Mahābhārata’s perception of Vedic religiosity: lexical evidences

Law 7th August 2007 – Call 2017 DEPARTMENT OF LITERATURE, LANGUAGES AND CULTURAL HERITAGE UNIVERSITY OF CAGLIARI INTERNATIONAL PHD PROGRAMME IN PHILOLOGICAL-LITERARY AND HISTORICALCULTURAL STUDIES IN PARTNERSHIP WITH THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH AND UNIWERSYTET JAGIELLOŃSKI W KRAKOWIE 10-12 November 2021 FONDAZIONE DI SARDEGNA via San Salvatore da Horta, 2, Cagliari (Conference Room on the Ground Floor) “JUSTIFYING CHANGES AND LEGITIMIZING INNOVATION IN INDIAN CULTURE” Rotating Indological Seminar Prague, Milan, Cracow, Warsaw, Calicut and Cagliari Partnership BOOKLET OF ABSTRACTS 1 WEDNESDAY 10 NOVEMBER 2021 h. 14.30-14.45 GREETINGS Prof. Ignazio Efisio Putzu – Pro-rector for didactics and Director of the Department of Literature, Languages and Cultural Heritage of the University of Cagliari Dr. Franco Carta – Coordinator of artistic and real estate assets, Fondazione di Sardegna Prof. Giuliano Boccali* (Milan) Introduction to the Rotating Indological Seminar CHAIR MAURO PALA h. 15.00-15.30 LIDIA SUDYKA (Cracow) Varadāmbikāpariṇaya Campū – the Tuluva dynasty in the eyes of Tirumalāmbā The Varadāmbikāpariṇaya was written by Tirumalāmbā, the poetess at the court of Acyutadevarāya, a king of Tuluva dynasty ruling Vijayanagara Empire. The life of Acyuta (r. 1529-42) was also a subject of the Acyutarāyābhudaya written by Rājanātha III Ḍiṇḍima, however here we are interested in the strategies which Tirumalāmbā adopted in order to show the greatness of Tuluvas and the place of Acyuta in this line. PAOLA MARIA ROSSI* (Milan) h. 15.30-16.00 From conquering the sun to conquering heaven: spatio-temporal cosmographies and sovereignty in the Atharvavedic collection. The term svargá, generally interpreted as derivative of svàr “sun/sunlight”, meaning “place where the sun/sunlight (svàr) goes”, hence “heaven” (Scarlata 1999: 108), is mentioned only once in the Ṛgvedic collection, namely in X.95.18d, despite the solar imagery, especially the theme of the conquered sun (svar-jít / svar-ṣā́ ) is well attested. On the contrary, in the Atharvavedic collection the term svargá is commonly quoted: given the use of the phraseology “svàr √gam”, a thematized syntagm *svar-gā́ - meaning “going to the sun/sunlight” must be assumable at the basis of the epithet “heavenly” (Spiers 2020: 550); moreover, the compound svargaloka “heavenly world” occurs (AVP XVI.117.1;5d; XVII.43.4a) also. Furthermore, in the Rigvedic collection the directions (díś / pradíś) are mostly mentioned as a generical plural, denoting merely “regions”; only relative spatial coordinates are enumerated in detail, as derivatives of puras ‘forward’, adhara ‘lower’, paśca ‘hinder’ and uttara ‘upper’. Hints to a cosmic spatial taxonomy, centred on the sun, are rare: in actual fact, only in ṚV VII.72.5ab the same terminology refers clearly to the cardinal points. In the Atharvavedic collection, in addition to such a phraseology, heavenly directions are explicitly specified: in place of puras ‘forward’, prā́ cī [díś] ‘eastern’ is used; in place of adhara ‘lower’, dákṣiṇā [díś] ‘southern’ is found; in place of paśca ‘hinder’ pratī́cī [díś] ‘western’ is adopted, and in place of uttara ‘upper’, údīcī [díś] ‘northern’ is employed (e.g. AVŚ IV.40; IX.3.25-30∼AVP XVI.41.5-10; AVŚ XVIII. 3. 30-35; XII.3.55-60∼AVP XVII.55.5-10). Finally, also dhruvā́ díś ‘nadir’ and ūrdhvā́ díś ‘zenit’ complete the list. Furthermore, such detailed spatial coordinates are clearly centered on the sun and its movement: in actual fact, also temporal coordinates are combined with the heavenly directions, in a cyclical succession of daylight and night (ahorātra), half-months, months, seasons, year (e.g. AVŚ XI.6.17-18; XV.4). Therefore, at the stage of the Middle Vedic textual repertoire (later Ṛgvedic, Atharvavedic and matric textual layer) a spatio-temporal cosmography is outlined: the vertical axis of the mounting sun crossing the horizontal axis of the spatial quarters is associable with the image of axis mundi (Bodewitz 2000). However, it is in the Atharvavedic collection that 2 such a cosmography appears to come to be drawn: the heavenly directions are remarkably outlined – two hymns are devoted to them (AVŚ III. 26; III. 27 ∼ AVP III.11; III. 24); the cosmic pillar (skambhá) is well represented in AVŚ X.7, also in relation to spatial directions and temporal coordinates (X.7.5; 35), though anticipating upaniṣadic speculations. As well known, also the sacrificial space of the śrauta ritualism is clearly heavenly directions oriented, and Prajāpati himself, the supreme deity of Brahmanical ritualism, is homologised to the year. Nonethenless, on the one hand, in the Brahmanical ritualism itself, the royal consecration (rājasūya) is characterized by ‘mounting the heavenly directions’ (digvyāsthāpana) and offerings to the quarters of space (Heesterman 1957: 103ff.; 196ff.), on the other hand in the Atharvavedic collection the quotations of the heavenly directions are insistently associated with warriorship and rulership. Moreover, in the Atharvaveda sovereignty is characterized by solar attributes (e.g. várcas, rohitá), and ascending to the heavenly world appears to pertain both to sun and king. Besides, it is worthy noticing that these Atharvavedic texts are mostly in prose (yajus-like rhythmical prose or brāhmaṇa-like prose). Therefore, although the process of the śrauta reform, culminating in the sacerdotal orthopraxy centred on the figure of Prajāpati, attributed to the Brahmanical ritualism the mapping of cosmic space and a certain idea of cyclic time, it is assumable that also kṣatriya sphere and kingship played an important role, especially taking into account that in the primordial Vedic society the clan-lord held the double function of ‘warrior-lord’ and ‘priest-lord’, as well represented by the mythical figure of Indra. In actual fact, the redefinition of the priestly role was promoted by the emergence of the new paradigm of the Kuru sovereignty, that is a supra-tribal, dynastic-like leadership. Therefore, it is reasonable that the affirmation of Brahmanical prestige and ritualistic cultural primacy must be interpreted as output of a process of Brahmanical re-orientation of Kuru cultural models, which in turn are patterned after proto-Vedic and even Indo-Iranian models. Bibliographical References Bodewitz, H.W. 2000. “Classifications and Yonder World in the Veda”, in WZKS 44 (2000), 19-59. Brereton, J.P. 2004. “Bráhman, brahmán, and sacrifice”, in A. Griffiths, J.E.M. Houben (eds.), The Vedas: Texts, Language, and Rituals. Proceedings of the Third International Vedic Workshop, Leiden 2002, Groningen, 325344. Dore, M. 2015. “The Ekavrātya, Indra and the Sun”, in T. Pontillo, C. Bignami, M. Dore, and E. Mucciarelli (eds.), The Volatile World of Sovereignty, New Delhi, 33-64. Geslani, M. 2018. Rites of the God-King. Śānti and Ritual Change in Early Hinduism, Oxford. Gonda, J. 1966. Loka. World and Heaven in the Veda, Amsterdam. Gonda, J. 1984. Prajāpati and the Year, Amsterdam-Oxford-New York. Heesterman, J.C. 1957. The Ancient Indian Royal Consecration: The Rājasūya Described According to the Yajus Texts and Annotated, ‘s-Gravenhage. Kirfel, W. 1920. Die Kosmographie der Inder, nach Quellen dargestellt, Bonn. Klaus, K. 1986. Die altindische Kosmologie. Nach den Brāhmaṇa dargestellt, Bonn. Pontillo, T. 2019. “Devayāna and Dyutāna in some supposed fragments of the so-called Proto Indo-Aryan I culture”, in P.V. Bhattathiripad, S.S. Bahulkar (eds.), Living Traditions of Vedas, New Delhi, 256-277. Proferes, T. 2007. Vedic Ideals of Sovereignty and the Poetics of Power, New Haven. Scarlata, S. 1999. Die Wurzelkomposita im R̥g-Veda, Wiesbaden. Spiers, C. 2020. Magie et poésie dans l’Inde ancienne: édition, traduction et commentaire de la Paippalādasaṁhitā de l’Atharvaveda, livre 3, Paris. Tsuchiyama, Y. 2005. “Abhiṣeka in the Vedic and post-Vedic Rituals”, in Sh. Einoo & J. Takashima (eds.), From Material to Deity. Indian Rituals of Consecration, New Delhi, 51-93. Yanchevskaya, N., M. Witzel 2017. “Time and Space in Ancient India: Pre-philosophical Period”, in S. Wuppuluri, G. Ghirardi (eds.), Space, Time and the Limits of Human Understanding, Cham 23-41. Witzel, M. 1995. “Early Sanskritization. Origins and Development of the Kuru State”, EJVS 1 (4) (1995), 1-26. 3 DUCCIO LELLI (Pistoia) h. 16.00-16.30 A poet at the assembly: Some remarks on a feature of Rudra in the Atharvaveda The god Rudra occupies a minor position in the Ṛgvedic pantheon: only three hymns of the Ṛgveda are dedicated solely to him, and though he is often celebrated together with other gods and frequently mentioned as the father of the Maruts, on the whole he plays a very circumscribed role. In the post-Ṛgvedic Saṃhitās, however, Rudra’s presence increases significantly: his features expand, while his sphere of influence and his domain broaden, whereby the god, having undergone substantial changes, ultimately assumes a higher position. The Śatarudrīya litany of the Yajurveda and the Atharvaveda represent two milestones in this process, since the figure of Rudra emerges from these texts ready to assume the position and responsibilities he will have in later Hinduism. The aim of this contribution is to investigate one of the numerous “new” qualifications that Rudra acquires, namely his connection with the assembly (sabhā́ -) and verbal contests, especially as it appears in both recensions of the Atharvaveda. The analysis will start from the discussion of the hymns AVŚ 2.27 ~ AVP 2.16, where Rudra is invoked, together with Indra, in a rite for overcoming a rival in a dispute held before the assembly, and of some stanzas from AVP 20, where Rudra, in his function of an ally in a quarrel, is addressed as sabhāprapādin- ‘the one who goes to the assembly’. As I shall try to demonstrate, this quality that becomes far more prominent in the later texts can be traced back to the Ṛgveda itself, where there are few but clear references to Rudra as a poet who knows ritual and poetic speech. This often overlooked aspect of Rudra, besides being important for the correct evaluation of the god’s relationship with Indra — a relationship that recent studies confirm to be very close —, could also shed some light on the prehistory of the god and help explain his function as a tutelary deity of the ancient Indian sodalities that developed from the Indo-European Männerbund. h. 16.30-17.00 BREAK (Hotel Regina Margherita, viale Regina Margherita, 44, Cagliari) 4 CHAIR CINZIA PIERUCCINI h. 