CONTRIBUTIONS TO AVESTAN SYNTAX. 585 



junctive and Indicative are most liable to be interchanged. The 

 possible ground for this is the fact that the Subjunctive and the 

 indicative are the most vivid moods. On the other hand, the 

 majority of these interchanges between the Subjunctive and the 

 Indicative are certainly only apparent. They are due to the fre- 

 quent confusion in the Avestan manuscripts of the signs for a 

 and« (compare on this Jackson, Av. Gram., § i8, note i). It is 

 noteworthy that an interchange between the Optative and Indica- 

 tive is scarcely found without some of the manuscripts showing 

 a Subjunctive as well. Especial emphasis is to be laid on the 

 fact that the older the Avestan texts are, the more accurate are 

 the distinctions in the use of the moods. Thus we find that the 

 Gathas are the most exact in their use of Indicative, Subjunctive, 

 Optative, and Injunctive, while in certain portions of the Vendi- 

 dad a confusion reigns which is almost hopeless, so far had the 

 feeling for the language decayed. 



Conclusion. — In the light of the examples which have been 

 given in discussing the problem of the conditional sentences in 

 Avestan, one important fact becomes clear. This fact is that 

 the conditions are capable of exact classification, and that their 

 types are as clearly defined as are those of the conditional sen- 

 tences of Sanskrit or of Greek. More than this, we see that the 

 types of the conditional sentences in Avestan are quite the same 

 as those which meet us in the Vedic language, and that in one 

 instance — the Unfulfilled Condition — the Avestan type is older 

 than the Greek. The inference which is to be drawn from these 

 proofs of the antiquity of the Avestan syntax in regard to the 

 conditional sentences is the necessity of emphasizing the impor- 

 tance of a strict adherence in the interpretation of the Avestan 

 texts to the laws of the great body of Indo-Germanic syntax. 



Columbia University, 

 March, 1899. 



Annals N. Y. Acad. Sol, XII, May 26, 1900 — 37. 



