MacDonnell II - Wilbourhall.org

78 DECLENSION [97a. The N. A. neuter forms are :Sing, priya-m. Du. priy6.PI. priya" and priya-n-i.'^a. In the Brahmanas and Sutras the D. s. f. ending ai is used insteadof the Ab.G. ending as both in tliis declension and elsewhere (98. 3 a) ;e. g. jirnayai tvacah of dead skin.2. Eadical a stems, m. and f./''are common in the RV.,being formed from about thirty roots. Most of them appearonly as the final member of compounds, but four are used asmonosyllables in the m. : ja child, tra protector, da giver,stha standing; and seven in the f. : ksa abode, 'kh.a. ivell,gna divine woman, ja child, jya ma bowstring, measure,The forms occurring in the oblique cases are sovra troop^''6 The form amba, occurring thrice in the RV., may have a V.meaning, mother ! The VS. and TS. have the V. ambe as from a stemd.niba mother.'^This form seems to consist of a double :ending as-as. The formin as is about twice in the RV. and twenty-four times in the AV. asfrequent as that in asas.8That the ending was originally -ns is shown by the Sandhi (40. 2) ;ep. Gothic -cms, Gk. inscr. -ors.3This ending is preservedin such Greek datives as imrois. It isslightly commoner in the RV. than priy^bhis, but in the AV. it isfive times as common. It is almost always used in the Brahmanas.10The n seems to have been due to the iniluence of the n stems.11The u of su is almost invariably to be read with hiatus, evenbefore u.12This form is rare in the RV., being probably due to the influenceof the maiiy masculines.13The du. in a is more than seven times as common as that in auin the RV.1*The form in a is commoner in the RV. than that in ani in theproportion of three to two. In the AV. the proportion is reversed.'5This form is due to the influence of the an stems, which formtheir n. pi. in both a and ani, e. g. nama and namani.16There are no distinctively n. forms, as the radical vowel in that"ender is always shortened to a,and the stem is tlien inflectedaccording to the derivative1''These stems become less declension.common in the later Sarnhitas, wherethey often shorten the final vowel to a, areand^then inflected likederivative a stems.