Chapter II. On The Differences Which Distinguish Individual Languages Of The Four Continents.
Section I.
These differences may be explained by Causes now in Operation. The principal causes are, The abandonment by different branches of the same race:
1, Of different Synonymes;
2, Of different meanings of the same Synonyme.
This Section may be considered as confined to an affirmation of the propositions above stated.
Section II.
On the Differences between the Celtic and Gothic Classes of Languages. The Celtic and Gothic differ almost totally in the most Common Words. Celtic and Gothic words identical with Persian Synonymes.
The Celtic and Gothic Races form the population of North-western and Central Europe.
In those early ages in which the Celtic tribes first came into collision with the Roman legionaries, the Celtic language and race occupied a wide section of Europe, including the British islands, France, the Rhine, the whole of Switzerland, a portion of South-western Germany, and the [pg 027] North of Italy. The Celts were also in possession of some of the fairest regions of the Spanish Peninsula, a country which they shared with Iberian tribes, the ancestors of the Basque nation, of which a remnant still preserves among the fastnesses of the Pyrenean mountains the language, character, and institutions of their warlike forefathers. The existence in those ages of a Celtic population, occupying territories thus extensive, and the identity of their languages with the living tongues still spoken by the Welsh and other Celtic nations, have been placed beyond all doubt by the luminous investigations of Dr. Prichard and Humboldt.
In the present day, the Gothic nations and languages extend over a large section of the area of Europe, including the greatest portion[29] of Germany, the whole of Sweden, Norway, and Iceland, the German Cantons of Switzerland, and the British Isles, with the exception of those districts in which dialects of the Celtic are spoken.
Of the common origin of the Celtic and Gothic tongues we possess no direct historical proof, for the sources of these languages reach far higher than the records of history. Nor, as I conceive, is it possible, from a comparison of these languages themselves, to elicit a satisfactory demonstration of their original identity. Instances of partial resemblances may no doubt be pointed out; but it will be found nevertheless that in the most common corresponding terms, the Celtic and Gothic differ almost totally.
The only satisfactory mode of proving the common origin of the Celtic and Gothic seems to be by means of the affinity to the languages of India, Persia, &c., which are displayed by both, even in those very features in which they differ most [pg 028] widely from each other. The following are examples of the union, in the form of Synonymes in the Persian, of corresponding terms, in which the Celtic and Gothic differ totally from each other.
| Persian. | Welsh. | English. |
| Made, a maid, a female. | Maid. Mädchen, Germ. | |
| Geneez, a girl. | Geneth. | |
| D.ch.t.r., a girl, a daughter. | Daughter. Töchter, Germ. | |
| Chonahr, a sister. | Idem. | |
| Ch.d. a God. | God. | |
| B.r.ee, God. | Beree or Peree, to create, (spelt Peri.) Beri|adur, Creator. B.r.a. Heb. Id. | |
| Pechegan, infants. | Bechgyn. | |
| Juvan, young. | Ieuange. | Juvenile, from Lat. |
| Braud.|r. | Braud (Brathair, Irish.) | Brother. |
| Mam, mother. | Mam. | |
| M.d.r. mother. | Mother. | |
| P.d.r. father. | Pater, Lat.; Fader, Ang.-Sax. | |
| Latin. | Greek. | |
| Aud.|n. the ear. | Aud|io, I hear. | |
| Koush, the ear. | A|kous|o, I will hear. Akoustics, Eng. | |
| F.m. the mouth. | (Fhuaim, a voice, Irish.) Fama, Fame, Latin. | Feem|ee, I speak. |
The Persian grammar also combines many European languages:
| Persian. | Welsh. | English. | Latin. | German. |
| Men, I. | My. | Mine. | Meus. | Mein. |
| Tou, thou. | Thou. | Tu. | Du. | |
| Av, he, she, or it. | Idem, spelt Ev. | |||
| A een, this. | Hyn.; Hon. | |||
| Bod|n|, to be; (n. infinitive affix.) | Bod. | |||
| Am, I am. | Idem. | (Eim|i, Greek.) |
This tense is very like Latin:
Shou, be thou.
Shou d (sit), let him be.
Shou eem (simus), let us be.
Shou eet (sitis), be ye.
Shou nd, let them be.[30]
Section III.
On the Changes which have taken place in the English Language. Effect of the Norman Conquest, as a Cause of these Changes exaggerated. Dr. Johnson's Opinion. Sir Walter Scott's. Speech of “Wamba” in Ivanhoe. Some of the most important Changes have occurred since the time of Chaucer. The modern English, the Provincial Dialects of Lancashire and other English Counties, and the Lowland Scotch, different Fragments of the Anglo-Saxon. The Provincial English Auxiliary Verb, “I Bin,” &c.
That extensive changes have taken place in many Human languages, within a comparatively limited period, is a truth of which the proofs are alike abundant and indisputable. The various dialects that sprang from the Latin after the downfall of the Roman Empire, the emanation of numerous dialects in the Scandinavian Kingdoms from one ancient tongue, “The Danska Tunge” or “Norse,” and finally the successive phases of transition through which the English language itself has passed since the period of the Norman conquest, conspire, with other examples of the same kind, at once to establish the occurrence of such changes, and to exhibit in a striking point of view their extraordinary variety and extent.
In order to account for differences, so characteristic and apparently so fundamental, as many of the languages which are the offspring of these changes display, it has generally been deemed necessary to ascribe them to the agency of a violent disturbing cause. Hence the origin of an opinion that may be regarded as the prevalent one, viz. that these varieties of dialect have been mainly produced by the influence of Foreign invasions and conquests, and the consequent admixture of [pg 030] the Languages of the dominant, with those of vanquished, nations.
The grounds of this conclusion may be appropriately tested—and its fallacy, as I conceive, satisfactorily established—in one single instance, which I have been naturally led to select as involving considerations of peculiar interest to English readers. I allude to the influence which the Norman conquest of England is supposed to have exercised, in the production of those peculiar features, which distinguish the modern language of England from the original Anglo-Saxon tongue.
The share which the Norman conquest may have had in the formation of those peculiarities may be best determined by investigating 1st the immediate, and 2d the remote, consequences of that event.
On the subject of the immediate effects of the Norman conquest, it is highly interesting to observe that Dr. Johnson thus expresses himself in the following remarkable passage:
“About the year 1150 the Saxon began to take a form in which the beginning of the present English may be plainly discovered; this change seems not to have been the effect of the Norman conquest, for very few French words are found to have been introduced in the first Hundred years after it; the language must, therefore, have been altered by causes like those which, notwithstanding the care of writers and societies instituted to obviate them, are even now daily making innovations in every living language. I have exhibited a specimen of the language of this age from the year 1135 to 1140 of the Saxon Chronicle, of which the latter part was apparently written near the time to which it relates.”[31]
Yet Professor Rask of Copenhagen, a writer of great learning [pg 031] and ability, in alluding to the changes that occurred at this period, attempts to account for them by vaguely attributing them to an infusion of the speech of the “old northern settlers,” (in other words—the Danes,) and to the ascendancy of the Norman French as a court language.[32] But the facts are singularly at variance with his conclusions! The sway of the Danish kings had produced, as he admits, no material alteration in the English language, even during its continuance; and how then could it have done so a century after its termination? Nor can the ascendancy of the Norman Court be accepted as a satisfactory explanation of these results, since the changes to be accounted for did not consist in the adoption of Norman words, but in an internal change in the structure and inflections of the original Anglo-Saxon itself, unattended by the introduction of any Foreign admixture.
It is obvious, then, that the conclusion of Professor Rask cannot be regarded as a deduction naturally suggested by the phenomena, with which he was so profoundly conversant, but must be viewed rather as a result of the influence which the popular and generally received opinions on the subject, must have exercised upon his mind. Highly instructive is it to mark in this instance an example of the extent to which even erudite and admirable philologists have frequently been betrayed into inconsistency and error, by the supposed necessity of referring the revolutions which languages have undergone, to some abrupt and violent social revolution, with which, being connected in the order of events, they are also and not unnaturally conceived to be equally connected by the relation of cause and effect!
It may be assumed therefore, agreeably to the views of Dr. Johnson, that the Norman conquest had no immediate effect on the language of the Anglo-Saxons. It remains then [pg 032] to inquire in what manner the influence of that event was felt at a more distant period, viz.: about a century afterwards, during the reigns of John and Richard Cœur de Lion, the period during which the intermingling of the Norman and Saxon races and tongues is believed to have been consummated. During this period also, we possess the guidance of a great master, who has embodied all the philosophy of this subject in a few pathetic words which he has put into the mouth of a jester.[33]
“Truly,” said Wamba, without stirring from the spot, “I have consulted my legs upon this matter, and they are altogether of opinion, that to carry my gay garments through these sloughs would be an act of unfriendship to my sovereign person and royal wardrobe; wherefore Gurth, I advise thee to call off Fangs, and leave the herd to their destiny, which, whether they meet with bands of travelling soldiers, or of outlaws, or of wandering pilgrims, can be little else than to be converted into Normans before morning to thy no small ease and comfort.”
“The swine turned Normans to my comfort,” quoth Gurth; “expound that to me, Wamba, for my brain is too dull, and my mind too vexed, to read riddles.”
“Why, how call you those grunting brutes running about on their four legs?” demanded Wamba.
“Swine, fool, swine,” said the herd; “every fool knows that.”
“And swine is good Saxon,” said the Jester; “but how call you the sow when she is flayed, and drawn, and quartered, and hung by the heels, like a traitor?”
“Pork,” answered the swineherd.
“I am very glad every fool knows that too,” said Wamba, “and Pork, I think, is good Norman-French; and so when the brute lives, and is in the charge of a Saxon slave, she goes by her Saxon name; but becomes a Norman, and is called Pork, when she is carried to the Castle-hall to feast among the nobles. What dost thou think of this, friend Gurth, ha?”
“It is but too true doctrine, friend Wamba, however it got into thy fool's pate!”
“Nay, I can tell you more,” said Wamba, in the same tone. “There is old Alderman Ox continues to hold his Saxon epithet, while he is under the charge of serfs and bondmen such as thou, but becomes Beef, a fiery French gallant, when he arrives before the worshipful jaws that are destined to consume him. ‘Mynheer Calf,’ too, becomes ‘Monsieur de Veau,’ in the like manner: he is Saxon when he requires tendance, and takes a Norman name when he becomes matter of enjoyment.”
“By St. Dunstan,” answered Gurth, “thou speakest but sad truths; little is left to us but the air we breathe, and that appears to have been reserved with much hesitation, solely for the purpose of enabling us to endure the tasks they lay upon our shoulders. The finest and the fattest is for their board; the loveliest is for their couch; the best and bravest supply their foreign masters with soldiers, and whiten distant lands with their bones, leaving few here who have either the will or the power to protect the unfortunate Saxon!”
The effect of the Norman Conquest was simply to introduce among the Saxon population a certain class of new terms, which—though they were eventually embodied in their language—are still readily distinguishable from the Stock on which they were thus engrafted. But the general structure and composition of the language remained unaffected by any [pg 034] Foreign alloy. The most common verbs, nouns, and grammatical inflections and forms—Horne Tooke's “epea pteroenta” of the English language—remained, and have since continued to be, pure, unadulterated Anglo-Saxon!
Such was the character of those modifications in the English Tongue that flowed from the Norman Conquest. Partial and peculiar were those changes in their nature—brief, also, was the interval of which they were the result! A period can be fixed, at which it is certain that the dialect of the Norman had ceased to encroach on that of the Anglo-Saxon people. In the age of Chaucer, for example, the Norman and Saxon races had long become undistinguishable, and the languages they spoke had blended into one. Can the same age be fixed upon as an epoch at which the process of transition in the English language had also been arrested? That considerable changes have since occurred will not be disputed—for it is an historical fact which does neither admit of doubt nor discussion. But had all important changes ceased at that time? Can it be said that—in the time of Chaucer—that progressive revolution which has so widely separated the modern English from the original Anglo-Saxon had gone through all its stages? Can it be said that the innovations which have since occurred are few in number, and trifling in point of character, compared to those which belong to earlier periods of our History?
