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Geminates after long vowel in Indo-Aryan

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 December 2009

R. L. Turner
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Extract

In the central and eastern inscriptions of Aoka (Kls, Dhauli, and Jaugaḍa, Pillar Edicts and Minor Rock Inscriptions) a long vowel of Sanskrit whenfollowed by a double consonant or a consonant-group is shortened (e.g. tt att) as generally in Pali and Prakrit. But the long vowel is retained in the Girnr inscription and in some of the Pillar Edicts and Minor Rock Inscriptions. In the Girnr forms the consonant following the long vowel still representeda geminate; whether or not it still did so in the other inscriptions atthat date cannot be ascertained. Although the distinction of length is not shownin Kharoṣṭh writing, the long vowel before geminates was certainly maintainedin the language of the Shhbzgaṛh and Mnsehr versions, for the longvowel in this position is still preserved in the North-Western languages: Sindh, Lahnd, Western Panjb, Kshmr (not so demonstrably in other Dardic languages) and some West Pahari dialects.

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Articles
Information
Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , Volume 30 , Issue 1 , February 1967 , pp. 73 - 82
Copyright
Copyright School of Oriental and African Studies 1967

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References

1 Abbreviations of language names as in A comparative dictionary of the Indo-Aryan languages, with in addition Brahmagiri (br.) and Siddpur (sd.).

2 Hultzsch, Corpus inscriptionum Indicarum, I, p. lxxiv, cii, cxiv, and cxxiv.

3 Hultzsch, op. cit., p. lix; Turner, BSOS, VI, 2, 1931, 535Google Scholar; Turner, Indian Linguistics, IV, 16, 1934, 161.Google Scholar

4 e.g. (including those quoted by Hultzsch, loc. cit.)ppotave (prpnti) in ru. br. sd., mahtp, pena (mahtman-) in br. sd., mahmt (mahmtra-) in br. sd. sn. (also in top. beside lajk *rjjk in gir. rjk); see below for -dkhinge (*dkṣiṇ) dghvuse (drghyus-), dhti (dhtr-),-ytaṁ (ytr-), lti (ratr-), -ste (stra-.

5 Turner, Proceedings and transactions of the second Oriental Conference, Calcutta, 1922, 493; Jules Bloch, Indo-Aryan. English edition, 1965, 41.Google Scholar

6 See p. 77, below.

7 This shortening of geminate occlusives or of nasal and occlusive with lengthening of a preceding vowel dates from about the second century A.D. in Sinhalese (Wijeratne, P. B. F., BSOAS, XII, 1, 1947, 163;CrossRefGoogle Scholar XIX, 3, 1957, 486) and was carried through in the areas of India where it occurred by at least the ninth or tenth century A.D. This process of compensatory lengthening began in Old Indo-Aryan with the loss of z, ẓ before d(h), ḍ(h). It was extended to the groups ṁ h or r or sibilant (Pa. sha-, Pk. shaya- siṁh-, saṁhṛta-; Pa. visati- viṁat-; Pa. srajjti, Pk. sra saṁrajyat, saṁracayati), and finally to -ss- (most frequently in mh. and amg. Prakrit according to Pischel, Grammatik der Prakrit-Sprachen (Gr. Pk.), 62, 64). The long vowels which Pischel held to have developed from short vowels before other geminates are accounted for otherwise: k(d)uṁ and k(d)avva- etc. krtum and kartavyv- are due to the influence of roots in (BSOS, VI, 2, 1931, 535), dhava- and nṇei etc. to that of other compounds with regular d- and n (dus and nis before initial d- or sibilant). For vga- vlka- (not valk-), phguṇa- phguna- (not phlguna-), gyari- *grgar- (not gargar-) see below.Google Scholar

8 Indo-Aryan, 92.

9 Gr. 87.

10 In La formation de la langue marathe, 217, he goes no further than to specify somewhere in Hindustan.

11 In this he is followed by Lders, Beobachtungen, tber die Sprache des Buddhistischen Urkanons, 118; S. K. Chatterji, Origin and development of the Bengali language, 254; Geiger, Sinhalese grammar, 17; Wijeratne, , BSOAS, XI, 3, 1945, 588.Google Scholar

12 Figures in brackets refer to the head-words in A comparative dictionary of the Indo-Aryan languages.

13 Pischel, Gr. Pk., 64, wrongly dkṣiṇa.

14 The generally accepted derivation of these forms from dṁṣṭra- leaves both MIA. -th- and S. P. -- unexplained.

15 So Pischel, Gr. Pk., 66, and Lders, op. cit., 118, but sḍh- wrongly liṣṭi-.

16 MIA. *vṭa- or vaṭṭa-. Though derivation of bar *vṭa- like that of (v)ro *ṭa- would separate them from Gy. pal. watăṭ *vaṭṭa- and ăts *ṭṭa-, there is apparently similar distinction in Dardic between Pas wṛ and Gaw. wṭ etc.

17 For tt tr see below.

18 Rather than with Mayrhofer, EWA, II, 491, as having a different suffix.

19 Indian Linguistics, IV, 16, 1934, 1614.Google Scholar

20 Mayrhofer, Handbuch des Pali, 43, wrongly valk-.

21 A bweichend von alien anderen Dialekten bleibt die Lnge in AMg. sehr hufig vor Suffix -tra das zu -ẏa aus -ta wird , Gr. Pk., 87.

22 Only in Abhidhnappadpik: W. Geiger, Grammatik des Pali, 43, 7.

23 As in Pischel, Gr. Pk., 55.

24 Turner, The position of Romani in Indo-Aryan, 30.