocabulary of every modern Indo-Aryan language: ( i ) Words which havedeveloped from Sanskrit via Middle Indo-Aryan into Modern Indo-Aryan, e.g., Hindihath "hand" from Sanskrit hasta "hand," are called tadbhava. (2) Words which areborrowed directly from Sanskrit, e.g., Hindi hast denoting "hand, autograph," arecalled tatsama. A tatsama word which was introduced into the language at an earlystage and underwent a similar change as the tadbhava words is sometimes called asemi-tatsama. Chatterji gives the following examples from Bengali: the Sanskrit wordfraddha yields, apart from a tatsama pronounced sroddha, a semi-tatsama wordchedda and a tadbhava word sddh. (3) Words of Indian but non-Indo-Aryan originare called de'sl. The de'sl words are sometimes of Dravidian or Munda origin. Anotherclass of words of foreign (i.e., non-Indian) origin is called vide'sl (e.g., Persian, Eng-lish, etc.) The mutual influences of the modern Indo-Aryan languages have alsobeen important, for instance, the Panjabi influence on Hindi and the Hindi influenceon Bengali, Gujarati, Marathi, and Nepali. According to Chatterji, roughly fifty percent of the words of a Modern Indo-Aryan language are borrowed from Sanskrit,either as tatsama or as semi-tatsama. The influence of Sanskrit vocabulary seems tohave been gradually increasing.

C. Dravidian52

Although the Dravidian languages (part of what will be stated here applies alsoto the Munda languages) are not Indo-European, the terms tatsama and tadbhavaare used to denote respectively unmodified and modified Sanskrit words introducedinto Dravidian and corresponding to the tatsama and semi-tatsama words mentionedabove. The earliest Dravidian, the Tamil of the Sahgam period, shows the influenceof Sanskrit. According to S. A. Pillai, there are fifty-four Sanskrit words in theTolkappiyam, composed in the early Christian era. Tamil is the least Sanskritized ofthe Dravidian languages. The other main languages, Telugu, Kannada, and Ma-layajam, contain in their literary form an exceedingly large percentage of Sanskritwords or words of Sanskrit origin, possibly well over fifty per cent. As we have seenthat there is a considerable Dravidian element in Sanskrit itself, it becomes possiblefor a Sanskrit word of Dravidian origin to be adopted into Dravidian again. Accord-ing to Collins, the word pujd provides an example of this kind of migration.53 TheDravidian languages have also influenced each other. Malayalam can actually beconsidered an offshoot of Tamil. There are in addition mutual influences betweenDravidian and Modern Indo-Aryan, especially in cases where the languages are

5 1 For the following see: J. Bloch, La formation de la langue marathe (Paris, 1915); J. Bloch, L'lndo-

Aryan du Veda aux temps modernes (Paris, 1934); S. K. Chatterji, The Origin and Development of theBengali Language I (Calcutta, 1926), especially 189-223; S. K. Chatterji, Indo-Aryan and Hindi (Cal-cutta, i960). I am grateful to Dr. E. Bender for valuable comments on an earlier draft of this section.

62 For the following see: S. A. Pillai, The Sanskritic 'Element in the Vocabularies of the Dravidian

Languages (Madras, 1919); and cf. S. Levi, J. Przyluski, and J. Bloch, Pre-Aryan and Pre-Dravidian inIndia (Calcutta, 1929).

53 See however, P. Thieme in Zeitschrijt der deutschen morgenldndischen Gesellschaft, XCIII (1939).

SANSKRIT AND SANSKRITIZATION 273

spoken in adjacent areas, such as in the cases of Oriya-Telugu and of Marathi-Kannada. Bloch discusses cases where Marathi has common features with Dravidianwhich are absent in the other modern Indo-Aryan languages, e.g., the pronunciationof initial e- and o- as ye- and wo- respectively. The relationships between the threeindependent groups (Indo-European, Dravidian, and Munda) have ever since theVedic period been so close that one can speak of the existence of an "Indian type oflanguage."54 Some of their common features are: the retroflex or cerebral consonants;postpositions; absence of affixes for the degrees of comparison; the gerund or con-junctive participle; verbal composition; nominalization; and echo words. It followsfrom the above that these similarities are not necessarily due to "linguistic" San-skritization.