17.00-17.30 EDELTRAUD HARZER* (Austin) Removal of Memory of the Vrātyas This study examines certain pivotal case of removal of memory and also what has been argued as a semantic shift in lexicon, though that is somewhat nebulous. In the development of the Vedic sacrifice, the Vedic students played an important role. A 150 of them were to “play” with 150 vibhītaka nuts, in preparation. There was no opponent and there was no competition. The purpose of this activity was to get a selection of the one who ended up last, he will be the butcher and the precise carver of the sacrificial animal. After the task will be over, he’d be considered a “dog.” This process is considered as the basis of several games in later times. Other similar processes were formed during the further development of the Vrātyahood. These had other concerns especially observed in the period of gradual settlement of the semi-nomadic “family” groups. There the head of the household would go on “expeditions” to procure supplies for the family group, which included accidental visitors, serfs, and cattle. These expeditions were framed by ritual sessions, before and after. This head of household might be officiating at the ritual and going with the troops on the expeditions absolutely inactive. In a forthcoming paper, I had addressed the various titles/names for the headman: sthapati, gṛhapati, veśman, jyeṣṭha, and argued against a direct transition of gṛhapati into gṛhastha, though there may be a tenuous connection. The first four names mentioned here vanished in the subsequent texts of the pre-classical and classical texts, whether there was or still is activity of this sort on the ground is not certain. 17.30-18.15 CHIARA NERI* (Cagliari), TIZIANA PONTILLO (Cagliari) The ascetic whom the gods worship: conservative heterodoxy in the Vrātyakāṇḍa and in the Suttapiṭakas The common interpretations of the vrātya phenomenon as an Aryan, non-brāhmaṇic historical reality often devote just a brief mention to the XV book of the Śaunakīya Atharvaveda-Saṃhitā (ŚS), i.e. to the well-known Vrātyakāṇḍa. It is in fact an exception among the sources on Vrātyas, as it is the only source in which the Vrātya figure receives a mystic extolment rather than the more common contempt of the other works and it is envisioned as a single ascetic (the so-called ekavrātya), while elsewhere the matching plural Vrātyas clearly denotes a brotherhood. We consider that such a unique perspective on the Vrātyas still deserves a specific inquiry, aimed at singling out the plausibly comparable Indo5 Aryan sources, which might help us in understanding the present aporias. We will focus on three practical features, namely the immobility target (ŚS XV 3 1), the attention paid to breathing (ŚS XV 15-17), and the lonely way of the asceticism (ŚS XV 1 3; 6) of the ekavrātya, which seem to be hardly comparable with those of the other Vedic ascetics (see e.g. Zysk 1993; Bronkhorst 2007; Zysk 2007; Dore 2016), and viceversa easily comparable with significant aspects of the heterodox asceticism. In particular, we will respectively compare in the Suttapiṭakas the ideal of solitary researcher (Sn vv. 3575, A V 46), the ascetic practices described in the Buddha life (e.g. M I 163-167, M I 242-245), and, although in a much more sophisticated form, some meditative techniques starting with the meditative support (kasiṇa; see e.g. A V 47-48, A V 60, M II 14) and the practice of mindfulness of breathing (ānāpāna-sati; e.g. M 78-87, S V 314-328, etc.). We will concentrate on the pre-eminence of this type of ideal ascetic even with respect to the gods and especially on the gradual conquest of several lokas depending on successive degrees of asceticism achievement. This mechanism is frequently used in Buddhist literature describing meditative absorption (jhāna) technique (e.g. A II 128, D I 215-223). This could even offer an interpretative key to some otherwise incomprehensible passages of the Vrātyakāṇḍa, such as ŚS XV 13.1-5, provided that we assume that the ekavrātya, as a guest, plays the role of teacher for his host (be he a king – ŚS XV 10.1 – or not – XV 11.1) and makes him even able to tread the devayānas paths (ŚS XV 11.3; 12.5; 9). Moreover, this ascetic figure possesses a special status, which surprisingly and unlike an orthodox vision, is superior to that of the gods themselves by whom he is honoured (cf. ŚS XV 1; XV 5; XV 14 with A I 325; S I 136). In our hypothesis, such a specific way of achieving a more than divine status through an ascetic way of life, which we sometimes find later depicted as an alternative to the ritualistic option, for example in the Upaniṣads, often connected with an esoteric knowledge (Horsch 1966: 405-410), might be traced back to a common archetypal culture, secondarily respectively tuned to the different philosophical and religious contexts. Bibliographical References Bronkhorst J. 2007. Greater Magadha: Studies in the culture of Early India, Leiden 2007 Dore, M. 2016. “The Path Towards Indra’s Realm”, in T. Pontillo, M. Dore, and H. Hock (eds.), Vrātya culture in Vedic sources: select papers from the Panel on “Vrātya Culture in Vedic Sources” at the 16th world Sanskrit Conference (28 June - 2 July 2015) Bangkok, Thailand, New Delhi, 177-195 Horsch, P. 1966. Die vedische Gāthā- und Śloka-Literatur, Bern. Zysk, K.G. 1993. “The Science of Respiration and the Doctrine of the Bodily Winds in Ancient India”, Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 113, No. 2, 198-213. Zysk, K.G. 2007. “The bodily winds in ancient India revisited”, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute (N.S.), 105-115. 6 18.15-18.45 DILETTA FALQUI (Rome) Mahābhārata’s perception of Vedic religiosity: lexical evidences Throughout a half-century of inquiries regarding religious studies of the Mahābhārata (henceforth MBh), the more general framework of the crucial fields of research mainly favoured by scholars regards pro and cons of the acknowledged references to Vedic sources in the MBh in terms of a continuum (Fitzgerald 1985; Feller 1999, Sutton 2000) and the supposed adherence to ritual technical literature, discussed according to narrative structure and literary point of view (Brockington 1998, Feller 2004; Witzel 2005, Reich 2010; Feller 2014) and debated according to theories of ritual performance analysis, which rely on cultural background (Minkowski 1989, Reich 2001, Thite 2014, Pontillo-Bignami-Dore-Mucciarelli 2015), the consequences of which are therefore detectable in the MBh, given its reliability as a historical source. However, to the best of my knowledge, the specific question regarding the perspective of MBh religiosity in terms of continuity with the Vedas perceived as a revealed text, still needs deep dedicated research work. In this sense, from the point of view of philological and lexical approaches targeted at understanding contextual involvements regarding religious semantics Hara (1979), Sutton (2000) and Vassilkov (2014) establish an invaluable starting-point. In this paper, I will present some MBh instances of use of the lexicon relating to Vedic ritual in order to a) attempt to contribute to a wider understanding of a synchronic evaluation of the ritual adherence of the MBh textual context, i.e. how the Vedas themselves are perceived and which motifs, beyond the liturgy, prompt sacrificial acts that differ so from traditional ritual; b) take into account further reconsiderations of the matter of an unorthodox religiosity in MBh kṣatriyabased contexts and to understand an emerging pattern of depictions of an unorthodox faith triggering a divergence in MBh religiosity from the Vedic religious framework. Bibliographic References Brockington, J. (1998) The Sanskrit Epics, Leiden-Boston-Köln, Brill. Feller, D. (1999) ‘The theft of the soma’, In M. Brockington, P. Schreiner (eds.) Composing a Tradition: Concepts, Techniques and Relationships, Proceedings of the First Dubrovnik International Conference on the Sanskrit Epics and Purāṇas (August 1997), (199-225), Zagreb, Croatian Academy of Sciences and the Arts. Feller, D. (2004) The Sanskrit Epics Representation of Vedic Myths, Delhi, Motilal Banarsidass. Feller, D. (2014) ‘The epic hero: between brahmin and warrior’, Indologica Taurinensia 40, 97-112. Fitzgerald, J. L. (1985) ‘India’s Fifth Veda: the Mahābhārata’s Presentation of Itself’, Journal of South Asian Literature, 20 (1), 125-40. Hara, M. (1979) Koten Indo no kugyō [tapas in the Mahābhārata], Tokyo, Shunjūsha. Minkowski, C. Z. (1989) ‘Janamejaya’s Sattra and Ritual Structure’, Journal of the American Oriental Society, 109 (3), 401-420. Pontillo, T. (et ali.) (eds.) (2015) The Volatile World of Sovereignty. The Vrātya Problem and Kingship in South Asia, New Delhi, D.K. Printworld. Reich, T. (2001) ‘Sacrificial Violence and Textual Battles: Inner Textual Interpretation in the Sanskrit Mahābhārata’, History of Religions, 41 (2), 142-69. Reich (2010) ‘The Interruption of the Sacrifice and the Verbal Contest: Three Different Epic Interpretations of a Pair of Vedic Motifs’, In D. Shulman (ed.) Language, Ritual and Poetics in Ancient India and Iran, (136-157), Jerusalem, The Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities. Sutton, N. (2000) Religious Doctrines in the Mahābhārata, Delhi, Motilal Banarsidass Publishers. 