________________ viii immediately raises the question "Of which words ?" and adds by way of its explanation "Of the popular and of the Vedic"6. Although both Buddha and Mahavira taught their followers in the popular dialects of Magadha regions in about the 6th century B. C., and the language of the masses had undergone many modifications in actual utterance and pronunciation, we can realize from the words, formations and the usages of both the Pali and the Ardhamagadhi that it was in principle more or less the same archaic Vedic , speech in its essentials. During the days of Patanjali, i.e., in the second and third century B. C. all such usages were prevalent in different regions of the world and their use was very wide spread?. That the same language (bhasa) was widely spoken in different dialects in different regions by different people, and that the various differences in the pronunciation of this same speech or words tended to the developments of various dialects, known as Prakrits and Apabhraiias, has also been alluded to by Patanjalis. It is obvious that the natural tendency of simplification and lesser effort in pronunciation was responsible for this process of evolution of different dialects, while the actual fact was that the people in general who actually spoke them could also understand each other. This natural linguistic tendency has been alluded to by Bharata, the author of the Natyasastra', and by Bhartphari, the author of the Vakyapadiyalo. 1.2. This common popular language was not subjected to linguistic analysis by splitting the words into the aspects of a base (prakrti) and termination (pratyaya) in very ancient times", and the language was learnt as a mother-tongue, and was mastered by its being taught by the system of usage of words, as has been referred to by Patanjali"? This was very easy, though extremely long-winding, process for learning practical usage for dayto-day purposes. But for mastering all the aspects of speech with a view to grasp the purport of ancient scriptures of ancient seers it was too lengthy for the short life-span of the human beings, and hence rather impractical13. To this end the process of analysing the speech-words and their relation in the sentences was started in very ancient times by a mythical Indra; he initiated the system of linguistic analysis14, obviously with a view to preserve the Vedas in tact". This process of linguistic analysis of speech into words of different types, and of words into the artificial constituents of base, prefix, suffix, termination, substituent, etc., was undertaken with a view to preserve the speech of the elite (sista) and protect it from the onslaught of the natural tendency of linguistic change; it was known as purification (samskara), and the speech thus purified, was known by the name Samskrta, i.e. Sanskrit. The
