About the language and wisdom of the Indians

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About the language and wisdom of the Indians is an art, language and social theoretical monograph by Friedrich Schlegel . It was published in 1808 by the Mohr and Zimmer Verlag , today Mohr Siebeck Verlag , in Heidelberg.

Emergence

The author Friedrich Schlegel had lived in Jena for several years. After the 'Jena Circle' broke up in 1801, Friedrich Schlegel went to Paris. There he devoted himself to art criticism and from 1803 to "studies of the Sanskrit language and Indian antiquity" - so Schlegel's own words. He continued these studies in Cologne, where he and his wife had moved in 1804. One result of these studies is the monograph, which appeared in 1808.

Structure and content

Schlegel's work, which is over 300 pages long, consists of a preface, the three books “Von der Sprache”, “Von der Philosophie” and “Historical Ideas” and finally the translations of selected original literature, “Indian Poems”.

preface

In the first sentence of his preface, Friedrich Schlegel refers to Sir William Jones . He was one of the first to notice the similarity between Sanskrit on the one hand and several European languages ​​on the other. Jones' lecture quickly became known in Europe and fascinated many researchers in Germany and other European countries. Including Schlegel, the employed, the question of whether or not to the analogous prime numbers in mathematics Primworte could, original words give, from which the languages of the world draw their words. Jones had now suggested a partial answer with reference to Sanskrit, which Schlegel wanted to pursue.

Book I: Of Language

Schlegel considers Sanskrit to be the original language he was looking for , from which Greek , Latin , Persian and Gothic are said to have descended. Today we know that this is not correct. Sanskrit and most European languages ​​developed from Indo- European.

In the first chapter he shows that the Indian language is closely related to the "Roman and Greek as well as to the Germanic and Persian languages", but removes the older Indian language from the front. This is not just a matter of superficial relationships, but also of a relationship of the roots of the word, as well as of the structure and grammar. He expands on this idea in the following chapter and presents a multitude of word roots that connect Indian with other languages ​​such as German and English . For example, in German there is "vindoti - he finds, [...] Rotho - the wheel, Bhruvo - the brows of the eyes" or in English and Latin "Yūyon - you, English you", "navyon - navis, danen - donum"

The third chapter is entitled “On the grammatical structure”. Schlegel points out that, in addition to the word relationships, “the inner structure of the grammar or the comparative grammar” are best suited to clarify the relationships. A few years later, Franz Bopp , the founder of Indo-European studies, was to follow him. By this means he also tries to prove that Indian was not formed from the related languages, but rather that these must have arisen from Indian. For example, "the regular simplicity of the Indian language in the same structure is an unmistakable characteristic of higher antiquity". In the fourth chapter he divides the languages ​​of this world into two categories, the linguistic principle of which forms a contradiction. On the one hand, there are the languages ​​that form words through inflection , or through word components or particle words . “Either the secondary determinations of the meaning are indicated by an inner change of the root sound, by inflection; or each time through a word of its own added, which in and of itself means majority, past, a future ought, or other relative concepts of the kind; and these two simplest cases also designate the two main genres of all languages. "

As an example, Chinese can be cited as a language that consists of innumerable individual words, or American, which combines words from many individual parts. Celtic and Indian, on the other hand, are inflected languages. The inflected languages ​​can be traced back to an original language that runs like a "thread" through the language landscape. At the end of the chapter, however, he adds that this classification should not correspond to any rating, but that even the most elaborate and noble language can deteriorate, as happens "with bad writers enough".

Then he looks at the origin of languages. Here he sees Indian as a language that did not arise from onomatopoeia and "animal dullness", but from "the clearest and most intimate prudence". He also provides the previously mentioned "proof" for the old age of Indian: "from the use of the terminology, or etymologically from the compound words."

Finally, in this first book, he deals with so-called middle language like Armenian and explains why the languages ​​appear so different today, when they can originally come from an original language. He mainly cites historical processes, so-called “interference”, such as Arabic roots in the language of the Greeks, who often had contact with the Phoenicians.

