MacDonnell II - Wilbourhall.org

72-74] DECLENSION 49shortened in the vocative, becauseto the first syllable in that case.the accent always shifts73. The strong stem appears in the following cases :Nom. voc. ace. sing.Nom. voc. ace. dual of masc. nouns. ^Nom. voc. (not ace.) plur.Nom voc. ace. plural only of neuters.a. When the stem has three forms, the middle stemappears before terminations beginning with a consonant^(bhyam, bhis, bhyas, su) the weakest before terminations;beginning with a vowel in the remaining weak cases ;e. g. pratyanc-au nom. du. ; pratyag-bhis inst. pi. ;pratic-6s gen. du. (93).h. In neuters with three stems, the nom. voc. ace. sing,are middle, the nom. voc. ace. du. weakest ;e. g. pratyaksing. ; pratic-i du. ; pratyanc-i pi. (93). The other casesare as in the masc.NOUNS.74. Nominal stems are, owing to divergences of inflexion,best classified under the main divisions of consonant andvowel declension.I. Stems ending in consonants ^mayA. unchangeable ; B. changeable.be subdivided intoII. Stems ending in vowels into those in A. a and a ;B. iand u; C. i and u.'Excepting names of relationship in -tar (101), nearly all nounswith changeable stems form their feminine with the suffix -i (100).2Changeable stems are named in this grammar in their strong andoriginal form, though the middle form would be more practical, inasmuchas that is the form in which changeable stems ajjpear as priormember in compounds.^Some Sanskrit grammars begin with the vowel declension in a(11. A) since this contains the majority of all the declined stems inthe language. But it appears preferable to begin with the consonantdecleiTsion which adds the normal endings (71) without modification.181QE