THE DECLENSION OF NOUNS 24I The feminines in -a and the neuters take the termination -t. This agreement is another sign of the close relations existing be- tween the feminine a-stems and the neuters. Examples from neuter consonantal stems are : vricast, cdksusi, n&mni, brhatl . In the thematic neuters and the feminines in -a this -l combines w r ith the vowel of the stem to form the diphthong -e ; yugi, sfnge ; dsve , sene. This - 1 is found also in Old Slavonic, though rarely ( imeni , telesi) , and Slavonic shows the same diphthong in 0 - and a-stems (sele, ryce) a form which then spreads to con- sonantal stems (imene ' two names '). The 1 - and w-stems make the dual by lengthening the vowel of the stem : ftati, sunii, and with them are to be classed the feminines in -l of the devt type in the Vedic declension (du. devt, later devyau). This type is ancient, appearing also in Avestan (gairi, mainyn ), Slavonic (O. SI. pgti, syny) and Lithuanian (nakti, s&nu ). Instr . Dat . Abl. Dual . The termination that serves for all the three cases is -bhydm, and it contains the same element - bhi - that occurs in the dat. -abl. and instr, pi. A corresponding - byam appears only once in Avestan ( brvatbyqm from brvat- ‘ brow '), Elsewhere it has -by a and O. Pers. has -biyd, which makes it clear that -m is an element secondarily added, as else- where (cf, tubhya, tubhyam, etc.). The Balto-Slavonic languages have, as in the plural, - m - instead of -bh- here (O, SI. ocima, etc.). The termination is ordinarily added to the normal stem, but in the earlier language sometimes to the form that serves as nom. acc. du., e.g. akstbhydm , cf. aksi ' the two eyes ’ (cf. O. SI. ocima ; oci ‘ the two eyes '). This has become the normal form in the case of thematic stems : vfkdbhydm , cf. vfkd(u) t etc. Genitive-Locative Dual. The termination common to these two cases is -os : padds f pitros , etc., which is added to the weak form of the stem. Avestan on the other hand has two separate terminations, -6 (zastayo) for the locative and -d ( ndirikayd ) for the genitive. The ending -d is derived from - au and is equi- valent to the Sanskrit ending minus the final -s. The genitive -d ( <-as) is peculiar to Avestan. Slavonic has a termination -u which could represent either -ou (Av. ~d) or -ous (Skt. -os). Lithuanian which keeps this inflection only in some adverbial forms has both -au and - aus : dvejau y dvejaus * in twos, as a pair *, cf. Skt. dvdyos. The -ay- which in Sanskrit appears before the termination in a and a-stems has spread from the declension of the pronouns and the numeral * two ' ( tdyos t dvdyos ). It re-
