Page:Comparative Grammar of the Sanskrit, Zend, Greek, Latin, Lithuanian, Gothic, German and Slavonic languages (Bopp 1885).pdf/33

CHARACTERS AND SOUNDS. 11 a remarkable accordance with the Sanskrit rule of euphony before mentioned. From laupsin-u. "I praise," therefore comes laupsinau, "I shall praise;" as in Sanskrit fa hansydmi, "I shall kill," from the root han. In the Prakrit, not only them, but then, at the end of words, has always fallen into Anuswâra, without regard to the follow- ing letters Thus we read in Chezy's edition of the Sakun- talá, p. 70, ***, which is certainly to be pronounced, not bhaaram, but bhaavan, for na bhagavan; kudhan, for kutham.

The second of the signs before mentioned is named Visarga, which signifies abandonment. It expresses a breath- ing, which is never primitive, but only appears at the end of words in the character of an euphonic alteration of स् 8 and र.. These two letters (s, r) are very mutable at the end of words, and are changed into Visarga before a pause or the deadened letters of the guttural and labial classes. We write this sign h to distinguish it from the true DEV h.

The proper consonants are classed in the Sanskrit alphabet according to the organs used in their pronunciation; and form, in this division, five classes. A sixth is formed by the semi-vowels, and a seventh by the sibilants and the DEV h. In the first five ranks of these consonants the single letters are so arranged, that the first are the surd or hard consonants, the thin (tenues), and their aspirates; next, the sonant or soft, the medials, and their aspirates, each class being completed by its nasal. The nasals belong, like the vowels and semi-vowels, to the sonants; the sibilants to the surd or hard. Every thin and every medial letter has its corresponding aspirate. The aspirates are pronounced, like their