Lectures on the Science of Language

by F. Max Müller

vi. sev-ish-dir-mek, to cause them to love one another, becomes xviii. sev-ish-dir-me-mek, not to cause them to love one another.

vii. sev-il-mek, to be loved, becomes xix. sev-il-me-mek, not to be loved.

viii. sev-in-il-mek, to be rejoiced at, becomes xx. sev-in-il-me-mek, not to be the object of rejoicing.

ix. sev-ish-il-mek, if it was used, would become xxi. sev-ish-il-me-mek; neither form being translatable.

x. sev-dir-il-mek, to be brought to love, becomes xxii. sev-dir-il-me-mek, not to be brought to love.

xi. sev-in-dir-il-mek, to be made to rejoice, becomes xxiii. sev-in-dir-il-me-mek, not to be made to rejoice.

xii. sev-ish-dir-il-mek, to be brought to love one another, becomes xxiv. sev-ish-dir-il-me-mek, not to be brought to love one another.

Some of these forms are of course of rare occurrence, and with many verbs these derivative roots, though possible grammatically, would be logically impossible. Even a verb like “to love,” perhaps the most pliant of all, resists some of the modifications to which a [pg 315] Turkish grammarian is fain to subject it. It is clear, however, that wherever a negation can be formed, the idea of impossibility also can be superadded, so that by substituting eme for me, we should raise the number of derivative roots to thirty-six. The very last of these, xxxvi. sev-ish-dir-il-eme-mek would be perfectly intelligible, and might be used, for instance, if, in speaking of the Sultan and the Czar, we wished to say, that it was impossible that they should be brought to love one another.

Finnic Class.

It is generally supposed that the original seat of the Finnic tribes was in the Ural mountains, and their languages have been therefore called Uralic. From this centre they spread east and west; and southward in ancient times, even to the Black Sea, where Finnic tribes, together with Mongolic and Turkic, were probably known to the Greeks under the comprehensive and convenient name of Scythians. As we possess no literary documents of any of these nomadic nations, it is impossible to say, even where Greek writers have preserved their barbarous names, to what branch of the vast Turanian family they belonged. Their habits were probably identical before the Christian era, during the Middle Ages, and at the present day. One tribe takes possession of a tract and retains it perhaps for several generations, and gives its name to the meadows where it tends its flocks, and to the rivers where the horses are watered. If the country be fertile, it will attract the eye of other tribes; wars begin, and if resistance be hopeless, hundreds of families fly from their paternal pastures, to migrate perhaps for generations,—for [pg 316] migration they find a more natural life than permanent habitation,—and after a time we may rediscover their names a thousand miles distant. Or two tribes will carry on their warfare for ages, till with reduced numbers both have perhaps to make common cause against some new enemy.