Vedic Metre in its Historical Development c11.231

c11.231

It is remarkable that contraction seems to be equally common in all parts of the Rigveda proper, not only in these words as a whole, but in single words which are particularly common, such as tvám and súrya. I find some difficulty in thinking that these forms were really established as common variants so early, and am therefore inclined to distrust the text. Since single passages in the Rigveda have retained for us such old forms as kú and ródasoḥ, usually written kvà and ródasyoḥ, it seems not improbable that an old nominative tú may be concealed in many cases under the tvám of the archaic period, and that the order of developement was tú, tuám, tvám. In the case of súrya the doublet súra (p. 36) is sufficiently common in the Rigveda, as márta by the side of mártia: it is therefore likely enough that súra stood originally in many passages where súrya is now read, the order of developement being súra, súria, súrya. Similarly the frequency of such forms as the instrumental masc. in -iā, -uā, and the corresponding datives -ie, -ue may be concealed from us under the later forms -inā, -unā, -aye, -ave. It is possible that a similar history underlies other forms.