Lectures on The Science of Language Part 7

he would answer _Yea_. He observes the same distinction between _No_ and _Nay_, the former being used after negative, the latter after all other questions. This distinction became obsolete soon after Sir Thomas More,(209) and it must have become obsolete before phrases such as _Yes Sir_ and _Yes Madam_ could have a.s.sumed their stereotyped character.

But there is still more historical information to be gained from these phrases. The word _Yes_ is Anglo-Saxon, the same as the German _Ja_, and it therefore reveals the fact that the white masters of the American slaves who crossed the Atlantic after the time of Chaucer, had crossed the Channel at an earlier period after leaving the continental fatherland of the Angles and Saxons. The words _Sir_ and _Madam_ tell us still more.

They are Norman words, and they could only have been imposed on the Anglo-Saxons of Britain by Norman conquerors. They tell us more than this.

For these Normans or Northmen spoke originally a Teutonic dialect, closely allied to Anglo-Saxon, and in that dialect words such as _Sir_ and _Madam_ could never have sprung up. We may conclude therefore that, previous to the Norman conquest, the Teutonic Northmen must have made a sufficiently long stay in one of the Roman provinces to forget their own and adopt the language of the Roman Provincials.

We may now trace back the Norman _Madam_ to the French _Madame_, and we recognize in this a corruption of the Latin _Mea domina_, my mistress.

_Domina_ was changed into _domna_, _donna_, and _dame_, and the same word _Dame_ was also used as a masculine in the sense of lord, as a corruption of _Domino_, _Domno_ and _Donno_. The temporal lord ruling as ecclesiastical seigneur under the bishop, was called a _vidame_, as the Vidame of Chartres, &c. The French interjection _Dame!_ has no connection with a similar exclamation in English, but it simply means Lord!

_Dame-Dieu_ in old French is Lord G.o.d. A derivative of _Domina_, mistress, was _dominicella_, which became _Demoiselle_ and _Damsel_. The masculine _Dame_ for _Domino_, Lord, was afterwards replaced by the Latin _Senior_, a translation of the German _elder_. This word _elder_ was a t.i.tle of honor, and we have it still both in _alderman_, and in what is originally the same, the English _Earl_, the Norse _Jarl_, a corruption of the A.-S.

_ealdor_. This t.i.tle _Senior_, meaning originally _older_, was but rarely(210) applied to ladies as a t.i.tle of honor. _Senior_ was changed into _Seigneur_, _Seigneur_ into _Sieur_, and _Sieur_ soon dwindled down to _Sir_.

Thus we see how in two short phrases, such as _Yesr_ and _Yesm_, long chapters of history might be read. If a general destruction of books, such as took place in China under the Emperor Thsin-chi-hoang-ti (213 B. C.), should sweep away all historical doc.u.ments, language, even in its most depraved state, would preserve the secrets of the past, and would tell future generations of the home and migrations of their ancestors from the East to the West Indies.

It may seem startling at first to find the same name, _the East Indies_ and _the West Indies_, at the two extremities of the Aryan migrations; but these very names are full of historical meaning. They tell us how the Teutonic race, the most vigorous and enterprising of all the members of the Aryan family, gave the name of _West Indies_ to the country which in their world-compa.s.sing migrations they imagined to be India itself; how they discovered their mistake and then distinguished between the East Indies and West Indies; how they planted new states in the west, and regenerated the effete kingdoms in the east; how they preached Christianity, and at last practised it by abolis.h.i.+ng slavery of body and mind among the slaves of West-Indian landholders, and the slaves of Brahmanical soulholders, till they greeted at last the very homes from which the Aryan family had started when setting out on their discovery of the world. All this, and even more, may be read in the vast archives of language. The very name of India has a story to tell, for India is not a native name. We have it from the Romans, the Romans from the Greeks, the Greeks from the Persians. And why from the Persians? Because it is only in Persian that an initial s is changed into _h_, which initial _h_ was as usual dropped in Greek. It is only in Persian that the country of the _Sindhu_ (_sindhu_ is the Sanskrit name for _river_), or of the _seven sindhus_, could have been called _Hindia_ or _India_ instead of _Sindia_.