The answer to these inquiries involves a truth that I believe will be found no less startling to the Philologist than to the general reader, in whose mind the changes which the English language has undergone are associated with the violent shock given by the Norman Conquest to Anglo-Saxon institutions. The truth to which I allude—and it is one for which I apprehend few inquirers will be prepared—is this: that the changes which have occurred in the English language since the age of Chaucer are at least equal in importance to [pg 035] those which took place in the antecedent periods of our history. Novel as this conclusion may appear, the proofs are so simple and so conclusive, as to place its accuracy beyond the possibility of doubt.
The features which distinguish different languages from each other are divisible into two classes—Words and Grammatical inflections. In both these features marked differences have arisen between our modern English and its parent Saxon, and to both these classes we must refer in forming our conclusion as to the relative importance of the alterations which have taken place in our language at two different epochs.
1st. The difference in words between the language of Chaucer and our modern English will be sufficiently obvious, from a cursory glance at the venerable remains of that poet. How many terms are there in the pages of the father of English poetry that require the aid of a glossary to render them intelligible even to an educated Englishman! These terms too, be it observed—and it is a reflection highly deserving of the attention of those who may still cling to the impression that the Norman Conquest has been the sole agent of those phases through which the English Tongue has passed—do not consist exclusively of Anglo-Saxon roots, but comprise also a large number of Norman words which have shared the same fate!
2d. Still more striking have been those Changes in the Grammatical forms of the English which may be referred to the last four centuries.
The ancient Saxon was a language of inflections—the modern English is a language of simple forms. Thus, in the Anglo-Saxon the terminations of the Verb were varied in different Persons, as they are in the Latin “Hab-eo, Hab-emus, Hab-ent,” and in the German “Hab-e, Hab-en, Hab-en.” These inflections have, for the most part, progressively disappeared from the English, which expresses the changes of [pg 036] Persons by separate Pronouns, in conjunction with a Root, in most instances unvarying, as “I Have, We Have, They Have.” There is distinct evidence that this change has, in a great measure, perhaps principally, taken place since the time of Chaucer—whose writings, to a great extent, preserve the Anglo-Saxon inflections, such as “They Hav-en,”[34] &c., corresponding with the German “Sie Hab-en,” &c.
Slow and almost imperceptible have been the steps in this as in other examples of that revolution of which the progress may be faintly traced in the writings of Spenser, and Shakspeare, and Milton, and even in those of the great modern Masters of the last century. In our own generation it has not been consummated! A striking instance occurs in the old inflection of the third person singular “He Giv-eth,” still partially used in the venerable forms of Scripture. This inflection, now fast passing into oblivion, trifling as it may appear, forms a link which serves to associate the English language not only with the German, but with the Latin and the Sanscrit![35]
The Auxiliary Verb may probably be regarded as the most important part of Language. Now it is highly deserving of remark, that in the Anglo-Saxon there existed an Auxiliary Verb, “Beo, or Beonne, To Be,” which has been abandoned in the modern English. This Verb is interesting, not merely from its important functions as a part of Language, but also from its forming a link, as will hereafter appear, between the Anglo-Saxon, the German, the dialects of the English Provinces, and of the Scottish Lowlands. From the English of [pg 037] Literature it has been lost since the days of Chaucer, by whom it is commonly used, as in the following example:
“These two sinnes bin so nigh cosins.”—Person's Tale.
The peculiarities which distinguish the dialects of the English Counties from the language of the higher classes of society are not, as is perhaps generally supposed, the results of the capricious deviation of uncultivated minds from an established standard. On the contrary, they appear clearly for the most part to be various relics or Fragments of Old English or Anglo-Saxon, which the more educated classes have lost. For example, To “axe” (for To ask,) “I conne,” (I can,) expressions used by the peasantry of Shropshire, are words of Saxon origin that occur in Chaucer. In an able work on the peculiarities of the dialect of Lancashire, by Mr. Collier,[36] it has been shown with much learning and research that those peculiarities are to be recognized in Chaucer, Spenser, Ben Jonson, and other old English writers. Obsolete Norman, as well as Saxon, words occur in this dialect. Similar inferences with regard to the Lowland Scotch may be drawn from Mr. Jamieson's work on that branch of the Anglo-Saxon.
Some very interesting results will be found to flow from a Comparison of the “Pronunciation” of different English Counties, and of the Lowland Scotch, with that of the educated classes of modern England. One of the most marked differences between the modern English and the German consists in the superior breadth or distinctness which is given in the German to words which are uttered with a comparatively narrow and indistinct sound in Modern English. There is every reason to believe that the Anglo-Saxon Pronunciation [pg 038] was similar to the German, and that the present English mode has been the result of progressive innovation. Of the various dialects of the Anglo-Saxon, the Lowland Scotch, in its pronunciation, as well as in individual words, approaches nearest to the Continental German.[37] But, as intimated above, many of the characteristics of German articulation have been preserved also in the Provincial dialects of England. Moreover, it is interesting to observe, that different primitive peculiarities have been preserved in different counties. For example, the English of the educated classes differs from the Continental German, and, as it is believed, from the Anglo-Saxon also,[38] in giving a narrow sound to the vowels A and U. Now the Shropshire dialect has preserved the broad A; (“Hair,” for instance, is pronounced “H-ā-r,” as it is by the Germans!) On the other hand, in Lancashire and Cheshire the broad U forms the prominent feature in the dialect of the peasantry; (for example, “Butter” and “Gutter” are pronounced “Bootter” and “Gootter!”)
As already noticed, the Anglo-Saxon Auxiliary Verb forms in numerous instances an important connecting link. Thus the modern English and the modern German Auxiliary Verbs differ totally in the present tense.
| English. | German. |
| I am, | Ich bin, |
| Thou art, | Du bist, |
| He is. | Er ist. |
| We are, | Wir sind, |
| You are, | Ihr seyd, |
| They are. | Sie sind. |
But both these Verbs co-exist in the present tense in the old Anglo-Saxon.
Anglo-Saxon[39] Verb the source of the English “I am,” and Anglo-Saxon Verb corresponding with the German “Ich bin.”
Indicative Present.
Singular.
1, Eom; 1, Beo,
2, Eort; 2, Byst,
3, Is.; 3, By & Byd.
Plural.
1, 2, 3, Synd.; 1, 2, 3, Beod & Beo.
Subjunctive Present.
Singular.
1, 2, 3, Sy (Seo); 1, 2, 3, Beo.
Plural.
1, 2, 3, Sy'n; 1, 2, 3, Beon.
Indicative Imperfect.
Singular.
1, Wæs; 1, 2, 3, Beo.
2, Wære,
3, Wæs.
Plural.
1, 2, 3, Weron; 1, 2, 3, Beod.
Infinitive Present.
Wesanne; Beonne.
Participle Active.
Wesende; Beonde.
Participle Past.
Gewesen.
But though the present tense of the Verb “Beo” or “Beonne” does not exist in modern English, it has been preserved in a remarkable manner in the Shropshire and other dialects, in which it runs thus:
| Provincial English. | German. |
| I Be, or I Bin, | Ich Bin, |
| Thou Bist, | Du Bist, |
| He Is. | Er Ist. |
| We Bin, | |
| Yō Bin, | |
| They Bin. |
The word “Bin” or “Ben” is used by Chaucer for the 1st, 2d, and 3d Persons Plural,[40] as in the passage previously quoted: “These two sinnes bin so nigh cosins.” (Person's Tales.)
These are singular but highly instructive examples of the caprices of “the great Innovator!”
Section IV.
On the Scandinavian Languages. Resemblances between the Icelandic and Anglo-Saxon. Recent Origin and extensive Nature of the Differences among the Icelandic, Swedish, Danish, and Norwegian Tongues. Approximation of the Ancient Specimens of the Scandinavian and Teutonic Languages.
The Island of Iceland abounds in diversified features of interest; and its Language, early History, and Institutions, will be found replete with instruction, in connexion with the inquiry pursued in this volume.
As has been previously stated, the Gothic Class of languages are naturally divisible into two great subordinate branches: the Teutonic or German, including the dialects of Germany, the Low Countries, and of Great Britain—and the Scandinavian, including those of the two Scandinavian Peninsulas and Iceland. These two great Divisions of the Languages of the Gothic race are radically the same, but they are supposed to display certain specific differences by which they are distinguished from each other.
Of the Teutonic—one of the most venerable specimens is the Anglo-Saxon, the primitive tongue of the Ancestors of the modern English. More ancient specimens of some of the other Gothic dialects have been preserved, but as these are for the most part mere fragments—while of the Anglo-Saxon literature and language we possess copious Remains—it has been inferred by eminent Scholars that it is in these Remains—to Englishmen so interesting for other reasons—that we may on the whole, perhaps, hope to find the nearest approach to a transcript of the early language of the Teutonic [pg 042] tribes.[41] Of all the Scandinavian Languages, on the other hand, the Icelandic—by the general concurrence of the scholars of the North—appears to be the most primitive.
Now in relation to these two Languages, a very interesting proposition has been established by Scandinavian scholars—and though they widely differ as to the cause of the results they discuss—they seem to be agreed with respect to the proposition itself. The Icelandic, they have shown, closely approaches to the Anglo-Saxon in numerous features in which it differs from the languages of Norway, Sweden, and Denmark. Moreover it has been pointed out by the writers who first noticed these resemblances, that—in their Literary and Bardic Institutions, as well as in their Language—the Icelanders approach to the Anglo-Saxons. In explanation of these facts, they propose the theory—that in the early ages of their history the Icelanders must have benefited by direct communication and instruction from the Anglo-Saxons.
These views have been fully discussed by Professor Rask, in a Preface prefixed to his Anglo-Saxon Grammar, which contains a valuable body of facts that serve to throw a new light on the history of the Scandinavian Tongues.[42] He does not deny the existence of these important common features in the Icelandic and Anglo-Saxon Languages and Remains; nor the absence of the same features as regards the Modern specimens of the Danish, Swedish, and Norwegian; but he maintains, nevertheless, that all these characteristics may be retraced in detail, either in the Ancient or in the Provincial specimens of those three Languages. In the present day the Icelandic differs widely from the Languages of the Mainland of Scandinavia, and those Languages also differ widely among themselves. But originally, he maintains, one [pg 043] common Speech, the ancient Scandinavian, (“Danska Tunge,”) was spoken from the coasts of Greenland to those of Finland, from the Frozen Ocean to the Eider.[43] As we ascend into the remoter periods of history we find the languages of Scandinavia gradually approximate to each other, and finally blend into one.[44] During the ninth century, and the period immediately succeeding, these tongues were perfectly identical.
Professor Rask's proofs of this proposition may be said to consist of a reunion of the “Disjecta Membra” of the “Danska Tunge,” as found dispersed in the various kingdoms and provinces of the Scandinavian Mainland. Of these proofs I shall offer a few examples.
After observing that the Danish and Norwegian have from various causes become very much alike, he adds that a comparison of the Danish with the Swedish would, for that reason, be more instructive.
“The Swedish has almost from the introduction of Christianity, even during the Calmar union, a.d. 1397, and in the time of Gustavus I., been a distinct tongue; a comparison, therefore, with the Swedish is more to the present purpose.”
He then gives a specimen of an ancient Danish MS. of a date prior to the Reformation, which, “like all MSS. prior” to that event, “differs widely from the present Danish.... It has many inflections now obsolete, but which are to be found only in Old Swedish and Icelandic; many antiquated words and phrases, exempli gratia, then annin,” Icelandic “thann annan.”
He then mentions some words contained in this MS. which are still preserved in “the provinces of Upland, Jutland, and Dalecarlia.”
He next notices an old Swedish document issued by King Magnus Smik, of which he observes: “This, although about a century older, greatly resembles the preceding specimen, and is scarcely distinguishable from the Danish of the same period.... But if we go further back to the language of the old Danish Laws, we there recognize nearly the entire structure of the earliest Swedish, and the Icelandic though not always strictly adhered to, as the language in those unhappy and turbulent times which preceded the Calmar Union, underwent in Denmark what may be termed its fermentation, somewhat earlier than in the other states.”
He then gives a specimen from the Ecclesiastical Laws of Zealand, of which he observes: “The few deviations from the Icelandic bear, for the most part, a strong resemblance to the Swedish.
