No. 25 — 1882.] SINHALESE AND ARYAN VERNACULARS, 245 



vowel, e. g., Sanskrit, GB2&5), sayyd, " bed" ; Prakrit, sejja ; 

 Sinhalese, enda, the first form of which seems to have been 



C3i<^, senda, then C£^<Q, henda, and now q?^, 



8. c5 )t /a, is often changed to q, da ; as QC, laja, "parched 

 grain," (Sinhalese, Q§ } lada ; &}Q,jdla, "net," Sinhalese, <£<3, 

 Of /a. 



9. The Sanskrit conjunct consonant cq, gna, is changed in 

 Pali to /«s^, ?za, which is changed in Sinhalese to n; as (2, 

 gndna "wisdom," Pali, /fisc^^c, ?7«rta, Sinhalese, ^ 'T*, nma, 

 pragnd, "wisdom," Pali, pannd, Sinhalese, pena. 



10. sD, J, and d, r, ar^ changed to @, /, in Prakrit ; and 

 Sinhalese adopts it, (^530(9^.1 ed, so/os, "sixteen," for (^23oe)s5a, 

 shodasa; ©\<5\(§N(3'e5, tefes, "thirteen," for <^SJ53c3, terasa ; {£0 



atalos, " eighteen," for do 5e3, atthdrasa. Sinhalese 

 also changes 0, tf, into <e>, /, as vs*&z)zS), karkataka, Sinhalese, 

 233^5 '<£), JraJculu, " crab.' 



11. Prakrit (in which is included Pali) always reduces 

 conjunct consonants of different classes to one class : this is 

 done by eliding one and doubling the other ; cD$, dharma, 

 "scriptures," is written dhamma; q^cse), aswa, " horse" 

 is written qp&G3. assa ; ©c^£>, mudga. "kidney beans," is 

 mugga; puny a, "merit," is punna, in Prakrit, and Cj^S^ScJ, 

 punna in Pali; matsya, "fish," is written 32)£fc£, machchha. 

 The Sinhalese still further reduces these to single consonants by 

 eliding one of them ; as dam, or <^Q£)D, daham, "scriptures" ; 



<f c£, as, "horse;" mungu, "kidney beans;" B?s5,pin, "merits" 

 ©g, masw, "fish." 



12. In Prakrit, consonants are elided in the middle or end 

 of words, and sometimes in the beginning also ; but in Sinhalese 

 the hiatus thus occurring is avoided either by the coalition of the 

 vowel or by the insertion of semi-vowels : thus, 

 ©^Jzsszs, ' traildkya, " the three worlds," is in Prakrit 

 teloa, but in Sinhalese we find <^(^(30£) ? tilova. Here we have 

 the semi -vowel £>, v, inserted between the vowels o and a. For 

 the Sanskrit nabhastala, "sky," Ave find in Prakrit nahaala, where 

 both the b and the nexus st are lost. The Sinhalese avoids the 



