Page:Vedic Grammar.djvu/73

 1 II. EUPHONIC COMBINATION. VOWELS. a. The short vowel regularly remains unchanged at the end of a verse (even within a hemistich); and often before the caesura of a Triṣṭubh or Jagati Pada (even in terminations otherwise liable to be lengthened) ². b. The final vowel is not lengthened in 1. vocatives (except vṛṣabhā VIII. 4538, and hariyojanā 1. 61¹6); 2. datives in -aya; 3. nom. plur. neuter in -i; 4. verbal forms ending in i and - (excepting imperatives in -dhi and the 3. sing. rákṣati II. 264) ³; 5. the prepositions úpat and ápa (except ápā vrdhi VII. 27²). = c. In some instances final vowels appear to be lengthened before vowels 5 or two consonants 6. 69. Contraction of similar vowels. When a final à ž or ž¹ is followed by corresponding initial à i or ž, contraction resulting in the long form of the respective vowel regularly takes place; e. g. ihásti - ihá asti; indrá indra á; tvagne = tva agne; vidám (VI. 99) = ví idám; a. The contraction of a + a and of й + occasionally does not take place even in the written text of the RV. both at the end of and within a Pāda; thus manīṣá | agníḥ (1.70¹); manīṣá abhí (1.1017); pūsá ásuraḥ (v.51¹), pūsá abhi- (vI. 505), pūsá avistu (x. 26¹d); vīli utá (1. 39²); sú urdhvá(h) (VI. 24⁹); sú utíbhiḥ (1. 112¹-23); the compound suutáyaḥ (vIII. 471-18) 8. b. On the other hand, in many instances where the contraction is written, the original vowels have to be restored in pronunciation with hiatus. The restored initial in these instances is long by nature or position, and the preceding final if long must be shortened in pronunciation "º; e. g. casắt (1. 273) 10; = ca āsát; carcata (1. 155¹) = ca arcata; mápéh = mă apéḥ; mắpsávaḥ må apsávaḥ; mrlatīdý še (IV.57¹)= mrlati idŕše; yántíndavaḥ (IV.472)=yánti indavaḥ; bhavantūksánaḥ (VI. 1647) bhavantu uksánaḥ. After monosyllables, the hiatus is regular in the case of the written contractions ī and ū, especially when the monosyllables are vi and hi; e. g. vindra (x. 32²) vi indra; hindra (1. 1025) ví hi indra II c. Duals in ãī ū are regularly uncombined. Such i and are usually written with hiatus in the Samhita text; the dual a always appears before ¹2, but at the end of internal Padas invariably coalesces in the written text. 70. Contraction of a with dissimilar vowels.-I. When final à is followed by i ž, contraction takes place resulting in e o¹3 respectively; e. g. pitéva pitá iva; ém = á îm; óbhá = á ubha. When a is followed by ?, contraction is never written in the RV. and VS. ¹4, but the metre shows that the combination is sometimes pronounced as ar, as is the case in the compound saptarsáyah 'the seven seers’ ¹5. 5 Op. cit. 60. 6 Cp. WACKERNAGEL I. 265 b, note. - in the 7 There is no example of contracted Samhitās, as never meet; and in the RV. final never occurs (cp. above, p. 59, note 8). 63 ― = L 9 ná 'like', is never combined in pro- nunciation, see above 67; cp. ARNOLD 120. ¹ Apparent exceptions are due to erroneous 8 Cp. BENFEY, SV. XXXIIf.; ROTH, Litte- metrical division of Padas by the editors of ratur 67 f. the Samhitãs, or to mechanical repetition of formulas originally used in a different posi-| tion in the verse. Thus śrudhi | hávam (1.25¹9) appears in imitation of śrudhi hávam which is frequent at the beginning of a verse (II. 11¹, etc.). Cp. OLDENBERG 420 f. 2 See ZUBATY, Der Quantitätswechsel im Auslaute vedischer Wörter, Vienna Or. Journal 2, 315. 3 See ZUBATY, op. cit. 3, 89. 4 See OLDENBERG 399. 10 Long vowels being regularly shortened before vowels; see OLDENBERG 465 f. 11 Cp. ARNOLD 124. 12 Op. cit. 120. Before other vowels, āv, the Sandbi form of au, the alternative dual ending, appears. 13 Because the long monophthongs ē and ō represent IE. či and Ⓡău. 14 The MS. does not contract either, but on the contrary often lengthens à to ā, even where the metre requires contraction. Cp. WACKERNAGEL I, 267 a a, note. ¹5 See GRASSMANN, Wörterbuch p. VII.