Kansvaho

Author(s): Rama Paniwada, A N Upadhye
Publisher: Motilal Banarasidas

Page 38

INTRODUCTION
XXXVII
lic or, in grammarians' words, non-initial and non-conjunct k, g, c, j, t, d, p, y and v are generally dropped. The rule is a good one for all practical purposes. Even in the earlier nages of Prākrit literature we find that this rule has affected a few initial consonants also in some words : im = kis, ira.= kila, una:= punar, na yānāmi = na jānāmi, ya = ca etc. It only means that these consonants were changed along with the previous words with which they went and thus became non-initial as it were. If at all, in the literary Prakrits, Sanskrit words were to be corrupted into Prākrit, the question may be asked whether a word is to be taken as an unit of corruption or a string of words say as in a compound phrase or in an elegant expression which is conceived by the author primarily in Sanskrit. Common sense demands that simple words should be taken as the units of corruption, and their non-initial and nonconjunct consonants may be dropped according to the above rule. The term 'simple words' included prepositions etc. ; So we have forms like uvažsai, paāsai, pažnna. It also included some compound words of two members of frequent occurrence : kara-ala, dharani-yala, bhamara-ula ; in these words the whole expression is treated as an unit of change. When the initial consonants of the various non-initial members of a compound expression are being elided, softened etc., on a large scale, it only means that the author first conceives an expression in Sanskrit, and then he converts it into Prākrit at a stretch. This difficulty faced the Präkrit grammarians, and Hemacandra (VIII. i. 177) allows an option admitting both forms like jala-cara and jalayara. Aciram and svajana would give aïraṁ and saäņa, but on that account it would not be justified to use iram for ciram and ana for jana when they are independent words. In our text we do come
across some such cases, and both the Mss. agree to adopt the · same reading : iram = ciram (i. 12, 16, ii. 57, iv. 47), ana =