Page:The Origin and Development of the Bengali Language (Volume 1).pdf/14

xvi of Modern India, the great Rājā Ram Mohun Rav, whose work was published om English in 1826, and in Bengali in 1833; and he knew what we should mean by ‘Bengali.’ Chintāmani Gāŋguli’s book (published in the early eighties) is a great advanee on the so-called Bengali grammars of the period, and in recent times we have Nakulêśvara Vidvyābhuṣaṇa’s little book (first edition Bengali year 1305, fourth edition 1315), and mention may be made of Hŗsikėśa Śāstrī’s hook (Bengali vear 1307 = 1900). But the first Bengali with a scientific insight to attack the problems of the language was the poet Rabindranath Tagore; and it is flattering for the votaries of Philology to find in one who is the greatest writer in the language, and a great poet and seer for all time, a keen philologist as well, distinguished alike by an assiduous enquiry into the facts of the language and by a scholarly appreciation of the methods and findings of the modern western philologist. The work of Rabindranath is in the shape of a few essays (now collected in one volume) on Bengali phonetics, Bengali onomatopoetics, and on the Bengali noun, and on other topics, the earliest of which appeared tn the early nineties. and some fresh papers appeared only several years ago. These papers may be said to have shown to the Bengali enquiring into the problems of his language the proper lines of approaching them.

Two works, however, though not on historical grammar, have been specially useful in writing this book, and I cannot be too grateful te the scholars responsible for them. These are the Bengali Dictionary of Jñānêndra Mōhan Dās, and the edition of the ‘Śrī-Kŗṣṇa-Kīrttana,’ our most important Middle Bengali text, by Basanta Rañjan Rāy Vidvad- vallabha, The former work presents the richest collection of material for phonology and for the study of the formative affixes of both New Bengali and Middle Bengali; and the latter with its excellent commentary and word index, especially the latter, has been an invaluable help for both phonology and morphology, For the rest, stray papers and monographs on points of vocabulary and grammar, in the Journal of the Vaŋgīya Sāhitya Pariṣad and in periodicals like the Prabāsī,’ have at times been requisitioned, These latter of course are not always