5. Language and CultureThe preceding section has shown that in the development of the languages of

India various processes have been at work, of which only tatsama borrowing can beconsidered Sanskritization. The term can be used in this field as a conceptual tool onlyfor a first approximation, and covers only part of the material. The same holds for proc-esses operating in Indian cultural history. While Sanskritization is undoubtedly auseful heuristic concept, other more specific processes are at work. It is easy to give toSanskritization a definite meaning with reference to language, but very difficult toattach to it an unambiguous cultural significance. Cultural processes are inherentlymore complex than processes of language change, yet the above-mentioned structuresmay be generalized and applied to the material which the concept of Sanskritizationwas intended to analyze. The role played by Sanskrit in the analysis of languagecan be assigned to Hinduism in an anthropological and historical analysis, providedit is realized that Hinduism has a more complex structure than Sanskrit, and that itsvarious aspects have even less of an all-India spread than those of Sanskrit.

The analysis with reference to Hinduism applies in a different way in two con-texts: phenomena inside Hinduism and phenomena outside Hinduism. Srinivasmakes a somewhat less unambiguous distinction:

All-India Hinduism . . . spreads in two ways: by the extension of Sanskritic deitiesand ritual forms to an outlying group, as well as by the greater Sanskritization of theritual and beliefs of groups inside Hinduism. Both these processes are at work, and thefirst results in Sanskritic deities' assuming different forms in their travels all over Indiawhile the second results in local deities' assuming Sanskritic labels and forms. The Vedicdeity Kshetrapala becomes Ketrappa in Coorg, while the local cobra-deity becomes iden-tified with Subrahmanya, the warrior-son of Shiva.55

Here is a parallel to the distinction between tadbhava and tatsama. Numerous ex-amples could illustrate the same process. Many pre-Vedic divinities, mentioned in theRgveda, underwent various transformations so that a contemporary form can be con-sidered a tadbhava development of the original or originals. The modern Visnu, forexample, is a tadbhava form of the deity Visnu who played a subordinate role in theRgveda.56 At the same time a great deity like Visnu incorporated alien or desi ele-

B*See: Chatterji, Origin and Development of Bengali, pp. 170-178 and L. Renou-J. Filliozat, L'lnde

classique I (Paris, 1947), 119.B5

Srinivas, Coorgs, p. 214.66

See for instance: J. Gonda, Aspects of Early Visnuism (Utrecht, 1954).

274 J. F. STAAL

ments, as Sanskrit did in the course of its development, and the final result wasgenerally syncretistic. Similarly, in another context, a modern Brahman marriageritual is a tadbhava form of the Vedic marriage: new Vedic elements have beenadded (e.g., Vedic chanting takes place on the third day during an orthodox TeluguBrahman marriage), but desi elements have also been incorporated (e.g., tying ofthe tali). The ritual by means of which a child is introduced to writing is a tatsamaform in a similar sense, whereas the naming ceremony and the rites connected widithe first feeding with solid food, are tadbhava forms.

A semi-tatsama is a form introduced into Hinduism at an early stage and de-veloped from then onward. The concept of bhafyi provides an example, as it makesits appearance in the later classical Upanisads. Various distinctions can be applied.The domestic ritual of the higher castes is predominantly a tadbhava developmentfrom the material dealt with in the grhyasiltras, though it has incorporated desielements as well. The temple ritual consists predominantly of tatsama forms and desiforms, though there are a few tadbhava elements.57 The Vedic sacrifices, at presentperformed only rarely, are semi-tatsama forms; they survive from the Vedic period,but changes have crept in. Migration forms are not uncommon. Examples can befound in the cults of the mother goddess. Such elements were originally incorporatedinto Hinduism from outside, but they served in turn as forms (e.g. Devi, Kali) withwhich a local goddess could subsequently be identified.

The application to anthropological and historical data of these concepts which referto language poses several problems. It seems as if only the use of a precise termi-nology can show how extremely complicated the structures concerned are. Whileforms of language are relatively transparent, at least in principle, a certain lack ofprecision is apparently inherent in these cultural structures. There is more agreementon the use of certain concepts and conventions in the study of a language than inanthropology or history, and students of language seem to have reached a more con-crete level of analysis than most anthropologists and historians.68 An apparent confu-sion may show this. The same form can be considered a tadbhava, a tatsama, or adesi form according to the point of view adopted. The deity Visnu, as worshipped atpresent, is a tadbhava development from the Vedic Visnu, a de'si borrowing fromregional deities such as Krsna, with whom he is identified, and a tatsama form insofaras certain aspects of the Vedic god (e.g., the performance of three steps) are stillretained. These apparent inconsistencies apply, however, to a word in a modernIndian language as well, provided it is studied from equally many different points ofview. The Hindi word hath, for example, is a tadbhava form of Sanskrit hasta, atatsama form in that it preserves certain phonemes and also continues to denote thesame part of the human body, a desi form in that it results from die phonetic proc-esses which caused in a certain region the transformation from hasta to hath, andeven a videli form in diat one of its meanings is "autograph." In the study of lan-

