Re: [MEYKANDAR] Musical Phonetics in tholkAppiam
K. Loganathan
One of the most remarkable lines in the whole hymn is the following:
2(304)
unu-uru du-ge sa-du ( . . , ‘attaining the utterance’)
Ta. unnu uru tuukkee saattu ( A place of deep meditations on speech where verses are recited)
உன்னு உரு தூக்கே சாத்து
unu-uru : Ta. unnu uru; Ta. unnu : to reflect deeply Ta. uru, urai: speech, uttrances
du-ge : Ta. tuukku-ee : Ta. tuukku : to speak, sing etc See. PuRam : taN siir tuukkuntu ( they sing the melodious songs)
sa-du : Ta. saattu (< saaRRu) ; to tell relate etc. See saattan : the great poet as in Siittalai Sattan-aar ( the foremost and divine poet Saattan). Clearly Sk sastry is a derivative of this.
Clearly the translation is inadequate and perhaps because the Akkadian sources themselves quite inadequate here.
Once we see this as Ta. unnu uru , the whole meaning becomes quite transparent. Now we can equate this phrase with Su. en-nu-ru that occurs in the incantations and where it can be taken as Ta. ennu-uru( to recite the words, mantas ) or even Ta. uNNu uru ( think about the words, mantras) etc. The ‘unu= unnu’ may be a variant of Su. ennu Ta. ennu: to recite. Even now the word ‘uru’ as in ‘uru ceytal’ stands for mantra recital, repeating a mantra hundreds of times.
We should recall here Su. uru and Ta. uru, urai stand for speech and in linguistic treatise for ‘commentary’ In Malay ( and perhaps also other Austric languages ) we have ‘hurai” with the same meanings as in Tamil.
So I have rendered the meaning as ‘the deep meditations or reflections on language ‘ and which also sheds light on the meanings ‘du-ge sa-du ( i.e. Ta. tuukkee saattu ) ‘announce the grammatical essences’ and recite verses to that effect.
Now Su. dug, du-ga exists in Ta. as tuukku , not only to sing out as PuRam ( 5th cent BC?) ‘taN kuravai siir tuukuntu” but also as a technical term in poetics, the study of the Yaappu - the prosodic features of the verses.
In Tol CeyyuLial ( a Study of the Prosodies) we have already the mention of “tuukku’ as one of the uRupu, the organs of prosodic structure of CeyuuL, the literary compositions :
Cey. 1
maattirai ezuttiyal asaivakai enAa
Yaatta siir adiyaappu enAa
Marabu tukkee todaivakai enAa
.. . . . ..
Meaning:
Among the grammatical organs of verses we have maattirai ( sound length) ezuttu ( the kind of phonemes), asai vakai ( the various kinds of intonations), the siir ( the number of morphemes) adi ( the feet) yappu ( the modality) , marabou ( the stylistic tradition) tuukku ( the prosodic structure) todai ( how one clause connects with another to produce agreeable sound) . . . .
This makes it clear that one of earliest grammatical features that the ancient Dravidian linguistic philosophers identified was Ta. tuukku ( <Su. du-ge ) and this was announced (saattee< Su. sa-de) after reflecting (unnu., Su. unu) upon the verses ( Ta. uru, urai < Su. uru)
This should not be surprising for the Sumerians not only developed a script for writing down the languages and which they also improved upon periodically but also developed catalogues of various kinds of compositions and in which towards the end they also mention something- what kind of song it is and so forth and which habit we see also in the CaGkam Anthologies such as PuRa NaanuuRu, Aka NaanuuRu and so forth
Relations among the Musical Notes in a composition
A key to the Musical Phonetics in tholkAppiam
S.A.Veerapandian
http://musicdrvee.blogspot.in/
http://musictholkappiam.blogspot.in/
tholkAppiam had well defined grammar rules governing the musical sound of the letters.
The next interesting area of research may be the probable relation of the above rules, with the rules, governing the relation between the musical notes in a melody.
The musical notes in a melody are governed by four kinds of relations in ancient Tamil Music.
The seven basic music notes are ச -Sa –C; ரி -Re – D; க -Ga –E; ம -Ma –F ; ப - Pa –G; த - Dha –A; நி -Ne –B. After the seven notes, the eighth note will be again the higher octave – thAra sthAyi - ச -Sa –C , having sound frequency double the value of the first note ச -Sa –C. The musical relation between the first note and its eighth note is called the octave relation.
In a composition, the adjacent musical notes corresponding to the musical sound of the letters in the syllables, may be the same musical note or the next musical note in the musical scale of the composition. Or it may be the 3rd or 4th or 5th or 6th note with respect to the previous note. The musical feeling matching the content of the composition will be conveyed depending on the nature of the musical relation between the two adjacent musical notes related to the letters in the syllables, and their significance in the music substructure cIr (group of one or more syllables) in a melodic composition.
First kind is known parallel (iNai - இணை) – Octave.
For example C(Sa- ச) and higher octave C (Sa - ச) - the pair involving the first note and the eighth note is parallel notes ; (C - Sa- ச and higher octave C - Sa- ச).
The second kind is known as branch (kiLai - கிளை) in view of its functional role of branching in the melodic flow.
For example C (Sa) and G (Pa) , the first note and the fifth note above are known as the pair of branching notes.
tholkAppiyam (poruL 8:90) had clarified about the functional role of branching involving ‘kiLai ezhuththu’ (branching letter) in the following Sutra (formula)
‘ஆயிரு தொடைக்கும் கிளையெழுத்து உரிய.’
தொல்காப்பியம் பொருள்8:90
‘Ayiry thodaikkum kiLaiyezhuththu uriya.’
- tholkAppiyam -poruL 8:90
The musical phonetics in the grammar rules of tholkAppiuam is related to 'ezhuththu' (letter- எழுத்து), 'acai' (syllable- அசை), 'cIr' (group of syllables - சீர்), 'thUkku' (percussion related group of cIr- தூக்கு), 'thaLai ' (poem related group of cIr- தளை), 'adi' (line- அடி), 'thodai' (poem related group of lines - தொடை), 'vaNNam' (musical aesthetics colour- வண்ணம்).
'thodai' -- தொடை was one of the significant parts of a poem related to the group of lines. From the rule cited above, we find that the branching letter – kiLaiyezhuththu- plays a significant joining role of two different 'thodai' in a poem. When musically rendered, the musical note related to the kiLaiyezhuththu in the syllable would be the branching musical note with respect to its previous musical note in the melodic poem.
The third kind is known as friendly (nhadpu -நட்பு).
For example for C (Sa), both D(Ri2) and F(Ma1) are friendly notes i.e the second and fourth note, are known as friendly notes.
The fourth kind is inimical. (pakai - பகை).
For example, For C (Sa), both E(Ga) and A(Dha) are inimical notes i.e both the third and sixth; E and A for C.
The music note C (Sa) was taken as just an example. The above musical relations are applicable to every musical note in the composition under consideration.
The above relations between the musical notes related to the letters in the syllables of a poem, along with the four kinds of pAlai ( 1. AyappAlai ஆயப்பாலை, 2. vattappAlai வட்டப்பாலை, 3. cathurappAlai சதுரப்பாலை , & 4. thirikONappAlai திரிகோணப்பாலை.) would serve as the base in the grammar for composing amelody – Raga Sputa Method.
(Some Research scholars including late Dr. V.P. K. Sundaram differed and stressed that Sa and Pa had parallel relation. This view, apart from excluding octave relation in the four kinds of relations, could not be justified on the basis of evidences, as explained in http://www.musicresearch.in/categorydetails.php?imgid=61 )
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