Page:The history of the Bengali language (1920).pdf/206

184 was presumably a dialectic form which made its way into Sanskrit. In Sūtra literature, it is মাতুল which was no doubt taken from the popular speech. The popular word was wrongly sought to be derived from a Vedic stem, and as such মাতুল was imagined to be a vaiiant of মাতুর, and then the curious word মাতুর্ভ্রাতা was coined as the supposed original word in the Maitrāyaṇi Samhitā.

(10) মন্মথ.—I have shown in a previous lecture that this purely Prākṛta word was adopted on account of long use in the Classical Sanskrit, but failing to derive it properly from মনস্ o£ Sanskrit (which was only মন in Prākṛta), a rule of exception was invented for its justification.

(11) বিধবা.—In the Vedic speech বিধু means 'alone' and বিধু with the feminine suffix আ became বিধবা (a widow); there was no ধব in the Vedic speech to dominate this বিধবা and we get a Vidova in Italian, for example without any masculine form for it. As বি (vi) was wrongly thought to be the initial উপসর্গ, বিধবা was derived as a woman who lost her never existent ধব; ধব is a pseudo-Sanskrit word. (12) বিশ্যা, a courtesan, signified in derivation a woman who was accessible to the Vis or the Aryan people in general. When the corrupt Prākṛta form Vissā was purified, an imaginary origin of the word was sought in the dress, etc., of the displayer of beauty, and hence Veśya (from Veśa), was used as the correct form. (13) শুতুদ্রী of Vedic use was made a শতদ্রু by imagining a hundred streamlets for the river.

(14) সরল—signifies 'a species of pine tree' as well as 'straight.' The original Vedic for the class of the pine tree is শরল (the tree which is straight like a শর); the word সরল occurs in the Brāhmaṇa literature after the pronunciation of the common people.

It is notorious that the Classical Sanskrit has swelled with words of Prākṛta and Deśi origin; as these words are