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    Palaeography of Oris...

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Palaeography of Orissa

by: Subrata Kumar Acharya

It studies the palaeography of Orissa, especially the evolution of the regional Oriya script, by analyzing several copper-plates and stone inscriptions. An attempt to resolve the prolonged debate on the parentage of modern Oriya script, considering the importance of geo-political forces and the cultural growth of a region.

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ISBN: 9788124603062
Year Of Publication: 2005
Edition: 1st
Pages : xx, 340
Bibliographic Details : 77 B/w photographs; 49 Charts; Glossary; Bibliography
Language : English
Binding : Hardcover
Publisher: D.K. Printworld Pvt. Ltd.
Size: 29 cm.
Weight: 1425

Overview

The book studies the palaeography of Orissa from the third to the seventeenth century ad. It focuses on the evolution of the regional script of Orissa from the Bràhmã script to the advent of the modern Oriya script through various intermediate stages. Analyzing several hundreds of copper plate and stone inscriptions and with reproductions from facsimiles of many original inscriptions, the author delves into the palaeographical peculiarities of the scripts prevalent in different sub-regional/regional kingdoms of ancient and medieval Orissa. He followed the dominant stylistic nomenclatures for studying the scripts and emphasized on the importance of the geo-political forces in determining the writing style of a sub-region/region. The view that the process of `palaeographical segmentation ran parallel with linguistic segmentation’ has been successfully tested in Orissan context. The advent of the proto-regional and regional script of Orissa has been studied in the backdrop of this process. Besides, an attempt has been made to resolve the prolonged debate on the parentage of the modern Oriya script. It has been argued that political changes and ideologies of the ruling class were some of the determining factors in the growth and development of Oriya language and script. The work will be useful to scholars and students of history, culture, language and literature for understanding the growth and development of languages and scripts in interaction with the political milieu and cultural growth of a region.

Contents

Foreword
Preface
Abbreviations
Key to Transliteration
List of Photographs
List of Plates
1. Introduction
2. Imperial Brahmi Script in Orissa
3. Transitional and Later Brahmi Script in Orissa
4. Median Kalinga Script
5. Box-Headed Characters in South Koshala
6. Acute-angled Alphabet in Toshali, Utkala and Kongoda
7. Kutila Script in Toshali
8. Proto-Nagari Script in Orissa
9. Mixed Kalinga Script
10. Proto-Oriya Script
11. Early and Modern Oriya Script
12. Conclusion
Plates
I to XVII
Glossary
Bibliography
Index

Meet the Author
avatar-author
1962
Dr. Subrata Kumar Acharya (b. 1962) is a scholar of Indian epigraphy and palaeography who has published research papers in prestigious journals in India. He has authored Numerals in Orissan Inscriptions (Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Simla, 2002) and his work Symbols and Syllables: Understanding the Origin and Development of the Brahmi Numerals is shortly going to press.
Books of Subrata Kumar Acharya