In Search of the Original Ardhamagadhi English Translation

Author(s): K R Chandra, N M Kansara, Nagin J Shah, Ramniklal M Shah
Publisher: Prakrit Text Society Ahmedabad

Page 103

In Search of the Original Ardhamāgadhi
K.R. Chandra
(2) Some may have suspected the 'r'- śruti in the 'khetaṇna' and 'nitiya' and so they adopted 'kheyenna' and 'niie', 'niie' only;
(3) Some may have been influenced by the rule of elision, and so thought it necessary to elide medial 't' and 'd' and adopt the reading 'paveia';
(4) Some may have felt the change of 'j' to 'nn' as improper (i.e. going against the phonetic rule of Prakrit), and so changed it to 'nn' in accordance with the grammatical rule.
In these adopted readings :
(1) There is Pāli too, as in pavedita;
(2) There is Pāli and Ardhamāgadhi too, as in samecca; (3) There is Ardhamāgadhi too, as in logam;
(4) There is Mahārāṣṭrī too, as in loyam, niie, kheyanna; and
(5) There are, on the other hand, the linguistic peculiarities of the Eastern region during the Ashokan period as in 'logam', 'niie' and (kheya) nne(him). It seems, from this analysis, that as a result of all these, the Ardhamāgadhi language as is found at present is practically a hotchpotch' of many Prakrit (languages) dialects.
In whatever manuscripts that were availed of by each of the editors, there were variant readings too, but they have left out some of them. In fact, if considered from the viewpoint of historical development of the Prakrit (M.I.A.) languages, there were preserved in some or the other Mss. the archaic elements (i.e. retention of medial consonants of the original language; but they were not at all taken into consideration. For instance :
(1) The variant reading 'khettannehim was available there in the Cūrṇi and in the G manuscript, those were utilised by Schübring;
(2) The variant reading 'khettannehim' was there in the C manuscript utilised for the JVB. edition;
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