CLDF dataset derived from Grierson's "Linguistic Survey of India" from 1928
How to cite
If you use these data please cite
- the original source
Grierson, George Abraham (1928): Linguistic Survey of India. Comparative Vocabulary. Calcutta: Government of India Central Publication Branch.
- the derived dataset using the DOI of the particular released version you were using
Description
This dataset is licensed under a CC-BY-4.0 license
Available online at https://lsi.clld.org
Conceptlists in Concepticon:
- Grierson-1928-168
Notes
Digitization
The first pass on the digitization was done by Patrick Lundberg and Taraka Rama, who typed the text from the tables in the scanned book pages into text files in a format easy to parse computationally. From this dataset, available in raw/LSI_txt, the data was then parsed and successively converted to CLDF, adding orthography profiles, providing links of language names to Glottolog, and linking the concept list to Concepticon (see Grierson-1928-168).
The following considerations went into creating the orthography profiles:
| Grapheme | IPA | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| V | v | typically common in Indian languages. Alternates between v and w |
| ^A | ɑ | a in America or u in hurry |
| a | ə | a in America or u in hurry |
| à͛ | à͛/a | Occurs twice in Pwo-Bassein. No explanation |
| ā | aː | a in America or u in hurry |
| ǟ | ǟ/æ | lengthened ɛ. ɛː |
| ǎ̀ | ǎ̀/a | occurs in Katurr Palaung. A short version of a. ă |
| ạ̄ | ạ̄/aː | Palaung. u in but (ʌː) |
| ạ̌ | ạ̌/a | Only occurs in Syrian Gypsy) |
| ḅ | ḅ/b | A peculiar labial according to Grierson, unvoiced may be) |
| ḇ | ḇ/b | Another variety of sound. Occurs in Tailang) |
| c̣ | c | No mention in the book. Based on context, treat it as ch ~ tɕ) |
| ḥ̣ | h | A sound equivalent to visarga in Sanskrit. Essentially h) |
| ī̃° | ī̃°/ĩ | actually a glottal check) |
| ī̇ | ɪː | Only occurs once in Mandarin) |
| ï̌ | ï̌/ɪ | Centralized vowel (may be) occurring once in Prakrit) |
| ị̄ | ị̄/ɪː | Occurs in Palaung. Supposed to be a modification of ī) |
| i̯ | i̯/j | Occurs only in Cham. no explanation given. Is it non-syllabic?) |
| ḷ’ | ɭ̥ | supposed to be a breathy voiced ɭ) |
| m̊° | m̥ | mˤ (Should be a glottal check according the book. ˤ) |
| m̌ | m̌/m | Occurs in Singhalese. No description given in Grierson) |
| n | n̪ | not clear if this should be a dental sound. Tamil has an alveolar stop. In general dental nasal stops are present in Indian languages) |
| ṅ̇ | ṅ̇/n | Typo in the data. Should be treated as velar nasal ŋ |
| r | r/ɾ | possibly a flap for Tamil/malayalam. Rest of languages, it could be r. No explanation in the book. |
| ṛ’ | ɽ̊ | weak aspiration |
| r̤ | r̤/r ɻ | retroflex approximant occurs in Malayalam and Tamil |
| ṟˡ | ṟˡ/r | trilled r |
| s̄ | s̄/s | Typo in case of Anal, Bhojpuri |
| š́ | š́/ʃ | skh in Ormuri |
| ṣ̌ | ṣ̌/ʂ | sch in Ormuri |
| s̱ | s̱/s | part of ṯs̱ |
| t̤ | t̤/t | tˤfor ط Arabic. |
| ū’ | ū’/uː | Only occurs in Sakai and Semang. SHould be treated as "uː h" |
| ǖ | ǖ/yː | long variant of ü (y) |
| v | v | ʋ typically common in Indian languages. Alternates between v and w |
| à | à/a | as in German Mann |
| è | è/e | no explanation in the book. Better go with e |
| é | é/e | no explanation in the book. Better go with e |
