Texts in Transcription with Translation and Notes

The language of the extant Indus texts is at the typically isolating stage, where every two or three syllables make a clause. Very rarely, there are phrases or lexical words, showing the transition of the language to the next stage.

These clauses have generally their shadows in the form of the wornout and mutilated vocables of the early Vedic language, but sometimes these shadows too are lost in the dim light.

There are some instances to show that the Vedic language had reached the climax, and started to slope down towards the next round of the isolating stage, when the hymns began to be composed.

Though the Vedic language is of great help in identifying the Indus clauses, it is believed, the modern rustic dialects of India, from north to south, may not be less helpful. The Indus language dwells in the rustic Indian dialects, in the kitchens of the countryside.

ta na Sa / 2659 , 2374 , 1365 , 4464.
From the womb (of a woman) gems come out.

This is a clause of the isolating stage of the Indus language in four graphic forms. Its phrase stage, gems coming out from the womb of a woman, with the same body of the text, can be easily imagined. The phrase tanaSa was phonemically reduced to the lexeme tánas at the inflexional stage. It is attested by a single occurrence of the RV (4,70,5), where it means ‘an offspring’. The gem produced from the womb of a woman is naturally the offspring, and the transfer of meaning is quite imaginable and justified.

From this tánas the root tan (to expand) was deduced, because a child is responsible for the expansion of the family. This root has been very reproductive in Sanskrit, because it was extended to tan-o and gave birth to a small group of tan-class roots; its -no- was attached to some roots, and gave birth to the su-class of roots; the imaginary -nA- of *tan-A was attached to some other roots, and gave birth to the krI-class of roots; and its -na- itself was infixed to certain roots ending with consonants (ru-na-dh from rudh, e.g.), and gave birth to the rudh-class in the present system.

At the inflexional stage of Indus itself, tánas had suffered further reduction due to the loss of a at the second syllable, and *tan s changed into tars (to have desire for a child) due to a peculiar phonetic tendency of n changing into r in certain phonetic conditions (P.4,1,7).

Perhaps shortly after this phonetic change, the Indus community partly moved towards West Asia on their way to Europe, carrying tan as well as tars. Just after this event, the people in the land of the Soma plants started composing hymns in praise of Soma, which forms the earliest part of the RV.

The meaning attached to tars was ‘to be thirsty’, because the desire for a child is a kind of thirst. This ‘thirst’ had also affected the Germanic people who have the words Thars (Gothic), thirst (English), Durst (German). In Vedic, this tars was reduced to tRS (to be thirsty) in various derivatives.

An important derivative of tarS/tRS, namely tRSNA (thirst, desire), comes upto the middle Indic as taNhA after which this family of words seems to have disappeared.
ga Su va NaSa / 4132/ 4147.

The plants may grow; the water gives life.

There are two clauses in this line: ga Su and va Na Sa. The use of Su in the first clause indicates that it has some sort of syntactic relationship with the following clause. Some conjunction joins these two clauses through ‘idea’ indicated by the vowel u, which later reflects in the imperative endings 3p. -tu and -ntu. In the second clause, va may also be taken to be an oblique case: from the water the life comes out. The appropriate conjunction in the middle may be supposed to be ‘because’: the plants grow, because the water gives life.

In the Vedic Volkssprache, gasa seems to have emerged as gaccha due to a sibilant changing into ch in Prakrit. In some modern Hindi dialects, we have gAchh (tree).

The clause va Na Sa was reduced to vánas at the inflexional stage, which generally makes a compound vanas-pati (plants in general) in Vedic. A shorter form of vánas is van in van-Am and also vana (wood).

When vanas lost its a at the second syllable, the reduced form *van s changed into vars, which is attested by the Vedic root vRS (to pour water) and its derivatives. The seed syllable va- exists in some form in other IE dialects.

The future form of this clause, namely va Na gha-Sa (the water will give life) may have abbreviated to van gh-sa at some advanced stage of the inflexional Indus which, through the stage *var ksa, would have come to vra kSa, later becoming vR-kSa, lit. grown up through water (tree).

