A Grammar and Dictionary of Indus Kohistani
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Claus Peter Zoller
Indus Kohistani is a major language of the Dardic group of Indo-Aryan languages. It is spoken in North Pakistan in the North-West Frontier Province along the west bank of the Indus and in the side-valleys to its west.
Volume I: Dictionary (already published)
The dictionary contains around 8.000 lemmata, many of which are supplemented with parallels from adjacent dialects, from other Dardic, from Nuristani, Indo-Aryan, Iranian, Dravidian and Munda languages, and from Burushaski. The lemmata have been, wherever possible, provided with information about their origin, and they are connected by numerous cross-references.
Since Indus Kohistani is a pitch accent language with complicated rules governing the behaviour of the two pitch accents in compounding, derivation, and inflexion, the lemmata are not only marked with their appropriate pitch accents, but the behaviour of the accents (change of value, shift) is illustrated with a large number of inflected forms and cross-references. And since Indus Kohistani has a rich (and frequently irregular) inner and outer conjugation, most verbs are provided with many finite and participle forms. In this way the reader gets acquainted with the multi-layered linguistic background of the language as well as with its intricate structure.
In addition, the dictionary contains two indexes (English - Indus Kohistani and Old Indo-Aryan - Indus Kohistani), and lists with place and clan names, names of the months, etc.
The book is presently the most comprehensive dictionary of a Dardic language. It provides new material for work on the early stages of Indo-Aryan as well as a solid database for comparative studies on Dardic languages (and Burushaski). It addresses Modern and Classical Indologists, Iranianists, Indo-Europeanists, and linguists interested in typology, linguistic prehistory, and language contact.
Volume II will contain a comprehensive Grammar of Indus Kohistani.
Information zu Autoren / Herausgebern
Claus Peter Zoller is Assistant Professor at the Southasia Institute of Heidelberg University, Germany.
Volume 1 of A Grammar and Dictionary of Indus Kohistani contains around 8.000 lemmata, many of which are supplemented with parallels from adjacent dialects, from other Dardic, from Nuristani, Indo-Aryan, Iranian, Dravidian and Munda languages, and from Burushaski. The lemmata have been, wherever possible, provided with information about their origin, and they are connected by numerous cross-references. Since Indus Kohistani is a pitch accent language with complicated rules governing the behaviour of the two pitch accents in compounding, derivation, and inflexion, the lemmata are not only marked with their appropriate pitch accents, but the behaviour of the accents (change of value, shift) is illustrated with a large number of inflected forms and cross-references. And since Indus Kohistani has a rich (and frequently irregular) inner and outer conjugation, most verbs are provided with many finite and participle forms. In addition, the dictionary contains two indexes (English - Indus Kohistani and Old Indo-Aryan - Indus Kohistani), and lists with place and clan names, names of the months, etc.
