1838.] rocks of Girnar in Gujerat, and Dhauli in Cuttack. 273 



The n of the second class, or palatials is an acquisition upon which 

 there is no room to doubt. It is a peculiarity in the Pali language that 

 this letter, which has the pronunciation of ny, both supplies the place 

 in the Sanskrit compound letter jn in such words as rdjnah K[%*>' of a 

 pro fee, and W>UT djnd, * order' — and of •Jj, or ny in such words as ^?g?r: 

 anyatahy else, ^wfif anydni, others ; and in iissr^ manyate, Pali 

 mahhate, deems. Now these and many other examples occur most 

 opportunely in the Girnar inscriptions — the letter "h, with the ne- 

 cessary, vowel, inflections ^ ne % "ft n<i> or ^ no being invariably em- 

 ployed in all such cases ; as in the sixth tablet above quoted, n n A 



rlAXUI TO J_ ahata agena pardkamena : whereas in the Delhi 

 pillars the word ahata, for instance is written ^ '_L A a nnata, with the 

 dental n, the -only one there made known to us, doubled by the anus- 



wara. In this letter "Ji we at once recognize the primitive form from 

 which are regularly deducible the *fl of the No. 2 alphabet ; the ^ of 

 the Tibetan, and the of of the modern Nagari. I should also be strong- 

 ly tempted to deduce from this letter rather than from _]_ the n of the 

 Mahamalaipura alphabet of Babington, J], but I have not closely 

 investigated the subject. 



The next form of n y belonging to the cerebral series, has already 

 been made known to us from the Sainhadri cave inscriptions, X ; an( * tne 

 modern derivative forms were on that occasion described (see page 1045 

 of volume VI.) In the present inscription this n invariably follows the 

 letter r as in Sanskrit ; ex.gr. D*8d II' Dhammacharanam 'the 

 progress of religion.' The vowel affixes are united to the central perpen- 

 dicular stroke as il ± ne, nd, no. A few words written in Sanskrit 

 with the dental », are found in the inscription written with X> as fana- 

 sa, dusanam (7th and 8th tab.) and the same holds good of the gram- 

 matical Pali of books. It should be remembered that in the regular 

 Prakrit, this is the only n which ever stands singly in a word. 



The only letter of the labial series which was yet wanting to us, the 

 ph, is most fortunately recovered through the indubitable expression 

 muldni cha phaldni cha in the second tablet of Girnar — ' both roots and 



fruits' — written O -J J_ d b -J _L d . In the letter b we at once per- 

 ceive the prototype of the X3 of No. 2, and the ^ of the Tibetan alpha- 



"fTM^T ^T5f ^r<®fp?T, * expelling the murderer (from the town or community) 

 they shall give him an alma.' And in the edict regarding animals, — ta se sajivc 

 nojhtipuyitaviye — ' such while life remains shall not he abandoned,' \J^fiT'*Tn? , ?r3j: 

 and in the last tablet for ilhamma niyame nijhuyitd bhut/e, read m^TfJfH^'fr 

 ' the rules of dharraa shall be iu vincible/ 



