I've got a question about the two instances of の in 君が代:

> さざれ石の巌となりて  
>  苔の生すまで

First, is さざれ石の巌 to be interpreted as _a boulder made of pebbles_ (analogous
to, say, 木製の槍)?

Second, is the の in 苔の生すまで essentially が, akin to the が/の alternation in
relative clauses:

> 太郎の焼いた魚 / 太郎が焼いた魚

If so, at what stage of the development of Japanese was this alternation
possible outside of relative clauses?

(Bonus: what stage of Japanese does 君が代 even reflect and why? I know it was
cobbled together in the Meiji period; [the Wikipedia
article](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kimigayo) says it's based on a waka from
the Heian period, but doesn't provide the original text.)
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grammar history
In 君が代, what's the function of の?
Turning comments into an answer. Credit should go all to the commenters on
original question!

[Choko](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/users/1016/choko):

> 「さざれ石(=細かい石)が巌【いわお】(=大きな岩)になって、(それに)苔【こけ】が[生]{む}す(=苔が生【は】える)まで。」って意味です。

[jogloran:](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/users/816/jogloran)

> Is the fact that が=の in this text commonly known to ordinary Japanese
> speakers?

[Choko](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/users/1016/choko):

> 私学の中高に通っていた大学生は結構知らなかったりしますね・・・
>
> College students that went to private junior and high schools often aren't
> aware of it...
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The lyrics is written in Classical (Heian-era) Japanese, where the が/の
alternation is known to be _180 degree inverted_ than today, that is, `君が代` is
`あなたの代` in today's language, so `さざれ石の巌となりて` → `さざれ石が巌となって` and `苔の生すまで` →
`苔が生えるまで`. I'm not sure about the origin of the alternation, since the usage
is attested in earliest documents.

The original text has multiple variations. One of them is
[here](http://www.emuseum.jp/detail/100171/001/000?x=81926&y=203&s=3)
(fullscreen recommended). It reads `わがきみはちよにましませさゞれしのいはほとなりてこけのむすまで`.
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