7 Thite, G. U. (2014) ‘Vedic Ritual, Rāmāyaṇa and Mahābhārata’, Vedic Studies, 6, 417-426. Vassilkov, Y. (2014) ‘The Indian Hero in Heaven and on Earth: on the meaning of the word devaputra’ Indologica Taurinensia, 40, 433-457. Witzel, M. (2005) ‘The Vedas and the Epics: Some Comparative Notes on Persons, Lineages, Geography, and Grammar’, In P. Koskikallio (ed.) Epics, Khilas, and Pūraṇas: Continuities and Rupture, Proceedings of the Third Dubrovnik International Conference on the Sanskrit Epics and Pūraṇas (September 2002), (21-80), Zagreb, Croatian Academy of Sciences and the Arts. 18.45-19.15 CHIARA POLICARDI (Milan) Variations on the Elephantine Theme: Jyeṣṭhā- Vināyakī, from Independent Goddess to Gaṇeśa’s Female Form An Indian female deity characterised by an elephant face is usually identified with Gaṇeśa’s female form. She is known as Vināyakī, Gaṇeśanī, Gaṇeśvarī, Gajānanā and with numerous other epithets. However, very early on, this little-studied elephant-faced figure appears as an independent, albeit minor, divinity in her own right. The earliest known textual occurrence of an elephant-faced goddess is found in a Vedic ancillary text, the Baudhāyanagṛhyaśesạsūtra (III, 9). This text prescribes that, during the ritual of veneration, the deity, called Jyeṣṭhā, is to be praised with several epithets, including hastimukhā, ‘elephant-faced’, vighnapārṣadā and vighnapārṣadī, which refer to her divine action over obstacles. As is known, in subsequent phases of Hinduism, the goddess Jyeṣṭhā or Alakṣmī traditionally represents misfortune and disease; she is sometimes described as riding a donkey. On the figurative level, the earliest representations of an elephant-faced goddess date from the first centuries BCE-CE and come from Rairh (Rajasthan) and Mathura. In the attempt to disentangle the intricate connections between Jyeṣṭhā-Alakṣmī and Vināyakī, a key element is represented by the ass vāhana. In Indian culture, the donkey is connected to impurity, unpredictability, chaos, and excess: it presumably symbolises the goddess’s power over vighnas, or obstacles, a function she shared with the male deity Vināyaka. In the early phase it was an ambivalent power, capable of both creating and destroying or removing the adversities: at the risk of somewhat simplifying the complexity at stake, we could hypothesise that the goddess’s elephant face expressed the positive function of averting evil, while the donkey vāhana evoked the obstacles, which were, however, brought under control by her. Subsequently, presumably from the early Gupta era onwards, the benign role of dispelling adversities and thus promoting success and prosperity became par excellence the sphere of influence of Vināyaka/Gaṇeśa, while Jyeṣṭhā was merely considered as the goddess of inauspiciousness. The paper attempts to trace the religious-historical development of this elephant-faced female deity. Originally independent, she underwent several shifts, as attested by purāṇic literature: from being one of the numerous Mothers of the Kuśāṇa period she was then associated to the aṣṭamātṛs in 8 some post-Gupta occurrences, and eventually came to be considered as the female form of Gaṇeśa with the rise in popularity of the latter god. But it is in the tantric domain that, apparently, her originally ambivalent nature reemerges, specifically in the context of the yoginī cult. An elephantine yoginī occurs, under various names, in both Vidyāpīṭha (7th-8th century) and Kaula (post-10th century) scriptures, and an elephant-faced female sculpture is enshrined in different yoginī temples and sculptural collections of yoginīs. In several cases, this yoginī’s iconography has no apparent connection with Gaṇeśa’s features, and in one case she is accompanied by a donkey mount. Adducing illustrative rather than exhaustive evidence, the paper reflects on the dynamics that led to the interpretation of this goddess as the female form of Gaṇeśa. The idea is that mapping and piecing together some of the diachronic and diatopic variants of this elephant-faced figure may contribute to a more nuanced understanding of the historical process whereby indigenous female divine figures are reinterpreted as female counterparts of Brāhmaṇical male gods. The layered belief system that characterizes the tantric yoginī cult might be an eloquent mirror of this process, insofar as it incorporates local or indigenous figures, retaining elements of non-Brāhmaṇical traditions. 9 THURSDAY 11 NOVEMBER 2021 CHAIR MONIKA NOWAKOWSKA h. 8.30-9.00 MARIA PIERA CANDOTTI* (Pisa) The reception of a heterogeneous model within the system: the fourfold division of words The success of Pāṇinian grammar has condemned the evidence of earlier and contemporary grammatical systems to oblivion, but it is still possible to recognise traces of them, particularly through the analysis of technical terminology and its vicissitudes. In fact, the role of these alternative systems in the development of Pāṇinian grammar itself is still partly to be reconstructed but potentially fruitful as potentially demonstrated by Radicchi (1988) in the identification of the non-Pāṇinian concept of pradhāna. In this contribution we will focus on the fourfold division of words, of non-pāṇinian origin, evoked by Patañjali (III BCE) and which organizes them into the classes of guṇaśabda “quality words”, jātiśabda “class words", kriyāśabda “action words” and yadṛcchāśabda “chance words”. Some research on this fourfold classification has been done recently (see Tanizawa 1989 and 2000; Candotti 2006; Aussant 2009), but often focusing on a specific element of the classification (in particular that of the yadṛcchāśabda) and without questioning the relation of the classification as a whole to the Pāṇinian system as such. In particular, we will try to clearly identify the points of differentiation from the Pāninian model and at the same time to reconstruct the process of adaptation to the system operated by Bhartṛhari in his Dīpikā (V CE). Bibliographic References Aussant, É. 2009. Le nom propre en Inde: Considérations sur le mécanisme référentiel. Lyon: ENS Éditions Candotti, M.P.. 2006. Interprétations du discours métalinguistique. La fortune du sūtra A 1.1.68 chez Patañjali et Bhartṛhari. Firenze: Firenze University Press. Radicchi, A. 1988. La teoria Pāṇiniana dei Samāsasecondo l’interpretazione delle scuole grammaticali indiane dal quintoall’ottavo secolo d.C., Firenze. Tanizawa, J.1987."Yadṛcchāśabda and saṃjñā—from the Point of View of Proper Names”. Journal of Indian and Buddhist and Buddhist Studies (Indogaku Bukkyōgaku Kenkyū-Tōkyō) 37: 1008-1003 Tanizawa, J.2000. “Pāṇinian Theory of Proper Names and Frege’s Puzzle”. Studies In Humanities (Jinbun-kagaku ronshū) 33:21-35. 10 h. 9.00-9.30 VALENTINA FERRERO (Cagliari) Are there occurrences of sarvanāmans + áka̲C already in pre-Pāṇinian sources? A first analysis The aphorism A 5.3.70 introduces the taddhita affix ká. In the section beginning here and extending as far as A 5.3.96, ká is introduced after a nominal stem to denote the senses listed in this section; for example, aśva- + -ká signifies “a horse whose ownership is ‘not known’ (ajñāta)” (A 5.3.73), uṣṭra- + -ká in the meaning of “a ‘bad’ (kutsita) camel” (A 5.3.74), or putra- + -ká that is intended as “a son who has received ‘affection’ (anukampā)” (A 5.3.76), and so on. But as is well-known, pronouns and pronominal declension always differ in respect to the other nominal stems. In fact, the sūtra A 5.3.70 is immediately followed by an apavāda rule introducing sarvanāmans. The following rule A 5.3.71 avyayasarvanāmnām akac prāk ṭeḥ states that “the taddhita affix áka̲C is introduced before the syllable beginning with the last vowel of nominal stems consisting of indeclinables and pronominal stems”. For instance, sarva- + -áka̲C- = sarv- + -ák- + -a = sarváka and so viśváka and the others sarvanāmans. But the question is: why are pronouns so important here? That is, why did Pāṇini dedicate more than twenty rules to the áka̲C-question? The research begins with the analysis of the different occurrences of sarvanāmans + áka̲C in pre-Pāṇinian sources. The first example reads thus evā te mūtraṃ mucyatāṃ bahir bāl iti sarvakam (Atharvaveda 1.3.6); these and the following three verses are translated by William Dwight Whitney as follows: “so be thy urine released, out of thee, with a splash! All of it”. The next step is then to understand which sūtra allows Pāṇini to succeed in explaining this meaning of -áka̲C-; and the only possible solution is to refer to rule A 5.3.77 nītau ca tadyuktāt that signifies “[the taddhita affixes ká and áka̲C occur after a nominal stem or a pronominal stem provided their denotatum is associated with ‘compassion’ (anukampā)] and derivates denote ‘an act of relief’ (nīti) associated with that”. Therefore, the aim is to verify whether the author of the Aṣṭhādhyāyī describes all the previous examples or if viceversa all the examples of the previous sources can be explained by using the grammar. On the basis of such linguistic research, it will be possible to contribute to better understand which language Pāṇini analysed in order to compose his grammar: was it the one of the sacred scriptures (the Vedas) or did he also draw from other sources? The indications for this come from the word bhāṣāyām ‘in the domain of the (current) spoken language’. And another question is the following: after having analysed sarvanāmans + áka̲C, can this practice be considered as legitimized in order to create a conservative feature or is it possible to find other innovative trends? The research will then move to the examples that can be found in sources subsequent to the author of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Bibliographic References Böthlingk, O., 1887 Pâṇini’s Grammatik, heraugegeben, übersetzt, erläutert und mit verschiedenen Indices versehen, Verlag von H. Haessel, Leipzig. Jamison, S.W., Brereton, J.P., 2014, The Rigveda. The Earliest Religious Poetry of India, 3 Voll., Oxford University Press, Oxford. Joshi, S.D., Roodbergen, J.A.F, 1991-2011, The Aṣṭādhyāyī of Pāṇini, with translation and explanatory notes, 14 Voll., Sahitya Akademi, New Delhi. Katre, S.M., 2015 (I ed. 1989), Aṣṭādhyāyī of Pāṇini, Motilal Banarsidass Publishers, Delhi. 11 Rama Nath Sharma, 1999-2002 (I ed. 1987), The Aṣṭādhyāyī of Pāṇini, 6 Voll., Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers, New Delhi. Vasu, S.C., 1891-1898, The Ashṭádhyáyí of Páṇini. Translated into English, 8 Voll., Indian Press, Allahabad. Whitney, W.D., 1905, Atharva-Veda Saṁhitā. Translated with a Critical and Exegetical Commentary. 