| ì | ì/i | no explanation in the book. Better go with i |
| í | í/i | no explanation in the book. Better go with i. Three instances |
| ï | ï/ɪ | a centralized vowel |
| ò | ò/o | Typo for ö in Yeinbå. |
| ó | ó/o | Occurs in Rong/Lepcha. Equivalent to o in "for" or "nor" |
| ô | ɔ | no sound in the original transcriptions. Occurs in the language name: Salôn |
| õ | õ | nasalized. No explanation but can assume... |
| ö̌ | ö̌/œ | (̈̌ü dipthong. A very short French eu followed by u. Found in Miao-Hmong |
| ù | ù/u | no explanation in the book. Better go with u |
| ú | ú/u | no explanation in the book. Better go with u |
| ü | y | y: is for German ubel |
| ė | ė/ə | No explanation. Only found once in Annamese (Vietnamese) |
| ě | ě/e | equivalent to ə. occurs in Katurr Palaung |
| ň | ň/n | no explanation in Grierson |
| ũ | ũ | probably nasalized vowel |
| ż | ż/z | no explanation in Grierson |
| ǎ | æ | parsing error. It is part of the ǎ̀ symbol |
| Ǐ | i | no explanation in Grierson |
| ǐ | ǐ/i | no explanation in Grierson |
| ǒ | ɒ | no explanation in Grierson |
| ǔ | ǔ/ʊ | short version of oo in soon, boon. ŏ |
| ǚ | ǚ/y̆ | extra short y |
| ȧ | ȧ/a | It should be å. It is not clearly printed in the original book |
| ȯ | o | Only occurs once in Shodochi for "ten". |
| ȳ | yː | not there in the book |
| ɯ | ɯ | Book shows this form |
| δ̤ | ðʰ | ðˤ version. Ẓāʾ in Modern Standard Arabic |
| δ̱ | d̪ | ˤ version of d̪ |
| ḣ | ḣ/h | Typo. should be ḥ |
| ḥ | ḥ/h | A sound equivalent to visarga in Sanskrit. Essentially h |
| ḳ | ḳ/k | Occurs only in Salon. No explanation in the book |
| ṁ | ṁ/m | as a nasal vowel. typically nasalizes previous vowel and occurs in Sanskrit and borrowings |
| ṃ | ṃ/ṁ | Typo. should be rendered as ṁ |
| ṙ | ṙ/r | typo. should be rendered as ṛ |
| ṟ | ṟ/r | a trilled r |
| ṡ | ṡ/s | better shown as ʃ |
| ṫ | ṫ̪ | Could be a parsing error. Can't locate it |
| ạ | ạ/a | Less rounded ö. Occurs in SHAN. A slightly long variant occurs in Siamese. ø̜ |
| ạ̄ | ạ̄/aː | ø̜ː in Siamese |
| ẹ | ẹ/ɚ | Gheko has this sound mainly. variant between i and e. So ɪ is a good candidate. Occurs in Avestan but no explanation. |
| ị | i | Occurs in Palaung. Supposed to be a modification of i |
| ụ | ụ/u | Less rounded ü. May be y̜. Occurs in Siamese and Shan |
| ꭓʷ | χʷ | xʷ labialized x |
| ꭓ́ | χ | kkh according to the book |
| ^ō̂ | ō̂/oː | One occurrence in Guzuri of Hazara |
Coverage
LSI covers more than 350 language varieties from multiple language families.
Data model
See cldf/README.md for a description of the tables and columns and the entity-relationship diagram for how they relate.
Statistics
- Varieties: 363
- Concepts: 168
- Lexemes: 60,533
- Sources: 1
- Synonymy: 1.14
- Invalid lexemes: 0
- Tokens: 364,236
- Segments: 170 (0 BIPA errors, 0 CLTS sound class errors, 170 CLTS modified)
- Inventory size (avg): 42.32
Contributors
| Name | GitHub user | Role |
|---|---|---|
| Grierson, George Abraham | Author | |
| Taraka Rama | @phylostar | Editor |
| Patrick Lundberg | DataCurator | |
| Christoph Rzymski | @chrzyki | DataCurator |
| Robert Forkel | @xrotwang | Editor |
| Johann-Mattis List | @lingulist | Editor |
CLDF Datasets
The following CLDF datasets are available in cldf:
- CLDF Wordlist at cldf/cldf-metadata.json