THE DECLENSION OF NOUNS 227 In the same way the few neuters in -x substitute an n-stem outside the nom. acc. sg. : dsthi : asthnds ' bone etc. Besides these the instr. pi. naktdbhis may correspond to an old neuter ndkti ' night ' which has been replaced by a feminine (nom. sg. ndktis) , In the case of vdri ‘water' the n-suffix is added to nistead of being substituted for the i- suffix (gen. sg. vdri^as). This process appears commonly in neuter w-stems : ddru drunas , mddhn ‘ honey mddhunas, etc., and its antiquity is guaranteed by similar formations elsewhere : Gk. Sopu, Soparo? (*dorwntos, with the additional /-suffix characteristic of Greek). In the Vedic language this is only one means of inflecting the neuters (the alternatives are mddhvas and madhos , the latter an innova- tion borrowed from the masc.), but it becomes the general rule in the classical language. This ^-extension in the oblique cases is found occasionally with other suffixes : e.g. the os-stem sir as * head gen. sg. strsnds , and the yd~ stem kanyd , gen. kaninatn , Av. also gen. sg. kainind. The use of this n is much extended in certain cases, e.g. instr. sg. of masc. i- and w-stems (agmnd, vdyund) ; in the gen. pi. it has been intro- duced in the case of all vocalic stems : devdnam, agnlnam, pitfnam , etc. Certain defective neuter n- and m-stems appear in the Veda mainly as instrumentals, and have become attached to the corresponding man- stems : bhund , mahnd, prend, prathind, mahind } varind (bhumdn- 1 abundance etc., prathimdn - ‘ width etc.). It has been noted above that it is unnecessary in these cases to assume a change of -mn- to -n-. An alternative us Ivan similar to the rjn alternation appears in the Vedic declension of dhdnus- ‘ bow The ws-stem appears in the nom. sg., while elsewhere the stem dhdnvan- is used. It is probable that the two stems pdrus - and pdrvan - ' joint ' were originally distributed in the same way. This combination of n- and s-stems is found also in the corresponding masculines. The voc. sg. of certain ^aw-stems in the Veda is in -vas : rtdvas, sva-ydvas , vibhavas , mdtavisvas from ftdvan- ‘ righteous etc. There are also doublets like fbhvan-, fbhvas - ; sikvan- } sikvas - (both meaning 1 skilled ') in which the two suffixes alternate without any apparent rule. This voc. -vas appears also, and more regularly, in the stems in -vant, which is a /-extension of the i>a«-suffix, and in the parallel stems in - mant : rsivas, gndvas, patnlvas, tuvismas, bhdnumas , sucismas. In the case of