Unless the followers of Zoroaster had p.r.o.nounced every _s_ like _h_, we should never have heard of the West Indies!

We have thus seen by an imaginary instance what we must be prepared for in the growth of language, and we shall now better understand why it must be laid down as a fundamental principle in Comparative Grammar to look upon nothing in language as merely formal, till every attempt has been made to trace the formal elements of language back to their original and substantial prototypes. We are accustomed to the idea of grammatical terminations modifying the meaning of words. But words can be modified by words only; and though in the present state of our science it would be too much to say that all grammatical terminations have been traced back to original independent words, so many of them have, even in cases where only a single letter was left, that we may well lay it down as a rule that all formal elements of language were originally substantial. Suppose English had never been written down before the time of Piers Ploughman. What should we make of such a form as _nadistou_,(211) instead of _ne hadst thou_? _Ne rechi_ instead of _I reck not_? _Al o'm_ in Dorsets.h.i.+re is _all of them_. _I midden_ is _I may not_; _I cooden_, _I could not_. Yet the changes which Sanskrit had undergone before it was reduced to writing, must have been more considerable by far than what we see in these dialects.

Let us now look to modern cla.s.sical languages such as French and Italian.

Most of the grammatical terminations are the same as in Latin, only changed by phonetic corruption. Thus _j'aime_ is _ego amo_, _tu aimes_, _tu amas_, _il aime_, _ille amat_. There was originally a final _t_ in French _il aime_, and it comes out again in such phrases as _aime-t-il?_ Thus the French imperfect corresponds to the Latin imperfect, the Parfait defini to the Latin perfect. But what about the French future? There is no similarity between _amabo_ and _j'aimerai_. Here then we have a new grammatical form, sprung up, as it were, within the recollection of men; or, at least, in the broad daylight of history. Now, did the termination _rai_ bud forth like a blossom in spring? or did some wise people meet together to invent this new termination, and pledge themselves to use it instead of the old termination _bo_? Certainly not. We see first of all that in all the Romance languages the terminations of the future are identical with the auxiliary verb _to have_.(212) In French you find-

j'ai and je chanter-ai nous avons and nous chanterons.

tu as and tu chanter-as vous avez and vous chanterez.

il a and il chanter-a ils ont and ils chanteront.

But besides this, we actually find in Spanish and Provencal the apparent termination of the future used as an independent word and not yet joined to the infinitive. We find in Spanish, instead of "_lo hare_," I shall do it, the more primitive form _hacer lo he_; _i.e._, _facere id habeo_. We find in Provencal, _dir vos ai_ instead of _je vous dirai_; _dir vos em_ instead of _nous vous dirons_. There can be no doubt, therefore, that the Romance future was originally a compound of the auxiliary verb _to have_ with an infinitive; and _I have to say_, easily took the meaning of _I shall say_.

