Page:A Comparative Grammar of the Modern Aryan Languages of India Vol 1.djvu/82

60 right one, you will find the tendency to give a curve to all written lines will gradually result in a form similar to the Panjabi letter; whereas, if on the contrary you follow down the right limb first, and then taking the pen off, make the left limb separately, the result will be the Kutila t, from which come the Nagari and others.

The th is apparently a modification of the Kutila, due like the last letter to a different way of writing. In the Kutila the little top loop is first formed, and then, without taking off the pen or graver, the larger loop, and then the upright stroke. The Panjabi scribe, however, formed the large loop first, and taking off his pen, made a stroke across it, separating it into two parts, in order to produce the effect of the two loops, in which attempt he has signally failed, turning out something more like a ष than a थ.

There is a curious similarity between dh and p in Panjabi. The former is written प with the character used in Nagari for p, while the p is indicated by the same character with the top open. In this it adheres closely to the Kutila, which adds a small side stroke to the dh, which in early alphabets is an oval, grape-shaped letter, and thus produces a character closely resembling प; the double semicircle of the Nagari ध is quite modern.

In n again Panjabi preserves an archaic form, and the same remarks apply to this letter as to t. The Panjabi n is that of Asoka’s inscriptions, with the horizontal footstrokes sloped downwards and curved. The Gupta, Vallabhi, and Kutila forms arose from trying to form the letter by one continuous stroke without taking the pen or graver off. The Tibetan exactly reproduces the Kutila in its ན.

In ph we have another piece of antiquity. The form of this letter is identical with the Nagari ढ ḍh. In the Asoka character the ḍh and ph are almost the same; the former having a curved downstroke, the latter a straight one. This is