Grammatica Grandonica, the lost manuscript of Hanxleden's Sanskrit grammar rediscovered

Vielle, Christophe [UCL] Van Hal, Toon [KUL] Muller, Jean-Claude [I.A.Luxembourg]

(eng) The recent rediscovery by Toon Van Hal in Italy, in May 2010, of the autographic manuscript of the Sanskrit grammar composed in Kerala by the Jesuit Father Johann Ernst Hanxleden(Arnos Padiri, 1681–1732) constitutes a major contribution to the progress of the historical and linguistic researches on the first European attempts of grammatical description (in Latin)of the Sanskrit language. A first Sanskrit grammar had already been composed c. 1660–62,using Devanāgarī script, by Father Heinrich Roth s.j. (1620–88, Agra), the manuscript-facsimile of which was published in 1988 (A. Camps & J.-C. Muller eds); Roth’s grammar was based on Anubhūti Svarūpācārya’s Sārasvata-vyākaraṇa. Another Sanskrit grammar was composed before 1732 (for its first 5 chapters at least), using Bengali script, by Father Jean-François Pons s.j. (1688–1752, Chandernagor); this grammar, still waiting for an edition (cf. the preliminary studies by J. & P.-S. Filliozat, and J.-C. Muller) was based on Vopadeva’s Mugdhabodha and was later used by A.H. Anquetil-Duperron. Hanxleden’s grammar (also composed before 1732), in which Sanskrit is written in Grantha-Malayāḷam script, has served as a model for Paulinus a Sancto Bartholomaeo (Paulinus Padiri)’s Sidharubam seu Grammatica Samscrdamica, the first Sanskrit grammar ever printed (Rome, 1790). The paper will examine the context and the structure of Hanxleden’s grammar; its relationships with its Sanskrit (indigenous grammatical) source, viz. the Siddharūpa which was the manual used in traditional Kerala for learning basic Sanskrit; and some of its South-Indian peculiar features, introductive to its further edition as planned by the authors.

(fre) Communication aussi présentée au 15th World Sanskrit Conference, New Delhi, 5-10 janvier 2012 (Abstracts of papers, p. 37)