2. Two roots may be joined together to form words, and in these compounds one root may lose its independence.
3. Two roots may be joined together to form words, and in these compounds both roots may lose their independence.
What applies to two roots, applies to three or four or more. The principle is the same, though it would lead to a more varied subdivision.
The first stage, in which each root preserves its independence, [pg 287] and in which there is no formal distinction between a root and a word, I call the Radical Stage. This stage is best represented by ancient Chinese. Languages belonging to this first or Radical Stage, have sometimes been called Monosyllabic or Isolating. The second stage, in which two or more roots coalesce to form a word, the one retaining its radical independence, the other sinking down to a mere termination, I call the Terminational Stage. This stage is best represented by the Turanian family of speech, and the languages belonging to it have generally been called agglutinative, from gluten, glue. The third stage, in which roots coalesce so that neither the one nor the other retains its substantive independence, I call the Inflectional Stage. This stage is best represented by the Aryan and Semitic families, and the languages belonging to it have sometimes been distinguished by the name of organic or amalgamating.
The first stage excludes phonetic corruption altogether.
The second stage excludes phonetic corruption in the principal root, but allows it in the secondary or determinative elements.
The third stage allows phonetic corruption both in the principal root and in the terminations.
A few instances will make this classification clearer.
In the first stage, which is represented by Chinese, every word is a root, and has its own substantial meaning. Thus, where we say in Latin baculo, with a stick, we say in Chinese ỳ ćáng.[298] Here ỳ might be taken for a mere preposition, like the English with. But in Chinese this ỳ is a root; it is the same word which, [pg 288] if used as a verb, would mean “to employ.” Therefore in Chinese ỳ ćáng means literally “employ stick.” Or again, where we say in English at home, or in Latin domi, the Chinese say ŭŏ-li, ŭŏ meaning house, and li originally inside.[299] The name for day in Chinese is ģi-tse, which means originally son of the sun.[300]
There is in Chinese, as we saw before, no formal distinction between a noun, a verb, an adjective, an adverb, a preposition. The same root, according to its position in a sentence, may be employed to convey the meaning of great, greatness, greatly, and to be great. Everything in fact depends in Chinese on the proper collocation of words in a sentence. Thus ngò tà ni means “I beat thee;” but ni tà ngò would mean “Thou beatest me.” Thus ngŏ ģin means “a bad man;” ģin ngŏ would mean “the man is bad.”