Momentary-Durative

[petegray]

[ moderator re-formatted ]

I said:

>> In some parts of Sanskrit literature, it is the aorist which is [the
>> equivalent of Greek perfect], not the perfect.  Elsewhere aorist and perfect
>> are in practice indistinguishable, and the perfect drops out of use.

Nath gave a full reply (for which, thank you - the details are helpful) and
asked:

> Which parts of Sans lit? Please be specific concerning times, genres etc.

This distinction of the aorist from the imperfect and perfect as the tenses
of narration is very common in the Brahmana language (including the older
Upanishads and the Sutras) and is closely observed.   Violation of it is
very rare.   Earlier, in the Vedic hymns, the same distinction is prevalent,
but is both less clear and less strictly maintained.   The aorist can even
be used where a present would be expected.   In the later language the
perfect is simply a preterit or past tense equivalent with the imperfect and
fully interchangeable, and sometimes co-ordinated with it.   Different
authors appear to prefer different tenses.

Older grammars (e.g. Whitney), modern grammars by Indian linguists (e.g.
Misra) and modern lingistics books (e.g. Hewson & Bubenik "Tense and aspect
in IE") all say the same kind of thing.

> I don't see any parts of Sans lit in which aorist has resultative meaning.

An example from the RV (sorry I don't have the exact reference):

  putrasya na:ma grhanti praja:m eva anu sam atanat.

"He gives the son's name; and thus _he has extended_ his race."

I happily grant that there might be distinctions;  but if there are, they
are subtle, and not present in all cases.    This does not weaken my
argument that Sanskrit and Greek do not agree in the meaning and the
function of these tenses, even if they do agree on the formation.   Those
books of PIE (or of IE languages, such as Baldi's recent one on Latin) which
read the Greek situation back into PIE, do so on the basis of one language
only, and in my opinion (which is often wrong, but seldom humble), this is
an unscholarly prejudice.

Peter