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$ 20, A.]
INDIAN PALEOGRAHY.
41
As regards the details, the following innovations deserve special mention: -(1) Side by side with more ancient signs, the 4 of col. IV. shows a form lending op to the modern 4 of the Nägart of Western India; compare also pl. IV, 1, IX, XI f. (2) The bar denoting the length of A is attached low down (2, III, IV); compare pl. IV, 2, VII ff. (3) Three strokes, one of which is set up vertically, take the place of the three dots of I (3, III). (4) The horizontal stroke of U occasionally shows a curve at the left end (4, IV). (5) The base of the triangular B(5, IV, V) is mostly at the top; como pare pl. IV, 5, X ff. (6) 1 he khn (, II-V) is mostly triangular below, and its hook is often small. (7) One of the two originally horizontal stroken of ra is always torrred into a curve notched in the middle, and sometimes both are changed in this manner, as in 20, III, IV; occasionally the vertical is split up into two lines, which are attached to the ends of the left horizontal line, each bearing a portion of the curved top-bar (20, V). (8) The ta shows sometimes, but rarely, a loop, as in sti (43, IV). (9) The lower end of da (23, IIT-V) is drawn further to the right, and the bolge on the right becomes larger. (10) The dhe (24, III, IV) becomes narrower and pointed at the ends. (11) The horizontal stroke of Na is cnrved (25, 1II) or looped (25, IV), whereby the still more modern looking form in 25, V, is developed. (12) The ya (31, III-V) mostly has a hook or circle on the left limb, and in ligatures is either looped as in ryya (42, III), or bipartite as in ryyu (41, V). (13) The va is occasionally rounded on the left (34, V), or becomes similar to ca, as in reva (42, 11). (14) The sa (35, III-V) becomes narrower, and its middle stroke lies horizontally across the interior; sometimes the left down-stroke bears a Serif at the end, or the right one is made longer, just as in ga (9, V); compare pl. IV, 36, I ff. (15) The central bar of sa (36, III-V) goes straight across the interior of the letter. (16) The left limb of ra is occasionally, bat rarely, turned into a loop (37, IV); compare plate IV, 38, 1 ff.
All there peculiarities, as well as the advanced forms of the medial vowels, of a in rå (32,IV), of win ku (7, IV, V) and in site (43, V)," and of o in to (21, IV), reappear constantly in the northern alphabets of the next period, those of the Gupta infcriptions (pl. IV, cols I-VII) and of the Bower MS (pl. VI, cols. I-III), or are precursors of the forms of those documents. The literary alphabets used in Mathurā during the first two centuries A. D., very likely were identical with or closely similar to the later ones, and the admixture of older forms. observable in the inscriptions of tire Koşana period, may be due purely to an imitation of older votive inscriptions.
Attention must be called to the medial in tr (21,1V) and [42] in or (34, III), for which we have also once the form of pl. IV, 3, III ; likewise to the rather common final m, which resembles that in ddham (41, VII), and to the Visarga, which looks exactly like the modern one (compare 411, 41, 1X) and first appears in these inscriptions. The broad strokes of the letters and their thick tops indicate that they imitate an alphabet written with ink,
20. - The precursors of the southern alphabets, A. -The alphabet of the Katrapas of Malva and Gujarāt; Plate III. While the inscriptions of Northern India thus show in the first and second centuries A. D. the beginning of the development of a new local variety of the Brahmi, we find in the documents from Western and Central India, as well as from the Dekhag, the first steps leading up to the later southern alphabets. The inscriptions and coins of the Kşatrapa dynasty of Mālva and Gajarāt, descended from Castana or Tiastaner, illustrate the western writing, and col. VI, taken from the Gimar Prasasti of the reign of Rudradaman (about A. D. 160) giver a specimen of it. This peript agrees with the later southern alphabets ($ 27, below) in the following characteristic points : - (1) in the curves at the ends of A and A (1, 2), ka (7), 1 Compare my remarks, EI. 1, 871 ff. ; 2, 197.
Compare the ts of plate II, 48, III. • EI, 1, 389, No. 18.
• Compare, for instance, mal, EI. 1, 882, No. S. • BHĀNPABEAR, Early Hint, of the Dekkan, 28 f., C.CMI. 8-3, BHAGVINIRL, J.RAS. 1890, 642; BÖHLER, Die ind. Inacbr, u das, Alter d. ind. Kunstpoesie, 46 ff.
