Essays on Vedic and Indo-European Culture.

• Author: Rocher, Ludo
• Position: Brief Reviews of Books

Essays on Vedic and Indo-European Culture. By BORIS OGUIBENINE. MLBD Series in Linguistics, vol. 12. New Delhi: MOTILAL BANARSIDASS, 1998. Pp. xi + 257. Rs. 495.

This volume offers an English translation of Oguibenine's Essais sur la culture vedique et indo-europeenne (Testi linguistici, vol. 6; Pisa: Giardini, 1985). Most chapters of the French publication appeared earlier (for a detailed concordance, see Schmitt, below), in the Journal asiatique (1978, ch. 1; 1983, ch. 4), Etudes indo-europeennes (1983, ch. 2.4), the Indo-Iranian Journal (1984, ch. 6), and the Bulletin de la Societe de Linguistique de Paris (1984, ch. 7). Some of these, and other chapters in the book, expanded on lectures delivered at various institutions. Only chapter three, "Notes sur la guerre et la religion chez les Indo-europeens," was "une somme de reflexions inedites sur des travaux recents" (p. 9; English p. vii).

Indoeuropeanists are familiar with the high praise and the severe criticism which the French text received, in reviews by Chlodwig H. Werba (Die Sprache 31 [1985]: 320-21, Indogermanische Chronik 31b), Claude Calame (Museum Helveticum 43 [1986]: 264), R. Della Casa (Salesianum 48 [1986]: 399-400), Rudiger Schmitt (Kratylos 31 [1986]: 189-90), and Franco Crevatin (Indo-Iranian Journal 31 [1988]: 142-44).

Essais sur la culture vedique et indo-europeenne was translated into English, by Hema Parthasarathy, in the hope that it "could arouse the interest of my Indian colleagues who might have had no access to the book published in Italy" (p. xi). A few samples taken at random show that the translator has generally been successful. Inevitably some nuances get lost in translation: "Il rappelle que..." (p. 27) / "...he states that..." (p. 23); "Dans le souci de verifier..."...