“But the oldest remains of the Danish language are to be found on our Runic stone monuments, and here at length it perfectly coincides with the earliest Swedish, Norwegian, and Icelandic.
“The Danish is closely allied to the Swedish, and both, in the earliest times, lapse into the Icelandic, which, according to all ancient records, was formerly universal over all the North, and must therefore be considered as the parent of both the modern Scandinavian dialects.”[45]
On the subject of the differences of dialect in the different provinces of the Northern Kingdoms he says that, “In Norway as well as in Denmark one province terminates its verbs [pg 045] in a, another distinguishes all the three genders, while a third has preserved a vast number of old words and inflections which to the others are unintelligible.”
We have thus a proof that even in the provinces of the same kingdom there are differences of “words, grammar, and inflections.” The difference in the number of genders is a very remarkable one.
The researches of Professor Rask will be found distinctly to warrant the following conclusions. These conclusions are in the nature of results that legitimately flow from his researches; they do not represent the inferences which he himself has thence deduced. With regard both to the languages of England and of his native Scandinavia, this learned writer seems evidently to have been perplexed by the extent and variety of the changes he has described. Hence, in both instances, he has shown an inclination to ascribe to the influence of War and Social disturbance changes which his own researches clearly prove to have been the effects neither of transient nor of local influences, but of causes progressively at work through a series of ages, and embracing large groups of nations and languages in their action.
1. The differences which now exist between the various Scandinavian Languages extend to all those features in which it is possible that one Language, or one Class of Languages, can differ from another; viz. to Words, Grammar, Inflections,[46] and to the arrangement of Words in sentences,[47] or Idioms.
2. Not only do differences of this nature present themselves in the various Scandinavian Kingdoms—but also in the various [pg 046] Provinces of the same Kingdom, which in many instances are distinguished by the most marked differences in Words, Grammar, &c. Thus the Dialect of Dalecarlia in Sweden is very ancient and distinct, and approaches to the Gothic.[48]
3. These characteristic features of the various languages and dialects of Scandinavia have arisen progressively during the course of ages.
4. These differences principally consist in the abandonment in one Kingdom or Province of a portion of the Words, Idioms, Grammar, &c. of the Parent Speech—that part of the elements of the Original Tongue which have become obsolete in one dialect having generally been preserved in the dialects of other kingdoms and provinces—which have at the same time generally lost other distinct portions of the Vocabulary, Grammar, &c. of their common Original. In other words, the “Disjecta Membra” of the old Scandinavian, or “Danska Tunge,” when not preserved in the Danish, have been retained for the most part in the Swedish, Icelandic, and Norwegian, or in some of the Provincial dialects of Scandinavia, and vice versâ. In the various provinces in which it was once spoken different portions of the Parent speech have been abandoned or preserved.
5. Hence it follows that the Primitive Language of Scandinavia, or “Danska Tunge,” does not exist in any one—but is dispersed in all its derivative dialects. (Compare the motto from Grotius on the title-page.)
6. It is a necessary consequence of the third and fourth propositions that the more ancient remains of the derivative dialects approach more nearly to the Parent Speech, and—in the ratio of their superior antiquity—unite a greater proportion of the distinctive peculiarities of all the sister-dialects, [pg 047] which, as previously stated, have arisen in consequence of certain portions of the Parent speech having been abandoned in some provinces and retained in others, and vice versâ.
An interesting illustration of this maxim occurs in a passage from Professor Rask's preface already quoted, in which, after giving a specimen of old Danish, which approaches closely to the Icelandic, he adds, “The few deviations from the Icelandic bear for the most part a strong resemblance to the Swedish.” In other words, the older specimens of the Danish unite those peculiarities by which the modern collateral Tongues of Iceland, Denmark, and Sweden are distinguished from each other.
Let it be borne in mind, that the lapse of one thousand years has produced these changes, and the instructive nature of this example will be fully apparent. Of the accuracy of the data on which the previous deductions rest, all doubt must be removed by reference to one remarkable event. It is historically certain that the Island of Iceland is inhabited by a nation descended from emigrants from the opposite Norwegian coast. It is historically certain, also, that previously to the Ninth Century these warlike adventurers had not established themselves on the Icelandic soil. Anterior to that period, therefore, it is self-evident that, inasmuch as the Icelanders had no existence as a nation, the Icelandic Tongue could not have had a separate existence as a language. Yet it is certain that in the present day the Icelandic deviates at least as widely from the language of the adjoining Norwegian Coasts as that language deviates from the other Scandinavian Tongues.
The evidence furnished by Professor Rask and the writers whose views he has combated, will be found, when fairly balanced, distinctly to support a very important Conclusion, contemplated by neither. The facts adduced on both sides conspire to show a rapid approximation of the Teutonic and [pg 048] Scandinavian branches of the Gothic as we ascend into remote ages.
Of this approximation, the features of identity between the Anglo-Saxon and the Icelandic, pointed out by the writers whose views Professor Rask combats, furnish a reasonable presumption, which is converted into positive proof by the evidence collected by Professor Rask himself, that the same features occur in all the ancient, though they do not in the modern, specimens of the Languages of the Scandinavian Peninsulas. It is true, this learned writer, of whose researches I have chiefly availed myself in this Section, maintains that there are some features in which all the Scandinavian differ from the Anglo-Saxon and other Teutonic Dialects, a conclusion, however, but feebly supported by the examples he has adduced, and scarcely reconcilable in any way with the resemblance which the primitive Swedish dialect of Dalecarlia is said to bear to the Gothic. But, assuming the occurrence of some features of difference, even in the earliest specimens we possess, this assumption leaves untouched the proposition that these specimens show a rapid rate of approximation, which, if equally rapid prior to their date, implies that at an era not many ages anterior the identity of the languages of Germany and Scandinavia must have been complete.
Section V.
The Origin of the Irish Nation. The original Language of the British Isles was a Union of Welsh and Irish. Union of the Irish, Welsh, &c. in the ancient Local Names in the Celtic Countries of Gaul, &c. These Names a connecting Link between the existing Celtic Dialects and the Oriental, Greek, and other Languages, &c.
The origin of the Irish nation, or Gael, forms—for numerous reasons—a highly interesting and important subject of inquiry. Of this Nation the very same theories have been maintained as those which have been adopted in some quarters with respect to the North American Indians, the Negroes, and other branches of the Human Family; viz., that they are of a stock aboriginally inferior and distinct, by nature incapable of the virtues of civilization. Let the views advocated by Pinkerton with respect to the Gaelic race—views received with no slight degree of favour in his time—be compared with the doctrines of many modern writers on the subject of the native African and American Races, and an instructive lesson will be learnt on the force of prejudice and the uniformity of error!
On the other hand, it must be allowed that the opinions which have been generally espoused on the subject of the origin of the Gael by many of the Historians and Scholars of Ireland and of the Highlands of Scotland, can scarcely be said to possess a better claim to the approbation of a calm and dispassionate judgment. Eminently distinguished as the Irish are by Literary genius, there is probably no subject on which their native talent has appeared to less advantage than in the investigation of the early History of their own [pg 050] Country. Fictions the most extravagant, borrowed from the Chronicles of the dark ages, have been credulously adopted by their first Scholars in lieu of those solid truths to which a calm and sober inquiry alone can lead. Thus we find Mr. Moore, at once the Poet and the Historian of Ireland, lending the sanction of his name to the Fable that the Irish are of Spanish origin; and citing, in answer to the more reasonable hypothesis of a British origin, a variety of Irish writers of no mean note, and some Welsh writers also, in favour of the assertions: 1, that the Irish Language is almost totally unlike the Welsh or Ancient British; and 2, that the Welsh is not a Celtic but a Gothic Tongue! There is every reason to conclude that Mr. Moore—unacquainted, probably, with any of the Celtic dialects himself—resorted to those authorities which he might naturally have deemed most deserving of confidence. But this only renders more lamentably conspicuous the credulity, carelessness, and ignorance of those to whose labours he has appealed. The assertions, 1, that the Welsh and Irish are unlike; and 2, that the Welsh is a Gothic dialect, are contradictions of the plainest facts.
Influenced by national feelings Gaelic Scholars have also advanced various other theories, calculated to exhibit the antiquity of their language and race in a favorable point of view. The Gaelic has been maintained to be the Parent, at least in part, of the Latin, the Welsh, &c.; while to the first Colonists of Ireland a Carthaginian or Phœnician origin has been assigned.
These conclusions cannot be sustained. But it is highly probable, notwithstanding, that the proofs on which they have been based will be found, in many instances, to contain the germs of important truths, though blended with an admixture of error. The traces of affinity between the Irish [pg 051] and other ancient languages which have been collected by Gaelic Scholars, may be open in many cases to the same remark, which is clearly applicable to the examples of affinity pointed out by Mr. Catlin between the dialect of the North American Indian tribe the Mandans and the Welsh; viz., these features may consist of clear and genuine traces of a generic, though they may afford no proofs of a specific, affinity of race. There can be no doubt that the Irish preserves many primitive forms which the kindred Celtic of Wales has lost; there can be no doubt also that the Irish approximates to the Latin, to the Greek, and to the Egyptian,[49] &c. in many features which the Welsh no longer exhibits. The examples adduced in Appendix A of the connexion of the Irish language with the Hebrew, Egyptian, &c. are sufficient to show that the Irish are a nation of Oriental origin. But on the other hand it must be borne in mind, that inasmuch as the Welsh, Latin, &c., have also preserved primitive forms which the Irish has lost, there is no ground for concluding that the Gaelic is a Parent rather than a Sister of these venerable Tongues; and inasmuch as the evidence of the Eastern origin of the Gael, however unequivocal, is not clearer or closer than the accompanying[50] evidence with respect to the Welsh, English, and other European nations, there are no peculiar grounds for referring the first colonization of Ireland to a direct migration from the shores of Palestine or Africa, rather than to the gradual diffusion of population from a central point.
The following comparison presents examples of features in which the Irish approximates to the Gothic and other Languages, at the same time that it differs more or less from the Welsh.
Words in which the Gaelic resembles the Gothic, and other European Languages, more closely than it resembles the Cymraeg or Welsh.