Here, then, we see clearly how grammatical forms arise. A Frenchman looks upon his futures as merely grammatical forms. He has no idea, unless he is a scholar, that the terminations of his futures are identical with the auxiliary verb _avoir_. The Roman had no suspicion that _amabo_ was a compound; but it can be proved to contain an auxiliary verb as clearly as the French future. The Latin future was destroyed by means of phonetic corruption. When the final letters lost their distinct p.r.o.nunciation it became impossible to keep the imperfect _amabam_ separate from the future _amabo_. The future was then replaced by dialectical regeneration, for the use of _habeo_ with an infinitive is found in Latin, in such expressions as _habeo dicere_, I have to say, which would imperceptibly glide into I shall say.(213) In fact, wherever we look we see that, the future is expressed by means of composition. We have in English _I shall_ and _thou wilt_, which mean originally _I am bound_ and _thou intendest_. In German we use _werden_, the Gothic _vairthan_, which means originally to go, to turn towards. In modern Greek we find thelo, I will, in thelo dosei, I shall give. In Roumansch we meet with _vegnir_, to come, forming the future _veng a vegnir_, I shall come; whereas in French _je viens de dire_, I come from saying, is equivalent to "I have just said." The French _je vais dire_ is almost a future, though originally it is _vado dicere_, I go to say. The Dorsets.h.i.+re, "I be gwain to goo a-picken stuones," is another case in point. Nor is there any doubt that in the Latin _bo_ of _amabo_ we have the old auxiliary _bhu_, to be, and in the Greek future in s?, the old auxiliary _as_, to be.(214)

We now go back another step, and ask the question which we asked many times before, How can a mere _d_ produce so momentous a change as that from _I love_ to _I loved_? As we have learnt in the meantime that English goes back to Anglo-Saxon, and is closely related to continental Saxon and Gothic, we look at once to the Gothic imperfect in order to see whether it has preserved any traces of the original compound; for, after what we have seen in the previous cases, we are no doubt prepared to find here, too, grammatical terminations mere remnants of independent words.

In Gothic there is a verb _nasjan_, to nourish. Its preterite is as follows:-

Singular. Dual. Plural.

nas-i-da nas-i-dedu nas-i-dedum.

nas-i-des nas-i-detuts nas-i-dedu.

nas-i-da -- nas-i-dedun.

The subjunctive of the preterite:

Singular. Dual. Plural.

nas-i-dedjau nas-i-dedeiva nas-i-dedeima.

nas-i-dedeis nas-i-dedeits nas-i-dedei.

nas-i-dedi -- nas-i-dedeina.

This is reduced in Anglo-Saxon to:

Singular. Plural.

ner-e-de ner-e-don.

ner-e-dest ner-e-don.

ner-e-de ner-e-don.

Subjunctive:

ner-e-de ner-e-don.

ner-e-de ner-e-don.

ner-e-de ner-e-don.

Let us now look to the auxiliary verb _to do_, in Anglo-Saxon:

Singular. Plural.

dide didon.

didest didon.

dide didon.

If we had only the Anglo-Saxon preterite _nerede_ and the Anglo-Saxon _dide_, the ident.i.ty of the _de_ in _nerede_ with _dide_ would not be very apparent. But here you will perceive the advantage which Gothic has over all other Teutonic dialects for the purposes of grammatical comparison and a.n.a.lysis. It is in Gothic, and in Gothic in the plural only, that the full auxiliary _dedum_, _dedu_, _dedun_ has been preserved. In the Gothic singular _nasida_, _nasides_, _nasida_ stand for _nasideda_, _nasidedes_, _nasideda_. The same contraction has taken place in Anglo-Saxon, not only in the singular but in the plural also. Yet, such is the similarity between Gothic and Anglo-Saxon that we cannot doubt their preterites having been formed on the same last. If there be any truth in inductive reasoning, there must have been an original Anglo-Saxon preterite,(215)

Singular. Plural.

ner-e-dide ner-e-didon.

ner-e-didest ner-e-didon.

ner-e-dide ner-e-didon.

And as _ner-e-dide_ dwindled down to _nerede_, so _nerede_ would, in modern English, become _nered_. The _d_ of the preterite, therefore, which changes _I love_ into _I loved_ is originally the auxiliary verb _to do_, and _I loved_ is the same as _I love did_, or _I did love_. In English dialects, as, for instance, in the Dorset dialect, every preterite, if it expresses a lasting or repeated action, is formed by _I did_,(216) and a distinction is thus established between "'e died eesterdae," and "the vo'ke did die by scores;" though originally _died_ is the same as _die did_.

