64 



ON THE ORIGIN OF 



therefore be regarded more in the light of a verb of affirmation, 

 than as a pronoun. This appears to be the case when we examine 

 another use of the expression which is identical in the Sinhalese : 

 e. g., mei tan Tamil, sebce tam-a-i Sinhalese, 'it is indeed true,' or 

 ironically, poi tan, Tamil— boru tam-ai 'false indeed !' Sinhalese. 



But whether we accept this (tan==tama) as a pronoun or a noun 

 derived from the Sanskrit atman, it may be affirmed that the only 

 Sinhalese reflexive pronoun which the books adopt, and which the 

 Dravidian dialects do not possess, is siya, from the Sanskrit svayam 

 so near the Latin sui, sibi, and se. 



The Sinhalese, like the Sanskrit, is devoid of a simple pronoun 

 of the third person. The Sidatsangara gives e (remote) and me 

 ^proximate.) This looks like the Zend he, and the Prakrit se, for 

 sve ; for the s is changed in our language, as in the Prakrits, to h, 

 and that consonant is sometimes altogether omitted, leaving but 

 the vowel which was inherent in the original word. The Sin- 

 halese also possesses another word oku for the third person singu- 

 lar. Its affinity to the Zend hoi, to which, as pointed out by 

 Bopp, the Greek oi is similar, is very clear. This pronoun, so 

 different from the Tamil, is in common use amongst us, and may 

 be traced to a variety of dialects. See Caldwell's Dravidian 

 Grammar, p. 298. 



The demonstrative bases in the Tamil seem to be a (remote,) 

 and i (proximate;) e. g., apporadu ; that time ,' ipporadu 'this time;* 

 I shall here compare the Tamil demonstratives, with the Sinhalese, 

 which bear some similarity in the sense in which they are applied 

 although there is as much dissimilarity in their formation. 

 Tamil. Sinhalese. 

 A-adu (remote) e (remote) ' that * 



A-van e ka ' that person ' 



A-n-gu e-tena * that there * 



A-ndru e-da * thatdaj' 



Here the Sinhalese e is from the Bengali e; and the Tamil a as 