| English. | Gaelic. | Illustrations. | Cymraeg. |
| 1. Father. | Ath-air, (Ir.) | Atta, (Gothic.),Ayta, Aydia, (Basque.),Attia, (Hung.),Otek, (Russ.),Fader, slightly varied in all the Gothic dialects, except the Gothic properly socalled, Pater, (Greek & Latin.) | Tad, (W.) |
| 2. Mother. | Math-air, (Ir.) | Mater or Mutter (withsome trifling variations) in Latin, Greek, and all the Teuto-Scandinaviandialects except the Gothic—also in the Sclavonic and Bohemian.Ath-ei, (Gothic.) | |
| Mymmog, (Manx dialect. | Mam, (W.) | ||
| 3. Brother. | Brathair, (Ir.) | The Irish form,Brathair, occurs in the Latin and Teuto-Scandinav. tongues; theWelsh form, Brawd, inthe Sclavonian tongues. | Brawd, (W.),Bredar, (Cornish.) |
| Breur, (Manx dialect | Breur, (Arm.) | ||
| 4. Sister. | |Siur, (Ir.) | The Irish form prevails in the Latin, Teuto-Scand. and Sclavonic. | Chwaer, (W.) |
| Piur, (Scotch.) | Hor, Huyr, (Cornish.) | ||
| 5. A Company. | Drong, (Ir.) | Drang, a Throng, a Crowd, (German.) | Torv. |
| 6. Mock. | Magom, (Ir.) | Mock, (English.) | Gwatwor, (W.) |
| 7. Evil. | Neoid, (Ir.) | Naughty, (Eng.) | Droug, (W.) |
| Olk, (Ir.) | Ill, (Eng.) | ||
| 8. The Bank of a stream. | Rang, (Ir.) | Rand,[51] (Germ.) | Glan, (W.) |
| 9. A Step. | Beim, (Ir.) | Bēm-a, a Step, (Greek.),Bain-o, to go, Bahn, a Path, (Germ.) | Cam. |
| 10. To bear. | Beir-im, (Ir.) | Fero, (Latin.) Ge-Bähr-en, (Germ.) | Dwyn. |
| 11. Jeering, Delight, A Desire. | Fon-amhad (Ir.), Foun, (Ir.) | Fun, (Eng.), Vonne, Delight, (Germ.), Vunsch, a Wish, (Germ.) | Vynn, or Mynn, a Wish, (W.) |
| 12. A Woman. | Geon, (Ir.) | Cwen, (Ang.-Sax. & Icel.) | Gen-eth, a Girl, (W.) |
| 13. To know. | Fis-ay-im, Fod-am, (Ir.) | Viss-en, (Germ.), Vit-an, (Ang.-Sax.), “I wot,” (Eng.) | Wys, or Gwys, Wyth, or Gwyth, Knowledge (W.) |
| 14. To heat, or warm. | Gorm, (Ir.) | Warm, (Eng.) | Gwresogi, (W.) |
| 15. A Shadow. | Sgath, (Ir.) | Skia, Skiad-on, (Greek.), Schatten, (Germ.) | Cysgod, (W.) |
| 16. To speak. | |Raid-him, (Ir.) | Read-en, (Germ.) | Siarad, (W.) |
Some of these examples would furnish a more plausible argument to show that the Irish are a Gothic race than any which have been advanced to prove that the Welsh are of Gothic origin! It is singular, for instance, that the Irish terms expressive of the Domestic relations are so near the English as to excite in the first instance a suspicion that they must have been borrowed from the followers of Strongbow! But this impression must be dispelled by the reflection that terms of this class are never borrowed from its conquerors by a nation that continues to retain its primitive language. Moreover, it will be observed, that the Irish, in the instance of these words, approaches much more nearly to the Gothic, [pg 054] Hungarian, and Russian, &c. than it does to the English. Again, the Irish word “Gorm,” To heat or warm, is like the English “Warm.” But, on the other hand, its genuineness is rendered indisputable by its absolute identity with the word 'Gorm' in Persian and Egyptian, (See Appendix A, p. [21].) Finally, the resemblances manifested above by the Irish to the Greek are quite as close as those which the former language displays to the English and other Gothic Tongues. In these examples, therefore, we may recognize proofs not of any partial results or specific connexions, but of the more complete approximation of the European languages as we enlarge our range of inquiry, and obtain more ample specimens of each Class.
But, notwithstanding the occurrence of some features of difference, it is indisputable that there exists a close specific affinity between the Irish and Welsh Languages, which renders the common origin of the nations who speak them evident. The original identity of the Irish and Welsh Languages was established as far back as the commencement of the eighteenth century, by the investigations of the excellent Archæologist, Edward Lhuyd, who spent five years in travelling through the various Celtic regions, and whose comparison of the dialects of Wales, Cornwall, Armorica, the Highlands of Scotland, and the Isle of Man, is not inferior either in soundness of reasoning, or in patient, extensive, and honest research, to the best German works of the present day. But although the writings of Lhuyd may be said to have established the original unity of the Welsh and Irish races, since the publication of his work, a peculiar opinion has been adopted by some learned men with regard to the time of their original separation. Of this opinion, Edward Lhuyd was himself the first advocate; his conclusion was that though the Irish and British Celts were both descendants from one stock, they must have been separated into two [pg 055] distinct Tribes before their arrival in the British Islands. The Gaelic or Irish Tribe he supposes to have preceded the Welsh or British Tribe, by whom he conceives them to have been gradually driven to the West, as the Britons were by the Saxons in subsequent ages. Lhuyd's grounds are as follows:
The most ancient names of Rivers and Mountains in the Island of Britain are very generally composed of terms still preserved in the Welsh or Ancient British Tongue. But there are some remarkable exceptions, and in these instances it frequently happens that the Names may be clearly identified with Words still preserved in the Irish or Gaelic branch of the Celtic. For example, the names of the British rivers, the Usk and the Esk, are particularly noticed by Lhuyd; these names are identical with “Uisge, Eask,” the Irish term for “Water.” This word, he observes, does not exist in the Welsh, and he had looked for it in vain in the sister dialect of Armorica; but, he adds, it is still retained by the Irish or Gaelic. Hence, he suggests that the Irish or Gaelic branch of the Celts must have colonized the Island of Britain before the arrival of the Cymry or Welsh branch, by whom, as he conceives, they were expelled, after having conferred names on the principal localities.
The evidence of language will be found sufficient to show not merely the common origin of the Welsh and Irish, but also to fix a much more recent date for their separation than that which has been assigned by Lhuyd. It will thence appear that the Irish are descendants of Colonists of the Welsh or British race, not of a distinct Celtic sept, and that the commencement of the separate existence of the Irish nation must be referred to a comparatively recent date, propositions of much interest, of which the proofs about to be advanced will probably be deemed to be at once clear and simple.
Lhuyd's reasoning in favour of his theory, that the Irish or Gael existed in Britain as a separate Tribe, prior to the arrival [pg 056] of the Britons who fought against Cæsar, the ancestors of the modern Welsh, is founded on a false analogy not unnatural to a first inquirer.
The proposition that the most important local names in every country for the most part consist of terms belonging to the language of the very first inhabitants, is one of which I conceive the truth will be evident. For a proof of this principle, I may refer to Chalmers'[52] admirable analysis of local names in the Lowlands of Scotland, where, in spite of a succession of Conquests, and the utter extinction in that part of Britain of the language of the original inhabitants, viewed as a vernacular dialect, Welsh and other Celtic names are still preserved, after the lapse of ages, for the most prominent features of the country. This result, it may be observed, is one that flows from the very nature of things. Even the most fierce and ruthless invaders are compelled to hold sufficient intercourse with the first population to enable them to learn the proper names of their localities, and these names, from obvious motives of convenience, they almost universally adopt.
Now, had Lhuyd shown that the most ancient Local names in Britain are exclusively Irish, there can be no doubt that, consistently with the principle just noticed, his theory would have been supported by the facts to which he adverts. But the most ancient local names in Britain are not exclusively or principally Irish; in an equal number, perhaps in a majority, of cases they are Welsh.
Moreover, it may be observed that the names of localities in this Island furnish highly instructive evidence, not merely with respect to the different races by whom it has been successively peopled, but also of the order in which they arrived. Thus the names of Rivers and Mountains, and other natural [pg 057] objects, at least of the most conspicuous, are Celtic; the names of the most ancient Towns are Latin, or Latin grafted on British words; more modern Towns and Villages have Saxon appellations; those of more recent origin have frequently Norman designations; and last of all come those places which have names derived from our present English. These various classes of names cannot be nicely distinguished in each particular instance. Of the correctness of the general principle, however, there is no doubt.
But the terms noticed by Lhuyd as significant in the Irish language do not belong to a different class of appellations from those which are obviously of British or Cymraeg origin. The Irish and Cymraeg terms are both found to predominate most in the names of the most ancient Class, viz. in those of Rivers, Mountains, &c., and to be thus applied in conjunction. Hence the natural inference that flows from his facts is not that these names were conferred by two distinct and successive races, but that they were imposed contemporaneously and by the same People!
Further it may be noticed, that if British Topography presents words extant only in the Irish Tongue, Irish Topography also presents names which cannot be explained by means of the Irish, though their meaning is preserved in Welsh; for example: There is a place near the head of a Stream in Roscommon, called “Glan a Modda,” (from Glan, “The bank of a Stream,” Welsh.) There is a place in Wales, called “Glan a Mowdduy.” There is a place called “Glan-gora,” in a Creek at the head of Bantry Bay; and another place in Ireland called “Glan-gort.”
“Ben-heder,” the ancient Irish name for “The Hill of Howth,” interpreted by Mr. Moore “The Hill of Birds.” (Adar, “Birds,” Welsh. The word does not exist in Irish.)
Arran, A mountainous Island. (Arran, a Mountain, Welsh. This word does not exist in Irish,) &c. &c.
Mr. Chalmers in his Caledonia states that the prevalent ancient names of localities in Britain and Ireland are essentially the same.
The conclusions to which these facts legitimately and necessarily lead are, that the British Islands were originally colonized by Settlers, who, at the time of the first occupation of Great Britain and Ireland, spoke one uniform language, in which the Welsh, Irish, and other living Celtic Dialects were combined. We may infer, and I conceive most clearly, that these dialects must be viewed in the light of “Disjecta Membra” of the speech of the old British and Irish Celts, just as the Icelandic, Norwegian, &c. are fragments of the ancient “Danska Tunge,” as noticed in the previous section.
It has been shown by Dr. Prichard that the population of Islands has been derived from the neighbouring Continents, and that the population of the more distant Islands has been derived in like manner from those which are nearer to the common source of migration. It is highly unreasonable to assume that Ireland has formed an exception to this general rule, considering that the common basis of the Irish and ancient British or Welsh languages are confessedly the same, unless it can be proved that the accompanying differences are such as to require the solution Lhuyd has suggested. Here, then, the question arises, are the features of difference between the Welsh and Irish languages more numerous or more fundamental, in relation to the interval of time that has elapsed since the Roman Invasion of Britain, than the varieties of dialect among the Scandinavian nations are in relation to the period that has elapsed since the colonization of Iceland? They are not! It will thence be seen that Lhuyd's theory, as to the remote date of the separation of the Gaelic or Irish from the British or Cymraeg branch of the Celts, is founded on an exaggerated conception [pg 059] of the stability of Human Tongues; and that the abandonment by various septs of different synonymes used conjointly by their common forefathers will satisfactorily account for the differences between the Welsh and Irish, to which he attaches so much weight. It will be perceived, for example, that in the Icelandic, of which the existence commenced in the ninth century, and the Continental Scandinavian from which it then sprang, totally different terms are used for “Water,” the very instance to which Lhuyd especially adverts, as regards the languages of the Welsh and Irish, whom we know to have existed as separate nations in the time of Cæsar eighteen centuries ago!
Another highly instructive test of the correctness of his theory may be derived from the investigations of Lhuyd himself, who, in his comparison of the Welsh and Irish languages, uniformly distinguished the current terms from the obsolete synonymous words that occur only in ancient MSS. This comparison proves distinctly that the Irish and Welsh languages approximate, as we ascend, at a rate which, if as rapid previously as we know it to have been up to the date of the earliest MSS., would imply that these languages must have been identical about the era of the Roman invasion. As the changes which languages undergo in their infancy are more rapid than those which occur at later stages of their growth, it is possible that the unity of these Tongues may be ascribed even to a much later period, an opinion which has been maintained by a very judicious and excellent writer, Mr. Edward Davies, who in his “Claims of Ossian” has published an early specimen of Irish Poetry, which in Language and Style he regards as identical with the most ancient productions of the Welsh Bards. Making every allowance for the irregularity of the changes which occur in Languages, I do not conceive it possible that the Welsh and Irish could have differed very essentially [pg 060] in the time of Cæsar. This leads directly to another conclusion, viz. that the first colonization of Ireland could not have taken place a great many centuries before the Roman invasion. Had such been the case, the differences between the Welsh and Irish Languages must have been proportionately more extensive. In the time of the Romans we learn that an Irish traitor arrived in Britain, who stated that Ireland might be kept in subjection by a single legion, an incident which tends, however slightly, to favour the opinion that the sister Island was at that period but thinly, perhaps because but recently, peopled.
Of the extent of the changes which the Celtic languages have undergone since the first arrival of the Celts in Europe, we possess proofs of far more ancient date than the earliest literary specimens of the living dialects of the Celtic in the Local names of Celtic regions, as preserved in Roman Maps, and in the existing languages of the French, English, and other nations, who occupy countries of which the Celts were the first inhabitants. These names I shall show to consist of three elements: A union of 1, Welsh, Cornish, &c.; 2, Irish, Highland Scotch, &c.; and 3, Terms not extant in any Celtic Tongue, but preserved in the Oriental, Greek, and other languages.