It might be asked, however, very properly, how _did_ itself, or the Anglo-Saxon _dide_, was formed, and how it received the meaning of a preterite. In _dide_ the final _de_ is not termination, but it is the root, and the first syllable _di_ is a reduplication of the root, the fact being that all preterites of old, or, as they are called, strong verbs, were formed as in Greek and Sanskrit by means of reduplication, reduplication being one of the princ.i.p.al means by which roots were invested with a verbal character.(217) The root _do_ in Anglo-Saxon is the same as the root _the_ in _t.i.themi_ in Greek, and the Sanskrit root _dha_ in _dadadmi_. Anglo-Saxon _dide_ would therefore correspond to Sanskrit _dadhau_, I placed.

Now, in this manner, the whole, or nearly the whole, grammatical framework of the Aryan or Indo-European languages has been traced back to original independent words, and even the slightest changes which at first sight seem so mysterious, such as _foot_ into _feet_, or _I find_ into _I found_, have been fully accounted for. This is what is called comparative grammar, or a scientific a.n.a.lysis of all the formal elements of a language preceded by a comparison of all the varieties which one and the same form has a.s.sumed in the numerous dialects of the Aryan family. The most important dialects for this purpose are Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, and Gothic; but in many cases Zend, or Celtic, or Slavonic dialects come in to throw an unexpected light on forms unintelligible in any of the four princ.i.p.al dialects. The result of such a work as Bopp's "Comparative Grammar" of the Aryan languages may be summed up in a few words. The whole framework of grammar-the elements of derivation, declension, and conjugation-had become settled before the separation of the Aryan family.

Hence the broad outlines of grammar, in Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, Gothic, and the rest, are in reality the same; and the apparent differences can be explained by phonetic corruption, which is determined by the phonetic peculiarities of each nation. On the whole, the history of all the Aryan languages is nothing but a gradual process of decay. After the grammatical terminations of all these languages have been traced back to their most primitive form, it is possible, in many instances, to determine their original meaning. This, however, can be done by means of induction only; and the period during which, as in the Provencal _dir vos ai_, the component elements of the old Aryan grammar maintained a separate existence in the language and the mind of the Aryans had closed, before Sanskrit was Sanskrit or Greek Greek. That there was such a period we can doubt as little as we can doubt the real existence of fern forests previous to the formation of our coal fields. We can do even more. Suppose we had no remnants of Latin; suppose the very existence of Rome and of Latin were unknown to us; we might still prove, on the evidence of the six Romance dialects, that there must have been a time when these dialects formed the language of a small settlement; nay, by collecting the words which all these dialects share in common, we might, to a certain extent, reconstruct the original language, and draw a sketch of the state of civilization, as reflected by these common words. The same can be done if we compare Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, Gothic, Celtic, and Slavonic. The words which have as nearly as possible the same form and meaning in all the languages must have existed before the people, who afterwards formed the prominent nationalities of the Aryan family, separated; and, if carefully interpreted, they, too, will serve as evidence as to the state of civilization attained by the Aryans before they left their common home. It can be proved, by the evidence of language, that before their separation the Aryans led the life of agricultural nomads,-a life such as Tacitus describes that of the ancient Germans. They knew the arts of ploughing, of making roads, of building s.h.i.+ps, of weaving and sewing, of erecting houses; they had counted at least as far as one hundred. They had domesticated the most important animals, the cow, the horse, the sheep, the dog; they were acquainted with the most useful metals, and armed with iron hatchets, whether for peaceful or warlike purposes. They had recognized the bonds of blood and the bonds of marriage; they followed their leaders and kings, and the distinction between right and wrong was fixed by laws and customs. They were impressed with the idea of a divine Being, and they invoked it by various names. All this, as I said, can be proved by the evidence of language. For if you find that languages like Greek, Latin, Gothic, Celtic, or Slavonic, which, after their first separation, have had but little contact with Sanskrit, have the same word, for instance, for _iron_ which exists in Sanskrit, this is proof absolute that iron was known previous to the Aryan separation. Now, _iron_ is _ais_ in Gothic, and _ayas_ in Sanskrit, a word which, as it could not have been borrowed by the Indians from the Germans or by the Germans from the Indians, must have existed previous to their separation. We could not find the same name for house in Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, Slavonic, and Celtic,(218) unless houses had been known before the separation of these dialects. In this manner a history of Aryan civilization has been written from the archives of language, stretching back to times far beyond the reach of any doc.u.mentary history.(219)

