Staal nambUtiri claim

Frits Staal made a claim that certain nambUtiri-s recite udAtta in high-pitch pada & “ratha-pATha”. He claimed this was retention of ancestral style of veda recitation or even accented Skt speech as recorded by pANini’s statement of “ucchair udAttaH | All other veda recitation, including nambUtiri’s reciting taittirIya only raise svarita nor udAtta.

Staal claims that this is a post pANini development that spread throughout India. We hold that this hypothesis is not parsimonious & hence, flawed especially given that svarita is most conserved feature of veda recitation. Hence, uchchair udAttaH remains an unsolved problem with likely meaning being simply hand gesture.