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L A. SCHWARZSCHILD
(148.26). In the few verse sections of this text locatives in -mmi are found without any special emphasis: bhavanasamuddamajjhammi 'in the middle of this ocean of existence' (322.26). The same situation prevails in the Māhārāstrī texts edited by Jacobi (1886). The distribution of locative endings in the Vasudevahindi is thus not a random one, the use of -e as opposed to -mmi shows the difference between early Māhārāştri prose and verse style.
In later narrative texts -mmi is more prevalent but the usage is still not indiscriminate. The locative in -e prevails in the following conditions:
(a) in nouns rather than in adjectives (b) in formulaic expressions and fixed locutions
(c) in the immediate environment of the verb. This is evident as a general tendency, though not as an absolute rule in Māhārāstrī, Jain Māhārāştrī and Jain Saurasenī, though there are numerous stylistic differences between the various texts. There is evidence of this tendency sometimes even in verse, e.g. in the Dharmopadešamālā-vivarana where the distinction in the locative ending may serve as a means of differentiating a noun from an adjective: patte pattammı (p. 2, v. 3) which is rendered in the commentary by pătre (noun, locative), prapte (adjective, locative). This distinction is most noticeable in the prose of the Kuvalayamālā:
ruddammi bhava-samudde tulagga-laddhammi kaha vi manuyatte (adj.) (noun) (adj.)
(noun) ‘in this most dreadful ocean of existence where birth as a human being is obtained only by the rarest chance' (p. 2.1.12). erisammı ya samaye 'and at such a time' (195.1) (adj.) (noun) dīharammi samsāre 'in this long circuit of mundane existence'. (adj.) (noun)
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