The very name of _Arya_ belongs to this history, and I shall devote the rest of this lecture to tracing the origin and gradual spreading of this old word. I had intended to include, in to-day's lecture, a short account of _comparative mythology_, a branch of our science which restores the original form and meaning of decayed words by the same means by which comparative grammar recovers the original form and meaning of terminations. But my time is too limited; and, as I have been asked repeatedly why I applied the name of _Aryan_ to that family of language which we have just examined, I feel that I am bound to give an answer.

_arya_ is a Sanskrit word, and in the later Sanskrit it means _n.o.ble_, _of a good family_. It was, however, originally a national name, and we see traces of it as late as the Law-book of the Manavas, where India is still called _arya-avarta_, the abode of the _aryas_.(220) In the old Sanskrit, in the hymns of the Veda, _arya_ occurs frequently as a national name and as a name of honor, comprising the wors.h.i.+ppers of the G.o.ds of the Brahmans, as opposed to their enemies, who are called in the Veda _Dasyus_. Thus one of the G.o.ds, _Indra_, who, in some respects, answers to the Greek Zeus, is invoked in the following words (Rigveda, i. 57, 8): "Know thou the aryas, O Indra, and they who are Dasyus; punish the lawless, and deliver them unto thy servant! Be thou the mighty helper of the wors.h.i.+ppers, and I will praise all these thy deeds at the festivals."

In the later dogmatic literature of the Vedic age, the name of arya is distinctly appropriated to the three first castes-the Brahmans, Kshatriyas, Vaisyas-as opposed to the fourth, or the Sudras. In the Satapatha-Brahmana it is laid down distinctly: "aryas are only the Brahmans, the Kshatriyas, and Vaisyas, for they are admitted to the sacrifices. They shall not speak with everybody, but only with the Brahman, the Kshatriya, and the Vaisya. If they should fall into a conversation with a Sudra, let them say to another man, 'Tell this Sudra so.' This is the law."

In the Atharva-veda (iv. 20, 4; xix. 62, 1) expressions occur such as, "seeing all things, whether Sudra or arya," where Sudra and arya are meant to express the whole of mankind.

This word _arya_ with a long _a_ is derived from _arya_ with a short _a_, and this name _arya_ is applied in the later Sanskrit to a Vaisya, or a member of the third caste.(221) What is called the third cla.s.s must originally have const.i.tuted the large majority of the Brahmanic society, for all who were not soldiers or priests, were Vaisyas. We may well understand, therefore, how a name, originally applied to the cultivators of the soil and householders, should in time have become a general name for all Aryans.(222) Why the householders were called _arya_ is a question which would carry us too far at present. I can only state that the etymological signification of Arya seems to be "one who ploughs or tills,"

and that it is connected with the root of _arare_. The Aryans would seem to have chosen this name for themselves as opposed to the nomadic races, _the Turanians_, whose original name _Tura_ implies the swiftness of the horseman.