2 Voll., Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachussetts. h. 9.30-10.00 ANITA M. BORGHERO (Naples) Fulfilling the venerable prescriptions: some stratagems from the Mahābhāṣya Although general perception leads us to think about a monolithic grammatical tradition enshrined in the Mahābhāṣya, many discrepancies can be found by comparing the approaches of Kātyāyana and Patañjali with respect to the interpretations and descriptions taught by the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Over the centuries many scholars have focused on the correct placement in time and space of the three ancient grammarians (see among others, the resume given by Scharfe in 1977), thus explaining their different conception of the Sanskrit language. The Great Comment is in fact characterized by long pages of rejections, refutations and philosophic soliloquies: intriguing weaknesses can be detected therein, especially as far as its latest level is concerned, the one written by Patañjali himself. Indeed, despite his best efforts to ensure that the ‘sacrality’ of the principles handed down by the bhagavān ācāryaḥ remained untouched, there are cases of manifest uneasiness in finding solid arguments to support Pāṇini’s linguistic framework. Now, how can one avoid interpreting this attitude as a reactionary attempt to prevent cultural deviances, even concerning rules that are somewhat difficult to understand? The aim of the present paper is to consider some passages of the Mahābhāṣya in which we find a clear uncertainty in interpreting several pāṇinian sutras devoted to the formation of dvandva compounds, especially: a) M ad A 2.4.8 kṣudrajantavaḥ, “a dvandva denoting small creatures is inflected in the singular number” – with respect to the exact denotatum of kṣudrajantava. b) M ad A 2.4.10 śūdrāṇām aniravasitānām, “a dvandva is inflected in the singular number when it is made of constituents denoting śudras who are not expelled” – with respect to the identification of this particular subgroup of śudras. As such, these examples will be discussed in order to try to show how and why, even in grammatical literature, the search for everlasting immutability can become a tempting ambition. Bibliographic references [A] [M] Scharfe 1977 The Aṣṭādhyāyī of Pāṇini. Ed., tr. By R. N. Sharma, 6 Vols. New Delhi, Munshiram Manoharlal, 1987–2003. The Vyākarana-Mahābhāṣya of Patañjali. Ed. by Franz Kielhorn, 3 Vol. Osnabrück, Zeller 1970 [Bombay 1880–1885]. Scharfe, Hartmut. Grammatical Literature: Vol. 5, A History of Indian Literature. Edited by Jan Gonda. Wiesbaden, Germany: Otto Harrassowitz 12 h. 10.00-10.30 MITTAL TRIVEDI (Cagliari) Creating the body of the word: understanding the aṅga in the prakriyā of the Siddhāntakaumudī and the Prakriyākaumudī An essential component of the domain of nominal or verbal derivation is an understanding of the construction of the base, known as the aṅga, which provides the foundation for the development of the intended word form. The concept of aṅga was isolated as an important component of prakriyā as early in the development of prakriyā texts as Vyāḍi and his Paribhāṣāvṛtti which provides a peek into the significance of this device in grammar. By placing the aṅga saṃjñā (SK 199| A 1.4.13) in the nominal section of the Vaiyākaraṇasiddhāntakaumudī, Bhaṭṭoji Dīkṣita presents a derivational complication that defines the prakriyā grammars, creating a practical vacuum for applicability to other parts of the Siddhāntakaumudī. As observed in the Navya Vyākaraṇa tradition, this necessitates the use of the Paribhāṣā asiddhaṃ bahiraṅgam antaraṅge which has historically been common knowledge among grammarians (Wujastyk 1993: 144) but which did not receive much mention by Dīkṣita himself. The vṛtti of this rule provides examples from both nominal and verbal sections while the term aṅga itself has not been referred to in the instances in which it has been explained, hinting at a structural and/or conceptual deficiency in the grammar of Bhaṭṭoji Dīkṣita. When compared to the definition provided by Rāmacandraśeṣa in the Prakriyākaumudī, Dīkṣita’s language is more complicated despite its claims to the simplification of Pāṇinian grammar. Additionally, the Prakriyākaumudī’s Viṭṭhala commentary presents a shorter, less complicated reasoning of the sūtra compared to the Tattvabodhinī, offering a more straightforward comprehension of the rule. I propose to expand on these observations and explore the expression of the aṅga and its processes as provided by Dīkṣita and Rāmacandraśeṣa and the manner in which it contributed to a distortion of the Pāṇinian system through its apparent disregard for the centrality of this device in the process of derivation. h. 10.30-11.00 DAVIDE MOCCI* (Pavia), TIZIANA PONTILLO (Cagliari) The loneliness of the third person verbal triplets Commentators do not continue (1) in Aṣṭādhyāyī 1.4.108 (śeṣe prathamaḥ) by anuvṛtti from 1.4.105 (yuṣmady upapade samānādhikaraṇe sthāniny api madhyamaḥ). Accordingly, they interpret 1.4.108 as in (2). (1) upapade samānādhikaraṇe sthāniny api. (2) “the third person verbal triplets are introduced (after a verbal base) in the residual case (śeṣa)” (i.e., when neither yuṣmad- ‘you’ nor asmad- ‘us’ is involved)—see Cardona 1997:151. Crucially, (2) admits the possibility that third person verbal triplets co-occur and are samānādhikaraṇa with nothing whatsoever—not even with a silent third person pronoun. When instead (1) continues in 1.4.108, this rule is interpreted as in (3): (3) “the third person verbal triplets are introduced (after a verbal base) when they co-occur and are samānādhikaraṇa (lit. ‘having the same substratum’) with the residual (śeṣa)” (i.e., with the third person 13 pronoun), even when this residual is a placeholder (sthānin)—see Joshi and Bhate’s 1984:271 conventions 20-21. In this study we show that both Aṣṭādhyāyī-internal and linguistic considerations support (3), hence, the continuation of (1) in 1.4.108. First, he* cannot be coreferential with him (imam) in (4) (see Chomsky’s 1981:188 Principle B). If the -ti of paśyati did not co-occur and were not samānādhikaraṇa with a (silent) pronoun, this fact would be hard even to state, let alone to explain. (4) imam paśyati. “He* sees him”. Second, the continuation of (1) in 1.4.108 excises a problem tackled by Kātyāyana. He claims that a prohibition of the third person verbal ending is mandatory when yuṣmad-/asmad- are coordinated with another pronoun/noun, as in (5). (5) tvaṃ ca devadattaś ca pacathaḥ. “you and Devadatta are cooking”. Yet, no special prohibition is needed if (1) continues in 1.4.108: the use of the third person verbal ending in (5) is already excluded by the fact that this ending is not samānādhikaraṇa with tvaṃ ca devadattaś ca. Third, consider the following reasoning. The purpose of mentioning sthānini in 1.4.105 and (by anuvṛtti) 1.4.107 is to license such alternations involving yuṣmad-/asmad- as (6)-(7): (6a) tvam gacchasi; (6b) Ø gacchasi. (7a) aham gacchāmi; (7b) Ø gacchāmi. However, sthānini is too broad for this purpose: (6)-(7) can also be licensed by a specific replacement, i.e., the lopa (zero-replacement) of tvam/aham. Thus, the mention of lopini/lope in 1.4.105-107 would suffice to license (6)-(7). Third person pronouns, instead, can also be replaced by a noun, as in (8), and this typology of replacement is only covered by the general term sthānin: only if 1.4.108 mentions sthānini (which is the case when (1) continues in 1.4.108) can 1.4.108 license the alternation in (8). (8a) sa gacchati; (8b) gaur gacchati. Consequently, the mention of sthānini in 1.4.105-107 results as being fully justified only when 1.4.105-107 is considered in combination with 1.4.108: sthānini is there because (1) has to continue in 1.4.108. A close inspection of linguistic data and of the wording of 1.4.105-108 reveals that (1) does continue in 1.4.108, contrary to the traditional interpretation of 1.4.108. Bibliographic References Chomsky, N. 1981. Lectures on Government and Binding. Dordrecht. Cardona, G. 1997. Pāṇini. His Work and Its Tradition. Background and Introduction. Delhi. Joshi, S.D. and S. Bhate 1984. The Fundamentals of Anuvṛtti. PCASS, B, n° 9. Pune. h. 11.00-11.30 BREAK (Hotel Regina Margherita, viale Regina Margherita, 44, Cagliari) 14 CHAIR GAUTAM CHAKRABARTY h. 11.30-12.00 MADHULIKA CHEBROL (Oxford) Legitimising the Eternality of Dhārmic Cultural Norms – From Manusmṛti to Manubhāṣya The ancient and popular Hindu lawbook, Manusmṛti [circa. 2nd century C.E (Olivelle 2005: 24 -25)], while being in some sense an ideological text, inadvertently provides clues into fluctuating customs and norms of behaviour through a comparison with the commentarial tradition written centuries later, which systematically reinterpret the original text to emphasise continuity. This paper studies the efforts made by the better-known commentator Medhātithi [Manubhāṣya (820–1050 CE, c.f. Kane 1962 Volume I, Chronological Table)] writing on the Manusmṛti, accommodating changes in culture while attempting to keep intact the original texts’ authority; even where the original diktat differs acutely from contemporary culture in his time. Medhātithi appears to find a logical work-around using semantics and other hermeneutical techniques to read more into the Manusmṛti and explain how contemporary practices are not contradictory to the Veda or the original Manusmṛti [Kane 1962 Volume V, 1269; Lariviere 2004: 612]. His commentary is a sustained apologist effort in maintaining the authority of the Manusmṛti while, at the same time, arguing that no change has occurred, suggesting a homogeneity in cultural norms instead of the debate-oriented popular culture evidenced in his own work [vide. Medhātithi on Manusmṛti IX.112]. While this may/may not have affected contemporary culture, it has had great affect in future generation’s understanding of cultural norms by standardising and eulogising a past that very evidently was adjusted by Medhātithi. In his role as offering an explanatory commentary of the text, which were frequently utilised to ascertain the true meaning of texts [C.f. Clooney 1990:23-25, Olivelle 2005: 353-354, 356-382], Medhātithi ultimately upholds a homogeneity in Hindu culture which may not have existed. h. 12.00-12.30 SUDIPTA MUNSI* (Cagliari) Killing ritually and beyond The problem of killing in general and Vedic ritual killing in particular has been highly debated in ancient India. The main stakeholders in this debate are the Sāṃkhya-Yoga philosophers on one hand, who hold that the virtue following from Vedic ritual killing is adulterated by some amount of demerit; on the other hand, it is the Mīmāṃsā philosophers, who while generally agreeing to the genesis of malefic result from such Vedic bewitchment rituals as the Śyena sacrifice and trying to justify Vedic ritual killings like the Agnīṣomīya animal sacrifice, differ significantly about the method of doing so. In this presentation, an attempt will be made to show the changing face of such defense of Vedic ritualkilling as found in the works of the Mīmāṃsā philosophers, Śabarasvāmin, Kumārilabhaṭṭa and 15 Prabhākaramiśra. I will also refer to the points made in this regard by the Advaita Vedānta philosopher, Appayya Dīkṣita, in his Parimala commentary, the Viśiṣṭādvaita philosopher, Rāmānuja, in his Śrībhāṣya and also the grammarian-philosopher, Kauṇḍabhaṭṭa, in his Bṛhadvaiyākaraṇabhūṣaṇa and try to show how the staunch rational defense of Vedic ritual killing originally attempted by the Mīmāṃsā philosophers has slowly been made secondary to, if not totally replaced by, an external defense based on citation of Vedic, Smṛti and Purāṇa texts. As part of this, I will further show how the original rational defense of intra-ritual animal killing (as in