The verbs of ‘eating’ and ‘drinking’ in the history of Indo-Aryan

Abstract

The paper is dedicated to the problems of changes that have taken place in the semantic fields of ‘eating’ and ‘drinking’ in the history of Indo-Aryan. It is shown that in Ancient Indo-Aryan (in Vedic and Sanskrit) there were more than 10 verbal roots associated with the semantic class ‘eating’ while the class ‘drinking’ was represented by only 3 verbs. The basic root among the latter group was pā- ‘drink’; the rest were represented by cam- ‘draw’ (which actually signified the mode itself of the absorption of liquids) and by bhakş-, that is, by the root that changed its original semantics: its dominant meaning was ‘drink’ in Vedic and only in Sanskrit it started to signify ‘eat’. It is important that in Sanskrit the nominal deverbals bhakşá- and bhakşya- were used in the meaning of ‘(solid) food’, that is, “food that requires the use of teeth”. The greatest number of the “verbs of eating” was semantically grouped around khād- ‘eat / consume’ — the root that was well represented at every evolutionary stage of Indo-Aryan, which was characterized inside them by the highest frequency and by the most massive semantic abilities. The multitude of forms produced from khād- and from the roots associated with it, was based on the ideas of the ‘mastication’ and of the ‘use of teeth’. It was opposed to the analogous set of forms produced from bhu(ń)j- ‘devour; enjoy’ — the other root remarkable for its ‘longevity’ in the history of Indo-Aryan. Thus, already in Ancient Indo-Aryan there became noticeable the primary opposition of forms from khād- ‘to eat using teeth’ and forms produced from bhu(ń)j- ‘to partake /enjoy’ (that is, ‘to happily consume the food that does not demand biting or masticating’). This opposition became absolutely regular in the verbal system of Pāli (as one of the earliest Prākrits) where forms from the verb ‘khādati’ ‘to eat solid food which demands biting or masticating’ contrasted with those from ‘bhu(ń)jati’ ‘to experience pleasure when eating food which does not need biting or masticating and which thus is soft and enjoyable’. By the beginning of the New Indo-Aryan period the opposition had eroded. There were different reasons for this — among others, the extensive growth of the frequency of occurrence of all types of forms produced from khād- as well as the rapid increase in their semantic strength conditioned by various metaphorical transfers.

References

1. Elizarenkova T.Y. Rigveda. Mandaly I–IV [Rigveda. Mandalas I–IV]. Moscow, Nauka Publ., 1989. (In Russ.)
2. Elizarenkova T.Y. Rigveda. Mandaly IX–X [Rigveda. Mandalas IX–X]. Moscow, Nauka Publ., 1999. (In Russ.)
3. Khindi-russkii slovarʹ. T. II [Hindi-Russian Dictionary. Vol. II]. Moscow, Sovetskaya Entsiklopediya Publ., 1972. (In Russ.)
4. Hook P.E. Eat-Expressions in Hindi-Urdu. In: R.S. Katre Memorial Lecture-I. Lucknow University, 21.11.2010.
5. Hook P.E., Pardeshi Prashant. Sylleptic uses of EAT-expressions in Indo-Aryan Verbal Art. In: Indo-Aryan Linguistics. Omkar N. Koul (ed.). Mysore, Central Institute of Indian Languages, 2011.
6. Rgveda-saṃhitā. Ahmadabad, Svādhyāya-maņȡala, 1997.
7. Sanskrit-English Dictionary. Sir Monier Monier-Williams. Oxford (Indian edition), 1956.
8. The Pali Text Society’s Pali-English Dictionary. T.W. Rhys Davids and William Stede (eds.). London, Luzac and company, 1966.