I feel very happy in pronouncing before the scholarly world the English version of E. Blochet's Studies in the Pahlavi Grammar translated by Pranabesh Sinha Ray from a French original. Though before Blochet we have Spiegel's Grammatik der Huzvaresch Sprache (Vienna, 1856), the edition of the Frahang-i Oil and the Sassanian Frahang ('Old Zand-Pahlavi' and 'Old Pahlavi Pazand' glossaries) by Hoshangji and Haug, Bombay and London, 1867-1870. Manuel de Pahlavi of de Harlez (Paris 1880). Blochet's book, though small in size, weighs very heavily in contents, and excels many of his predecessors and even overshadowed many of his successors. Pahlavi, otherwise known as Middle Persian, belongs to one of the middle Iranian languages. to the line of Old Persian which is known to us through a series of Cuneiform Inscriptions of the Achaemenian period (B.C. 530-331). Pahlavi was the spoken and literary language of Sassanian period (? 1st century AD to 651 AD). Pahlavi is represented by Huzvaresh and Pazand. In this book the author has used many scripts, such as, Aramaic, Hebrew, Perso-Arabic, Chinese to strengthen his cases.
I believe this book will help the scholars to understand something about the Pahlavi language. This publication perhaps would not have seen the light of the day, but for the active co-operation of Dr. S. R. Banerjee, the present Library Secretary of the Society. I also thank our staff members of the Publication Section for their promptitude in doing any work. I shall be glad and happy if the book is received well by the scholarly world.
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