Collected Articles Of LA Schwarzschild On Indo Aryan 1953 1979

Author(s): Royce Wiles
Publisher: Australian National University

Page 33

186 DECLENSION OF FEMININE NOUNS IN MIDDLE INDO-ARYAN
DECLENSION OF PEMININE SOUNS IN MIDDLE INDO-ARYAN 185 yui could only give-ye in Pali andys - in Prakerity is the role in the Asokan inscriptions (except for thiya in the Shahbazgarhi Edicts). As the final -Gou of the other oblique cases became-dyeby phonetic changes, these cases tended to be confused with the dative and one therefore finds ya used for the dative in Prakrit: ee, the Nanaghit inscription of Western India as Nayanikiya and the Bhaj inscription has the datives jaydyd, Bhadharyd.
The ablative genitive and the locative endings are like the instrumental, derived from the corresponding Sanskrit ending by regular phonetic changes. The genitive and ablative forms in-flik lost the final visarga which rendered them identical with the
of the instrumental - is found occasionally in the Prakrit inscriptions, thus the Bhart inscription of Central India has Pulid (ablative) and Ndgedy (genitive), and with the commal shortening of the final-d we also find-dya. The ending the develops in exactly the same way as that of the instrumental and this nccounts for the inscriptional ye, the standard Prakrite, and the Mail variant-da.
By the rule of shortening of the final vowel after an accented syllable the ending of the locative gave-ym, which is found in the inscriptions of Asoka except in the north, north-west, and east; thus the Gimar inscription has ganandyan. This ending survives into later Prakrit inscriptions and into popular Jain Maharlas, for instance, in the Vasudevahindi. Finalmusvira is extremely weak and tends to disappear, is the case for instance, with the final nasal of the genitive plural ending in Maharastri. There is also a tendency for any ra to disappear with lengthening of the preceding vowel; examples of this have been noted in popular works in Jain Mabinistri, in the Paumacary of Vimalasari and the Vasudevahindi. The loss of the nasal made the locative identical with the other oblique cases and its development was the same. It is thus evident that the confusion between the cases of the oblique of feminine nouns was due to phonetic causes in the literary Prakrits there was no substitution of cases and in the inscriptions and in Pali and Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit and popular Jain Mahirit such a substitution took place only in the dative
Phonetic change alone cannot account for the inconsistencies between Prakrit and Apabhramla in the declension of feminine nouns. In Apabhrama the ending is found only in the instrumental, generally with shortening of the preceding vowel (mile). while the dative, genitive and ablative, and locative have a new ending-headlake) and more rarely-hi-hi. It has been shown by Professor Alsdorf and by Dr. H. C. Bhayani that he was the original ending of all the oblique cases of the feminine except the instrumental, and that the variants in hin, which occur occasionally, are a late and secondary feature in Apabhrama
There are a number of explanations for this ending-he.
A. (i) Pinchel thought that he came from yil, which is found in the genitive ablative singular of the feminine of the pronominal declension in Sanskrit and which has survived in the Pali tassi <Skt. tasyah and Prakrit tiad<ripydh.
(ii) Tagare follows Pischel, but assumes that hi and not he is the correct ending in the locative and that this may be based on the Prakrit all, Sanskrit adhi, usually a verbal prefix
(iii) Professor S. Sen carries Pischel's explanation to the extreme, he adopta, on the whole, the explanation for he, but for the variant in-hye he quotes a prototype bhim, which is a hypothetical IndoAryan ending, parallel to the Greek .
B. Professor Alsdorf regards the ending he as the result of a contamination between the Prakrit oblique in , which survives in the instrumental in Apabhrana and the masculine genitiveablative-dative ending-ha-ho of Apabhramia.
The main failing of Alsdorf's theory is that it leaves the locative unexplained. The Prakrit ending + did not simply, wherever it occurred, become he under the influence of the masculine ending ha, -ho, as there is no evidence of an in the instrumental: the confusion between the oblique cases found in the feminine in Prakrit was not continued by Apabhrama. The--must therefore have been
* Alsdorf, Hara dise, Hamburg, 1930, Introduction, p. 164. *H. C. Bhayan. Puumanariu Buayan , Singhi Jain Serim, No.34, Bombay, 1953, pp. 66
R Pabel, op. cit. p. 200. *G. V. Tagare, Historical roma/Apabile, Poona, 1948, p157.
* Sen, Compartive of Middle Tudo-Arya. Ini Linguistica, xi, 1919-1950, . *L Alsdorf, pobranio-Studies, Hamburg, 1937
pelionation
* S. Upay, Bombay, 15H, 31.
really Singh Jin Series, No 10