the Jyotiṣṭoma sacrifice) attempted by Mīmāṃsā has often been replaced later by similar external scriptural authority-based legitimisation finding expression in the form of eulogy, etc. of the sacrificed animal, the sacrificer, etc. h. 12.30-13.00 MONIKA NOWAKOWSKA (Warsaw) A matchless match – a case of an exchange on a shared ground Around 6-7th CE, Kumārila-bhaṭṭa, a representative of the exegetical tradition of Mīmāṃsā, in his Tantravārttika, an extensive commentary on the first three adhyāyas of the Mīmāṃsā-sūtras of Jaimini (ca. 4th-2nd BCE?) and the Bhāṣya thereon of Śabara (ca. 5th CE), discussed an important matter – from the perspective of Vedic exegesis – of the classification of various layers of the Vedas. Mīmāṃsā specialists, beside injunctions, distinguished in the Vedas exhortative portions (arthavādas), ritual formulas (mantras), and names of rituals (nāmadheyas). A discussion around the last category gave rise to a short analysis of the cognitive and hermeneutical function of similarity (sādṛśya), in the course of which Kumārila supplied an, allegedly, Rāmāyaṇa quotation rāma-rāvaṇayor yuddham… Some century later, the same quote appears in the discussion on similarity (or, in this case, incomparability, ananvaya), as a literary trope, in Vāmana’s Kāvyālaṃkāra. Earlier alaṃkāra theoreticians had not use the example, even though they had their opinion on the use of ananvaya, while later Mīmāṃsā authors would replace the Rāmāyaṇa illustration with other examples, only a couple centuries later intercepting the technical term ananvaya itself. In this paper, I summarize the results of research on the history and usages of both the Rāmāyaṇa quote and ananvaya, pointing out some moments of the exchange of ideas between the Mīmāṃsā and alaṃkāra traditions, while emphasising their respective contexts and needs for such appropriations. QUICK LUNCH (Hotel Regina Margherita, viale Regina Margherita, 44, Cagliari) 16 CHAIR LIDIA SUDYKA VALERIA MELIS (Venice/Cagliari) h. 14.30-15.00 Revising the myth in the light of historical changes: the case of Zeus ‘tyrant’ in Aristophanes’ Plutus It is well-known that, in Plutus, Aristophanes re-elaborates some myths in an original way: he makes up the story of the blinding of Plutus by Zeus by revising the legends on the end of the Golden Age and taking distance from both the traditional accounts on the Gods’ envy of humans and the version offered by Aeschylus in lines 750-762 of the Agamemnon (see Torchio 2001: 125 fnn. 87-92 e 87). Moreover, it has been shown (Pattoni 2018) that the figure of Zeus as a tyrant is one of the elements that Aristophanes elaborated according to a system of allusions with the intent to parody the Aeschylean Prometheus Bound. It is noteworthy that, in Plutus, Aristophanes’ portrayal of Zeus, depicted as a true tyrant and as a guarantor for an unjust order (Corsini 1986: 182), is remarkably different from any of the writer’s previous representations of the God. Even in Birds, where the protagonist carries out a coup d’état against Zeus, the God (despite the fear that he arouses in Prometheus) does not seem to be more of a “tyrant” than usual, that is as tradition would have it, and in Nu. 563-564, the only Aristophanean place to our knowledge where Zeus is defined τύραννος (‘tyrant’), the semantic value of the term is ‘lord’ (of the Gods). In the light of some selected literary and historical sources, the tyrannical traits Aristophanes assigns to Zeus on the basis of Prometheus Bound seem to go beyond any parodical intent or criticism of the traditional religion: from the coup d’état in the 411 B.C.E. onwards, Aristophanes, who quite often made fun of his fellow citizens for their nagging phobia of tyranny, was probably forced to change his mind. Bibliographic References Barkhuizen, Jan H. (1981), The Plutus of Aristophanes, in «Acta Classica», XXIV, pp. 17-22. Blaydes, Frederick Henry Marvell (1886), Aristophanis Plutus. Annotatione critica, commentario exegetico et scholiis Graecis, Halis Saxonum in Orphanotrophei libraria. Catenacci, Carmine (1996), Il tiranno e l’eroe. Per un’archeologia del potere nella Grecia antica, Mondadori, Milano. Catenacci, Carmine (2012), Il tiranno e l’eroe. Storia e mito nella Grecia antica, Carocci, Roma. Corsini, Eugenio (1986), La polemica contro la religione di Stato in Aristofane, in Id. (a c. di) La polis e il suo teatro, vol. 1, Editoriale Programma, Padova. Cozzo, Andrea (1988), Kerdos. Semantica, ideologie e società nella Grecia antica, Edizioni dell’Ateneo, Roma. David, Ephraim (1984), Aristophanes and Athenian Society of the Early Fourth Century B.C., Mnemosyne Suppl., LXXXI, Brill, Leiden. Flashar, Hellmut (1996), The Originality of Aristophanes’ Last Plays, in Erich Segal (a c. di), tr. ingl., a c. di W. Moscalew, Oxford Readings in Aristophanes, Oxford-New York, Oxford University Press, 1996, pp. 314-328 [= Zur Eigenart des aristophanischen Spätwerks, in «Poetica», I, 1967, pp. 154-175]. Giorgini, Giovanni (1993), La città e il tiranno. Il concetto di tirannide nella Grecia del VII-IV secolo a.C., Giuffrè, Milano. Heberlein, Friedrich (1980), Pluthygieia. Zur Gegenwelt bei Aristophanes, Haag und Herchen, Frankfurt. Holzinger, Karl (1940), Kritisch-exegetischer Kommentar zu Aristophanes’ Plutos, Holder-Pichler-Tempsky, WienLeipzig. Köckert, Heidelore (1976), Aristophanes und die Religion. Zum Verhältnis von Komik und Religion in der aristophanischen Komödie, Diss. Karl Marx Universität, Leipzig. Konstan, David (1995), Greek Comedy and Ideology, New York – Oxford, Oxford University Press. Lanza, Diego (1977), Il tiranno e il suo pubblico, Einaudi, Torino. 17 Lévy, Edmond (1997), Richesse et pauvreté dans le Ploutos, in «Ktèma», XXII, pp. 201-212. MacDowell, Douglas M. (1995), Aristophanes and Athens. An Introduction to the Plays, Oxford, Oxford University Press. McGlew, James (1997), After Irony. Aristophanes’ Wealth and its Modern Interpreters, «American Journal of Philology», CXVIII, pp. 35-53. Mureddu, Patrizia; Nieddu, Gian Franco (2000), Furfanterie sofistiche: omonimia e falsi ragionamenti tra Aristofane e Platone, Bologna, Pàtron Editore. Natalicchio, Antonio (1997), «Μὴ μνησικακεῖν»: l’amnistia, in Salvatore Settis (a c. di), I Greci. Storia, cultura, arte, società, II, 2, Una storia greca. Definizione, Giulio Einaudi Editore, Torino, pp. 1305-1322. Newiger, Hans-Joachim (1957), Metapher und Allegorie. Studien zu Aristophanes, Beck, Munich. Olson, S. Douglas (1990), Economics and Ideology in Aristophanes’ Wealth, «Harvard Studies in Classical Philology», XCIII, pp. 223-242. Paduano, Guido (1988), Aristofane. Pluto, Rizzoli, Milano. Pascal, Carlo (1911), Dioniso. Saggio sulla religione e sulla parodia religiosa in Aristofane, Francesco Battiato Editore, Catania. Pattoni, Maria Pia (2018), Zeus tiranno e Prometeo maestro delle arti: sviluppi tragici e distorsioni parodiche dal Prometeo incatenato al Pluto di Aristofane, in «Dioniso», n.s., VIII, pp. 89-120. Rogers, Benjamin Bickley (1907), The Plutus of Aristophanes, Bell, London 1907. Schareika, Helmut (1978), Der Realismus der aristophanischen Komödie. Exemplarische Analysen zur Funktion des Komischen in den Werken des Aristophanes, Lang, Frankfurt am Main - Bern - Las Vegas. Sommerstein, Alan H. (1996), Aristophanes and the Demon of Poverty, in Erich Segal (a c. di), tr. ingl., a c. di W. Moscalew, Oxford Readings in Aristophanes, Oxford-New York, Oxford University Press, 1996, pp. 252-281 [= Aristophanes and the Demon of Poverty, in «Classical Quarterly», XXXIV, 1984, pp. 314-333]. Torchio, Maria Cristina (2001), Aristofane. Pluto, Edizioni dell’Orso, Torino. h. 15.00-15.30 CINZIA PIERUCCINI (Milan) Variations in Immutability. Gardens in Classical Sanskrit Theatre As it is well known, Sanskrit kāvya feeds on predetermined situations and motifs, and establishing who first fully introduced each of these topoi is usually almost impossible, not least due to the gaps in the tradition; but it is very fruitful to follow some developments, highlighting the will of single authors to introduce variations in established patterns. The gardens, and especially the gardens of royal palaces, play an extraordinarily prominent role in classical Sanskrit theatre, particularly in court plays revolving around love stories. As places that can offer relative isolation, here gardens appear to be considered as the appropriate settings to stage the manifestations of the most intimate feelings and the most secret meetings in such a way that they remain hidden from other characters, but above all, if necessary, so that the protagonists’ feelings may be accidentally disclosed to the appropriate persons. Therefore, the location of the scenic event in a garden is a fundamental expedient that poets adopt to promote the development of the plot; in addition, it allows them to embellish the composition through polished stanzas, uttered by the characters, on the beauty of nature. My paper is based on an analysis of the following plays: Svapnavāsavadatta ascribed to Bhāsa; Mālavikāgnimitra, Vikramorvaśīya, and Abhijñānaśākuntala by Kālidāsa; Priyadarśikā and Ratnāvalī by Harṣa; and Mālatīmādhava by Bhavabhūti. I will try to outline how in these works, adopting garden settings, the authors express a continuous tension between a tradition that seems already solidly established and the desire for innovation. 