120 Professor BuHLER on the Sanscrit Unguals. 



responding Greek verb ap-ap-iWo prove must have meant 

 in the primitive Indo-European language ' to fit or to make 

 to fit.' The etymological meaning of arni=ani would there- 

 fore be "a thing to be fitted (into some other thing.") 

 (Compare also ara ' a spoke' which is derived from the same 

 root). Katu 'sharp' probably stands for kartu, like natayati 

 for nartayati, and seems to be derived from the root krit 

 < to cut.' 



But even if Dr. Caldwell's opinion regarding the origin 

 of all th$ sixteen words were correct, and even if they were 

 found in the most ancient dialect of Sanskrit, is it likely 

 that so small a number of words should have caused the 

 production of thousands of Sanskrit Unguals ? I think there 

 is a better way of solving our problem, and it is indicated 

 by the third point which I brought forward against Dr. 

 Caldwell's opinion. As the Bactro-Indian language con- 

 tained at least three Unguals, the consonantal and vocalised, 

 ' r' and sh, and as it can be shown that by far the greater 

 number , of Sanskrit lingual mutes and nasals is produced 

 either by the direct change of f r/ 'sh' into Unguals or by the 

 change of dentals into the corresponding Unguals through 

 the influence of %' 'ri' £ rf, sh, we are driven to conclude, 

 that the latter letters originally caused the production 

 of the lingual t, th, d, dh, and consequently that lingua- 

 lisation is entirely an Aryan proceeding rooted in the 

 ancient phonetic system of the language. On further in- 

 vestigation it will however appear, that the letter 'h' and in 

 rare cases also T undergo similar changes as r and sh, and 

 that in a very limited number of words Unguals have 

 been substituted for dentals without any apparent cause 

 whatever. 



I shall now turn to an examination of the facts in order 

 to show that they fully bear out my assertions. 



