THE SINHALESE LANGUAGE. 



8.3 



to the comparison of the Pali and the Sinhalese, I shall divide my 

 observations into three classes: first their lexical, secondly their 

 grammatical, and thirdly their syntactical analogies. 



Fuli. — Tissadatta thero kira Bcdhi mande suvanna s&lakan ga* 

 hetva a^harasasu bhasasu katara bhasaya katemi-iti pavaresi. 



Sinhalese.— Tisdat tera vanahi Bodi mandape suvarna (or ran) 

 salakava gena daha-a£a basaven kavara basavakin katk karam-ete*/£ 

 paeveri. 



English — * Tissadatta thera having taken up the gold broomstick 

 In the B6-yard, requested to know in which of the eighteen 

 languages he should speak.' 



i. Here are fifteen words, of which two alone cannot be traced 

 to the Pali. They are vanahi and d&yi, both indeclinable parti- 

 cles. Of the others, all which are independent of the Dravidian> 

 suvarna is nearer Sanskrit than the Pali. It is true that the 

 ancient Sinhalese word for 'gold' is ran, different from the above \ 

 but even that word is clearly a derivative of the Pali aranna. 



ii. Though the Sinhalese nominative a in tera is distinguish- 

 able from the Pali; yet the Pali locative e in mande is the same 

 as in the Sinhalese. The similarity in the termination of the verb 

 in the third person singular 'pavaresi' is obvious. The only differ- 

 ence in the grammatical construction of the two languages, as ex- 

 hibited in the above versions, is that the Pali locative hhasasu, is 

 expressed in the Sinhalese by the ablative. I have followed the 

 modern usage with a view to exhibit the difference between it and 

 the ancient, which, as we find from the Am&vatura and Pradipikdva, 

 preferred the locaiive. The locative if used in the Sinhalese would 

 not be less elegant than the ablative. 



iii. Syntactically, it will be observed that every word in the 

 Sinhalese takes the same position which it occupies in the Pali. 

 The nominative is the first word in the sentence; the adjective 

 precedes the substantive; the accusative suvanna precedes the 



past participlo gaheirit^ which it governs; the locative mande 



M 



