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Sanskrit Translation Services
With a large network of in-country, professional Sanskrit translators, Verbatim Solutions can respond quickly and effectively to your Sanskrit language translation needs.
Verbatim Solutions provides professional, high quality Sanskrit to English translations and English to Sanskrit translations. Our Sanskrit translation services will help you maximize your global strategy.
Native Speaking Sanskrit Translators
Verbatim Solutions Sanskrit translation teams are professional linguists performing translation from English to Sanskrit and Sanskrit to English for a variety of documents in various industries including:
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History
The
word Sanskrit means completed, refined, perfected. Sam (together) +
krtam (created). Virtually every Sanskrit student in India learns the
traditional story that Sanskrit was created and then refined over
many generations (traditionally more than a thousand years) until it
was considered complete and perfect. Sanskrit is considered a more
refined linguistic strain of the Prakrit (Prototype. Pra (prime,
first, pre-) + krt (created)) languages of India which include the
lower vernaculars such as Pali and Ardhamagadhi.
The language
underwent several stages of consolidation and modification.
In
its older Vedic form, it is a close descendant of
Proto-Indo-European, the root of all later Indo-European languages.
Vedic Sanskrit is also practically identical to Avestan, the language
of Zoroastrianism. After the consolidation of its grammar and lexicon
it turned into a classical language of strict esthetic rules and gave
rise to considerable literature of drama, medicine, politics,
astronomy, mathematics, alchemy, etc.
Its common origin with
modern European and the classical languages of Greek and Latin can be
seen, for instance, in the Sanskrit words for mother, matr, and
father, pitr. European scholarship in Sanskrit, initiated by Heinrich
Roth and Johann Ernest Hanxleden, led to the discovery of this
language family by Sir William Jones, and thus played an important
role in the development of linguistics. Indeed, linguistics (along
with phonology, etc.) was first developed by Indian grammarians who
were attempting to catalog and codify Sanskrit's rules. Modern
linguistics, which arose much later in the rest of the world, owes a
great deal to the grammarians, including key terms for compound
analysis.
Sanskrit is the oldest member of Indo-Aryan
sub-branch of Indo-Iranian. Vedic Sanskrit and Avestan are the oldest
members of the Indo-Iranian sub-branch of the Indo-European family.
Nuristani languages, spoken in roughly what has become Afghanistan,
are grouped with Vedic and Avestan.
The oldest form of
Sanskrit is Vedic, in which the Vedas, the earliest Sanskrit texts,
were composed. The earliest of the Vedas, the R gveda, was composed
in the middle of the second millennium BC. The Vedic form survived
until the middle of the first millennium BC. Around this time, as
Sanskrit made the transition from a first language to a second
language of religion and learning, the Classical period began. The
intense study of the structure of Sanskrit at this time led to the
beginnings of linguistics. The oldest surviving Sanskrit grammar is
P??nini's c. 500 BC A?s?t?dhy?y? ("8 Chapter
Grammar"). A form of Sanskrit called Epic Sanskrit is seen in
the Mahabharata and other Hindu epics.
Vernacular Sanskrit
may also have developed into the Prakrits (in which, among other
things, early Buddhist texts are written) and the modern Indic
languages. There has also been much reciprocal influence between
Sanskrit and the Dravidian languages.
Script
Sanskrit
has had no uniform script and still does not have one among its
users, though the syllabic Devanagari(meaning "as used in the
city of the Gods") script is nowadays being popularized.
traditionally it is written the script that is prevalent in that
region. For example, Kannada speaking people use the Kannada script,
Telugus use Telugu scipt etc. Grantha script was used by the Tamils,
though it has fell into disuse recently.
Sanskrit today is
generally written in the syllabic Devanagari (meaning "as used
in the city of the Gods") script composed of 51 letters or
aksharas. Several Latin-alphabet transliterations of varying utility
are also available. Sanskrit was earlier written in the Grantha
script, in which occasional modern Sanskrit texts are still written.
Earlier than that, the Brahmi script was used, for instance by Ashoka
for his pillar inscriptions Writing was introduced relatively late to
India, and did not immediately become important since oral learning
was the primary means of transmission of knowledge. Rhys Davids
suggests that writing may have been introduced from the middle east
by traders, but Sanskrit, which was used exclusively in sacred
contexts, remained a purely oral language until well into the
classical age of India. It is, however, interesting to note the
importance that Sanskrit orthography and Vedic philosophies of sound
plays in Hindu symbolism, as the varnamala, or
sound-garland/alphabet, of 51 letters is also seen to be represented
by the 51 skulls of Kali. In the Upanishads, the
transcendent-immanent nature of Brahman is represented by the
half-matra, or sphota of sound that is inherent to a beat of sound in
the Sanskrit system, as one cannot conceptualize it but realizes it
is the inherent base of all else.
Influences
Modern
day India
Sanskrit's greatest influence, presumably, is that it
exerted on languages that grew from its vocabulary and grammatical
base. Especially among elite circles in India, Sanskrit is prized as
a storehouse of scripture and the language of prayers in Hinduism.
While vernacular prayer is common, Sanskrit mantras are recited by
millions of Hindus and most temple functions are conducted entirely
in Sanskrit, often Vedic in form. Most higher forms of Indian
vernacular languages like Bengali, Gujarati, and Hindi, often called
'suddha' (pure, higher) are much more heavily Sanskrit zed. Of modern
day Indian languages, while Hindi tends to be, in spoken form, more
heavily weighted with Arabic and Persian influence, Bengali and
Marathi still retain a largely Sanskrit vocabulary base. The two
national songs, Jana Gana Mana (anthem) and Vande Mataram are both
higher forms of Bengali, so Sanskritized as to be archaic in modern
usages. But as a medium of instruction for Hindus in India, Sanskrit
is still prized and widespread within the educated echelons of
society.
The Sanskrit vocabulary, had some influence on the
Chinese culture because Buddhism arrived in China largely in the form
of texts composed in Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit, which was actually an
ornamented Prakrit. Many Chinese Buddhist scriptures were written
with Chinese transliterations of Sanskrit words. Some Chinese
proverbs use Buddhist terms that originate from Sanskrit.
Sanskrit
words are found in many other present-day non-Indian languages. For
instance, the Thai language contains many loan words from Sanskrit,
and ranged as far as the Philippines viz. Tagalog 'guru', or
'teacher', with the Hindu seafarers who traded there.
