Whitney's "Roots, Verb-forms..." was a "supplement" to the first edition of the Grammar (also published in 1879). Whitney's Grammar was also published in a second edition in 1896. As those of us know from using Lanman's Reader (which cites the original edition), the two are not the same. 

In the grammar's first edition, Whitney uses the "ch" spelling (i.e., not doubled): 

608. A small number of roots add in the present-system a ch, or substitute a ch for their final consonant, and form a stem ending in cha or chá, which is then inflected like any a-stem. This is historically, doubtless, a true class-sign, analogous with the rest; but the verbs showing it are so few, and in formation so irregular, that they are not well to be put together into a class, but may best be treated as special cases falling under the other classes.

a. Roots adding ch are ṛ and yu, which make the stems ṛchá and yúcha.

b. Roots substituting ch for their final are iṣ, uṣ (or vas shine), gam, yam, which make the stems ichá, uchá, gácha, yácha.


This seems to be coordinate with his Atharva-Veda Pratishakya (JAOS VII [1862]: 410), where Whitney writes: "we have followed in the printed text the authority of the manuscripts, with hardly an exception, write simply ch, instead of cch."

In the second edition of the Grammar, however, Whitney changes section 608, from the single "cha" to the doubled "ccha" (as Harry points out): 

608. A small number of roots add in the present-system a ch, or substitute a ch for their final consonant, and form a stem ending in cha or chá, which is then inflected like any a-stem. This is historically, doubtless, a true class-sign, analogous with the rest; but the verbs showing it are so few, and in formation so irregular, that they are not well to be put together into a class, but may best be treated as special cases falling under the other classes.

a. Roots adding ch are ṛ and yu, which make the stems ṛcchá and yúccha.

b. Roots substituting ch for their final are iṣ, uṣ (or vas shine), gam, yam, which make the stems icchá, ucchá, gáccha, yáccha.


Why he made this change is anyone's guess. But, the other grammars of the time (Müller; Monier Williams) did use "ccha," so it may simply have been a nod to the commonly accepted practice of the time (Whitney did tend to be contrarian!).


Herman Tull, PhD
Princeton, NJ


On Tue, Oct 17, 2023 at 9:27 PM Harry Spier via INDOLOGY <indology@list.indology.info> wrote:
Dear list members,
Whitney  in his grammar section 227 says about the doubling of "ch".
"As a general rule ch is not to be allowed by the grammarians to stand in that form after vowels but is to be doubled becoming cch (which in the manuscripts is sometimes written chch). . .According to Panini ch is to be doubled within a word after a long or a short vowel."

But if you look in his "Roots, Verb-forms and Derivatives" at the entry  for iṣ, ich  nowhere does he double "ch" not even after a short vowel rather he has ichati, ichaka,  ichā and ichu  . Does anyone know why for this root in all his examples he didn't double ch after vowels?
Thanks,
Harry Spier

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