CHAPTERS III. AND IV.
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Bréal, Principes de Philologie Comparée.
Geiger, Contributions to the History of the Development of the Race (trs.).
Grimm, Geschichte der deutschen Sprache.
Grimm, Ueber den Ursprung der Sprache.
Kuhn, Zeitschrift für vergleichende Sprachforschung.
Müller, Max, Lectures on the Science of Language.
Müller, Max, Sanskrit Literature.
Peile, Introduction to Greek and Latin Etymology.
Pictet, Les Origines Indo-Européennes.
Sayce, Introduction to the Science of Language.
Wilson, Introduction to the Rig Veda Sanhita.
Agreeably to the plan enunciated in the first chapter (pp. 4-6) I have used up all the more generally admitted facts and theories to form what seemed to me a reasonable account of the growth of language; to form an account too which should subserve one great end of this volume, by stimulating the thoughts of the reader at the same time that it pointed out the nature of the evidence upon which conclusions are founded, thereby preparing the reader to pursue the enquiry upon his own account.
The science of Comparative Philology is, however, in too unripe a condition to allow us to speak with dogmatic assurance with regard to its inferences; even those which seem fundamental have been, and may again, be called in question. It is right here, therefore, to remind the reader that it is quite upon the cards that further research may end by upsetting the generally accepted theory of the growth of inflexions in language. Even now there is a school of philologists and anthropologists that denies the premise upon which this theory rests—the radical origin of all language. This school maintains that, instead of speech beginning in monosyllabic root-sounds, as is generally supposed, it begins in extremely elaborate and complicated sounds which are in fact nothing else than sentences; that it is only by the wear and tear of use that the sentence has got split up into its component sounds, which have then taken the character of monosyllabic roots.
This theory was first set on foot by a writer (Waitz) who is an anthropologist rather than a student of language, and it might be distinguished as the anthropological theory of the origin of speech. We have no space here for a full discussion of its merits. It will be enough to indicate some à priori arguments in its favour.
1. It would make the language of primitive man analogous to a state of things which many people think they have discovered as typical of the most primitive savages—namely, a state of society which, in its customs, marriage laws, etc., differs from modern society in being not more simple, but infinitely more complex.
2. This supposed original expressive sentence and its subsequent analysis would have considerable analogy to what we ourselves have just seen is the history of writing, which begins with a more or less elaborate picture; then the parts of the picture are split up, and by the wear and tear of frequent use these parts are added together in separate items to form picture-writing, which is quite a different thing from picturing, and which is the immediate parent of writing as we know it. An analogy of this kind cannot be without weight.
On the other hand, it must be pointed out that the strongest arguments in favour of this view are the à priori arguments. True, we do not know enough of the languages of the world to speak with dogmatic assurance. But the history of all the languages which have been closely studied points away from the anthropological theory.
Again, the first argument in favour of Waitz’s theory is itself clearly founded upon a paradox. It can scarcely be seriously maintained that while we can trace the growth of implements, such as spears and knives, from the simplest possible form upwards, such implements as speech and social laws have been ready made in a highly complex form. Argument number two serves to expose the grossness of this paradox. It would be as reasonable to maintain that mankind had begun by drawing pictures before they learnt to draw the elements out of which the pictures were composed.
The whole theory, therefore, belongs to the category of theories which explain obscurum per obscurius. It may be, and no doubt is, practically impossible to explain in any natural way how speech arose. But at all events it is easier to understand how it may have arisen in a simple form and grown to one more complex, than to imagine it beginning in a complex state and by detrition resolving into simple elements.
[P. 68]. Consonantal and vowel sounds.—The fact that even in Aryan roots the consonants have more weight than the vowel sounds will be evident merely from the instances given in the course of this and the following chapter—fly, flee, flew (w is here a vowel sound); night, Nacht; knight, Knecht; Raum, room; asmi, esmi (eimi), sum, etc. This general rule holds good for almost all languages, and seems necessarily to do so from the stronger character of the consonantal and the weaker character of the vowel sounds.
But the relative importance of vowels and consonants is very different in different classes of language. In the Aryan tongues the essential root is made up of vowels and consonants, and the variations upon the root idea are generally expressed by additions to the root and not by internal changes in it. In this way, as we saw, most grammatical inflexions are made: hom-o, hom-inis, am-o, am-abam, τύπτω, ἒτυτον, ἒτυψον, etc. But in Semitic languages the root consists of the consonants only, and the inflexions are produced by internal changes, changes of the vowels which belong to a consonant. For example, in Arabic the three consonants k-t-l (katl) represent the abstract notion of the act of killing. From them we get kátil, one who kills; kitl (pl. aktal), an enemy; katala, he slew; kutila, he was slain. From z-r-b (zarb), the act of striking; zarbun, a striking (in concrete sense); zarábun, a striker; zaraba, he struck; zuriba, he was struck. Compare these with occido, occidi, occisor, or with τύπτω, τέτυφα, etc., and we see that in the Aryan tongues the radical remains almost unchanged, and the inflexions are made ab extra; but in the Semitic language the inflexions are made by changes of vowel sound within the framework of the root consonants.
The usual grammatical root in Arabic is composed of three consonants, as in the examples given above. Most of the Semitic languages are in too fully formed a state to allow us to see whether or no these roots, which are of course at the least dissyllabic, grew up out of single sounds; but a comparison with some languages of the Semitic family (e.g. Egyptian) which are still near to their early radical state, show us that they have probably done so.
The Coptic language, which is the nearest we can get to the tongue of the ancient Egyptians, is extremely interesting in that it displays the processes of grammar formation, as has just been said, in a more intelligible shape than we find in the higher Semitic tongues.
[P. 98]. We are here speaking, be it remembered, of families of language. The ethnology of a people is not necessarily the same as its language; so that when we speak of a family of language including the tongues of a certain number of races, we do not imply that they were wholly of the same ethnic family. This caution is especially necessary as regards the earliest great pre-historic nations who seem to have been what are called Cushites—anything but pure Semites (see Chapter V.)—but whose languages may properly be ranged in the Semitic family. The Egyptian, for instance, was more nearly monosyllabic than any other Semitic tongue (Chapter XIII.); yet such inflexions as it has show an evident relationship with Hebrew and other Semitic languages (see Appendix to Bunsen’s Egypt’s Place in Universal History).