We report inelastic neutron scattering measurements over 7-1251 K in CaMnO 3 covering various phase transitions, and over 6-150 K in PrMnO 3 covering the magnetic transition. The excitations around 20 meV in CaMnO 3 and at 17 meV in PrMnO 3 at low temperatures are found to be associated with magnetic origin. We observe coherent magnetic neutron scattering in localized regions in reciprocalspace and show it to arise from long-range correlated magnetic spin-waves below the magnetic transition temperature (T N ) and short-range stochastic spin-spin fluctuations above T N. In spite of similarity of the structure of the two compounds, the neutron inelastic spectrum of PrMnO 3 exhibits broad features at 150 K unlike well-defined peaks in the spectrum of CaMnO 3 . This might result from the difference in nature of interactions in the two compounds (magnetic and Jahn-Teller distortion). Abinitio phonon calculations have been used to interpret the observed phonon spectra. The ab-initio calculations at high pressures show that the variations of Mn-O distances are isotropic for CaMnO 3 and highly anisotropic for PrMnO 3 . The calculation in PrMnO 3 shows the suppression of Jahn-Teller distortion and simultaneous insulator to metal transition. It appears that this transition may not be associated with the occurrence of the tetragonal phase above 20 GPa as reported in the literature, since the tetragonal phase is found to be dynamically unstable although it is found to be energetically favored over the orthorhombic phase above 20 GPa. CaMnO 3 does not show any phase transition up to 60 GPa.