Text 7.55

सन्धेर् वैरूप्यं त्रिधा, विश्लेषोऽश्लीलत्वं कष्टत्वं चेति. क्रमेणोदाहरणानि,

sandher vairūpyaṃ tridhā, viśleṣo'ślīlatvaṃ kaṣṭatvaṃ ceti. krameṇodāharaṇāni,

(4) The fault called visandhi (awkward phonetic combination) means a distortion of a phonetic combination. It is threefold: viśleṣa (disjoined), aślīla (unpleasant), and kaṣṭa (harsh). Examples are given in order. This verse shows an instance of viśleṣa-visandhi,

dalite utpale ete akṣinī amalāṅgi te |
balād ākarṣatas tanvi mama īkṣaṇa-ṣaṭ-padau ||

dalite—which have opened; utpale—two lotuses; ete—these; akṣinī—two eyes; amala-aṅgi—O you whose body is spotless; te—your; balāt—by force; ākarṣataḥ—the two attract; tanvi—O slender woman; mama—my; īkṣaṇa—in the form of eyes; ṣaṭ-padau—two bees (“it has six legs”).

Slender girl, you have an immaculate body: These two eyes of yours, two blown lotuses, forcefully attract the two bees of my eyes. (adapted from Sāhitya-darpaṇa 7.8)

atra pragṛhyādi-hetukaḥ sandhi-viśleṣo’sakṛd eva.

Here a disjunction of the phonetic combination, caused by the pragṛhyas, occurs more than once. This is one subdivision of viśleṣa-visandhi. The other subvariety is exemplified in the second half: mama īkṣaṇa, where the phonetic combination was not done, by the will of the writer, out of fear of breaking the meter: This other kind is a fault even if it happens only once.

Commentary:

The term pragṛhya is given to the letters ī, ū, and e, when one of them is the ending of a noun or of a verb in the dual number: īd-ūd-ed dvi-vacanaṃ pragṛhyam (Aṣṭādhyāyī 1.1.11). When a pragṛhya occurs, the phonetic combination with a following vowel is not done, by the rule: pluta-pragṛhyā aci nityam (Aṣṭādhyāyī 6.1.125) (īd-ūd-etāṃ dvi-vacanasya maṇīvādi-varjam, Hari-nāmāmṛta-vyākaraṇa 60). The usage of the pragṛhyas is faulty if it occurs more than once. Again, Mammaṭa shows his disapproval of the alliteration of a vowel.