Some time later, in the colloquial language, both gaccha and vRkSa combined to express an aggregate of ideas ‘plants and trees’. In the colloquial Hindi, we have gAchh-brichh in the same sense.
rau Na Su ca na Sa / 1092.

The heat may give intelligence; the moon gives pleasure.

The Su in the first clause and the Sa in the second is again suggestive of some syntactic relationship.

The second clause ca na Sa is readily intelligible, because its fossilised form cánas in the RV, generally in company with dhA, meaning ‘to accept, be satisfied with, take pleasure in’. Thus the original meaning of ca na Sa centres round something like ‘pleasure’. It may also mean: the moon gives pleasant light, which can be a source of pleasure.

The clause ca na Sa does not stop at cánas; the latter is further reduced to carS in the manner of tarS and varS. The unattested verb *carS seems to mean ‘to be agreeable, give pleasure’. It is the basis of the controversial Vedic carSaNI. Roth takes it to mean ‘active’ and derives it from car ‘to move’. But carSaNI also means ‘people’. These two different meanings seem to be explained by the two sources of carSaNI in the Indus texts. The two meanings of the Vedic carSaNI seem to have parted asunder already at the cánas stage which had also its variant *cáNas from the clause ca Na Sa, which may be supposed to give the meaning ‘the moon gives knowledge’ or ‘the light is knowledge’. This difference of ‘pleasant light’ for na and ‘knowledge’ for Na has attached carSaNi with ‘pleasant, agreeable’ on the one hand and ‘people’ on the other.

The fossilised cánas could hardly survive till the RV, but its idea of ‘pleasure’ was transferred to Upanisads, where it incarnated as the word Ananda.

The first clause of this text could not even reach the Vedic stage, because there is no fossil like *ronas. The heat generating intelligence is an old idea, and the meaning of the clause is confirmed. Then the two clauses may be related in this way: If the heat may give intelligence, the moon gives pleasure. The last verse of the RV 3,62,10 (dhiyo yo naH pracodayAt) express the same idea with reference to sun, which is a form of fire. One cannot deny that rau can also mean ‘sun’.

By the time of the Upanisads, when canas was replaced by the updated Ananda, and when the vocables conveying the ideas of ‘sun’ and ‘intelligence’ were lost long ago, two vocables sat and cit, themselves the fossilsed forms of two prehistoric clauses, were brought to make sac-cid-Ananda. The two vocables sat and cid will come in our discussion later on.
ca Na Su va Na Sa / 2263.

The moon may give knowledge; the water gives life.

The clause ca Na Su of this text and rau Na Su of the previous text differ only on account of the first syllable, ca meaning ‘moon’ and rau meaning ‘sun’ or ‘fire’. If that could bring some difference in the meaning of na, that is not unexpected.

The RV 10,90,13a says: candramA manaso jAtaH. If we put ca Na Su parallel to it, Na appears to stand for manas (mind). But then ca Na Su can mean ‘the moon may bring forth mind’.

The RV 10,90,13d says: prANAd vAyur ajAyata. If we put va Na Sa parallel to it, Na appears to stand for prANa (breath), because va is for vAyu (air).

The only difficulty we have is that, following the vedic syntax, we are obliged to put the Indus oblique case in the middle, which those primitive people will not allow in their language.

Then we have to accept that the original Indus ideas as shown above in the translation were redrafted by the Vedic RSis: the moon was born from the mind; the air was born from the breath. This was considered more logical in the Vedic thinking.
ra Na Su pa ka sa bu Sa ci / 2687.

The fire may give knowledge; the air gives joy; the light is generated through water.

The nine-syllabic text is a typical example of the GAyatrI metre at the isolating stage of Indus. If we look at the Rigvedic stanzas in GAyatrI metre, we find that each stanza has nine ideas expressed through specific words. If a verse is less by one or two syllables, that is filled up by some little particles.

As in the last three texts, the first clause ends with Su, which indicates that the following two clauses are somehow connected. The first clause says: the fire may generate knowledge, or, the heat may cause intelligence. Then pa ka Sa means: the air gives joy. But the last clause, having the object behind the verb, is a passive construction: through the water is generated the light.