18 h. 15.30-16.00 CHETTIARTHODI RAJENDRAN* (Calicut) Confronting the Iconoclast: Abhinavagupta’s strategies to counter Bhaṭṭanāyaka Bhaṭṭanāyaka, in the words of Sheldon Pollock (Pollock, 2000) brought about a ‘Copernican revolution’ in Indian aesthetics. He caused severe dents in traditional aesthetics by bringing to the fore its inadequacies to explain intersubjectivity in aesthetic experience. He appears to have criticised early aestheticians like Bhaṭṭalollaṭa, Śankuka, and Ᾱnandavardhana whose theories could not explain how the spectator/reader could experience an emotion existing in a character removed from him spatially and temporally. He proposed a novel scheme for aesthetic experience postulating ‘additional’ powers to poetic language by virtue of which the facts conveyed by poetry transcend their spacio/temporal limitations and become ‘universalised’, so that the distinction separating the character and the reader/spectator become blurred and the emotion becomes capable of being relished by the latter. Incorporating some of the key concepts of mīmāmsā and sāmkhya systems, he gives shape to an aesthetic s which projects aesthetic experience as akin to spiritual experience. Although all these remarkable postulates are novel breakthroughs, Abhinavagupta counters the iconoclastic tendencies of Bhaṭṭanāyaka by demonstrating, not always very convincingly, that all these concerns could be addressed within the theoretical framework of the dhvani theory of Ᾱnandavardhana himself. Abhinavagupta is not ready to admit that the concerns raised by Bhaṭṭanāyaka are genuine and the solutions offered by him novel. The present paper aims at looking at the whole discourse of Abhinavagupta more closely and examine his strategies of reinterpretation and reworking of Ᾱnandavardhana’s theory of dhvani to counter the attacks of Bhaṭṭanāyaka. What could be of pivotal interest would be the question if Abhinavagupta’s reinterpretation involves any compromising of facts related to the history of ideas in Indian aesthetics. h. 16.00-16.30 MARTA KARCZ (Cagliari) Modern Sanskrit Dramas – between Tradition and Innovation The aim of the paper is to explore the dramatic output of modern Sanskrit writers in order to determine which traditional rules of Sanskrit drama have been obeyed by them, which have been refused, and what kind of innovations they introduced in their work. Although Sanskrit from many ages is no longer used as an everyday language, its literature, among which there is a significant number of dramas, is still being produced. However, although contemporary Sanskrit writers are aware of the dramatic rules set by Bharata in the Nāṭyaśāstra and his continuators, they are also under the influence of Western culture and its own dramatic tradition, as well as they are influenced by relatively new visual arts such as movies and television. What is more, some recent writers have been more willing to raise more up-to-date subjects, such as social changes, political issues, or the impact of technology on the contemporary world, rather than conventional themes. Therefore, they have introduced changes in the genres, the structure of drama, and even the lexicon, which they used. On the other 19 hand, they still have legitimized the place of their works in the realm of Sanskrit drama, by obeying certain traditional rules. Hence, the paper intends to examine what innovations are introduced in modern Sanskrit dramas, and what classical elements still can be traced in them. In order to explore this issue, several modern Sanskrit dramas are to be analysed. The first author, whose work is to be examined, is Dr. V. Raghavan (1908–1979), who is one of the most important Sanskrit scholars of the 20th century. He contributed to Sanskrit literature not only as a scholar but also as a poet. He wrote various dramas, in which he showed his expertise in the language, the knowledge of Sanskrit poetics, and numerous other subjects, like history, and music. Likewise, some dramas from the annual publication Samarpaṇam are to be taken into consideration. It is created by the students of Dr. G.B. Palsule and its purpose is to commemorate him. The volume is published every year on the 28th of November (death anniversary of Dr. G. B. Palsule) in one thousand copies. Each year numerous authors, mostly from Maharashtra, contribute their works in Sanskrit to the publication. Among prevailing poems, and short stories, in Samarpaṇam can be found also dramas. Most works included in these publications are characterized by relatively simple language and form, numerous neologisms as well as concentrating very often on everyday matters. Therefore, they make a significant contrast to the dramatic output of Dr. V. Raghavan. h. 16.30-17.00 BREAK (Hotel Regina Margherita, viale Regina Margherita, 44, Cagliari) 20 CHAIR PIOTR BOREK DAVID PIERDOMINICI LEÃO (Cracow) h. 17.00-17.30 Recreating a lost time in a far space: dynastic continuity and resistance in the Teṅkāśī courtly narrative (16th-17th century CE) After the collapse of the imperial line of Madurai, the Pāṇḍya dynasty ceased to play a fundamental role in the political scenario of Tamil Nadu. In the 14th century, the Muslim invasion of the South guided by Malīk Kafūr, general of the Sultan of Delhi ‘Alā’ ud-dīn Khaljī (1267-1316), deeply destabilised the precarious politics of the southern branches of the Indian sub-continent. Having irremediably lost the capital Madurai after an internecine war, the Pāṇḍyas drew back in the deep regions of the Tamil land. Around the last decades of the 14th century, a family of rulers claiming direct descent from the Madurai Pāṇḍyas organised a centre of power around the Tirunelveli area. The dynastic connection between this obscure family and the principal line of Madurai still remains uncertain. Nevertheless, the new Pāṇḍya dynasty of Teṅkāśī (c. 14th-18th century) undoubtedly represented a surprising—yet decaying—ruling continuum after the havoc of the 14th century CE. The paper is devoted to the study of the strategies of continuity and legitimisation employed by the new narrative of the Teṅkāśī court in the 16th-17th century, exemplified by the Pāṇḍyakulodayamahākāvya, a poem authored by Maṇḍalakavi, and later royal genealogies as those presented in the official copper plates. The focus on this little studied evidence will enlighten the possible catalysts of change and modalities through which the Teṅkāśī Pāṇḍyas projected claims of legitimisation as heirs of the lost Madurai imperial line. The ideological reaction to the historical change will be exemplified through the analysis of the Teṅkāśī political control over its own narrative, struggling to create both dynastic continuity and independent identity, fighting for recognition against the predominant and hegemonic culture of the Vijayanagara empire (1336-1565). h. 17.30-18.15 Michal PANASIUK (Warsaw) Changing the world of mangalkāvya: Sanskritisation and Innovation at the court of Nadiya in XVIII century The XVII century Bengal was a perilous time, full of instability and insecurity. Not only the shift in power happened, between the Mughals, their regional representatives and the East India Company, but also some disastrous events like the Maratha raids, famines and outbreaks of diseases like malaria, cholera and smallpox. The 1757 Battle of Plassey and the triumph of British Troops started 200 years of British rule in India. Within this time of turmoil one of the greatest works of Middle Bengali literature was written, Annadāmaṅgala or In Praise of Annada by Bhāratacandra Rāy, a court poet of the King Krishnacandra of Nadiya. This work was designed to impress and invite others to participate in Sanskritic court culture of the patron and as such was few decades later, in a new center of power and culture, Kolkata, literary critics found this work to be very problematic to judge. Not only was it the first Bengali work printed in press but also probably the most reproduced during the XIX century. For many of them the author’s incorporation of meters and rhetorical 21 devices from Sanskrit were regarded as outfashioned, for many his experiments with the language and innovations within the framework of Hindu tradition were applauded as modern. In my paper I try to identify the innovations done by Bhāratcandra within the literary tradition of the genre called ‘mańgala’ and show it in a more broad cultural context of the XvIII and XIX century brahmanical culture in Bengal. h. 18.00-18.30 MORENA DERIU (Cagliari) Pederast to whom? Conservative and innovative trends concerning pederasty in Ps. Lucian’s Amores Among the works attributed to Lucian, the Amores describe a “contest” (Am. 5) between the Athenian Callicratidas and the Corinthian Charicles to decide which eros was the more desirable (19-49): the desire for women, in Charicles’ opinion (19-28), or the desire for boys, according to Callicratidas (30-49). The quarrel was sparked off by the viewing of the statue of Aphrodite at Cnidus and is framed by a dialogue between Theomnestus and Lycinus. In fact, Lycinus, who narrates the story of the contest to his friend (Theomnestus) and had been in Cnidus with Charicles and Callicratidas, declared Callicratidas (and pederastic desire) winner of the contest (51). Nowadays, scholars generally agree about the fact that many of the literary techniques employed in the Amores are entirely unique to Lucian, even if it is not certain that the work can indeed be credited to this author. In fact, the dialogue was regarded as inauthentic for most of the 20th century and not studied by many scholars until the 1980s, when the publication of Michel Foucault’s third volume of his Histoire de la sexualité (1984) renewed scholarly attention. Indeed, Foucault (1984: 409-43) deals with the dialogue to show how it treats the place of aphodisia, “physical pleasure,” in eros. Moreover, he focuses on similar debates such as Plutarch’s Dialogue on Love and Book 2 of Achilles Tatius’ Leucippe and Clitophon to argue that all these works exhibit a “deproblematization” of pederasty. In particular, according to Foucault (1984: 423-4), the Amores prove the late antique change in the perception and representation of eros since they bear witness to the diffusion of a new attitude towards pederasty which, though not totally condemned, lost part of its credit in imperial philosophy. By contrast, marital affection was emerging as a subject worthy of serious discussion in philosophy. But was this attitude toward pederasty actually so new? According to Hubbard (2009: 249), “Foucault was clearly wrong to suppose that this development was uniquely Roman in origin or date.” Indeed, the scholar shows how the Amores’ physis-nomos antithesis in representing the desire for women and boys can be traced to the 5th-4th centuries BCE at least. Moreover, in his opinion, the dialogue partly deconstructs such antithesis since Callicratidas associates women to culture and boys to nature. However, such antithesis is not the sole tool aimed at marginalising pederastic desire in the Amores. The aim of my presentation will be to illustrate, firstly, all the tools Charicles adopted to ostracise pederasty in the Amores. I will then study such tools in the light of Lucian’s picture of pederasty, and, finally, I will look at the hypotexts to eventually recognise the existence of a much broader continuum as regards the marginalisation of pederasty than the one acknowledged by Hubbard. Indeed, Lucian’s works can be 22 considered as a promising source for contextualising sexual values in the Greek imperial era (Jope 2009) and can help to illustrate whether and how the tools adopted by Charicles to marginalise pederasty are “innovative” or, rather, “conservative.” Bibliographic References Bady G. 2005. “Le Socrate de Platon: pédéraste ou pédagogue?” In Les jeux et les ruses de l’ambiguïté volontaire dans les textes grecs et latins. Actes de la Table Ronde organisée à la Faculté des Lettres de l'Université Lumière-Lyon 2 (23-24 novembre 2000), 131-46. Lyon. Bloch, R. 1907. De Pseudo-Luciani Amoribus. Strasbourg. Bottenberg, L. 2020. “Pseudo-Lucian’s Cnidian Aphrodite: A statue of flesh, stone, and words.” Millennium 17.1: 11538. Buffière, F. 1980. Eros adolescent: la pédérastie dans la Grèce antique. Paris. Cavallini, E. 1991. Luciano. Questioni d’amore. Introduzione di Enzo Degani. Venezia. Dover, K.J. 1989. Greek Homosexuality. 