Sanskrit Grammar (Dover Language Guides) [Paperback]

William Dwight Whitney (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0486431363 | ISBN-13: 978-0486431369 | Publication Date: September 6, 2003 | Edition: 3

As Latin is key to the study of Western classics, so Sanskrit is the language of ancient Indian literature. This guide begins with an introduction to the Sanskrit alphabet, followed by a treatment of the accent — its changes in combination, inflection, and tone. Succeeding chapters discuss declension, conjugation, parts of speech, more.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

The late William Dwight Whitney was Professor of Sanskrit in Yale University, Knight of the Prussian Order Pour le Mérite, Corresponding Member of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres of the Institute of France, etc., and Editor-in-Chief of The Century Dictionary, an Encyclopedic Lexicon of the English Language. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 576 pages
• Publisher: Dover Publications; 3 edition (September 6, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0486431363
• ISBN-13: 978-0486431369
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 5.1 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #844,647 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #18 in Books > Education & Reference > Dictionaries & Thesauruses > Foreign Language > Sanskrit

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

42 of 43 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Exhaustive and well organized reference work, March 22, 2000

By 

James Brandon (Athens, Georgia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sanskrit Grammar: Including both the Classical Language, and the Older Dialects, of Veda and Brahmana, 2nd ed (Proceedings of the Harvard Celtic Colloquium) (Hardcover)

We have been using Whitney's Grammar in addition to Whitney's Roots and the Lanman Reader for the purposes of learning Sanskrit this year. Our professor teaches from a historical linguistic perspective for which this book is fairly well suited. This book is most remarkable for its extremely well organized format and exhaustive treatment of the forms. The inclusion of Vedic forms is very nice. The Sanskrit Reader by Charles R. Lanman is the perfect complement to this reference grammar. The excellent notes in Lanman's reader refer the student to Whitney's Grammar, the vocabulary is helpful and the stories are delightful. Whitney's Grammar is a must for a thorough grasp of the forms though.

20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Classic work in the field, September 28, 2004

By 

Jon Torodash (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Sanskrit Grammar: Including both the Classical Language, and the Older Dialects, of Veda and Brahmana, 2nd ed (Proceedings of the Harvard Celtic Colloquium) (Hardcover)

Whitney is the prototype for Sanskrit grammars in English. I suspect the author had in mind Allen and Greenough's Latin grammar or H.W. Smythe's Greek grammar when designing the numeric scheme for each point, theme, and paradigm. It is a very useful system of notation for referencing from other works.

I can't honestly see going through this lesson by lesson with most students who are not dedicated to long term research in the field and want to begin reading Sanskrit without learning every arcane morphological exception. This book serves as an indispensible reference work by including Vedic forms as well as accentation in the paradigms, which I would imagine is more authoritative than Coulson's simple rules. The book is long and comprehensive, and like Smythe and Greenough, has gained the respect of being "the" authoritative source. It is a wonderful book for learning troublesome concepts correctly and more fully than several of the shorter grammars treat them.

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Whitney Sanskrit Grammar, February 21, 2006

By 

SamSpirit (Baltimore, Md USA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Sanskrit Grammar (Dover Language Guides) (Paperback)

I like the introductory sections and discussion of differences in classical and Vedic Sanskrit. Still it moves quickly into more detail than can be absorbed with casual study. It is a good reference text -- easier to find things than some of the other grammatical texts -- and it answers some basic questions, like the history of the word spacing in modern texts. But still engages in the vocabulary of advanced grammar without defining the terms -- for example, desiderative, aorist, etc.