It is difficult to comprehend the semantic relationship, but the same verb in the three clauses points to three different sources of intelligence, joy and light which are fire, air and water respectively.

The Vedic fossils of the three Indus clauses are not available, but pakSa has relationship with pa ka Sa, now traceable in Hindi paMkhA (fan).

There are few instances of the isolating Indus marching towards the agglutinative stage. Though the past prefix A has never come to our notice, there is ga for ‘order’ and gha for ‘future’. But there is a peculiar combination of the future affix gha in the first clause and the injunctive affix ga in the following clause.
dra gha ra ga / 4378.

A fiery catastrophe will take place; do run away!

The placement of these two clauses in two lines is remarkable. That coincides with gha for future and ga for order in two lines.

The ligature d-ra (pain-fire) may be supposed to refer to a catastrophic fire. The same nominal idea has turned into a verb in connection with the future affix. Thus catastrophic-fire-future = A fiery catastrophe will take place.

The next clause is an order: speed-order = do run away! Even now in colloquial Hindi we advise some one in this way: jA ga = Please do go away! Similarly, there is ha with some past participle for ‘perfect’, and ra with the same for ‘pluperfect’. These are certainly not new creations. They are coming from the hoary past.

Because the Indus people were yogins, they had some idea of the future tragedy. Therefore, they used to warn the people about it.
pra gha va ga / 4588.

A storm will come; be careful.

If the first syllable of the first line is pra, it probably refers to (pa = wind+ra = speed) ‘storm’. Then storm-future predicts the coming of some tragic storm. The syllable va stands for arm. Thus arm-order = Be careful to face it.

This coordination of gha and ga appears to be very meaningful and this occurrence goes in scores.

It is also interesting to note that the ‘order’ relates to just four syllables: ya ra la va. And they are indicated through the numeral signs. As far as our glossary of the monosyllabic words permit, ya (meditation) advises to think of; ra advises to run away; and va advises to take precautionary measures. The exact meaning of la cannot be determined.

In the Indus texts there are some typical instances of the subjects in plural. The plurality of the subject is shown in a primitive way by repeating it so many times. Only three such texts may be presented where the meaning is somehow clear.
dha dha dha ra / 7201.

The heavenly bodies move.

The syllable dha stands for ‘light’. Therefore, it may refer to the shining heavenly bodies like the sun, moon and stars. Then the text means: the heavenly bodies move.

Later this clause was contracted to dhara and further reduced to dhra. Its weak form dhR means ‘to hold, seize’ in Sanskrit. Used reflexively, it also means ‘to be alive’. In colloquial usage, dhara stands for a body in general: the body of an animal, the trunk of a tree, etc.
ga ga ga Na / 1623.

The stars shine.

The contracted form of this clause is gagaNa ‘sky’ on the one hand and gaľa ‘group’ on the other, and both suggest that the meaning given above is correct.
rA rA rA ma / 4251.

The fires are extinguished.

The contracted form of this clause is rAma which, in its earliest occurrence, means ‘a black man’. Because the extinguished form of the fire is ‘ashes’ whose colour is black, the word rAma came to have this meaning.

The fire is said to be extinguished in the physical sense, but this clause could also have some abstract meaning. It could also mean: the fire is comfortable.
va Na Su NA Sa / 2300.

From the water the life may come; know! see!

Because the numeral sign ra capped from two sides stands for rA, a similar sign for Na may be read NA. Therefore, the last two syllables have been read NASa (knowledge wise).

The meaning of the first part, va Na Su, is already known to us: from the water the life may come. Perhaps the context relates to botany, because watering is the chief means of growing something. Even if Su and Sa of the two clauses show some coordination of ideas through ‘if’ or ‘because’, the meaning remains unaltered.

The Vedic fossil of this text may be *vanas nAs (with some "filler"), which does not occur.

The latter part of the text has two verbs, expressing admonition known this truth, see this truth. Somehow, in course of time, these two verbs combined together as a single vocable nAs (knowledge and wisdom), which occur with the privative a- in the controversial Vedic anAs (RV. 5,29,10), probably meaning ‘ignorant and unwise’.