1st ed. 1978. Cambridge, MA. Fleury, P. 2007. “Eroticos: Un dialogue (amoureux) entre Platon et la Seconde Sophistique?” REG 120.2: 776-87. Foucault, M. 1984. Histoire de la sexualité. Le souci de soi. Vol. 3. Paris. Furiani, P.L. 1987. “Omofilia e androcrazia nella società maschile di Stratone di Sardi.” Euphrosyne n.s. 15: 217-26. Goldhill, S. 1995. Foucault’s virginity. Ancient erotic fiction and the history of sexuality. Cambridge. Gruber, H.W. 2010. “Enduring stereotypes: Rhetorical education and the ‘problem’ of marriage.” Journal of late antiquity 3.2: 286-99. Halperin, D.M. 1992. “Historicizing the sexual body: Sexual preferences and erotic identities in the Pseudo-Lucianic Erôtes.” In Discourses of sexuality: From Aristotle to AIDS, ed. by. D.C. Stanton, 236-61. Ann Arbor. Halperin, D.M. 1994. “Historicizing the subject of desire: Sexual preferences and erotic identities in the Pseudo-Lucianic Erôtes.” In Foucault and the writing of history, ed. by J.E. Goldstein, 19-34. Oxford. Halperin, D.M. 2002. “Forgetting Foucault: Acts, identities, and the history of sexuality.” In The sleep of reason. Erotic experience and sexual ethics in Ancient Greece and Rome, edited by M.C. Nussbaum, J. Sihvola, 21-54. ChicagoLondon. Haynes, M. 2013. “Framing a view of the unviewable: Architecture, Aphrodite, and erotic looking in the Lucianic Erôtes.” Helios 40.1-2: 71-95. Hubbard, T.K. 2000. “Pederasty and democracy: The marginalization of a social practice.” In Greek love reconsidered, edited by T.K. Hubbard, 1-11. New York. Hubbard, T.K. 2009. “The paradox of ‘natural’ heterosexuality with ‘unnatural’ women.” CW 102.3: 249-58. Hubbard, T.K. 2013. “The irreducibility of myth: Plato’s Phaedrus, Apollo, Admetus, and the problem of pederastic hierarchy.” Phoenix 67.1/2: 81-106. Jope, J. 2009. “Lucian’s triumphant cinaedus and rogue lovers.” Helios 36.1: 55-65. Jope, J. 2011. “Interpretation and authenticity of the Lucianic Erotes.” Helios 38.1: 103-20. Klabunde, M.R. 2001. Boys or women? The rhetoric of sexual preference in Achilles Tatius, Plutarch, and Pseudo-Lucian. PhD dissertation. University of Cincinnati. Lear, A. 2014. “Was pederasty problematized? A diachronic view.” In Sex in Antiquity. Exploring Gender and Sexuality in the Ancient World, edited by M. Masterson, N. Sorkin Rabinowitz, and J. Robson. London-New York: 115-36. Maksimczuk, J.P. 2014. “Menipo y Sócrates en Diálogos de los muertos 6: pederastia en el Hades.” Argos 37: 141-59. Mossman, J. 2007. “Heracles, Prometheus, and the play of genres in [Lucian]’s Amores.” In Severan culture, ed. by S. Swain, S. Harrison, and J. Elsner, 146-59. Cambridge. Nieddu, G.F. 2012. “Pausania: un sofista ‘sociologo’ nel Simposio di Platone.” In Harmonia. Scritti di filologia classica in onore di Angelo Casanova, a cura di G. Bastianini, W. Lapini, M. Tulli, vol. 2, 651-68. Firenze. Percy, W.A. 1996. Pederasty and pedagogy in Archaic Greece. Urbana-Chicago. Skinner, M.B. 2014. Sexuality in Greek and Roman culture. 1st ed. 2005. Chichester. Yates, V. 2005. “Anterastai: Competition in eros and politics in classical Athens.” Arethusa 38: 33-47. 18.30 PARTNERSHIP MEETING h. 20.00 SOCIAL DINNER (Ristorante Su Cumbidu, via Napoli, 13, Cagliari) 23 FRIDAY 12 NOVEMBER 2021 CHAIR MICHAL PANASIUK K.K. GEETHAKUMARY* (Calicut) h. 8.30-9.00 Purakkali and Maruttukali: An Art form for Popularizing Sanskrit Purakkali is a folk artform performed by the non-brahmin community of north Kerala in connection with the Puram festival, celebrated in Kerala from very ancient times. This festival is during the month of April, which the time when the flora and fauna attain a festive mood due to the changes in season. The god of love cupid kindles desire of Kama during this season and Puram festival is celebrated to worship the God of Love. There are numerous myths connected with the Puram festival which are all accepted from the ancient Sanskrit puranas of Indian culture stating the story of lord Siva burning Kama. The Purakkali is a celebration involving the number of rites and rituals among which the most important one is Purakkali. During early period, women sang in groups in order to worship Kama, but later by the due course of time it gradually changed into Purakkali which is performed in sacred groups, also the practice of group singing by women is still continued in their home. Purakkali is divided into Puramala and Vankali, the former is the basic type performed in all sacred groves whereas the latter is always performed only in large Kavus (Groves of Devi temples). Puramal is of short duration and consists mainly the praises of God. The stories narrated in Purakkali chants should always be the stories of Kama, Siva and Visnu described in the puranas. Maruttukali is the oral combat form of Purakkali in which performers from two sacred groves meet and test their mettle. The word Marutt means combat. It is not only the performance that is tested but the literature and rituals are also tested. Arguments and counter arguments will follow on literature. It is an exciting event like the roman gladiator contestants use their scholarly erudition to defeat their opponents by asking questions and giving answering, thus radiating a knowledgeable atmosphere where audience also gets a grasp of this knowledge. In all these stages the introductory verses are in Sanskrit and the debate is based on Sanskrit verse. Scholarly Panikkar recites the verses without any error and interprets it in proper order. The verse is kept secret so that they have an edge over the opponent. The emergence of Sanskrit could be attributed to social and cultural transformation that took place in that took place in Kerala by 17th and 18th Century. In 18th Century Non. Brahmins got an opportunity to learn Sanskrit from the ancestral homes of Brahmin in the time bound manner, Purakkali Panikkar made use of this opportunity and Sanskrit came to be dominating in Maruttukali. Most he subjects being dealt in Maruttukali are pertaining to the Sanskrit language. Hence, greater sources of Sanskrit are found in Maruttukali. Since the spoken form of Sanskrit is losing ground in 24 India, particularly in North Kerala, a folk art form like Maruttukali plays a Pivotal role in regaining the prestige of Sanskrit. The specialty of this scholarly art form is that the performers of Maruttukali do not belong to the higher strata of society. They are the class both Socially, economically and culturally backward. Through Maruttukali is imported a message to maintain equality above all differences and it make comprehend on our life can reach ultimate end with spiritual awakening. PIOTR BOREK (Cracow) h. 9.00-9.30 Anxiety and legitimisation of media transition in the late 19th century. Three printing ventures of Bhushan’s Brajbhasha book of poetics (1673) Without a deeper study in print history, a considerably late development of the shift from manuscript to printed book in South Asia could be interpreted through the categories of technological and cultural backwardness. Several studies on the native print enterprises in India justify such late transition with the persistence of manuscript culture, or high costs of printed books competing with well-established networks of scribes. However, what requires an in-depth analysis is the uneven development of this process that varies not only regionally, but also in terms of language of the printed book or, for instance, social milieu of the agents. Throughout my presentation I am to show that even the history of a single text can prove the dynamics and complexity of this process. I base my arguments on a Brajbhasha book of poetics which has been put to print for the first time as late as 1888, thus much later than many Sanskrit or vernacular devotional oeuvres, and which saw three totally disparate printing enterprises within the next two decades. Moreover, some evidence suggests that it has not immediately displaced the manuscript culture which struggled to survive or tried to compete as what we may call a fourth trajectory of dissemination. MARTIN HRIBEK* (Prague) h. 9.30-10.00 Benoy Kumar Sarkar’s Hindu Sociology: Legitimising strategies for the state and the nation From early nineteenth century until Independence, Calcutta was a major centre of social and political innovation. Narratives of the past, critiques of the present, and debates on possible futures proliferated on the pages of vernacular press, often mixing freely religion with science and politics. The Bengali sociologist Benoy Kumar Sarkar belonged to the generation of Indian intelligentsia who sought to dismantle the British Empire by engaging with their counterparts in interwar Germany. Since this rather massive engagement, epitomised on a grand scale by Subhash Chandra Basu, became somewhat controversial after the WWII, it has been only recently more widely recognised. Benoy Kumar Sarkar proposed a vision of India which was fiercely modernist yet, at the same time, deeply embedded in a tradition reinvented to that 25 modernist end. This paper is going to explore the legitimation strategies he employed for new resurgent India in relation to her past as well as some European resonances of his thoughts. h. 10.00-10.30 ZUZANA ŠPICOVÁ* (Prague) Christians, Converts and Courtesans: Independent Women of Śaratcandra Caṭṭopādhyāẏ’s Works One of the most beloved Bengali authors, Śaratcandra Caṭṭopādhyāẏ, is especially well known for his kind and empathetic approach towards his heroines. In his works, many types of female characters can be found: from innocent virgins, devoted Hindu wives and widows to adulteresses, courtesans and even revolutionaries. Completely independent women who can go wherever they want and talk to men as equals are represented by courtesans (especially Candramukhī in Debdās and Rājlakṣmī in Śrīkānta), by Christians, mostly in his later works (Mary Bhāratī Joseph in Pather dābī and Kamal in Śeṣ praśna), and partially by (daughters