id	author	title	date	pages	extension	mime	words	sentences	flesch	summary	cache	txt
en-wikipedia-org-2896		Vedas - Wikipedia			.html	text/html	14915	1633	72	The emphasis in this transmission[note 9] is on the "proper articulation and pronunciation of the Vedic sounds," as prescribed in the Shiksha,[76] the Vedanga (Vedic study) of sound as uttered in a Vedic recitation,[77][78] mastering the texts "literally forward and backward in fully acoustic fashion."[79] Houben and Rath note that the Vedic textual tradition cannot simply be characterized as oral, "since it also depends significantly on a memory culture."[80] The Vedas were preserved with precision with the help of elaborate mnemonic techniques,[21][22][23] such as memorizing the texts in eleven different modes of recitation (pathas),[70] using the alphabet as a mnemotechnical device,[81][82][note 10] "matching physical movements (such as nodding the head)[disputed – discuss] with particular sounds and chanting in a group"[83] and visualizing sounds by using mudras (hand signs).[84] This provided an additional visual confirmation, and also an alternate means to check the reading integrity by the audience, in addition to the audible means.[85] Houben and Rath note that a strong "memory culture" existed in ancient India when texts were transmitted orally, before the advent of writing in the early first millennium CE.[82] According to Staal, criticising the Goody-Watt hypothesis "according to which literacy is more reliable than orality,"[86] this tradition of oral transmission "is closely related to Indian forms of science," and "by far the more remarkable" than the relatively recent tradition of written transmission.[note 11]	./cache/en-wikipedia-org-2896.html	./txt/en-wikipedia-org-2896.txt