Indo-European Caland Adjectives in *-nt-and Participles in Sanskrit

Abstract

The suffix *-nt- is taken for granted as a Caland suffix in two of the most recent and important works on the Caland system, those by Nussbaum (1976) and Rau (2009), but other authors have entirely ignored the suffix, usually treating alleged examples rather as participles.1 This paper re-examines the morphological, syntactic and semantic evidence for a category of *-nt- adjectives associated with the Caland system distinct from the categories of active present and aorist participles. I also consider several forms in Indo-Iranian which have not previously been considered as potential Caland adjectives: citánt-, śucánt-, tujánt-, bhrā́jant-, sáhant-, p ŕṣant-. Morphological and syntactic evidence shows that no single form must be analysed as a Caland adjective in contradistinction to anything else; on the other hand, the combined weight of evidence supports the supposition that a synchronically distinct adjectival suffix *-nt- did exist in Proto- Indo-European. The morphological evidence for a distinction between Caland adjectives and participles in -nt- however also suggests that there may be a deeper connection between the two at a Proto-Indo-European stage.