As regards the Names of the 1st and 2d Classes, it will abundantly appear from the ensuing examples that, in the Topographical Nomenclature of Gaul, Britain, and other Celtic regions of Europe,[53] words derived from all the various Celtic dialects now extant, occur in a manner that leads distinctly to the inference that these “Disjecta membra” must have simultaneously belonged to the language of the old Celts. Dr. Prichard, who has examined these vestiges of the [pg 061] ancient Celtic Populations of Europe with much ability and success, leans to the opinion that the Cymraeg or Welsh Dialects predominate in these names. But the following examples, which comprise many names derived from the Irish or Gaelic that have not been noticed by Dr. Prichard or by previous writers on this subject, will serve to render it manifest that the ancient Names in Europœa Celtica did, in fact, include all the various living Celtic dialects very equally and harmoniously blended.
How luminous and distinct these proofs of the identity of the ancient with the modern Celtic nations are, will be better understood by a preliminary statement of certain rules, which will serve to give greater precision and perspicuity to the illustrations selected:
1. There can be no doubt that the Romans, in the Celtic, as in other countries conquered by them, modified the native terms by the addition of their own peculiar grammatical inflections, as in “Judæ-i, Britann-i, Sen-ones,” &c. Now it is obvious that in identifying the Celtic terms we must reject these mere Roman inflections.[54]
2. In many cases the Roman Names cannot be supposed to involve complete transcripts of the Celtic Names; frequently they were doubtless convenient abbreviations of the original names—names consisting of descriptive terms to them unintelligible. According to Mr. Reynolds, the Saxons generally adopted the first syllable only of the Roman or British names they found in this island. According to Bullet, “Vic,” a word of Roman origin for a Village or Town, has, from similar causes, become common as a Proper name in Dauphiné; in modern times we have numerous Villages called “Thorpe,” the name for a Village in Anglo-Saxon and [pg 062] German. In instances of this kind, there can be no doubt that originally the names were descriptive, such as “Long-town,” “Old-town,” &c. Tre or Trev is the common Welsh word for a Town, Village, or residence; it had the same meaning in Cornwall:
“By Tre, Tres, and Tren,
You shall know the Cornish men.”
A consequence of the names of the gentry of the county having been derived from those of their residences, into which this word commonly entered!
In Wales we have numerous examples of “Tre,” as in “Tre-llwng,” “The Town” of the “Pool,” (i.e. Welshpool,) from an adjoining “Llyn,” or Pool, near Powis Castle; “Tre-lydan,” the Broad Village, or Residence near Welshpool; “Trev-alyn,” near Chester, the Residence on the Stream; the “Alyn,” &c. &c.
Now according to the Roman mode, such a term as Trev-alyn would have been changed into Trev-iri, the designation actually given to the Celts of “Treves,” &c.
The following are analogous examples:
There is a tribe of Brig-antes in Yorkshire, another in Ireland, and a third in the North-east of Spain. Many unsuccessful attempts have been made to show that these distant Celtic tribes must have been scions of the same tribe. A much simpler explanation may be given.
By referring to the Roman maps the reader will find a word, “Briga,” in such general use as part of the names of towns as to leave no reasonable doubt that it must have been, like Tre, a Celtic name for a town—now obsolete. Thus in Spain we have, Laco-briga, Meido-briga, Ara-briga, Tala-brica, Augusto-briga, &c. Now the analogous instances already noticed suffice to point out that the occurrence of [pg 063] Brig-antes as a Roman name of Tribes in three Celtic countries, is a natural result of the frequent occurrence of Briga as the first part of the names of Celtic places.
The “Allo-bryg-es.” The name of this warlike tribe, the Celtic inhabitants of Savoy, has also been the source of perplexity, which may be removed in the same manner. This tribe had a town, called by the Romans “Brig-icum,” which was said to be “the only one they had.”[55] Now Allo-Bryga may reasonably be identified with Alpo-Briga, the Town of the Alps (Briga being clearly the common base of “Allo-bryg-es,” and “Brig-icum.”)
The names of Celtic communities, as they appear on the Roman Maps, may, I conceive, be proved to have been descriptive of the most prominent natural features of the regions they inhabited, and not of their lineage or descent, as seems to have been often supposed. Thus we have the Mor-ini in Belgium, and the Ar-mor-ici in Gaul on the Sea; we have the Sen-ones on the Seine, the Tamar-ici on the Tamar-is, in Hispania, &c. In the Mountainous regions it will be observed that the names of tribes are derived from the Mountains. In the flat countries they take their names from Rivers or the confluence of Rivers. In the same manner it is highly deserving of remark, that the names of the different French Departments have been derived from precisely the same natural features. Thus in the Hilly countries we have the Departments of the High Alps, “Hautes Alpes;” of the Low Alps, “Basses Alpes;” in the Champaign countries the Departments are named from the Rivers; such as the Seine, the Marne, and the Somme, &c. Many of these French names are literally equivalent to translations of the ancient Gaulish names, as interpreted by means of the Welsh and Irish languages. It is impossible to conceive a [pg 064] more perfect verification of the accuracy of these interpretations!
I may here observe, that as far as we can perceive, the various independent communities of Britain and Gaul mentioned by Cæsar, such as the Edui, the Venetes, &c., did not consist of one clan or sept, they seem rather to have been a combination of several contiguous septs, to whom no appropriate common name could have been given, except one derived from the natural features of the district they occupied.
The durability of local names has been already noticed. Of this truth we possess remarkable proofs in those of localities in France, as preserved by the modern French to the present day. I do not doubt that the present French names are, in many instances, much more faithful transcripts of the original Celtic appellations than those which occur in the Roman Maps are. Thus, for example, Bonomia, a name conferred by the Romans upon Boulogne, and of which the origin has perplexed Antiquarics, may easily be explained as a Roman abbreviation of the word Boulogne itself, of which the Celtic meaning will be shown hereafter to be appropriate and unequivocal. Here it may be noticed, that the Celtic language did not become extinct in Gaul until many centuries after the termination of the Roman sway and the establishment of the Franks in that country. The use of the old Gaulish or Celtic continued until the eighth century, nearly until the time of Charlemagne.[56] Now we know that the modern Welsh and Irish, for the most part, continue to use their own primitive names of localities in those cases in which abbreviations or translations have been substituted by the English. There can be no reasonable doubt that the ancient Gauls did the same, and that these names were in use among the inhabitants [pg 065] of each locality at the time of the final subjugation of Gaul by the Franks, by whom, in many instances, these names are more likely to have been adopted than those used by the Romans.
It will also be observed in the course of the following examples, that names of the class about to be noticed, viz., Topographical names of which the elements are not extant in the existing Celtic dialects, but occur in Oriental words, &c., are remarkably well preserved by the modern French. Thus the “Aube,” as pronounced by the French, is identical in sound with the Asiatic terms for Water, and names of Rivers, to which it is allied.
3. By many, perhaps by all those Celtic scholars who have investigated this subject, it has been assumed that the living Celtic dialects may be expected to furnish a complete clue to all the Local Names of ancient Celtic regions. This conclusion, like the theory of Lhuyd above discussed, is founded on an exaggerated idea of the stability of Human Tongues! Neither the Irish nor the Welsh, nor a combination of all the Celtic dialects, will be found to afford a complete solution of the Topographical nomenclature of the ancient Celtic regions of Europe. Names undoubtedly occur in these countries which have been preserved in none of the Celtic tongues, names which I shall indisputably show to be positive transcripts, in many instances, of appropriate terms occurring in the Hebrew and other languages, with which, in other parts of this work, the original Celtic dialects will be proved to have been originally identical. These facts lead to the conclusion that the ancient nomenclature of Celtic countries forms in reality a connecting link between the existing dialects of the Celts and the language of the Oriental stock from which they are descended.
This conclusion, though at variance with the views of many estimable writers, is nevertheless in unison with those anticipations [pg 066] which historical facts legitimately suggest. It is only reasonable to infer that since the period of their first arrival in Europe, the era at which many of these names must have been conferred (see page [10]), the Celtic tribes must have lost many words which none of the modern Celtic nations have preserved. The Celts were settled about the sources of the “Ister, and the city,” (perhaps the mountains) “of Pyrene,” even in the time of Herodotus, and how many ages had elapsed since their first arrival is unknown![57]
There is a certain Class of terms of which the meaning can reasonably be inferred from their extensive use in combination with other terms, of which the meaning may be considered as ascertained. To this class may be referred the terms immediately following.
Catti, Cassii, Casses, or Cad, seem to have meant a People, Tribe, &c., as in the following examples of the names of Celtic Tribes:
The Abr-in-Catui, in Normandy. The Catti-euch-lani, the people of Cambridgeshire and the adjoining counties. The Cassii, in Hertfordshire. The Bidu-casses, in Normandy. The Tri-casses, a people in Champagne. The Cad-ur-ci, on the Garonne.
The above words seem clearly derivable from the following Welsh words, which are allied to the Hebrew:
| Welsh. | Hebrew. |
| From Kiw-dod (Kiw-dod-æ, plur.) a Clan, a Nation. | Gow, a Body of Men, a Society or Association. |
| Kiw-ed, a Multitude, a Tribe. | Gowee, a Nation. |
| Kyf, a Body or Trunk, a Pedigree. | Gow, Gowe, Goweeth, the Body of a Man or Animal. |
Tre, Trev, a Village, Town, or Residence, (Welsh,) a Tribe, (Irish.)[58]
Trev-iri, the people of Treves. A-Treb-ates, the people about Arras. (For further examples see Dr. Prichard's work.) Trev is a common element in names of places in Wales, as Tre-vecca, Tre-gynnon.
Trigo, to reside, dwell, (Welsh.)
Duro-trig-es, the dwellers on the Water or Sea, the people of Dorsetshire. (Camden.)
Catt uriges. (See Dour.)
Dun-um, a Hill, a Fort or Town, generally on a Hill, (occurs in Welsh and Irish.)
Oxell-dunum, a Hill-fort in Gaul, described by Cæsar. (See numerous instances in Dr. Prichard's work.)
“Castell Din-as Bran,” on a lofty eminence in the Vale of Llangollen, Wales.
Dur, Duvr, Awethur (Welsh), Dour (Cornish), Dur (Armorican), Dovar (Irish, obsolete, but occurs in ancient MSS.) “Water.”
This word, and Ydōr or Hudōr (Greek), and Tschur (Armenian), “Water,” have an obvious affinity. These forms may be traced in the names of Celtic Localities.
“Dour” occurs in the following names of Rivers: Dur, (Hibernia,) Dur-ia Major, “The Doria,” and Duria Minor, (Gallia Cisalpina,) Dur-ius, “The Douro,” and “Dero,” (Hispania,) Dur-anius, “The Dordogne,” (Gallia). In Bucharian Deriâ means “The Sea.”
Ydōr or Hudōr (Greek), Awethur (Welsh), occur in the [pg 068] Rivers “The Adour,”[59] Atur-is (Gallia), “The Adder” (Britain), “The Adare” (Ireland.)
“Tschur” (Armenian), occurs in “Stura,” (Gallia Cis.), “The Stour” (Britain), “The Suir” (Britain & Ireland), “The Souro” (Spain, a branch of the Tagus.)
From the frequent recurrence of all these different forms in several Celtic countries thus widely separated, it is plain that they were used conjointly by the early Celts, and represent various transitions of the same word. Thus “Stura” (in Gal. Cis.), flows between the neighbouring streams Duria Major and Duria Minor, &c.
This word “Dour” enters very largely into the names of tribes; it forms singly a natural clue to a great number of names that hitherto have been referred to a complication of Roots. Thus the Roman name for the people of Dorsetshire, Duro-trig-es, i.e. The dwellers on the Water or the Ocean, has been noticed by Camden.
In the preceding, and in several of the following, it will be apparent that the old Celts applied this term to the “Sea or Ocean,” as the Bucharians do, and also to a “River.” At present the Welsh apply the term to Water only, in a restricted sense.
In the South-east of England names abound (applied to places on Rivers or the Sea) in which the two slight variations of Dur and Du-v-r (or Do-v-ar, Irish), still preserved in Welsh, are apparent. Duro-vern-um, “Canterbury,” from Duro, Water, and Vern or Veryn, a Hill. (Compare the name of the “Ar-vern-i,” under Beryn, at p. 78.) The Town was on a Hill by the Stour.