5 7 See e.g. C. G. Diehl, Instrument and Purpose. Studies on Rites and Rituals in South India (Lund,

1956), p . 97.5 8

Cf. C. F . Hockett, "Chinese versus English: an Exploration of the Whorfian Theses," Language inCulture ed. H . Hoijer (Chicago, 1954), p . n o : "Of all the sister fields, named or nameless, which lieclose compacted within ethnography, linguistics has without doubt attained, to date, the clearest methodsand the most reliable results . . . if linguistics has progressed further, the chief reason is the relativesimplicity of its subject-matter. . . . Language is complex enough, but its complexity is as nothing incomparison with that of the whole fabric of life of a community . . . this state of affairs suggests thatlinguistics may have methodological lessons for other phases of ethnography."

SANSKRIT AND SANSKRITIZATION 275guage, this confusion is avoided by the adoption of a number of conventions, includingthe recognition that the root or stem is more important than a suffix and that gram-mar is more important than vocabulary. This becomes apparent when the terminologyis applied to entire languages. Malayalam, for example, is considered a Dravidianlanguage because its grammatical structure is Dravidian, even though its vocabularyis predominantly Sanskrit. This means that Malayalam is a de'si language from thepoint of view of grammar, even though it can be considered a tatsama or semi-tatsamalanguage from the point of view of vocabulary.

A ritual or a great deity cannot be compared to a word, but should be comparedto an entire language or at least to a grammatical structure. If language students hadas powerful concepts for the description of grammatical change as they have for thedescription of change in vocabulary, anthropology and history might be able to adoptsuch concepts profitably. At present it seems that the linguistic distinctions mentionedcan fruitfully be applied to structures in anthropology or history only if such structurescan be analyzed on the analogy of the linguistic analysis of a sentence into words orof a word into sounds. This would consist in new distinctions and the clarificationof traditional concepts. It is left to anthropologists to decide whether this would beuseful and whether structural anthropology is perhaps the first step on the road whichmight eventually lead to formal anthropology. The first required distinction would bebetween form and function. This would enable us to say, for example, that the "form"of Visnu is a tadbhava development, while the "function" of Visnu is a de'si borrow-ing. Similarly, the "form" of a Brahman marriage could be called a combined resultof tadbhava and de'si elements, while the "function" could be called a tatsama orsemi-tatsama element. We might arrive at a definition of form and function usefulin this context on the basis of Singer's distinction between text and context. Of course,further distinctions would have to be made. I have merely suggested that conceptualrefinements like those used in the study of language may be useful in the study ofculture.

Sanskritization as used by Srinivas and other anthropologists is a complex conceptor class of concepts. The term itself seems to be misleading, since its relationship tothe term Sanskrit is extremely complicated. Sanskritization covers cases where theinfluence of Sanskrit and the amount of Sanskrit material decrease. The concept ofSanskrit culture, in terms of which we could attempt to clarify the terms Sanskritiza-tion and Sanskritic, is not free from ambiguities. Despite these inherent complexities,the concept of Sanskritization is used heuristically, as related to some of the processesat work in Indian culture. In the study of Indian languages, Sanskritization is awell-defined concept denoting one of the processes of language change in India. Al-though these processes can be defined relatively precisely, we cannot transfer suchconcepts to anthropology and history unless we make additional distinctions. Thoughwe cannot adopt Srinivas' concept of Sanskritization in its original forms, we shouldnot forget that Srinivas himself was the first to modify it and to stress that it shouldbe discarded "quickly and without regret" if a better concept or concepts could befound.69 His concept has been fruitful in paving the way for the description andanalysis of numerous phenomena, inspiring others and giving rise to an extensiveliterature.

5 8 Srinivas, "Sanskritization and Westernization," p. 495; also quoted in Bailey, Tribe, Caste and

Nation, p. 188, n. 1.