Translations

Schlegel translates selected ancient Indian texts after his three books. Particularly noteworthy is the partial translation of the Bhagavadgita (written by Schlegel Bhogovotgita), the famous philosophical didactic poem which plays a central role in Hinduism . It is embedded in the ancient Indian epic Mahabharata . The English orientalist Charles Wilkins had already made the first translation into a European language in 1785. In Germany, however , the Bhagavadgita became known through Friedrich's brother August Wilhelm . In 1823 he had the epic printed in Indian letters and added a Latin translation, which was very successful.

The consequences

In the preface to his work Schlegel had described that he had various hopes for this publication: He would like to show “how fruitful Indian studies could one day be”, would like to make known “which rich treasures are hidden here” and finally want to achieve "to stir up the love for this study [...] in Germany too". In fact, Schlegel has a kind of 'renaissance' in mind. Just as the study of the Greek language and culture was pursued and promoted in Italy and Germany in the 15th and 16th centuries , he hopes that the present will be fertilized by ancient Indian times.

Franz Bopp and the founding of Indo-European Studies

Franz Bopp (1791–1867), who is considered the founder of Indo-European Studies, initially followed in Schlegel's footsteps . Bopp attended grammar school in Aschaffenburg and was very fortunate to be encouraged by his grammar school teacher Karl Joseph Windischmann . The enthusiasm for Indian culture and language transferred from Windischmann to Bopp was decisive. Both read About the Language and Wisdom of the Indians . Bopp followed Schlegel's example and went to Paris in 1812, financially supported by the Bavarian government.

As early as 1816, Bopp's studies in Paris led to his groundbreaking work on the conjugation system of the Sanskrit language in comparison with that of the Greek, Latin, Persian and Germanic languages . Here (and in his main work from 1833) Bopp took up the concept of 'comparative grammar' coined by Schlegel and examined - entirely in Schlegel's sense - the 'inner structure of grammar'.

Bopp's teacher and sponsor Windischmann also emphasized the importance of Schlegel's script for Bopp's work. In the 46-page memoirs , essentially a laudation for his pupil, Windischmann emphasizes that Friedrich von Schlegel "made Sanskrit language the subject of serious study and broke the ground for us all".

However, it is not Schlegel, but rather Bopp, who works more strictly and systematically, that is seen as the founder of Indo-European Studies. 1816, the year of publication of Bopp's conjugation system , is considered to be the year of birth of comparative linguistics and Indo-European studies. In contrast to Schlegel, Bopp received university honors and offices. In 1821 he was appointed to the professorship for "Oriental literature and general linguistics" in Berlin.

To focus on Sanskrit is also reasonable from today's perspective. In fact, the ancient Indian Vedas, the oldest texts of the Hindu religion, were formulated more than 3000 years ago without first being recorded in writing. For centuries it was only passed on orally. These are very old language certificates and Indo-European studies owe their origin to the discovery of Sanskrit by Jones and Schlegel.

More Indo-Europeanists

In the field of language comparison, Bopp has done some fundamental work. First August Schleicher (1821–1868), professor in Prague and finally Jena, and August Friedrich Pott (1802–1887), professor in Halle, worked on the reconstruction of the Indo-European language . The Leipzig School then made significant progress .

expenditure

  • Friedrich von Schlegel: About the language and wisdom of the Indians. A contribution to the foundation of antiquity; In addition to metric translations of Indian poems. Mohr and Zimmer, Heidelberg 1808 ( Internet Archive Memento, PDF ; 341 pages, 14.9 MB); ( Digitized and full text in the German text archive )
  • Friedrich Schlegel: About the language and wisdom of the Indians. A contribution to the foundation of antiquity . With an introductory article by Sebastiano Timpanaro . Translated from the Italian by J. Peter Maher. Prepared by EFK Koerner. Benjamin, Amsterdam 1977 (Amsterdam studies in the theory and history of linguistic science, Vol. 1; Series 1, Amsterdam classics in linguistics, 1800–1925), ISBN 90-272-0872-7 , pp. xiff .: Sebastiano Timpanaro: Friedrich Schlegel and the Development of Comparative Linguistics in the 19th Century .

swell

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i Friedrich von Schlegel: About the language and wisdom of the Indians. A contribution to the foundation of antiquity; In addition to metric translations of Indian poems. Mohr and Zimmer, Heidelberg 1808 ( Internet Archive Memento, PDF ; 341 pages, 14.9 MB); ( Digitized and full text in the German text archive )

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