Page:Sanskrit Grammar by Whitney p1.djvu/73

 of an  or -vowel: e. g.  or,  or ,  or ,  or. For the most part, doubtless, these are only two ways of writing the same pronunciation,, , and so on; and the discordance has no other importance, historical or phonetic. There is more or less of this difference of treatment of an - or -element after a consonant in all periods of the language.

e. In the older language, there is a marked difference, in respect to the frequency of vowel-combination for avoiding hiatus as compared with that of non-combination and consequent hiatus, between the class of cases where two vowel-sounds, similar or dissimilar, would coalesce into one (126, 127) and that where an - or -vowel would be converted into a semivowel. Thus, in word-composition, the ratio of the cases of coalesced vowels to those of hiatus are in RV. as five to one, in AV. as nineteen to one, while the cases of semivowel-conversion are in RV. only one in twelve, in AV. only one in five; in sentence-combination, the cases of coalescence are in both RV. and AV. about as seven to one, while those of semivowel-conversion are in RV. only one in fifty, in AV. one in five.

f. For certain cases of the loss or assimilation of and  before  and  respectively, see 233 a.

130. As regards the accent — here, as in the preceding case (128), the only combination requiring notice is that of an acute - or -vowel with a following grave: the result is circumflex; and such cases of circumflex are many times more frequent than any and all others. Examples are:

व्यु॑ष्टि ; अभ्य॑र्चति ;

नद्यौ॑ ;

स्वि॑ष्ट ; तन्व॑स्.

a. Of a similar combination of acute with following grave, only a single case has been noted in accented texts: namely,  (i.e. : ÇB. xiv. 6. 811); the accentuation is in accordance with the rules for  and.

131. Of a diphthong, the final - or -element is changed to its corresponding semivowel, य् or व्, before any vowel or diphthong: thus, ए  (really : 28 a) becomes अय् , and ओ  (that is, : 28 a) becomes अव् ; ऐ  becomes आय् , and औ  becomes आव्.

a. No change of accent, of course, occurs here; each original syllable retains its syllabic identity, and hence also its own tone.

b. Examples can be given only for internal combination, since in external combination there are further changes: see the next paragraph. Thus,

नय ; नाय  ;

भव ; भाव.