95. This declension came to include a part of the fifth and also some
neuter plurals of the second and third. With the exception of dia
(nearly always masculine) and of a few learned words, it contained only
feminine nouns. As the nominative, accusative, and ablative singular
early became identical, leaving only one form in the singular, the
plural forms were reduced to one, the accusative crowding out the
nominative; this substitution, which must have been begun before the
Provençal period, was doubtless helped by the identity of nominative
and accusative plural in feminine nouns of the third declension.
_Causa_ will serve as a model:--
_causa_ ＞ causa
_causam_ ＞ causa
_causæ_ ✱_causas_ ＞ causas
_causas_ ＞ causas
1. _Dia_ sometimes has a nom. sg. _dias_, following the example
of other masculine nouns.
2. Many feminine proper names, in Gaul and elsewhere, developed
a Low Latin declension _-a_ _-āne(m)_ or _-a_ _-ēne(m)_, as
_Anna_ _Annāne_. Provençal has few traces of this inflection.
The word _putana_ ＜?_pūtĭda_ + _ānem_ + _a_ may be a remnant
of it. Cf. Meyer-Lübke, _Gram._, II, p. 27; E. Philipon, _Les
accusatifs en_ -on _et en_ -ain, _Rom._, XXXI, 201.