From: Christopher Fynn (cfynn@gmx.net)
Date: Mon Mar 07 2005 - 11:05:27 CST
Peter Kirk wrote:
> On 07/03/2005 03:52, Doug Ewell wrote:
>> Azerbaijani, at least, has been written in Arabic, Latin, and Cyrillic.
>> (We have registered tags for each of those.) I don't know where that
>> places it in the derby.
> Indeed. And since all three of these scripts are still in current use,
> this could be a record for current use - although as such certainly
> tying with Uzbek and Tajik, probably also Turkmen, which also use the
> same three scripts.
I'm not sure what you classify as "current use", but Pali texts are still
published and read in Sinhala, Devanagri, Latin, Burmese, Thai, Lao and
Khmer (possibly other scripts as well) and many also exist in a number of
historical scripts which some people can still read.
Although Sanskrit is now usually published in Devanagri - scholars in
different parts of India often write it in their local script - (e.g.
Kannada script if they are from Mysore). This includes most of the scripts
used in India. Sanskrit is still spoken in a few Brahmin villages (e.g.
Malkote in Karnataka) and in religious institutions - and it is one of the
official languages of India. (I have a nice book on modern spoken Sanskrit
which includes Sanskrit words for things like cinema). Sanskrit is also
written in Newar (Nepal lipi), Ranjana, and, to some extent, Tibetan. Some
critical editions of Sanskrit texts are published in Latin script.
- Chris
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