Professor BiiilLER on the Sanskrit Lintfuals. 121 



Regarding the relation of f r' to the lingual mutes and 

 nasal, firstly it is changed to d, in anadvah, 1 an ox.'* This 

 word apparently is a compound formed by anas, ' a cart', 

 and vah ' drawing' from the root, vah ' to carry' to draw a 

 carriage. According to the phonetic laws of the classic 

 Sanskrit, anas + vah ought to have become anovah, In the 

 Vedas however a final s — or, as the Hindu grammarians 

 say, a visarga — preceded by 'a' and followed by a soft letter 

 is frequently changed to 'r.'-f* Thus we find usharbudh, 

 1 early awake' for ushobudh, vanargu ' a thief for vanogu, 

 literally ' going or prowling about in the wood.' Anas 4- vah 

 could therefore easily become anarvah and further be cor- 

 rupted into anadvah, as f r' is a lingual and being a soft let- 

 ter corresponds to d. The instance is, as far as I know, 

 unique. Secondly, the consonantal ' r' as well as its two 

 vocalised forms 'ri,' 'ri' regularly cause (by assimilation) the 

 change of a following dental 'n' to lingual 'n,' if they pre- 

 cede it either immediately or are separated from it by 

 vowels, diphthongs, gutturals, labials, n, m, y, v, h. At the 

 same time the 'n' must be followed either by vowels, dip th- 

 ongs, or n, m, y, v. The numerous further modifications, 

 which this rule undergoes, will be found in detail in Benfey's 

 Vollstsendige Sanskrit Grammatik, § 23, ff. It may be 

 safely said, that seven-tenths of all the Unguals thus owe 

 their existence to the principle of assimilation. 



But there are some cases in which, through further pho- 

 netic changes, it becomes very difficult to recognise that 

 a lingual f n' has been produced through the operation 

 of the above described rule. For according to another 

 phonetic law, which seems to have taken effect only irre- 

 gularly in Vedic and classical Sanskrit, but has later 



* Compare also Rigvedapraticakhya I. 1, 30, ff. aud Benfey's Volls- 

 taendige 6kt. gram. s. J 09, A. 2. 



t This explanation of the word has already been given by the native 

 grammarians, See V. S, Sanh. prat. Ill- 44». 



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