15G 
G. A. Grierson— "Essays on Bihari Declension. [No. 2, 
phrases like tihT TTTf’t (a beating on a beating) ‘ a mutual assault,’ 
‘ a mutual running,’ ‘ a running here and there.’ In these phrases TiTYt and 
are the direct strong forms corresponding to the Prakrit nominative 
TiTfY^T, and respectively, but thy - and are distinctly oblique 
forms, which I would derive as follows : — 
Dr. nom. Pr. gen. "Hindi obi. 
TTTft WTffaT (Var. V, 22) TFTTT 
The contraction of these terminations to ^|T need not cause any 
objection. would naturally become tjt, and finally ^?T, just as Pr. 
became ^ and finally 3\T, and Pr. became Hindi and 
finally H. H., ^i^T. Moreover the form in Pali is *?Tfr?JT, with 
a short penultimate, and though no similar form is recorded for Ap. Pr. 
still H. C. IV, 329 would entitle us to assume the possible existence of 
such a one. 
This direct verbal noun HTT or is what is called the root in Hindi 
grammars. It occurs frequently in Intensive compounds in forms like 
^*tt, ‘ to give a beating’, &c., and in the so-called conjunctive participle 
TUT % or TlTfY % or ('with the % dropped) simply ??TT , ‘ having beaten,’ lite¬ 
rally ‘ having done a beating.’ So also % ‘ having done the action of 
doing,’ and THT % ‘ having done the action of doing a beating.’ %, as 
will be shown under the head of conjugation, = the Vedic Skr. (Skr. 
3i<3T), ‘ having done’; hence, S'r. Pr. ^fY^F (H. C. 4, 271), and Hindi (with 
elision of Y) %. Mg. Pr. (Yara. XI, 16) has instead hence (through 
3ff^TfV,) the corresponding Bihari form (See, however, Hoernle, 
§ 491, for a different explanation of the forms.) 
The oblique Hindi form of the verbal noun, ?TTTr, also occurs in 
Desiderative compounds ; e. g. TTTYT ‘ he wishes to beat,’ in 
which TFTYT is for Tim ‘ he wishes for a beating’. This is borne out by 
the Bihari practice of introducing the post-position ^rr in such compounds; 
e. g., (Magadhi) iiar ^TT ‘ I wish for sending,’ ‘ I wish to send’ 
(Gr. § 118). It also explains the fact that in Hindi this form (mis¬ 
called by grammarians the Past Participle) does not change for gender. 
Moreover in Hindi it explains clearly the (so-called) anomalous forms «TRT 
(not jrtt) ^T^TTT, ‘to wish to go,’ and trt (not ttsett) ^T^TT ‘to wish to 
die’ (see Kellogg, p. 193). The same form (with the dative particle w) is 
also used in Marathi; e. g., (Man. p. 151) TT^TT ^T^T^T, ‘I 
fancy he wishes to eat me.’ 
To recapitulate therefore ;— 
There is a Prakrit feminine nominative TfT^t, which is the direct 
ancestor of the Gaudian verbal noun ?jty or *nfr. 
