66 



ON THE ORIGIN OF 



relations as the above, yet it would seem that the latter have no 

 more relation to the former than the Sinhalese have to the same. 

 The interrogatives kd-kd, kd-ki, koka, kavara are all from the San- 

 skrit base ka, and are allied to the North-Indian. Although I have 

 shewn an inanimate ko-ka, yet it must be remembered that this is 

 a usage of comparatively recent times, for inanimate objects as I 

 have shewn under the head of gender. 



Inseparable Prepositions. 



If one circumstance, more than any other favors my position 

 that the Sinhalese bears a close affinity to the Sanskrit, and is not 

 allied to the Dravidian, it is to be found in the unmistakeable iden- 

 tity which may be established between the Sanskrit or Pali, and 

 the Sinhalese prepositions, none of which are known to the Tamil,* 

 or any other Dravidian dialect, except indeed what may be found 

 in words which may be clearly traced to a Sanskrit origin. It 

 would also seem that, except in a few instances, [e. g. par a -jay a, 

 etc.] these ^prepositions are used in the Sinhalese and in the 

 later Sanskrit,f as prefixes, to qualify the sense of verbs, and 

 are thence named upa-sarga. 



The following is a comparative Table of Sinhalese, Pali, and 

 Sanskrit inseparable prepositions:-— 



Sinhalese Pali. Sanskrit Examples], 



a a a. adara, ( affection.' 



abi abhi abhi abi-seka ' anointed.' 



ati ati ati ati-sara, ' dysentery.' 



* Wherever prepositions are used in the Indo-European languages, the Dra- 

 vidian languages, with those of the Scythian group, use post -positions in- 

 stead, — which post- positions do not constitute a separate part of speech, but 

 are real nouns of relation or quality, adopted as auxiliaries." — Caldwell's Dra-- 

 vidian Grammar p. 35. 



f See Professor Monier Wi/liams Sanskrit Grammar p. 316„ 



£ The above examples are only piven in the Sinhalese. 



