[XeTeX] Polyglossia and Sanskrit

[Robert Zydenbos]

Yves Codet schreef:

> I am extending "hyph-sa.tex" (Sanskrit hyphenation patterns) so as to  
> incorporate Gujarati script. [...]

> I wonder if this behaviour of Polyglossia should not be changed.  
> Actually Sanskrit has no proper script, or it has many. If Devanagari  
> is often preferred nowadays if does not mean that it is *the*  
> Sanskrit script. I would be interested to know what members of the  
> list think.

You are perfectly right. [Deva]Nagari was popularized as "the" script 
for Sanskrit by the British after the founding of the first three modern 
universities of India in Madras, Calcutta and Bombay, so that Sanskrit 
scholars could read publications from all three of them knowing only one 
script. But still today, Sanskrit texts are also being printed 
throughout India in the script of the local modern language (Kannada, 
Bengali, Grantha in Tamilnadu,...).

I imagine that it ought to be relatively easy to adjust the Polyglossia 
package, since all the Brahmi-origin scripts of India are abugida 
scripts, having the same structure. Perhaps the demand that Devanagari 
is to be used can simply be removed, somehow.

RZ