Page:The history of the Bengali language (1920).pdf/216

194 of the Magadha country, we know from the phonetic representation of it in Greek as Palibothra, was once called পালিপুত্রো or পালিপুত্তো; the name Pāli, as a place name, is still in existence in Behar. I think that the people of Ceylon gave the name Pāli to the prākṛta speech in question, as the Buddhist canonical works were obtained by them in the Pāliputto country. Now that we see, that the word Pāṭaliputra could be, or rather was in reality reduced to the form Pāliputto, the objection that the term Pāli cannot come out of Pāṭali, will not be seriously urged. It will certainly be admitted, that the meanings given to the word Pāli by the Siṁhalese, are wholly unknown in the literature of India; once the Siṁhalese gave the name Pāli to the language of the canonical works, the secondary or tertiary meaning of the term could easily come into use in Ceylon.

Since Pāli has never been in use in India, as a term to denote either Prākṛta in general or any special Prākṛta in particular, Prākṛta should be the legitimate name for the language in question; if the Prākṛta of the Tripiṭakas be given a special name, the students of the Prākṛta speeches will be led into the wrong notion, that in the matter of origin and general character, Pāli differs widely and essentially from the other Prākṛtas. To use the word Pāli to signify "Buddhistic Prākṛta," is equally misleading; for the prākṛta in question was not during its currency, the speech of the Buddhists alone. In their canonical works the Buddhists have preserved a class of Prākṛta and the Jainas another; we are not on that account justified to designate those Prākṛtas by the names of those religious sects. I should also notice here another suggestion regarding the origin of the term Pāli: it is urged by some, on the strength of the supposition, that the speeches of the common people were not much in