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110
Prakrit infinitives are sometimes confused with gerunds. Though Schwarzschild has not suggested any new derivations of the origin of Prakrit infinitive, her paper shows that she is still not very happy with some of the explanations offered by some earlier scholars like Weber, Müller, Pischel and others. The usual practice of tracing the origin of Prakrit -um or ium is from (i) tum and -ttae from Vedic tvayai or tavai along with all its variations -yae, aya, -ae or even -āyāe. In fact, the latter forms are gerunds used infinitively. Though short, her paper on gerund, Some Forms of the Absolutive in Middle Indo-Aryan (No. 5, pp. 37ff), discusses the origin and usages of gerund in Prakrit. There are many gerundial forms in the Middle Indo-Aryan of which two types are noteworty. They are:
tv types: ttā, -ttāṇa(m) -(t)ūṇa(m)
-ccā, -ccāna(m),
.avi, -ivi, -evi
-eppi, eppiņu
ya type -ya, -a, iya, (i)yāṇa(m), -i,
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"The geographical and chronological distribution of these forms are complex", says Schwarzschild, yet she thinks that "(i) samprasaraṇa to tu is perhaps characteristic of the Southern dialects, (2) assimilation to -tt of the Eastern dialects, (3) assimilation to -pp of the Western dialects, while (4) palatalisation to cc is very sporadic (cf. p. 37)". Her explanations need further investigation.
Her papers on adverbs (Quelques Adverbs Pronominaux du Moyen Indien etc. No. 8 pp. 57ff), on conjunctive (Remarques sur Quelques Conjonctions du Moyen Indo-aryen, No. 21 pp. 153ff) and one on indeclinable (The Indeclinable je in Middle Indo-Aryan No. 44, pp. 104ff) and also one on syntax (Some Interrogative Particles in Prakrit, No. 22, pp. 159ff) are straightforward. Some seven or eight papers are devoted to the study of some Prakrit words.
In the Bibliography of the Prakrit Language prepared by S. R. Banerjee (Calcutta, 1977), Schwarzschild's articles published between 1953 and 1960 were included. This shows that a Prakrit bibliographymaker was quite conversant with the rise and growth of a scholar like Schwarzschild. I, therefore, believe that this book will rouse enthu
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