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454
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
(DECEXH, 1903.
It is well known that the personal pronouns of the first and second persons, and the reflexive pronoun in Dravidian languages, are formed in the same way. The suffix of the singular is usually n, and that of the plural m. Compare the following table :
We Thon. You. Self. Selvos.
Tamil
... tam
... nên, yân ... nam Malayalam ... sân . năm
...ni .. nó
... nir . Hina
... tan ..
tanna!
Kanarese ... lan, yan, ndnu. am, ndou ... ni, ninu
... nim, nivu ... tanu
... tamu
Kurukh
... en ...
...ém, ndin
...nin
tán
... tâm
Tula
...| gas
... nama, yerkulu?
Kui
... anu
amu
... inu
...tanu
... taru
Gôndi
... nannd
... mamma!
... imma
... immat
Telugu
...l énu, nênu ...ému, mému... nivu, ívu ... fru, miru .. tánu
tdmu
It will be seen from the table that the usual termination of the plural has replaced the old min many cases. That is exactly what has taken place in the Gôndi pronominalsnffix of the second person plural. Compare kit-it, you did. The change of r to is very common in Gôndi in plural forms; thus, kitos-am and Lidtor-am, we do.
The table seems to point to the conclusion that the oldest form for 'I' is an or én, and that for thou' is in, i, or ni. The final » in an and in is certainly a suffix, and is perhaps originally identical with the suffix of the demonstrative pronoun. The personal saffixes & or án, for I,' and i, for which we often find in, for thou 'in Gôndi, are therefore apparently the old personal pronouns, while the pronouns now in actual use in the language have been considerably obanged.
The case is similar in the plural. The pronominal suffix of the first person is am or 8m. For om we often find am which directly corresponds to the forms for 'we' usual in Old-Kanarese and kui. The suffix of the second person plural has already been mentioned. It may be added that the suffix m in all modern Dravidian languages has been confined to the first person plural. In old Tamil, however, we occasionally find this suffix used for all persons of the plaral. Thus, seydum, we, you, or they, did. Similarly we find forms snch as midugum, we, you, or they, do, in old-Kanarese. In such forms there is no distinction of person, and even the distinction of number does not seem to have been necessary in the old Dravidian dialects. Thus Malayalam no more adds the personal terminations to verbs, but uses the uninflected participles instead ; thus, cheyyunnu, I do, &c.; cheydu, I did, &c., for all persons and numbers. The corresponding beydu is used for all the persons of the singular in old Tamil, while m is added in the plural. The oldest Malayalam texts make use of personal terminations like Tamil. It is not, however, probable that they have ever been so commonly used in that dialect as in most modern Dravidian forms of speech. There are even indications that a similar
