Hostname: page-component-7b7567c8c-fvjsw Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-11-12T09:34:44.945Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Onomatopoetics in the Indian linguistic area

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 April 2026

M. B. Emeneau
M. B. Emeneau*
Affiliation:
University of California, Berkeley
Get accessRights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In two of the language families of India, Dravidian and Indo-Aryan, there is a common pattern of onomatopoetics, in their formation and also in part in their syntactic use, with proliferation of items in most of the languages for which there is adequate information. Comparison, based on the etymological dictionaries of the two families, yields some forty areal etymologies, i.e. overlapping which provides what within a single family would be considered clusters of etyma. Since the Indo-Aryan family seems not to inherit the pattern from Indo-European, diffusion is postulated from Dravidian both for the pattern and for some etymological items.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Language , Volume 45 , Issue 2-Part1 , June 1969, pp. 274 - 299
Copyright
Copyright © 1969 Linguistic Society of America

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Annamalai, E. 1968. Onomatopoeic resistance to sound change in Dravidian. Studies in Indian linguistics: M. B. Emeneau Ṣaṣṭipūrti volume, 15-9. Poona and Annamalai- nagar.Google Scholar
Beames, John. 1872-79. A comparative grammar of the modern Aryan languages of India. London. (Reprinted, 3 vols, in one, 1966.)Google Scholar
Bloch, Jules. 1915. La formation de la langue marathe. Paris.Google Scholar
Bloch, Jules. 1925. Sanskrit et dravidien. BSL 25.1–21.Google Scholar
Bloch, Jules. 1930. Some problems of Indo-Aryan philology. BSOS 5.719–56.Google Scholar
Bloch, Jules. 1934. L’indo-aryen du veda aux temps modernes. Paris.Google Scholar
Bloomfield, Maurice. 1895. On assimilation and adaptation in congeneric classes of words. American Journal of Philology 16.409–34.Google Scholar
Brown, C. P. 1907. A Telugu-English dictionary (2d ed. revised; 1st ed. 1852). Madras.Google Scholar
Burrow, T., and Emeneau, M. B.. 1961. A Dravidian etymological dictionary. Oxford.Google Scholar
Burrow, T., and Emeneau, M. B.. 1968. A Dravidian etymological dictionary: supplement. Oxford.Google Scholar
Caldwell, Robert. 1856. A comparative grammar of the Dravidian or South-Indian family of languages (2d ed.; 3rd ed., 1913). London.Google Scholar
Chatterji, S. K. 1926. The origin and development of the Bengali language. Calcutta.Google Scholar
Dimock, Edward C. 1957. Symbolic forms in Bengali. Bulletin of the Deccan College Research Institute 18.22–9.Google Scholar
Edgerton, Franklin. 1953. Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit grammar and dictionary. New Haven.Google Scholar
Emeneau, M. B. 1944-46. Kota texts. (University of California publications in linguistics, 2-3.) Berkeley and Los Angeles.Google Scholar
Emeneau, M. B.. 1956. India as a linguistic area. Lg. 32.3–16.Google Scholar
Emeneau, M. B.. 1959. Review of Mayrhofer, fasc. 11-12. Lg. 35.323–8.Google Scholar
Hoffmann, Karl. 1952. Wiederholende Onomatopoetika im Altindischen. Indogermanische Forschungen 60.254–64.Google Scholar
Kittel, F. 1903. A grammar of the Kannada language. Mangalore.Google Scholar
Kuiper, F. B. J. 1948. Proto-Munda words in Sanskrit. Amsterdam.Google Scholar
Kuiper, F. B. J.. 1965. Consonant variation in Munda. Lingua 14.54–87.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kuiper, F. B. J.. 1967. The genesis of a linguistic area. Indo-Iranian Journal 10.81–102. Madras University. 1924-39. Tamil lexicon. Madras.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marchand, James W. 1957. The Proto-Germanic long stops. General Linguistics 2.51–69.Google Scholar
Mayrhofer, Manfred. 1956. Kurzgefasstes etymologisches Wörterbuch des Altindischen. I: A-TH, 1956; II: D-M, 1963; Lief. 18, 1964; Lief. 19, 1967 (y-várṣma). Heidelberg.Google Scholar
Pinnow, Heinz-Jürgen. 1959. Versuch einer historischen Lautlehre der Kharia-Sprache. Wiesbaden.Google Scholar
Pinnow, Heinz-Jürgen. 1966. A comparative study of the verb in the Munda languages. Studies in comparative Austroasiatic linguistics, ed. by Zide, Norman H., 96–193. The Hague.Google Scholar
Platts, John T. 1911. A dictionary of Urdū, classical Hindi, and English. London.Google Scholar
Renou, Louis. 1956. Histoire de la langue sanskrite. Lyon.Google Scholar
Sheth, Hargovind Das T. 1963. Pāia-sadda-mahaṇṇavo; a comprehensive Prakrit- Hindi dictionary. 2d ed. Varanasi.Google Scholar
Thieme, Paul. 1942. Merkwürdige indische Worte. Zeitschrift fūr Vergleichende Sprachforschung 67.183–96.Google Scholar
Turner, R. L. 1926. Middle Indian -ḍ- and -ḍḍ-. Beiträge zur Literaturwissenschaft und Geisteswissenschaft Indiens, Festgabe Hermann Jacobi, ed. by Kirfel, Willibald, pp. 34–45. Bonn.Google Scholar
Turner, R. L.. 1931. A comparative and etymological dictionary of the Nepali language. London.Google Scholar
Turner, R. L.. 1966. A comparative dictionary of the Indo-Aryan languages. London.Google Scholar
Winfield, W. W. 1928. A grammar of the Kui language. Calcutta.Google Scholar