CELTIC AND LATIN LANGUAGES.
(Vol. viii., p. 174.)
There was a Query some time ago upon this subject, but though it is one full of interest to all scholars, I have not observed any Notes worth mentioning in reply. The connexion between these two languages has only of late occupied the attention of philologers; but the more closely they are compared together, the more important and the more striking do the resemblances appear; and the remark of Arnold with regard to Greek literature applies equally to Latin, "that we seem now to have reached that point in our knowledge of the language, at which other languages of the same family must be more largely studied, before we can make a fresh step in advance." But this study, as regards the comparison of Celtic and Latin, is, in England at least, in a very infant state. Professor Newman, in his Regal Rome, has attention to the subject; but his induction does not appear sufficiently extensive to warrant any decisive conclusion respecting the position the Celtic holds as an element of the Latin. Pritchard's work upon the subject is satisfactory as far as it goes, but both these authors have chiefly confined themselves to a tabular view of Celtic and Latin words; but it is not merely this we want. What is required is a critical examination into the comparative structure and formal development of the two languages, and this is a work still to be accomplished. The later numbers of Bopp's Comparative Grammar are, I believe, devoted to this subject, but as they have not been translated, they must be confined to a limited circle of English readers, and I have not yet seen any reproduction of the views therein contained in the philological literature of England.
As the first step to considerations of this kind must be made from a large induction of words, I think, with your correspondent, that the pages of "N. & Q." might be made useful in supplying "links of connexion" to supply a groundwork for future comparison. I shall conclude by suggesting one or two "links" that I do not remember to have seen elsewhere.
1. Is the root of felix to be found in the Irish fail, fate; the contraction of the dipththong ai or ê being analogous to that of amaïmus into amêmus?
2. Is it not probable that Avernus, if not corrupted from ἄορνος, is related to iffrin, the Irish inferi? This derivation is at any rate more probable than that of Grotefend, who connects the word with Ἀχέρων.
3. Were the Galli, priests of Cybele, so called as being connected with fire-worship? and is the name at all connected with the Celtic gal, a flame? The word Gallus, a Gaul, is of course the same as the Irish gal, a stranger.
T. H. T.