________________
SEPTEMBER, 1892.]
THE INSCRIPTIONS OF PIYADASI.
265
What about the literary Mahârâshtri? We know, in the first place, that the grammarians distinguish two varieties, the ordinary Maharashtri, which is that of Hâla and of a portion of the poetry of the plays, and the Mahârâshtri of the Jainas. We can for the moment neglect the shades which distinguish these two groups; taken as a whole, they closely resemble each other, as we should expect in the case of dialects which, bearing the same name, must have sprung up in the same soil. Between this literary idiom, and that of the monuments, numerous points of difference leap to the front the moment we examine them. We must consider these differences more closely.
-
The literary orthography ordinarily weakens into the corresponding sonant the hard; I have quoted above, from the inscriptions, the spellings mukuda, váḍaka, dhénukakada, kuḍumbini, sádakani, sáḍagéré, padidátava, padithapita, &c., by the side of the more usual writing which retains the consonant as in the standard Sanskrit. The literary language readily weakens p into bor v, and it completely elides the medial t; I have quoted above the sporadic spellings thuba for thúpa (stúpa), goyama for gautama (mi). The grammarians teach that a soft consonant between two vowels is elided; in the monuments, we have met words like bhayamta, bhaamta, beside bhadamita, siaguta for sivagupta, pavaïta and pavayita for pavajita, bhoigi and bhóa for bhojiki and bhoja, payuna and páüna for pádona, uyaraka beside ovaraka, chiarika, beside the usual chivarika, paithana for padithana, representing pratishthana. The locative singular of bases in a is formed in the Prâkṛit of literature in é, and more usually in ami; if in the monuments it is almost always formed in é, we, nevertheless, find examples like jambudipamhi (Karli No. 10, Arch. Surv. IV. 91); and, beside the locative tiraṇhumbi, the spelling tiranhumi (i. e., tiranhummi) (Arch. Surv. p. 106, No. 14). So, also, baimani beside baihmhana in the same dedication. These instances prove that the termination mhi was altered, in a manner more or less constant, into ammi in the vulgar pronunciation.
The y is constantly changed into j in the regular writing, and, consequently, yy into jj, and the group rya into jja, through an intermediate yya. Cases like sihadhayánam, (C. T. I., p. 31), No. 7; for "dhajúnamh, váṇiyiyasa, p. 16, No. 20, puyatham, Kanh. No. 98, ráyámacha, Arch. Surv. IV. p. 99, No. 4 (perhaps we might add bhoya beside bhoja), prove that in real pronunciation there was no distinction between y and j. Elsewhere, beside learned spellings like áchariya (C. T. I., p. 100), ácharia, Kanh. No. 17, we meet the forms ayyaka, Kanh. No. 19, C. T. I., p. 60, No. 2; bhayayá, C. T. I., p. 43, No. 6, &c., payavasdné, Arch. Surv. p. 114, No. 22; and the sporadic spellings, bhajaya, Kanh. 19, 27; bharijáyé, Nâs. 22; bhadrajanijja, Kanh. 27, beside pániyya, do not permit us to doubt that, between the grammars and the inscriptions, the difference was purely apparent, and simply graphic. I could quote other details, and, compared with the sûtras I. 29; III. 129, of Hêmachandra, point out, in the monuments, the spellings átévúsini, Kanh. 28, Kuda 22, idágni, Arch. Surv. IV. 114, No. 3, &c., dô, Kanh. No. 3, beside bé (Mahad. 1), or vé (Junnar, 14).
These comparisons suffice to put in its true light the character of the grammatical dialect. It is founded on the same local basis as the idiom of the monuments: both represent the same language but at slightly different periods of its history: both modify its appearance by an orthography which is in part arbitrary, but dominated in each case by divergent predilections. The one, when it is inspired with learned recollections, ordinarily chooses as its standard the least altered etymological form: the other goes, so to speak, to the extreme limit of existing corruptions; it prefers to take the most advanced facts of phonetic deterioration, as the level which grammatical elaboration imposes with a more or less absolute regularity on the system which it has consecrated.
The arbitrary constructions of the school can, of course, work in more then one direction. We must expect not only to find different tendencies, but also to meet both partial instances of unfaithfulness to the regulative tendency, and also elements and distinc
5 Jacobi, Kalpa Sutra, Introd. p. xvii.