Portus Du-b-r-is or Dub-r-œ, i.e. “Sea Port,” the modern [pg 069] “Do-v-or,” a word which is an echo of the Irish Dovar and the Welsh Du-v-r.
Duro-brivæ, Rochester on the Medway, (Briva or Brivis, the ancient Celtic for a Town.) Duro-levum, Milton on the Thames.
Lan-du-b-r-is, a Portuguese Island. Lan, a Bank of a Stream, or the Sea: also an inclosed Space, (Welsh.)
Tur-ones, the inhabitants of the country at the junction of several streams with the Loire, the neighbourhood of the modern Tours.
Bi-tur-ig-es, from Bi “Two,” Tur or Dour, Water, and trigo, to reside.
There are two tribes of this name in Gaul; the Bituriges Cubi, situated between two of the branches of the Loire, and the Bi-turi-ges Vobisci, between the Garonne and the Sea, at the junction of the Dordogne and the Garonne.
Cat-ur-iges, from Catti, Tribes or People; Dour, Water, and Trigo, to reside; on the Durentia, South-east of France, about Embrun or Eburo-Dunum, which was their principal town. Cad-ur-ci, from Catti, Tribes, and dur.
There is one tribe of this name on the Dordogne, and another contiguously placed on the Garonne.
The mutual support that these interpretations give to each other will be obvious.
The following Irish word for “Water,” which is not extant in the Welsh, may be traced in Celtic regions in its various modifications: Uisge (Irish), “The Usk” (South Britain)—Eask[60] (Irish, obsolete), “The Esk” (Scotland), “The Escaut” (North of France), Isca, “The Exe” (South Britain)—Easkong (Irish, obsolete), Axona (Gallia, Belg.), “The Aisne,” Axones, the neighbouring tribe.
Names Of Estuaries, Or Mouths Of Streams.
The terms of this class, which occur in ancient Gaul, &c., consist either of terms still thus applied in the living Celtic dialects, or of compounds of which the elements may be recognized, unchanged, in those dialects. Moreover it will be highly interesting to observe that these terms, for the most part, consist of Metaphors derived respectively from the same sources as the two English words “Estuary” and “Mouth,” and the two Latin words “Æstuarium” and “Os Fluminis.”
One of the principal arguments of those writers who maintain that the separation of the Irish from the other Celtic tribes must have been of remoter date than the first peopling of these islands, is founded on the fact that the Irish use the word In-ver for the Mouth of a Stream, while the Welsh use Ab-ber (spelt Aber); a feeble support for so wide a conclusion, which a correct analysis of these terms, and a comparison of some interesting coincidences in the local names of ancient Gaul will show to be utterly futile! In-ver and Ab-ber are not simple but compound terms, literally corresponding to the Latin expression “Fluminis Æstuarium.” Æstuarium is from Æstuo, “To boil,” a metaphorical term, obviously derived from the agitation of the Waters where two Streams meet, or where a River enters the Sea.
In the first syllable “Inver” and “Ab-ber” differ, but they agree in the last. Both “In” and “Ab,” the first syllables of these terms, occur so often in Celtic regions that there can be no doubt they were both in use among the ancient Celts as words for a River, or Water. The last syllable of these words, Ber or Ver, I shall show to mean an “Estuary.”
“In” occurs in the name of “The Inn,” in the Tyrol, the “Æn-us” of the Romans, and in other instances previously [pg 071] noticed. “An” is a Gaelic or Irish term for “Water,” which is identical in sound and sense with terms of frequent occurrence among the tribes of the American Continent, as in Aouin (Hurons, N. America), Jin Jin (Kolushians, extreme North-west of N. America), Ueni (Maipurians, S. America.)
“Ab” occurs in “The Aube,” in France, &c., a name of which the pronunciation may be considered identical with Ab, “Water,” (Persian.) Ap in Sanscrit, and Ubu Obe in Affghan, mean “Water.” “Obe” occurs in Siberia as the name of a well-known river. In India also the term has been applied to “Rivers;” thus we have in that country the Punj-âb, (the Province of “The Five Rivers,”) an appellation of which the corresponding Celtic terms “Pump-ab” would be almost an echo!
Further it may here be noticed—as an example of the complete identity of the Celtic and Oriental languages when all the “Disjecta Membra” are compared—that this word does not exist in the modern Celtic in the simple form of Ab, but in the derivative form of Avon, which is found in the Roman maps spelt “Abon,” &c. Now this form also occurs in the East. Abinn, “A River,” is given by Klaproth from the language of the inhabitants of the Mountains to the North of Bhagalpur. Apem means “Water,” in Zend, an ancient Persian dialect. Af is “Water,” in Kurdish.
“Berw” is the South Welsh name for the effervescence in the deep receptacle in which a Cataract foams after its fall; it is applied also to the Cataract itself, as “Berw Rhondda,” the fall of the River Rhondda.
Aber, in Cornish, means “a Confluence of Rivers,” also “a Gulf,” “a Whirlpool.”[61]
In Breton or Armorican Aber means “a confluence of Rivers.” “Dans le diocese de Vannes,” says Bullet, “le mot [pg 072] a encore une autre signification, c'est celle de torrent.” “In the diocese of Vannes this word has still another meaning, viz., that of ‘a Torrent!’ ” Compare Torr-ens (Latin), “Torrent” (English), from Torreo (Latin), “To boil.” “Aber, in a deflected sense,” he says, “has been applied to a Harbour; hence Havre de Grace!”
“It is a curious fact,” says Chalmers, “which we learn from the Charters of the twelfth century, that the Scoto-Irish people substituted Inver for the previous Aber of the Britons. David I. granted to the Monastery of May Inver-In qui fuit Aber-In in Chart May.”[62] This remarkable place is at the “Influx of a small stream, called the In, on the coast of Fife. Both appellations are now lost.”
Among the names of ancient Celtic regions we have Abrin-catui, that is (without any change in the word) Aber-In-Catui; the name of a Tribe in Normandy, about Avranches, which is at the mouth of a River now called the See. (Another stream flows into the same Estuary.)
Aber—In—Cattui.
Literally,
“Estuary (of the) River—Tribes or People,” i.e. The Tribes living at the Estuary of the River or Rivers.
The name of the same place will also furnish an example of a corresponding term, primarily meaning “The Mouth,” in the modern Celtic.
Genœ (Welsh), Ganau (Cornish), Gion (Irish), Genu (Armorican), mean “The Mouth.”
The original name of “Avranches,” when the country was first subdued by the Romans, was In-“gena.” Here it is plain “Gena” was synonymous with Aber! The Town was afterwards called Aber-in-Catui by the Romans, who very generally gave the names of the Celtic tribes to their principal Towns.
In D'Anville's Map we find, in the same part of Gaul, Aræ-genu-s given to Bayeux, (the capital of the Bajocasses,) at the mouth of a river now called the “Ayr!”
The following are very striking examples of the occurrence of the same word, Genœ or Ganau:
“Gano-durum” (Dur water) Constance, at the spot where the Rhine issues out of Lake Constance.
“Geneva.” (The Rhone issues here from the Lake, and is immediately afterwards joined by the Arve.)
“Genua” (Genoa). At the mouth of a stream.
“Albium In-gaun-um,” a town to the east of Genoa, where many streams from the Maritime Alps unite in one mouth.
Beal or Bel (Irish), Buel (Manx), “A Mouth.” This is another word, applied in Wales and Ireland, in topographical names, in nearly the same sense as Aber, as in Bala, at the mouth of a lake, North Wales, Bally-shannon, Ireland. This word does not occur either in vernacular Welsh or in the Welsh of old MSS. But in Irish, Beal or Bel is still the common word for “A Mouth.”
We shall find unequivocal proofs that this word also was used by the old Celts of Gaul, as in “Boulogne,” i.e. Bala (Beal, or Buel) Liane, “The mouth of the Liane.” The town is at the mouth of a small stream, of which Bullet, who does not appear to have suspected the derivation, says “La rivière qui passe à Boulogne s'appelle Liane.—The stream that runs by Boulogne is called Liane!” “Liane, Lune,” &c. is a common proper name for a stream in all countries of which the Celts formed the first population. Lliant (Llian-au, plur.) means a stream, a torrent, in Welsh; Llyn, “Water,” in Welsh; and Lean, Irish. Hence “The Lune” in Herefordshire, &c.
A further example of words of this Class occurs in the Latin name of the “Humber.”
This great receptacle of streams was generally called Ab-us; [pg 074] but Ptolomey, in Greek, gives the name more fully, “Abontrus!”[63] This word means in Welsh and Irish “The Outlet”, or literally “The Door” of the Rivers. Trus, A Door, (Drous, Welsh, Doros, Irish,) occurs in the same sense in Tura (Sanscrit), Der (Persian). Hence it appears that the Welsh word, which is nearer to the term preserved in this name, has not been borrowed from the English “Door!”
“Aber,” however, was the greatest favorite with the ancient Celts, as with the modern Cymry! It would seem that this word “Aber” was as commonly applied in ancient Gaul, &c. as it still is in Wales, not merely to the mouths of large rivers, but to places situated at those of very small streams![64]
Britain.—York, Ebor-acum (Caer Eboranch, Welsh; Ever-wick, Saxon.) Is inclosed for the most part between the Ouse and the Foss, which unite close to the Town! The river Foss separates some parts of the Town from the rest.
Eburo-cass-um (Alnewick), at the mouth of the River Alne, Northumberland. Ever-wick is the name of an adjoining Village on the same river.
Eburo-nes (Belgic. Gaul). About the junction of the Saba and the Mosa. Cæsar states in his account of them that this tribe had no Town.
There was a prince of the Œduans[65] in Cæsar's time, named Eporo-dor-ix, apparently from Aber-Dour “Water,” and Rex. The Gaulish chiefs, like those of the Gaelic Scotch, seem to have frequently derived their names from their peculiar territories [pg 075] or patrimonies; in the same manner, for instance, as the chiefs “Lochiel, Glengarry,” &c.
As before intimated, it appears pretty clear that the little nations into which Gaul was divided, such as the Ceno-mani, the Œdui, &c. consisted for the most part of a combination of several distinct septs or clans each under their respective princes. The name of the chief (Eporo-dor-ix) just mentioned may, therefore—and most probably must—have been derived from that of some place no longer capable of being identified, though the country of the Œdui, the source of many rivers, abounds in localities to which it would apply very appropriately!
Gaul.—Eburo-dunum (now Embrun in Dauphiné.) At the confluence of a small stream with the Durance.
Since writing the above I find this town in Hornius' map, marked “Epeb r-o-durû,” i.e. “Mouth of the Water,” (Welsh.)
Eburo-briga, a Town. At the junction of one of the streams that feed the Seine above Sens.
Ebro-lacum. A Town near the source of the Loire; precise situation apparently unknown. But the affinity of “Ebro” to the Celtic “Aber,” and the identity of Lac (um) with Loch[66] or Lach, the Gaelic for a Lake or Water, will be obvious.
Avar-icum (Bourges), at the junction of the L'Evrette with the Evre, one of the branches of the Cher.
Switzerland.—Ebro-dunum, “Yverdun,” at the mouth of the river Orbe, that flows there into the Lake of Neuf-chatel.
Spain and Portugal.—Eburo-britz-ium, the modern Alco-baza or Alco-baca, on the Portuguese coast, between the [pg 076] Tagus and the Mondego, and not far from Torres Vedras. This town is at the mouth of the Alcoa river. The modern name, Alco-baca, (“The mouth of the Alcoa,”) is a guarantee of the correctness of the above construction of the ancient name![67]
In the North-east of Spain, on the Bay of Biscay, we meet with the word Aber itself in an undisguised form, as we do in Gaul in the word Abr-in-catui.
There is a town, Uxam-aber, on a river called in Roman Maps the Uch-esia.[68] This is an unfortunate word for the advocates of the Spanish origin of the Irish, for here we have the Welsh Aber, in lieu of the Gaelic Inver, in the North of Spain—the very district from which the Colony is supposed to have come! Indeed the Local names in the Celtic regions of Spain generally approach much more nearly to the Welsh than to the Irish! This will be seen in some of the following examples.
Glan or Lan, “a Sea shore or Margin,” (Welsh,) not extant in Irish.
