Wilson Philological Lectures on Sanskrit and the Derived Languages c11.46

c11.46

The Bangâlî and Oriya apply the case terminations directly to the nom. and there is no oblique form. The new terminations being, as in all the modern languages, the same for both numbers and there being no oblique form to express the distinction between them in M. S. H. etc., these languages, like the Guj., were under the necessity of deriving some expression for denoting plurality. The G. found its fem. ओ and employed it for this purpose, but the B. and O. had no such distinctively pl. termination left to fall back upon and so they have recourse to the use of a word signifying collection such as दिग originally ‘direction, row, line’, गण, समूह and सकल etc. after the noun, the plurality of which is to be expressed. Thus राजा ‘ a king ’, राजार ‘ of a king ’, राजादिगेर ‘ of kings ’ lit. ‘ of the direction row or line of a king. ’ Sometimes the word दिग is attached to the gen. sing. as राजारदिगेर to express the gen. relation between राजा and दिग, which is understood in the first expression. To nouns denoting inferior animals समूह and such words are appended and such others as सकल to those signifying inanimate creatures as कुक्कुरेर ‘ of a dog ’ कुक्कुरसमूहेर ‘ of dogs. ’ The Oriya sign of the plural is मान for rational and animate creatures and सकल, समस्त etc. for irrational or inanimate, as पशु ‘a beast’, पशुर sing. ‘ of a beast ’, पशुमानकर ‘ of beasts. ’ The B. adds रा to the nom. sing. of names of rational creatures to form the nom. pl., while समूह, सकल, etc. are applied to the rest. राजा ‘a king’, राजारा ‘kings’; कुक्कुर ‘a dog’, कुक्कुरसमूह ‘dogs.’ The O. adds ए to मान to form the nom. pl. as पशुमाने. This ए is the same as that of घोडे in M. and H.