Dating Sanskrit texts using linguistic features and neural networks
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Oliver Hellwig
Abstract
Deriving historical dates or datable stratifications for texts in Classical Sanskrit, such as the epics Mahābhārata and Rāmāyaṇa, is a considerable challenge for text-historical research. This paper provides empirical evidence for subtle but noticeable diachronic changes in the fundamental linguistic structures of Classical Sanskrit, and argues that Classical Sanskrit shows enough diachronic variation for dating texts on the basis of linguistic developments. Building on this evidence, it evaluates machine learning algorithms that predict approximate dates of composition for Sanskrit texts. The paper introduces the required background, discusses the relevance of linguistic features for temporal classification, and presents a text-historical evaluation of Book 6 of the Mahābhārata, whose historical stratification is disputed in Indological research.
© 2019 by Walter de Gruyter Berlin/Boston
Artikel in diesem Heft
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- Dating Sanskrit texts using linguistic features and neural networks
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- Kleines Lautgesetz, große Wirkung
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Artikel in diesem Heft
- Titelei
- Inhalt
- Dating Sanskrit texts using linguistic features and neural networks
- Some difficult Tocharian genitives
- Kleines Lautgesetz, große Wirkung
- Germanic *ƀra (PIE *pro) as ditropic clitic and the etymology of *ƀrenga-, *ƀrūka- and *ƀraiđ̯a-
- Definite referential null objects in Old Hittite
- An apple a day …
- Phonotactics of the Lycian labial glide clusters
- Indo-European cladistic nomenclature
- The origin of non-canonical case marking of subjects in Proto-Indo-European
- TB pitke ‘fat, grease, oil’ and PIE *peih̯1- ‘to be fat, be bursting with’
- Indo-European syntax in disguise
- On Indo-European superlative suffixes
- Old Irish aue ‘descendant’ and its descendants