Glan a tuia (Glandeves), at the junction of a small stream with the Varus, that separates France and Italy.
Glan-um, on the Puech River, near Embrun.
Cat-a-laun-i. A tribe resident about Chalons on the Seine.
Cat-a-laun-i. “People (of) the river bank.” The name originally given to this town by the Romans was Duro-Cat-a-laun-i, i.e. (The Town of) “the Tribe on the Bank of the River or Water.”
Llanes, a place on the coast of Asturia. (The aspirated Ll of the Spaniards is very like the Welsh Ll, and is most [pg 077] probably a relic of Celtic pronunciation.) Lancia (Ciudad Rodrigo,) Lancia (Guarda.)
Lan-dubr-is. “The Shore or Margin of the Sea or Water,” or a spot inclosed by the Sea.[69] An Island, in Latin Maps, on the coast of Portugal.
“The Lan-des,” The well-known arid sandy deserts forming the South-eastern coast of France.
Medio-lan-um.[70] Medd, the middle, (Celtic,) and Lan. Towns thus designated seem to have been situated either at the Curve or Winding of a stream, or inclosed between two streams.
I may instance—in Cisalpine.
Gaul. Medio-lan-um, Milan.
Mediolanum (Santones), on the Loire.
(Eburovices Aulerci), Evreux, Normandy.
(Bituriges Cubi), inclosed between two winding streams, which are the sources of the Loire. Bi-tur-iges is from a synonyme, Bi, two, and Dour, Water.
Dôl, “A wind, a bow, a turn, a meander, a dale or mead, through which a river runs,” (Welsh,)[71] as in Dol-Vorwyn and Dol-Vorgan, Montgomeryshire, North Wales; “Dôle,” the ancient capital of Franche Compté. (Compare the situation.)
Lut-ecia,[72] Paris, seems clearly to have derived its name from its situation among marshes. “Située dans une isle de la Seine environnée de marais profonds, difficiles à traverser, qui communiquent à ce fleuve.” (Bullet, from Strabo.)
Llath-ach, “Mud, Dirt,” (Irish,) Llaith, Moist, (Welsh.)
Lug-dunum or Lau-dunum.[73] “Laon,” built on the Summit of a Rock divided into two branches. Lug, from Llech, a [pg 078] Stone. Clog, a detached rock, (Welsh.) Liag, a great Stone. Leagan Kloiche, a Rock, (Irish.)
In the following instances the identity of the Gaulish and other Celtic names with the Welsh is remarkably clear, and will be vividly felt by persons vernacularly familiar with the Welsh language, and the most common local names in Wales.
The “Bretons,” Ar-mor-ici. Ar, “On,” Mor, “the Sea.”
The people of a Hilly Region in the South-east of France, Ar-e-com-ici.
Coum, “a Hollow Circular Valley, or Depression,” (Welsh.) This word is the source of the numerous names of places in England ending in Combe. The Oriental origin of the word is clearly traceable. After describing the great Table-land of Central Asia as extending over the whole of Persia, Ritter adds: “Towards ‘Koom,’ (in Persia,) we find the greatest depression, in the Table-land; here the surface sinks to 2046 feet!”[74]
There are also the “Com-oni,” above Toulon, and Com-us, “Como,” to which the word is peculiarly appropriate. (Bullet.)
The People of Auvergne. Ar-vern-i, “On the Hills.” Veryn or Beryn is a Hill in Welsh. Thus “Cevn y Beryn,” is the name of a Hill in Montgomeryshire.
By Plutarch the Ar-vern-i are called Ar-ben-i. “This is a very interesting addition to our information. ‘Veryn’ and ‘Ben’ are both synonymes extant in Welsh for ‘a Hill.’ ”
We have the same words repeated in the following instances, joined with Um (Irish), Am (Welsh), “About.” (Compare the Greek Amphi.)
Um-benn i, “The People (living) about the Hills.” A Swiss Tribe.
Um-bran-ici (from Beryn or Bron, Welsh,) a name of the Helvii mountaineers to the South-east of the Cevennes.
In the following names, again, we have Pen or Ben, and Beryn or Bron, alone.
Ben-ones, a Mountain Tribe in Switzerland.
Breun-i, on the borders of Bavaria and the Tyrol.
Bern-enses, the people of Berne, in Switzerland, and also those of Bearne, in the South of France, adjoining the Pyrenees.
A-Pen-inus Mons. Alpes Pen-inæ, the Alps immediately to the South of Geneva. Vallis Pen-ina, the Valley of the Rhone.
The primary sense of Pen, in Welsh, is “the Head.” As observed at page 11, the names for Hills in that language are metaphors from “the Head, the Breast,” &c. Now it is observable that in ancient Celtic Europe a difference of application corresponding to the different primary meanings of the terms is discoverable. Alpes is the general name for the Alps. (Alpes) Pen-inæ, a term derived from the Head, are the lofty and abrupt Alps, as distinguished from Alpes Maritimæ, &c.
In Spain and Portugal. Pena-s da Europa, (North of Spain.) Cape Pena-s, (in the Asturias.) Pen-a Longa, a Town adjoining the long ridge called the Sierra da St. Catherina in Portugal.
Gebenn-a Mons, the Cevenn-es, “South of France.” Cevenn-es, (omitting “es,” French plural,) is identical with Cevn, “a Back,” “a Hill,” as in Cevn y Coed, the name of a hill in Montgomeryshire, (Welsh.)
The Irish Gibhis, “a Valley,” is from the same source. Names of “Valleys and Hills” are generally composed of the same roots. (Similiter the Latin word “Altus” means both “High” and Deep!) A Valley is, in fact, formed by Hills!
These various meanings and inflections are found united in the Hebrew.
| Hebrew. | Hebrew. | Derivatives |
| Ga.e, to rise. | ||
| Gve, or Gou e, to be high, gibbous, or curved. | Kub, a Mountain.[75] (Persian.) | |
| Kof. (Pehlwi.) | ||
| Goun, or Gav.n, Swelling. | Gb, the Back. Gbn, Hunch backed. | Gev.n, or Cev.n, the Back, the Ridge of a Hill. (Welsh.) |
| Gee a. Ga.oun, plur. A valley, or more properly a lawn rising to the top of the adjoining hill. | G.b.oe, G.h.o.th, a Mountain. G.b.o.the, the Slope of a Mountain. | Geib-his, Gibhis, a Valley. (Irish.) The Ghauts, Mountains in Asia. Gibb-osus. (Latin.) |
Goupp en, a chain of Hills in Switzerland. (Bullet.)
Alp. Dr. Owen Pughe quotes many classical authors to show that the word meant in Gallish a lofty Mountain. In the mountains of Glamorganshire, he adds, it is still used for a craggy summit.
Alp-es. Allo-bryges, from Alp- and (briga).[76] Brigi-cum was their only town. To the South-east of the Allobryges were the Hel-v-ii, (Alba their capital.) To the North the Hel-v-etii, (Vod in Welsh, a Residence.) Both names were probably from Al-p.
Nant, (Nan-au, plural,) a Mountain Valley, “a Mountain Stream,” (Welsh.) This word is still in use in Savoy. (See Dr. Prichard's remarks.)[77]
Nannet-es, a Tribe in Britany, and
Nant-uates, a Tribe occupying the valley of the Rhine below its source.
Nang-ates, the people of Connaught. This is one of numerous [pg 081] instances of local names in Ireland, of which the sense has been lost in the Irish and still preserved in the Welsh.
Cori, or Corrie, means a hollow between hills. A glen or “Cleugh,” a small stream.[78] (A word of Celtic origin. Jamieson's Etymological Dict. of the Scottish Language.)
This word appears to be in use both in the Highlands and Lowlands of Scotland; the first a Gaelic, the second originally a Cymraeg district. (See Chalmers's Caledonia.)
Sir Walter Scott has very gracefully introduced this ancient word in the beautiful “Coronach,” or Funeral-song of the Clansman, in the “Lady of the Lake:”
“He is gone from the mountain,
He is gone from the forest,
Like a summer-dried fountain,
When our need was the sorest.
“Fleet foot on the corrie
Sage counsel in cumber
Red hand in the foray,
How sound is thy slumber!”
To this passage Sir Walter Scott has added the following note:[79] “Corrie or Cori.” The hollow side of the hill where game usually lies!
I conceive a comparison of the following examples will serve to render it indisputable that this term may be accepted as a clue to a great number of the most important topographical names of Gaul and Britain, which have hitherto eluded the researches of Celtic scholars.
| Hebrew. | Celtic. |
| C.r. To surround, go round. | Cor. A Circle, (Welsh.) |
| A pasture or Circuit for Cattle. | Cor-lan. A Sheepfold, (Welsh.) |
| A Lamb. | Ka ora, or Kyra. A Sheep, (Irish.) |
| A “Cor.” A measure so called from its round form. | |
| C.eee.ou.r. A Round Pot, or Caldron. | “Cori,” or Corrie. “The hollow side of the Hill where the game usually lies.” (Sir W. Scott.) |
| C.r.e. To dig, as a Well or Pit. | A Hollow between Hills. A Cleugh. (Jamieson.) |
The Tri-Cori-i. From Tre and Cori. A tribe who inhabited the modern French Department of the “High Alps,” an Alpine region, the source of numerous streams which feed the Rhone and its branches.
The Petro-Cori-i.[80] The inhabitants of the Departments of Dordogne and Correze. Dordogne is thus described by Malte Brun:
“We may pass from the Department of Lot to that of Dordogne by descending the last river which traverses it on the South from East to West. It is also watered by the Ille, the Dronne, the Vezere, and by more than fourteen hundred small rivers and streams. Hills extend along this country in every direction, but with the exception of two vallies, those watered by the Ille and the Dordogne, they bound only narrow passes, almost all of which are desolated by torrents!”
Correze. From the same authority we learn that two thirds of this department consists of a mountainous region, full of “ravines and precipices,” and that its scenery progressively assumes more of this wild and romantic character as you ascend the river Correze, which gives its name to the Department, and to its principal town. Correze is plainly derived from Cori.[81]
The Cori-tan-i. A British tribe in Derbyshire, &c., from Cori and Tania, an addition frequently made by the Romans to the name of a province or district, as in Aqui-tania, Mauri-tania. Camden expresses himself totally unable to explain this term satisfactorily.
The following are partly composed of ancient Celtic Topographical Names, of which the appropriate meanings have not been preserved[82] in the Welsh and Irish, &c., but are found in the Oriental and other languages.
“Eryr-i,” the Welsh name of the Snowdon Mountains. This word has been variously explained by Welsh scholars, as meaning the “Snowy Mountain” (from Eira, “Snow”), the “Eagles' Mountain,” &c. None of these explanations are appropriate. Moreover “Eryr-i” is not the name of a single peak, but of the Snowdon range of mountains! “E.r.r” is a pure Hebrew word, signifying a very high mountain,[83] from which “Eryr-i,” the name of the Snowdon range, the highest in South Britain, is a plural regularly formed!
Cimas da Our-ar-as, are high Mountains to the North of Lisbon.
Ban-nau Brycheiniog, “the Brecon Beacons,” lofty hills in Brecknockshire. Ban de la Roche, the celebrated Pastor [pg 084] Oberlin's residence among the Vosges Mountains, in the East of France. Ban, “Lofty,” (Welsh,) Bian, a Hill, (Irish,) Boun-os, a Hill, (Greek,) Ban-k (English), a diminutive.
Bal. “Applied in Wales to Mountains that terminate in a Peak. Balannu, to shoot or spring forth.” (Dr. W. Owen Pughe.) Belan is also applied to Hills, as “Nant y Belan,” near Wynnstay. Bala, Bulund (Persian), Beland (Pehlwi), Bulund (Zend), “High.”
“The Don and the Dune,” Rivers in Scotland. Trev-i don, i.e. “the Town of, or on the River,” a place on the river Tarn, in the South of France. Don, Dun, “Water,” “a River,” (Ossetians, a people of the Caucasus). “The Don” River, in the country of the “Don Cossacks,” who are also considered to be a people of the Caucasus. “Donau” (German), the Danube.