This a-nAs qualifies the dasyus (the villagers, of the countryside) who were naturally deprived of knowledge and wisdom, and it did not know and see what was right or wrong. See Appendix: dAsa and dasyu of the RV.
ra Na NA Sa / 1120.

The knowledge shines; know; see.

This is probably an example of the clause beginning with the verb, ra (fire) Na (knowledge) saying that ‘the knowledge shines’. Otherwise, ‘the life goes on’, or ‘the fire (is) life’.
s'a ma yo Sa / 1013.

Let evil die; let comfort be there.

The evil dies; the comfort is there.

This is a wonderful text of the Indus language at the isolating stage. There are two clauses: s'a ma and yo Sa.

There are only a few meanings given to s'a in the traditional lexicons, but its chief meaning appears to be ‘evil’. Its association with ma (end) makes a clause, meaning ‘let evil die’ or ‘the evil ends’, which turns the evil into good. When s'a ma was reduced to s'ám, it got the meaning ‘wellbeing’.

The next clause yo Sa is more difficult, because yo never occurs in the lexicons. But from its old combinations yo-ni, yo-ga, yo-SA, we derive a very primitive meaning ‘pleasure’, ‘comfort’. Thus yo Sa means : let there be physical comfort, there is pleasure. The yoSa (lady) being a source of pleasure is wellknown.

This yo Sa was later reduced to yós and the meaning was restricted to ‘pleasure, comfort’.

Even not being in a compound, s'am and yós appear as s'áM ca yós' ca and s'áM yós, meaning ‘wellbeing and comfort’ conjointly. Rudra is said to be the best bestower of s'ám and yós.

This pair of clauses, s'a ma yo Sa, occurs nearly 20 times in several longer texts. The meanings of the additional syllables are not always clear, even when the texts can be read phonemically.

The phrases of the agglutinative stage of Indus have come to Vedic in somewhat unaltered form, but the clauses of the isolating stage have suffered drastic changes in form and meaning. They have invariably been reduced to monosyllabic or bisyllabic words and, as regards meanings, there is a sea change. Semantically the same vocable cannot be recognised. It is generally the meaning which prohibits the Indus origin of the Vedic words.

It may be pointed out here that, at the isolating stage of the language, the tenses and moods of the verbs were known from the context. Therefore, the same clause could express present, past and future tenses as well as blessings, orders and desires.
dha dhe gra Sa gha / 4320.

The extremely bright sun will shine.

Just on the face-value, we take the last two syllables sa-gha as a future form at the agglutinative stage. Of the first three syllables, gra appears to be a contraction of ga-ra (the moving fire) and refers to the ‘sun’. This gra is a seed-syllable in respect of a large number of words of the Germanic and Romance languages; e.g. glamour, glare, glory, etc. in English and Glut (fire) etc. in German. In Sanskrit, this gra has been devoiced to kra in many cases, e.g. in dadhi-krA and dadhi-krA-van, which also helps to recognise the preceding dha dhe. Because dadhi-krA refers to the rolling ball of the rising sun, where dh seems to intensify the idea of ‘shining’ through reduplication, the Indus text seems to mean: the extremely bright sun will shine.

At the agglutinative stage, the verbal idea merged with the phrase ‘the shining extremely bright sun’, which was squeezed into a mixture of these ideas, being a mythological being, a divine horse, etc.

The statement like this indicates the weather-forecast and related information of the Indus society. They carried an urban culture backed by agriculture.
rau ci Sa / 1305.

The sun (or fire) gives light.

Its reduced form in Vedic is rócis meaning ‘light’. From it, the verb ruc ‘to shine’ was deduced which later developed other meanings.
rau dha Su va dha Sa / 4131.

If the sun in bright, the rain is in plenty.

This meaning is mainly based on common sense, though rau (fire) for the sun and va (water) for rain are doubtless. The syllable dha for ‘light’ is generally assumed on the basis of cognate words beginning with dha, though its connection with the Vedic verb dhA (to do) cannot be doubted.

