Mental Evolution in Man: Origin of Human Faculty

by George John Romanes

Lastly, as I have before indicated, it appears to me impossible to dispute that every agglutinative language, in whatever measure it can be proved to be agglutinative, in that measure is thereby proved to have been derived from a language less agglutinative, and therefore more isolating. And, similarly, in whatever measure an inflective language can be proved to inflect its agglutinated words, in that measure is it thereby proved to have been derived from a language less inflective, or a language whose agglutinations had not yet undergone so much of the inflective modification.

On the other hand, as there is no necessary reason why an isolating language should develop into an agglutinative, or an agglutinative into an inflectional, it may very well be that the higher evolution of isolating tongues has proceeded collaterally with that of agglutinative, while the higher evolution of agglutinative has proceeded collaterally with that of inflectional. If this were so, both the schools of philology which we are considering would be equally right, and equally wrong: each would represent a different side of the same truth.

Thus it appears to me that, so far as the purposes of the present treatise are concerned, we may neglect the question of phylogenesis as between these three orders of languages. For, so long as it is on all hands agreed that the principles of evolution are universally concerned in the genesis of every language, it will make no difference to my future argument whether these principles have obtained in one or in more lines of development. There can be no reasonable doubt that in some greater or less degree the three orders are connected: in what precise degree this connection obtains is doubtless a question of high importance to the science of philology: it is of scarcely any importance to the problems which we shall presently have to consider.

But the issue touching the relation between the polysynthetic and other types of language is of more importance for us, inasmuch as it involves the question whether or not we have here to do with the most primitive type of language. In the opinion of some philologists, “these polysynthetic languages are an interesting survival of the early condition of language everywhere, and are but a fresh proof that America is in truth ‘the new world:’ primitive forms of speech that have elsewhere perished long ago still survive there, like the armadillo, to bear record of a bygone past.”[156] On the other hand, it is with equal certainty affirmed that “polysynthesis is not a primitive feature, but an expansion, or, if you will, a second phase of agglutination.”[157]

Of course in dealing with this issue I can only do so as an amateur, quite destitute of authority in matters pertaining to philology; but the points on which I am about to speak have reference to principles so general, that in trying them the lay mind may not be without its uses in the jury-box. Moreover, philologists themselves are at present so ill-informed touching the facts of polysynthetic language, that there is less presumption here than elsewhere in any outsider offering his opinion upon the matters in dispute.[158] It is however, undesirable to occupy space with any tedious rehearsal of the facts on which, after reading the more important literature of the subject, my judgment is based. For what it is worth, this judgment is as follows.

In the first place, it appears to me that those experts have an overwhelmingly strong case who argue in favour of the polysynthetic languages as presenting a highly primitive form of speech. Indeed, so undifferentiated do I think they prove this type of language-structure to be, that I agree with them in concluding that it probably brings us nearer “the origin of speech” than any other type now extant. Furthermore, looking to the wide contrast between this type and that which is presented by the isolating tongues, it appears to me impossible that the one can be genetically connected with the other. For it appears to me that the experts on the opposite side have no less completely proved, that the isolating tongues also present evidence of a highly primitive origin; and, therefore, that whatever amount of evolution and subsequent degeneration (“phonetic decay”) the Chinese language, for instance, may be proved to have undergone, this only goes to show that it has throughout remained true to the isolating principle—just as the Protozoa, through all their long history of evolution, have remained true to their “isolating” type, notwithstanding that some of their branches must long ago have given origin to the “agglutinated” Metazoa. In other words, it appears to me that the experts on this side of the question have been able to place the isolating type of speech on as low a level of development—and, therefore, presumably on as high a level of antiquity—as experts on the other side have been able to claim for the polysynthetic.

If I am right in this opinion, it follows that there must have been at least two points of origin from which all existing languages arose—or rather, let me say, at least two types of language-formation upon which the earliest materials of speech were moulded. For even the strongest advocates of the polysynthetic origin of speech do not venture to question the highly primitive nature of the monosyllabic type. Thus, for instance, Professor Sayce is the principal upholder of the polysynthetic view, and yet he quotes the isolating forms of Chinese and Taic as furnishing “excellent illustrations of the early days of speech;”[159] and he adduces them as “examples from the far East to show us the way in which our words first came into existence.”[160] But if this is allowed to be so even by the leading advocate of the polysynthetic view, I cannot conceive the possibility of the one type having become so completely transformed into the other as to have left no trace in the isolating type of its polysynthetic origin. For, in view of the above admissions, we are left to conclude that the transformation must have taken place soon after the birth of language in any form—notwithstanding that, as Professor Sayce elsewhere insists (in the passage already quoted), “the conception of the sentence which underlies the polysynthetic dialects is the precise converse of that which underlies the isolating or the agglutinative type.”

In view of these statements, therefore, by Professor Sayce himself, I do not think it is necessary for me to go further in justification of the opinion already expressed—namely, that we must recognize at least two types of language-formation upon which the earliest materials of speech were moulded. It is probable enough that both these types of language-formation were independently originated in many parts of the earth’s surface at different times; and it is possible that yet other types may have arisen, which are now either extinct, or fused with some of the later developments of the two which have survived. But, be these things as they may, I believe that both the schools of philology which we are considering have made out their respective cases; and, therefore, that they both err in so often assuming that these cases are mutually exclusive.

It will thus be apparent that I am altogether in favour of the polyphylectic theory of language-development. Even if it were not for the specially philological considerations just adduced, on grounds of merely general reasoning it would appear to me much more probable that so useful a sociological instrument as that of articulate sign-making should have been evolved from the sign-making of tone and gesture, wherever the psychological powers of mankind were far enough advanced to admit of the evolution. And, if this is so, it clearly becomes probable that any aboriginal races which were geographically separated would have slowly and independently elaborated their primitive forms of utterance—supposing, of course, that mankind had become segregated while still in the speechless state, which, as I will subsequently explain, seems to me the most probable supposition. And, if this were the case, it appears to me highly improbable that languages which originated and developed independently of one another should all have been under the necessity of starting either on the monosyllabic, the polysynthetic, or any other type exclusively. That the existing languages of the earth did originate in more than one centre is now the almost universal belief of competent authorities.[161] But too many of these authorities are still bound by what appears to me the wholly gratuitous and highly improbable assumption, that although various languages thus originated in different centres, they must all have been born with an exact family resemblance to one another, so far as type or “genius” is concerned. But there is no basis for such an assumption, either in the physiology or the psychology of mankind. On the contrary, if we look to the nearest analogue of the case, namely, the growing child, we may find abundant evidence of the fact that the earliest attempts at articulate utterance may occur on different types, as we saw so strikingly proved by quotations from Dr. Hale in a previous chapter.

In this connection I would like to conclude the present chapter by giving prominence to an interesting and ingenious hypothesis, which has been suggested by Dr. Hale on the basis of the facts just alluded to.