Image de la littérature dans la grammaire tamoule
Résumé
This paper considers some of the connections which exist between Tamil grammar and literatzre. Taking as a basis the grammar of the Tamil scholar Cēṉāvaraiyar (13rd-14th cent.), which is a commentary on part of the famous ancient Tamil grammar, the /Tolkāppiyam/ (viz. the /Collatikāram/, «chapter concerning "words"», i.e. syntax and morphology), the aim is to delineate the literary knowledge of Cēṉāvaraiyar, and hence to define both the corpus which he had in mind and his working methods.
C.'s commentary borrows examples both from the ordinary language (ca. 1500 items) and from classical poems (ca. 500 items, evidently well-known at the time). Statistics show which of the latter were the most popular in the 13rd-14th cent. Consideration of the literary usage makes it clear that grammar sometimes has to accept "exceptions" to the rules which it aims to enforce.
Domaines
Sciences de l'Homme et Société
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