From Ar, “a River, a Stream,” (Hebrew.) “Ar-a,” now “the Ayr,” that enters the sea at Bayeux, (see before, p. [73].) “The Ar-ar,” Gaul. “The Ayr,” Scotland.
From Ee.a.ou.r, “a River, a Stream,” (Hebrew,) a modification of A.r. Wari, “Water,” (Sanscrit.) “The Evre” and “Evrette,” France. “The Wavre,” Belgium. “The Weaver” and “the Wear,” England.
From Ee.a.r (Hebrew), and Iaro, “a River,” (Egyptian,) “The Yarrow,” Scotland. (See p. [10].)
From Ur, “Water,” (Jeniseians, in Siberia,) and Our-on (Greek), terms connected with the previous Hebrew words; “Ur-us,” the Ouse, Britain.
Thus it will be seen that the various inflections of the Hebrew word A.r. have been completely preserved in the names of the different rivers in each of the Celtic countries of Britain and Gaul.
Lamu, “the Sea,” (Tungusian.) Lam, “the Sea,” (Lamutian.) Limnē, a Lake, “Poetically, the Sea, the Ocean, which seems to be the most primitive sense; also anciently, as it would [pg 085] appear, the Estuary of a River,” Schneider (Greek). At the mouths of the rivers that flow into the Black Sea lakes are formed, which are called “Limans.”[84] Hence “Leman-us Lacus” in Switzerland.
Lim-ēn, a Haven, (Greek,) connected apparently with the last word, Limnē (Greek). “Lemanæ” vel Portus “Leman-is.” Lyme, in Kent, where Cæsar first landed.
Jura, a long Mountainous ridge in ancient Gaul. Jura, a long Mountainous Island (Scotland). “Jur-jura,” an important chain of Mountains in the North of Africa. Gora (Russian), Ghiri (Sanscrit), a Mountain.
In the foregoing examples Celtic words having an affinity to the Latin frequently occur, employed in a manner that shows they could not have been borrowed by the Celts from the Romans. Thus we have the names Ar-mor-ici, Ebro-lacum, names in which terms like the Latin “Mare” and “Lacus” are naturally blended with other Celtic words which are quite unlike the Latin!
I conceive the evidence adduced in the previous pages must serve to place beyond all doubt the truth of the propositions illustrated in this Section, viz., that the language of the primitive Celts of Europe and the British Isles originally consisted of a combination of the Welsh and Irish, and other living Celtic dialects, united with many words and forms preserved in none of those dialects, but traceable in the Hebrew, the Greek, and the languages of other ancient and distant nations.
The uniformity that presents itself in the ancient local nomenclature of all the Celtic countries is a very remarkable and instructive feature, of which an adequate conception can be formed only by an examination of the Roman Maps. The identity of names, for example, is found to be as complete [pg 086] when the Roman Maps of Gaul and Britain are compared, as we meet with in examining the Maps of two English Counties! To this rule Ireland, as far as we can judge from the imperfect nature of the information transmitted to us, formed no exception. These facts lead to the inference that the Celts must have diffused themselves, within a comparatively short interval of time, over all the regions of Europe of which the Romans found them in possession! Had the process of diffusion occupied a great many ages, there must have been a commensurate change in the Celtic language, which would have displayed itself in the local names of the more distant regions. But no such difference occurs, the local nomenclature of Britain, for instance, being identical with that of Switzerland and Spain!
Section VI.
Summary of the Results deducible from the previous Sections. The Changes which have occurred in the English, Scandinavian, and Celtic Languages, sufficient to account for the Differences among all Human Tongues. Causes which give rise to the Abandonment and specific Appropriation of Synonymes. Total Differences of Grammatical Forms no Proof of a fundamental Difference of Language. The Relation which the Languages of one Continent, viewed in the aggregate, bear to the individual Languages of such Continent, the same as that which the ancient Scandinavian bears to its derivative Dialects, &c. Incipient Changes in the Language of Australia.
The facts developed in the previous Sections obviously present a satisfactory solution of the problem suggested at page 25, viz., whence it has come to pass that languages almost totally different in their present composition could have sprung from one original Tongue? That existing languages have sprung from one source is a proposition of which the proofs have been explained in the same Chapter in which this problem has been suggested. (See Chap. I.)
In the preceding Sections it has been shown, agreeably to the statement contained in Section I., that Languages are exposed to two prominent causes of change; viz., the abandonment by different branches of the same race—1, of different Synonymes; 2, of different meanings of the same Synonyme.
From the facts Historically proved in the previous Sections it will be found to be an indisputable truth, that—assuming their operation to be continued for an adequate period of time,—these [pg 088] two causes are calculated to produce, from one parent Tongue, languages of which the differences are apparently fundamental. For example, if the differences between the Gothic and Celtic languages noticed at page [28],—languages which differ almost totally,—are compared with those which have been proved to have arisen in the last nine hundred years among the various branches of the Scandinavian and the Celtic, it will be seen at once that the latter are of precisely the same nature as the former. The only distinction is that they are fewer in point of number! But on the other hand, it is certain that the same causes of change—acting at the same rate during a previous period of treble that length of time—might have produced between two branches of a common original speech differences equally numerous with those which the Gothic and Celtic exhibit; in other words, differences sufficiently extensive almost entirely to exclude all vestiges of original unity!
But it must be added, that it would be highly erroneous to infer that the rate of change previous to the commencement of the Historical period was the same as it has been since; it must have been much more rapid! Changes of this nature are prompted by the dictates of convenience, which suggest the extinction of superfluous words, and the appropriation of the remainder to distinct though kindred purposes; names for “Water, Rivers, the Sea,” for example, were doubtless in the first instance applied indifferently to all these objects. Now, inasmuch as languages are more redundant in their earlier than they are in their later stages, it is apparent that these changes, of which this redundant character is the source, must be more rapid.
This explanation would fully account for the diversity of structure evinced by the Gothic and Celtic Tongues, which probably differ as widely as any languages of the globe, without referring the commencement of their separation to a [pg 089] more remote date than would be quite consistent with received systems of Chronology. That the Celtic and Gothic were originally one speech, and that the differences which they now display have arisen in this manner, will be evident from Section II. (page [26],) combined with the facts developed in the other Sections of this Chapter.
Difference of Grammatical forms has been supposed to afford proof of a fundamental difference of language. A comparison of those of the languages previously noticed will show this to be a highly erroneous conclusion! The Welsh and Irish differ most widely in their grammars, though the general resemblance of these languages proves their original identity. The German and English also differ very widely, the majority of the Pronouns being unlike. Again, even the modern and the provincial English have different Auxiliary Verbs, &c. &c. These are results of the same principle, viz., the tendency to abandon, or appropriate differently, the various elements of a common parent speech.
Moreover since Pronouns, which are the principal basis of Grammar, are merely different Synonymes for “Man,” or a “Human Being” (see page [13]), appropriated to different Persons, the supposition that kindred nations may be expected in all cases to use the same grammatical forms is founded on the gratuitous and highly unreasonable assumption, that the process of appropriating these various Nouns to different Persons must have been complete at a very early period, before the separation of the Human Race into distinct Tribes!
But though the rejection of superfluous Synonymes, and the specific appropriation of the remainder are results of the dictates of convenience, the selection of the particular synonymes which are retained, and the particular mode of application, are results dependent on individual caprice and idiosyncracy. Hence we find, as has been shown in previous [pg 090] Sections, the various branches of the same race adopt and abandon different terms. This feature, which has been traced in the Historical progress of languages, completely explains the phenomenon especially noticed at the close of the First Chapter, viz., the positive identity which we find on the one hand, when the languages of the different Continents are compared in the aggregate, combined on the other with a difference nearly total among individual languages, occurring, in many cases, among the languages of contiguous nations of the same Continent. In each separate tribe there is a tendency to abandon part of the parent speech, but as different tribes generally abandon different parts, probably no portion of the original tongue is lost! Its component parts are dispersed, and not destroyed! There is a complete and perfect analogy between the relation which will be found to prevail between the languages of each continent viewed in the aggregate as one original Tongue—compared with the individual existing languages of the same continent—and the relation shown in the previous Sections to prevail between the ancient “Danska Tunge” and its derivative Scandinavian Tongues—between the Anglo-Saxon and the modern English Dialects—between the ancient Celtic and the modern Welsh and Irish!
A recent work on Australia, by Colonel Grey, furnishes an account of the language of that country, so strikingly corroborative of the views developed above with respect to the origin of the various languages of the other four great Divisions of the Globe, that I have been induced especially to advert to Colonel Grey's statement in this Section.
“The arguments which prove that all the Australian dialects have a common root, are:
“1st. A general similarity of sound, and structure of words, in the different portions of Australia, as far as yet ascertained.
“2d. The recurrence of the same word with the same signification; to be traced, in many instances, round the entire continent, but undergoing, of course, in so vast an extent of country, various modifications.
“3d. The same names of natives occurring frequently at totally opposite portions of the continent. Now, in all parts of it which are known to Europeans, it is ascertained that the natives name their children from any remarkable circumstance which may occur soon after their birth; such being the case, an accordance of the names of natives is a proof of a similarity of dialect.
“The chief cause of the misapprehension which has so long existed with regard to the point under consideration is that the language of the aborigines of Australia abounds in synonymes, many of which are, for a time, altogether local; so that, for instance, the inhabitants of a particular district will use one word for water,[85] while those of a neighbouring district will apply another, which appears to be a totally different one. But when I found out that in such instances as these both tribes understood the words which either made use of, and merely employed another one, from temporary fashion and caprice, I felt convinced that the language generally spoken to Europeans by the natives of any one small district could not be considered as a fair specimen of the general language of that part of Australia, and therefore in the vocabulary which I compiled in Western Australia, I introduced words collected from a very extensive tract of country.
“Again, in getting the names of the parts of the body, &c. from the natives, many causes of error arise, for they have [pg 092] names for almost every minute portion of the human frame: thus, in asking the name for the arm, one stranger would get the name for the upper arm, another for the lower arm, another for the right arm, another for the left arm, &c.; and it therefore seems most probable that in the earlier stages of the inquiry into the nature of the language of this people, these circumstances contributed mainly to the erroneous conclusion, that languages radically different were spoken in remote parts of the continent.
“One singularity in the dialects spoken by the aborigines in different portions of Australia is, that those of districts widely removed from one another sometimes assimilate very closely, whilst the dialects spoken in the intermediate ones differ considerably from either of them. The same circumstances take place with regard to their rites and customs; but as this appears rather to belong to the question of the means by which this race was distributed over so extensive a tract of country, I will not now enter into it, but merely adduce sufficient evidence to prove that a language radically the same is spoken over the whole continent.
“If, then, we start from Perth, in Western Australia, following the coast in a southerly direction, it will be found that between Perth and King George's Sound a common language is spoken, made up of several dialects, scarcely differing from one another in any material points, and gradually merging into the dialects of these two places, as the two points considered are nearer to one or the other.
“The word for the Sun at Perth is Nganga, whilst at Adelaide it is Tin-dee; but the word used by the natives at Encounter Bay, South Australia, thirty-six miles from Adelaide, is Ngon-ge, and the word used in the southern districts of Western Australia for the Stars is Tiendee; [pg 093] thus, by extending the vocabularies of the two places, the identity of the language is shown.”[86]
The reader who by a perusal of the previous Sections has learned how rapid are the changes which languages undergo, will not merely conclude, with Colonel Grey, that the population of Australia must be descendants of one Sept, but he will conclude also that the first colonization of that continent must be referred to a comparatively recent date. Australia is nearly as large as the Continent of Europe, and yet we find one language prevail over the whole of its extensive surface! It may be inferred with certainty, from the changes which one thousand years have produced in the European languages, that this fact makes it probable that the date of the origin of the Australian tribes must have been comparatively recent,—makes it impossible that it can have been remote!
In relation more immediately to the conclusions developed in this Section, it remains to be noticed that the trifling incipient differences of dialect in the language of Australia, as described by Colonel Grey, afford a vivid picture of the first phases of that process which, during the course of a series of ages, has given rise to the different languages of the four great Continents of Asia, Europe, Africa, and America!
But how are we to account for the origin of these numerous synonymous terms which abound in all, especially in ancient, languages?
This subject will be discussed in the next Chapter.