In India, as we saw, the name of arya, as a national name, fell into oblivion in later times, and was preserved only in the term aryavarta, the abode of the Aryans. But it was more faithfully preserved by the Zoroastrians who migrated from India to the north-west, and whose religion has been preserved to us in the Zend-avesta, though in fragments only. Now _Airya_ in Zend means venerable, and is at the same time the name of the people.(223) In the first chapter of the Vendidad, where Ahuramazda explains to Zarathustra the order in which he created the earth, sixteen countries are mentioned, each, when created by Ahuramazda, being pure and perfect; but each being tainted in turn by Angro mainyus or Ahriman. Now the first of these countries is called _Airyanem vaejo_, _Arianum s.e.m.e.n_, the Aryan seed, and its position must have been as far east as the western slopes of the Belurtag and Mustag, near the sources of the Oxus and Yaxartes, the highest elevation of Central Asia.(224) From this country, which is called their seed, the Aryans advanced towards the south and west, and in the Zend-avesta the whole extent of country occupied by the Aryans is likewise called _Airya_. A line drawn from India along the Paropamisus and Caucasus Indicus in the east, following in the north the direction between the Oxus and Yaxartes,(225) then running along the Caspian Sea, so as to include Hyrcania and Ragha, then turning south-east on the borders of Nisaea, Aria (_i.e._ Haria), and the countries washed by the Etymandrus and Arachotus, would indicate the general horizon of the Zoroastrian world. It would be what is called in the fourth carde of the Yasht of Mithra, "the whole s.p.a.ce of Aria," _vispem airyo-sayanem_ (totum Ariae situm).(226) Opposed to the Aryan we find in the Zend-avesta the non-Aryan countries (anairyao dainhavo),(227) and traces of this name are found in the ??a????a?, a people and town on the frontiers of Hyrcania.(228) Greek geographers use the name of Ariana in a wider sense even than the Zend-avesta. All the country between the Indian Ocean in the south and the Indus in the east, the Hindu-kush and Paropamisus in the north, the Caspian gates, Karamania, and the mouth of the Persian gulf in the west, is included by Strabo (xv. 2) under the name of Ariana; and Bactria is thus called(229) by him "the ornament of the whole of Ariana."

As the Zoroastrian religion spread westward, Persia, Elymais, and Media all claimed for themselves the Aryan t.i.tle. h.e.l.lanicus, who wrote before Herodotus, knows of Aria as a name of Persia.(230) Herodotus (vii. 62) attests that the Medians called themselves Arii; and even for Atropatene, the northernmost part of Media, the name of Ariania (not Aria) has been preserved by Stepha.n.u.s Byzantinus. As to Elymais its name has been derived from _Ailama_, a supposed corruption of _Airyama_.(231) The Persians, Medians, Bactrians, and Sogdians all spoke, as late as the time of Strabo,(232) nearly the same language, and we may well understand, therefore, that they should have claimed for themselves one common name, in opposition to the hostile tribes of Turan.

That _Aryan_ was used as a t.i.tle of honor in the Persian empire is clearly shown by the cuneiform inscriptions of Darius. He calls himself _Ariya_ and _Ariya-chitra_, an Aryan and of Aryan descent; and Ahuramazda, or, as he is called by Darius, Auramazda, is rendered in the Turanian translation of the inscription of Behistun, "the G.o.d of the Aryans." Many historical names of the Persians contain the same element. The great-grandfather of Darius is called in the inscriptions Ariyaramna, the Greek _Ariaramnes_ (Herod, vii. 90). Ariobarzanes (_i.e._ Euergetes), Ariomanes (_i.e._ Eumenes), Ariomardos, all show the same origin.(233)

About the same time as these inscriptions, Eudemos, a pupil of Aristotle, as quoted by Damascius, speaks of "the Magi and the whole Aryan race,"(234) evidently using Aryan in the same sense in which the Zend-avesta spoke of "the whole country of Aria."

And when, after years of foreign invasion and occupation, Persia rose again under the sceptre of the Sa.s.sanians to be a national kingdom, we find the new national kings the wors.h.i.+ppers of Masdanes, calling themselves, in the inscriptions deciphered by De Sacy,(235) "Kings of the Aryan and un-Aryan races;" in Pehlevi, _Iran va Aniran_; in Greek, ???????

?a? ??a??????.