of) converts to Brāhmoism (such as Acalā in Gr̥hadāha). While the Brāhmo women are often shown to be trapped between wanting to be independent and being expected to follow the ideal of Hindu womanhood nevertheless, courtesans and Christians – even though they may be occasionally compared to chaste Hindu women by other characters – experience a great deal of freedom in Śaratcandra’s work. The way these three types of women are portrayed is crucial: Śaratcandra’s implied author typically first uses focalisation through a male character who presents an unflattering opinion of them (a Brāhmo woman will be dry, arrogant and fickle, a Christian an immoral anglicised traitress, and a courtesan a scheming seductress), views which can very well be in accordance with the prevalent views of the expected/implied readership. Later on, the heroine in question is introduced in person and the male character’s (focaliser’s) former inimical opinions change to respect and love. Furthermore, the implied author lets these heroines fearlessly discuss issues of great importance with other characters and uses various narratorial resources to support the heroines’ positions. In this paper, Śaratcandra’s skilful use of focalisation in introducing courtesans, converts and Christians in selected novels will be analysed in order to show how the implied author leads his readers to change their opinions about these three. TATIANA DUBYANSKAYA* (Moscow) h. 10.30-11.00 “Made in heaven”: spiritual union in Premchand’s early novels. Hindi novels of the 1880s-1910s highlight romantic or matrimonial union as an important, even pivotal part of each story: indeed, in formula-based novels, a wedding and/or a reunification of a couple are typically shown as the ultimate celebration of personal or social harmony. Successful and prolific Hindi writers, such as Devakinandan Khatri, Kishorilal Goswami, Gopalram Gahmari, typically employed, in their novels, a time-tested formula, which can schematically be described as: departure from some initial harmonious state followed by a journey through chaos, towards the restoration of harmony. Premchand, known in India as 26 “the emperor of novels” (upanyās-samraṭ), in his early prose did not introduce any significant changes to the time-tested “minimal schema of the plot” (Todorov): his Pratijnā (1908), Vardān (1912), and even Sevāsadan (1918), on deep structural level, remain quite similar to Khatri’s stories. However, the content, themes, social context of his texts show an entirely different approach to literature, as compared to his predecessors and other contemporary writers. The presentation will argue that Premchand’s personal beliefs regarding the spiritual significance of marriage not only influenced his family life, but helped to shape up his novel-writing skills. In his early texts, the idea of a matrimonial union was reinvented, to become a powerful tool of social and moral changes. h. 11.00-11.30 BREAK (Hotel Regina Margherita, viale Regina Margherita, 44, Cagliari) 27 CHAIR FIORENZO IULIANO GAUTAM CHAKRABARTY (Berlin) h. 11.30-12.00 ‘Tin Kanyā’ in Ur-Bollywood: Three Baghdadi-Jewish Actresses Negotiating a Hindu-Muslim Binary The commercial Hindi/Hindustani film-industry, based in Bombay, famous throughout the world as Bollywood, is – whatever one may feel about its often overblown artistic and thematic aspects – easily the foremost vehicle of cultural expression in the Indian Subcontinent; it is also one of the most important platforms of legitimisation of societal-cultural innovation. From showcasing causes of societal reform – e.g., inter-caste romantic relationships in films like Acchut Kanyā („An Untouchable’s Daughter“, 1936) – to advancing those of socialist transformation of society and the economy in the realist films of the 1970s, Bollywood has been at the forefront of post/colonial India’s quest for r/evolutionary innovation. The issue of Hindu-Muslim relations has been central to this social transformation agenda that has characterised Bollywood since its humble beginnings. It is, therefore, important and interesting to highlight other intersectional identities that negotiated the fault-lines of Hindu-Muslim encounters in Indian cultural life. This paper seeks to look at three Baghdadi Jewish actresses, from Bollywood’s early days – Ruby Myers („Sulochana“, 1907-83), Esther Victoria Abraham („Pramila“, 1916-2006) and Florence Ezekiel („Nadira“, 1932-2006) – who gave the Indian film-industry its first leading ladies and vamps. The Hindu and Muslim stage-names they took served to make them more acceptable to the wider Indian audience, but also pointed towards crucial questions regarding privacy, anonymity, „fields of belonging“ (Olwig 2003) and the „social self“ (Matthews 2010). It seeks to theorise what one might call a „maverick cosmopolitan“ (Chakrabarti 2021) artistic self-fashioning, as negotiating substantial ethno-religious tensions and pressures – through a global microhistorical study of three Indian Jewish actresses seeking to establish themselves in a male-dominated domain that was largely defined by Hindu-Muslim binaristic competition. [Tin Kanyā (“Three Daughters”, in Bangla) is the title of a tripartite episodic film by Satyajit Ray in 1961; the standalone individual short films are based upon three well-received short stories – written from a protoFeminist perspective – by Rabindranath Tagore.] Bibliographic References Chakrabarti, G.. “Hei-Ren-Hei-Hu: Be/Longing and E/Migration in the Work of a Chinese Dissident.” Migrating Minds: Theories and Practices of Cultural Cosmopolitanism, ed. Didier Coste, Christina Kkona and Nicoletta Pireddu. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, 2021. Matthews, S.. “Anonymity and the Social Self.” American Philosophical Quarterly, vol. 47, no. 4, [North American Philosophical Publications, University of Illinois Press], 2010, pp. 351–63. Olwig, K. F. “Global Places and Place-Identities – Lessons from Carribean Research.” Globalisation: Studies in Anthropology, edited by Thomas Hylland Eriksen, Pluto Press, 2003, pp. 58–77. 28 ARIADNA MATYSZKIEWICZ* (Cracow) h. 12.00-12.30 Sanskrit tricks in the Jain grand narrative: itihāsa and mahākāvya devices in Jinasena’s Ādipurāṇa Jinasena’s Ādipurāṇa is a voluminous work from the 9th century CE, which along with its second part Uttarapurāṇa, written by Jinasena’s pupil Guṇabhadra in late 9th century CE, represents the Jain universal history genre built upon life stories of 63 illustrious men (śalākāpuruṣas). Untypically for this genre of Jain texts, the work is written entirely in Sanskrit, the language of both Jinasena’s prior Brahmanical background and the Rāṣṭrakūṭa court at which he served under the protection of king Amoghavarṣa I. Apart from the language, Jinasena’s work employs a broad spectre of literary devices that can be traced back to Sanskrit itihāsa and mahākāvya works, which may be collectively characterized as grand narratives, or in other words, narratives that imprint large explanatory and normative schemes by appealing to a sense of grandeur. The study aims to identify and describe several literary devices of the Ādipurāṇa, including themes, plot construction, figures of speech, and style, which turn this work into the grand narrative in the same way as they did with Sanskrit itihāsas and mahākāvyas. Another objective is to capture the uniqueness of the identified literary devices, which firstly synthesize the itihāsa and mahākāvya traditions and secondly transform them in accordance with the distinctive aesthetics designed by the Digambara Jain author for the work illustrating the principles of his faith. J. E. Cort, ‘An Overview of the Jaina Puranas’, in W. Doniger (ed.), Purana Perennis: Reciprocity and Transformation in Hindu and Jaina Texts, Albany, State University of New York Press, 1993, p. 192. TAMARA DITRICH (Sydney/Ljubljana) h. 12.30-13.00 Paradigmatic similarities between the Aṣṭādhyāyī and the Abhidhamma: an example of pratyaya / paccaya This research paper will firstly compare the overall structure and architecture of two ancient Indian seminal texts, i.e., the Aṣṭādhyāyī of Pāṇini and the Theravāda Abhidhamma corpus, by exploring paradigmatic similarities between them, and proposing that Pāṇini’s structural analysis and generative model for language may have influenced the overall conceptualisation of the Abhidhamma cognitive model. It will outline some of the main structural features, the tools of analysis and underlying premises of the Aṣṭādhyāyī which can also be discerned in the structure and workings of the Abhidhamma (i.e., its analysis and generation of various types of cognitive states). The analysis of both the Sanskrit language (in the Aṣṭādhyāyī) and that of cognition (in the Abhidhamma) are products of ancient Indian methods of scholastic analysis, presentation and discussion; hence, Pāṇini’s analysis of language (and more generally, the ancient Indian vyākaraṇa tradition itself within which it sits) in all likelihood largely informed and influenced non-Brāhmaṇical Indian traditions, such as Buddhism, especially in the development of cognitive models that are closely related to language. The proposal here is that similarly to language (which is viewed as a complex dynamic structure 29 of basic elements, presented over several levels and generated through a number of fundamental elements according to constraints of various rules), cognition itself is also presented as a complex structure involving basic units (dhamma) that combine in numerous ways and generate mental states. The paper will then outline some examples of the parallels between the two traditions, such as the use of samartha in Pāṇini’s grammar and the criteria for combining various mental components (cetasika) in the Abhidhamma, or the role of the grammatical zero in the Aṣṭādhyāyī and the inclusion of the absence of some mental constituents in the scheme of cetasikas. Finally, the paper will explore one of the key terms in the Aṣṭādhyāyī, namely, pratyaya, which has the central role in the processes of word derivation (involving as it does a wide range of suffixes (pratyaya) added to the bases under different conditions), and identify the similarities with the role of paccaya in the Abhidhamma, especially in the Pāḷi text, entitled Paṭṭhāna, which presents the dynamics of generating cognitive processes in the light of dependent origination (paṭiccasamuppāda) through twenty-four conditions or modes (paccaya), governing the interrelated dhammas. 13:00 – 13:15 FAREWELL WISHES Legenda: * = PARTICIPANT ON-LINE 30