The coordination of Su and Sa indicates the cause-effect or if-then relationship: because/if the sun is hot, there is plenty of rain-fall.

The clause rau dha Su may be phonetically related to rodhas, though semantically it does not agree. Because the aspiration is not a distinctive features in primitive phonology, rodas in rodas-ÝI (heaven and earth) may be brought in relation to it, the rain-water being the connecting factor.

The second clause va dha Sa is phonetically related to the Vedic vádhas (weapon) from which a root vadh (to kill) also has been deduced, but this meaning is not relevant to the present context. Because the meaning is an unpredictable factor, we may ignore it if it does not help.

A slightly different text may be seen in this context.

16a. dhe rau dha / 2241.

The bright fire shines.

The first dhe and the last dha refer to the ‘light’ element and, probably, the first is the adjective and the last is the verb. Then ‘the bright fire shines’ is the possible meaning.

The last two syllables appear to make the colloquial Hindi word raudA (the heat of the sun), though we expect to derive it from raA dha, which does not exist.
va Na ra / 8011.

Into the dwelling creatures go.

This clause, if reduced to Vedic size, may become vánar. This word actually occurs as the first member of the compounds vánar-gu and vánar-Sad. In the Vedic lexicography, this vánar is confounded with vánas, though the change of s into r after a is full of difficulty. Because vánar is an older vocable, it could hardly endure till the RV, but vánas continued till later.

The compounded elements -gu and -sad have misguided us to the extent that ‘wood’ has come to be associated with vánar. These two elements insist that some ‘resting place’ or ‘seat’ in intended. The syllable va itself means ‘dwelling’; Na stands for ‘creatures’; and ra (speed) means ‘to hasten’. A workable meaning of the clause is :Into the dwelling creatures go. At the inflexional stage, the meaning seems to have been restricted to ‘a safe place’. Therefore it may be ‘nest’ for the bird, ‘altar’ for the fire, ‘den’ for the thieves and robbers, and so on.

Therefore a vocable vánar, different from vánas, has to be assumed for the Vedic language. Provisionally, it may be said to mean ‘a residing place, a seat of safety’.

It is also possible that vAnara is derived from vánar, because the former was originally a forester, which was later identified with monkey due to confusion with some similar vernacular word. We come to the conclusion that vánar is a ‘seat’ or ‘resting place’, but not within human habitation. Therefore, the meaning runs towards forests and woods. Later perhaps nara (a man) was distinguished from vAnara (a forester), which was wrongly derived.
I va ta / 4691.

The beauty dwells in gems.

This doubtful reading of a text gives a doubtful meaning, and the Vedic fossil itself, namely Ivat, is doubtful as to meaning and etymology.

Let us suppose that the reading is true as far as possible. Then I stands for beauty, but ta and va do not give coherent meanings. However, we take the Vedic vocable to mean ‘beautiful’. But the verb at the second position and the oblique case at the end is embarrassing. The reading of the text from left to right in Indus too does not give satisfactory results. We leave it here.
ta na va Na Sa / 2594.

A child (tana) resembles a plant (vana).

Though the text appears to be a combination of the two clauses, which are clear as to their respective meanings, the same are not easily reconciled in this text.

If these two clauses are supposed to have turned into phrases in this combination, tana (gem from the womb of a woman) and vana (grown up through water) with the following şa, undergoing a slight twist in meaning, may indicate: a child resembles a plant, suggesting that a child expands the family like a plant.

This meaning is liable to be arrived at when the isolating stage was shortly past and the clauses were turning into phrases.
I ka Sa / 7044 , 4030.

The beauty (or eye) gives joy.

At the inflexional stage I ka sa was reduced to IkSa, and its original meaning was ‘seeing’. In Vedic, IkSate = sees, but in Taitt. Up. sa IkSata = he desired.

Though the verbal form IkSata is truly 3p. sg. without the past augment, it is actually a continuation of the oral tradition from the agglutinative stage of Indus, where the person had begun to be distinguished.

The Evolution of The Indus Language and its transition into Sanskrit: 1 | 2 |3

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