The so-called “Smaller Petrograd Dicrtionary†– the German title is Sanskrit-Worterbuch in Kuerzerer Fassung – was started by O.V. Bohtlingk only a few years after the completion, in 1875, of the 7-volume “Larger P.D.†(Which he had worked on in cooperation with R.V. Roth). As stated by Bohtlingk himself in the Preface of 1879, the ‘shorter version’ was not meant to replace the earlier one, but “to improve where something ought to be improved and to always remind the reader by leaving out all the quotations and references, that the larger dictionary had to remain the main sourceâ€. Indeed, whoever wants to know more about a word, i.e., the background and basis of the meanings given for it, still has to turn to the larger P.D. On the other hand, it is equally evident that Bohtlingk has fully achieved his aim: The “Smaller P.D.†is so considerably an improvement both in terms of substance as also of quantity that it has become the tool of all those who wish to read Sanskrit texts. In fact most of the later Sanskrit dictionaries are heavily indebted to Bohtlingk’s work, directly or indirectly; e.g., Monier-Williams’ is little more than a translated abridgement. It is a long left need of Indian Studies that the shorter version, a signal achievement in lexicography is also made available again to present day scholars, and in a reprint which is both good and reasonably priced.
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