XXI.—§ 9. Law of Development.
So far, then, from subscribing to Whitney’s dictum that “the law of simplicity of beginnings applies to language not less naturally and necessarily than to other instrumentalities” (G 226), we are drawn to the conclusion that primitive language had a superabundance of irregularities and anomalies, in syntax and word-formation no less than in accidence. It was capricious and fanciful, and displayed a luxuriant growth of forms, entangled one with another like the trees in a primeval forest. “Rien n’entre mieux dans les esprits grossiers que les subtilités des langues” (Tarde, Lois de l’imitation 285). Human minds in the early times disported themselves in long and intricate words as in the wildest and most wanton play. Nothing could be more beside the mark than to suppose that grammatical and logical categories were in primitive languages generally in harmony (as is supposed, e.g., by Sweet, New Engl. Grammar § 543): primitive speech cannot have been distinguished for logical consistency; nor, so far as we can judge, was it simple and facile: it is much more likely to have been extremely clumsy and unwieldy. Renan rightly reminds us of Turgot’s wise saying: “Des hommes grossiers ne font rien de simple. Il faut des hommes perfectionnés pour y arriver.”
We have seen in earlier chapters that the old theory of the three stages through which human language was supposed always to proceed, isolation, agglutination and flexion, was built up on insufficient materials; but while we feel tempted totally to reverse this system, we must be on our guard against establishing too rigid and too absolute a system ourselves. It would not do simply to reverse the order and say that flexion is the oldest stage, from which language tends through an agglutinative stage towards complete isolation, for flexion, agglutination and isolation do not include all possible structural types of speech. The possibilities of development are so manifold, and there are such innumerable ways of arriving at more or less adequate expressions for human thought, that it is next to impossible to compare languages of different families. Even, therefore, if it is probable that English, Finnish and Chinese are all simplifications of more complex languages, we cannot say that Chinese, for instance, at one time resembled English in structure and at some other time Finnish. English was once a flexional language, and is still so in some respects, while in others it is agglutinative, and in others again isolating, or nearly so. But we may perhaps give the following formula of what is our total impression of the whole preceding inquiry:
The evolution of language shows a progressive tendency from inseparable irregular conglomerations to freely and regularly combinable short elements.
The old system of historical linguistics may be likened to an enormous pyramid; only it is a pity that it should have as its base the small, square, strong, smart root word, and suspended above it the unwieldy, lumbering, ill-proportioned, flexion-encumbered sentence-vocable. Structures of this sort may with some adroitness be made to stand; but their equilibrium is unstable, and sooner or later they will inevitably tumble over.
XXI.—§ 10. Vocabulary.
On the lexical side of language we find a development parallel to that noticed in grammar; and, indeed, if we go deep enough into the question, we shall see that it is really the very same movement that has taken place. The more advanced a language is, the more developed is its power of expressing abstract or general ideas. Everywhere language has first attained to expressions for the concrete and special. In accounts of the languages of barbarous races we constantly come across such phrases as these: “The aborigines of Tasmania had no words representing abstract ideas; for each variety of gum-tree and wattle-tree, etc., they had a name; but they had no equivalent for the expression ‘a tree’; neither could they express abstract qualities, such as ‘hard, soft, warm, cold, long, short, round’”; or, The Mohicans have words for cutting various objects, but none to convey cutting simply. The Zulus have no word for ‘cow,’ but words for ‘red cow,’ ‘white cow,’ etc. (Sayce S 2. 5, cf. 1. 121). In Bakaïri (Central Brazil) “each parrot has its special name, and the general idea ‘parrot’ is totally unknown, as well as the general idea ‘palm.’ But they know precisely the qualities of each subspecies of parrot and palm, and attach themselves so much to these numerous particular notions that they take no interest in the common characteristics. They are choked in the abundance of the material and cannot manage it economically. They have only small coin, but in that they must be said to be excessively rich rather than poor” (K. v. d. Steinen, Unter den Naturvölkern Brasiliens, 1894, 81). The Lithuanians, like many primitive tribes, have many special, but no common names for various colours: one word for gray in speaking about wool and geese, one about horses, one about cattle, one about the hair of men and some animals, and in the same way for other colours (J. Schmidt, Kritik d. Sonantentheorie 37). Many languages have no word for ‘brother,’ but words for ‘elder brother’ and ‘younger brother’; others have different words according to whose (person and number) father or brother it is (see, e.g., the paradigm in Gabelentz Spr 421), and the same applies in many languages to names for various parts of the body. In Cherokee, instead of one word for ‘washing’ we find different words, according to what is washed: kutuwo ‘I wash myself,’ kulestula ‘I wash my head,’ tsestula ‘I wash the head of somebody else,’ kukuswo ‘I wash my face,’ tsekuswo ‘I wash the face of somebody else,’ takasula ‘I wash my hands or feet,’ takunkela ‘I wash my clothes,’ takutega ‘I wash dishes,’ tsejuwu ‘I wash a child,’ kowela ‘I wash meat’ (see, however, the criticism of Hewitt, Am. Anthropologist, 1893, 398). Primitive man did not see the wood for the trees.[108]
In some Amerindian languages there are distinct series of numerals for various classes of objects; thus in Kwakiatl and Tsimoshian (Sapir, Language and Environment 239); similarly the Melanesians have special words to denote a definite number of certain objects, e.g. a buku niu ‘two coconuts,’ a buru ‘ten coconuts,’ a koro ‘a hundred coconuts,’ a selavo ‘a thousand coconuts,’ a uduudu ‘ten canoes,’ a bola ‘ten fishes,’ etc. (Gabelentz, Die melan. Spr. 1. 23). In some languages the numerals are the same for all classes of objects counted, but require after them certain class-denoting words varying according to the character of the objects (in some respects comparable to the English twenty head of cattle, Pidgin piecey; cf. Yule and Burnell, Hobson-Jobson s.v. Numerical Affixes). This reminds one of the systems of weights and measures, which even in civilized countries up to a comparatively recent period varied not only from country to country, sometimes even from district to district, but even in the same country according to the things weighed or measured (in England stone and ton still vary in this way).
In old Gothonic poetry we find an astonishing abundance of words translated in our dictionaries by ‘sea,’ ‘battle,’ ‘sword,’ ‘hero,’ and the like: these may certainly be considered as relics of an earlier state of things, in which each of these words had its separate shade of meaning, which was subsequently lost and which it is impossible now to determine with certainty. The nomenclature of a remote past was undoubtedly constructed upon similar principles to those which are still preserved in a word-group like horse, mare, stallion, foal, colt, instead of he-horse, she-horse, young horse, etc. This sort of grouping has only survived in a few cases in which a lively interest has been felt in the objects or animals concerned. We may note, however, the different terms employed for essentially the same idea in a flock of sheep, a pack of wolves, a herd of cattle, a bevy of larks, a covey of partridges, a shoal of fish. Primitive language could show a far greater number of instances of this description, and, so far, had a larger vocabulary than later languages, though, of course, it lacked names for a great number of ideas that were outside the sphere of interest of uncivilized people.