Page:Comparative Grammar of the Sanskrit, Zend, Greek, Latin, Lithuanian, Gothic, German and Slavonic languages (Bopp 1885).pdf/23



writing distinguishes the long from their corresponding short vowels by particular characters, slightly differing from these latter in form. We distinguish the long vowels, and the diphthongs ए e and ओ o, which spring from i and u united with an antecedent a, by a circumflex. The simple vowels are, first, the three, original and common to all languages, a, i, u, short and long; secondly, a vowel r, peculiar to the Sanskṛit, which I distinguish by ṛ, and its long sound by ṝ. The short ṛ (ऋ) is pronounced like the consonant r with a scarcely-distinguishable i, and in European texts is usually written rĭ; the long ṝ (ॠ) is scarcely to be distinguished from the union of an r with a long i. Both vowels appear to me to be of later origin; and ṛ presents itself generally as a shortening of the syllable ar by suppression of the a. The long ṝ (ॠ) is of much rarer occurrence. In declension it stands only for a lengthening of the ṛ, where, according to the laws of the formation of cases, a short vowel at the end of the inflective base must be lengthened; and in the conjugation and formation of words, those roots to which grammarians assign a terminating ॠ ṝ almost always substitute for this unoriginal vowel अर् ar, इर् ir, ईर् îr, or, after labials, ऊर् ûr. The last simple vowel of the Sanskṛit writing belongs more to the grammarians than to the language: it is in character, as well as in pronunciation, an union of an ल् l with ऋ ṛ (ऌ), or, when lengthened, with ॠ ṝ (ॡ). We require no representative for this vowel, and shall not further advert to it.

Sanskrit possesses two kinds of diphthongs. In the one,