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Nāsaketari Katha
the text: that is, we cannot say for certain to which sub-division of Rājasthānī it more especially belongs. If it were, e.g., written in a Thali-dialect (i.e., 'Western Māravāḍī' )· - as I suppose it really is (cp. p. 8) the old unstressed final a would still be audible (as it often is in modern Thali : cp. Linguistic Survey Vol. IX, Part II, p. 109), and, therefore, 'inherent a' would have to be expressly transcribed in many cases in which it is mute (or nearly mute) in every other modern ( ! ) Rājasthānī-dialect.
(b) But even if the dialectal origin of our text were proved beyond a doubt, it would be a petitio principii to assume all the phonetic peculiarities of a modern vernacular to have existed in an old one already, the special phonetic character of which has yet to be found out. Thus, the values of,, and 3, 3, of, of anusvāra etc. in earlier texts are not yet exactly known, nor do we know where and when e.g., 'inherent a' means a kind of svarabhakti-vowel or a remnant of an old unstressed a respectively, or is mute1.
(c) Several words (especially names of hells: cp. VII. 83 Note) are, in the manuscript, given in so corrupted forms that sometimes neither their meaning can be guessed at, nor their Samskṛta (or other ) equivalents ascertained, nor yet their proper phonetic shape.
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(d) In some propernames (e.g., fatura, fazyчfa), popular etymology may have exercised an influence, but we do not know how far, nor whether on their actual pronuciation or merely on their spellings (cp. the name of the hero and its explanation in adhyāya 1-2!).
Jain Education International
1. Questions which, according to my opinion, cannot be finally decided without a thorough investigation of the general phonetic character of numerous similar texts. As to the methods to be employed here, may suffice to refer e.g., to Professor Sievers' treatment of the relations between Otfrid's spelling and phonology in 'Aufsätze zur Sprach und Literaturgeschichte f. W. Braunme', Dortmund 1920, p. 148 ff.
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