Page:Vedic Grammar.djvu/70

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I. Allgemeines und Sprache. 4. Vedic Grammar.

traction. Thus a appears as am before e and 0; e. g. ghanenaiBekas (i. ZJ,''); a appears am before ^ <? r; q. g. yamynamcaye {Y.2,0^'^); while the prepositions (7 'near', and wa 'together', are nasalized before any vowel; q. g. sdcam^udydn. The vowel a once appears as ayn before r in vipanydmytdsya (iv. i'^), following the regular rule that unnasalized a is shortened before r in the RV. b. Consonants are liable to change of mode of articulation and, to some extent, of place of articulation.

1. Final mutes, whether tenuis, media, or aspirate, are without distinction represented by the corresponding tenuis; e. g. durat (111.593) = durdd ^iroxa afar'; usar-bhut (i. 65') = usar-bi'idh 'waking at dawn'.

2. The palatals c and / revert to the original guttural, becoming k; thus arvdk (i. 118^) = arvdc 'coming hither'; su-yi'ik = su-yuj 'well yoked'. The old palatal y, however, becomes /, e.g. rat ij. i2i3), m. £ 'king', 'queen', = raj; in rtvik, however, it becomes the guttural, = rtvlj 'priest' {{xovayaj- 'sacrifice') ^.

3. The ritual exclamations vdsat (x. iis') and srdusat (i. 139'), which are probably modified forms of the 3. sing. aor. subj. of »«/?- 'carry', and srti- 'hear'*, have t for i owing to the analogy of the exclamations vdtiys.), vat (TS.), 3. sing. aor. of Yvah-^.

4. The nasals occurring as finals, «, n, m^, remain unchanged. Of these, n and m are very common; but n is found very rarely and only secondarily after the loss of a following k (representing an original palatal; e. g. prsfi for *prdnk, from prdnc-). Probably no instance of final n can be found in Vedic Mantras. The palatal n never occurs, since final palatals become guttural (b, 2).

a. In the rare instances in which a radical m becomes final after dropping a following -t or -s, it appears as n owing to the influence of the dental; thus ddn (= *dam-s) 'of the house' {dam-)T; d-kran (^=*d-kram-t), 3. sing. aor. of kram- 'stride'; d-gan (= *a-gam-s, *a-gam-t), 2. 3. sing, aor., a-Jagan {=*ajagam-i), 3. sing, plup., aganTgan (VS.), 3.sing. intv. of gam- 'go'; d-yan {= *a-yam-s-t), 3. sing. aor. of yam- 'reach'*.

5. The semivowels y v /^ do not occur as finals, r is represented by Visarga; thus pi'mar 'again', is written punah'^°.

6. The sibilants and h are all changed when final.

a. The dental s, which is by far the commonest of final sibilants, becomes Visarga; e. g. ketus is written ketuh (iii. 61 3).

^. The cerebral s, which is very rare as a final, becomes cerebral / in sdt 'six', for sds; -dvit 'hating', for -dvis; vi-prut (AV.) 'sprinkling'.

1 The ritual interjection 6m (VS.) may be due to the nasalization of an original prolated (cp. RPr. xv. 3). Thus the JUB. I. 24. 3ff., mentions the pronunciations o as well as om, both of which it rejects in favour of om.

2 O^. RPr. I. 13; Whitney on APr. 1.43,

3 Cp. Wackernagel I, 149 a a.

4 Cp. above 42 c (p. 34).

5 Loc. cit.

6 Final m is often incorrectly written as Anusvara in Mss. (as conversely in Prakrit Mss. m is often written as m under Sanskrit influence: cp.PlscHEL.Grammatik derPrakrit- Sprachen, in this Encyclopedia, 339, 348), and their example is sometimes followed in printed editions.

7 In the K. also occurs the 'form a-nSn = *-!iSm-s-i, from nam- 'bend'. The SB. has prasan 'painless', ^= *pra-sam-s.

8 See 46 d, /?.

9 Final / is spoken of as occurring rarely (Wackernagel i, 260 c), or as very rare (Whitney 144), but I have been unable to find a single example in the Vedas (or even in post-Vedic Sanskrit). But though no etymologically final / seems to occur either in pausa or in Sandhi, it is found as a sub- stitute for d in two or three words in the later Sainhitas (see above 52 d, p. 45).

10 When h stands for etymological r, this is indicated by an added iti in the Pada- patha; e. g. piinar iti (x. 8518).