History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v4.c63.t2.163

v4.c63.t2.163

¹³⁹⁰ The general rule is that several words that would be in the same case when separately used may be compounded together to form a *dvandva*, when they are employed to convey the sense of 'ca', as said in 'cārthe dvandvaḥ' (Pāṇ. II. 2. 29). Such a compound is called dvandva and mātā-pitarau is an example of it. Another sūtra (I. 2. 64) of Pāṇini states that when words denoting several individuals of the same kind are to be compounded together, only one of them may be retained and that is called an ekaśeṣa compound, which is of two kinds, *sarūpa* (e. g. haṁsaśca haṁsaśca haṁsau) and *virūpa* (when the two words are of different genders). The latter kind of ekaśeṣa is of restricted use. In such a compound when a male and female are associated together only the word in the masculine gender remains or the word 'pitṛ' when compounded with mātṛ (vide Pāṇ. I. 2. 67 and I. 2. 70). Therefore we have two forms to denote the idea of parents viz. *mātāpitarau* or *pitarau*. In dissolving this compound (*pitarau*) we employ the phraseology ‘mātā ca pitā ca’ and in the word ‘mātāpitarau’ the word for mother comes first. Therefore among parents as heirs mother should come first. Vide pp. 242-244 of my notes to the V. Mayūkha (ed. of text) where both the Mit. passage and its criticism by the V. Mayūkha are explained at length. In *Balkrishna v. Lakshman* 14 Bom. 605 both the Mit. and Mayūkha’s criticism thereof are set out (pp. 608-609).