Apbhramsa of Hemchandracharya

Author(s): Hemchandracharya, Kantilal Baldevram Vyas, Dalsukh Malvania, H C Bhayani
Publisher: Prakrit Text Society Ahmedabad

Page 27

The contents of the Apabhramśa grammar in Siddha-Hemacandra can be classified as below :
The phonology of Apabhramśa is discussed in sūtras 329, 396-399, 410-412;
Nominal declensions-the terminations forming them-form the content of sūtras 330-354;
Formation of Feminine stems is discussed in sūtras 400, 431-433;. Pronominal declensions are detailed in sūtras 355-381; Verbal formations form the subject of sūtras 382–389, 438-442; Verbal substitutions are given in stras 390–395;
Adverbs, postpositions, etc. form the subject of sūtras 401, 404-406, 414-420, 423, 428, 436, 444.
Other substitutions are mentioned in sūtras 402, 403, 407-409, 413, 421, 422, 435;
Formation of words are discussed in the concluding sūtras 429430, 434, 437, 443;
The irregularities in gender of Apabhramśa words vis-a-vis Sanskrit are touched in sūtra 445;
While the next sūtra (446) mentions that some Saurasenisms are likely to be encountered in Apabhramśa.
Sūtra 447 deals with the occasional occurrence of some characteristics of one (Prakrit) dialect in another (Prakrit dialect), and the stray use of the terminations of the Present tense to indicate the Past, and vice-versa, while sūtra 448---the concluding sātra of the Prakrit section of सिद्धहेमचन्द्र (i.e. अध्याय ८)-refers to an occasional use of Sanskrit ‘tatsama' words and formations in Prakrit.
VIII The present work was inspired, as mentioned earlier, by Paramaśraddheya, Agama Prabhākara Muni Sri Punyavijayajl somewhere about 1942-43. His mastery over the MIA (Prakrit and Apabhramśa) and early NIA (Old Gujarati etc.) language and literature was simply phenomenal. It was he who studied minutely the immense mass of manuscripts in the great 'jñānabhandāra's at Pātan and other places, classified them and catalogued them, devoting his entire life to this extremely strenuous and most valuable