# A Comparative Grammar (Bopp 1885)/Preface

PREFACE
TO THE
FIRST EDITION.
The study of Comparative Philology has of late years been cultivated in Germany, especially, with remarkable ability and proportionate success. The labours of Grimm, Pott, Bopp, and other distinguished Scholars, have given a new character to this department of literature; and have substituted for the vague conjectures suggested by external and often accidental coincidences, elementary principles, based upon the prevailing analogies of articulate sounds and the grammatical structure of language.
But although the fact that a material advance has been made in the study of Comparative Philology is generally known, and some of the particulars have been communicated to the English public through a few works on Classical Literature, or in the pages of periodical criticism; yet the full extent of the progress which has been effected, and the steps by which it has been attained, are imperfectly appreciated in this country. The study of the German language is yet far from being extensively pursued; and the results which the German Philologers have developed, and the reasonings which have led to them, being accessible to those only who can consult the original writers, are withheld from many individuals of education and learning to whom the affinities of cultivated speech are objects of interest and inquiry. Translations of the works, in which the information they would gladly seek ​for, is conveyed, are necessary to bring within their reach the materials that have been accumulated by German industry and erudition, for the illustration of the history of human speech.
Influenced by these consideratione, Lord Francis Egerton was some time since induced to propose the translation of a work which occupies a prominent place in the literature of Comparative Philology on the Continent—the Vergleichende Grammatik of Professor Bopp of Berlin. In this work a new and remarkable class of affinities has been systematically and elaborately investigated. Taking as his standard the Sanskrit language, Professor Bopp has traced the analogies which associate with it and with each other—the Zend, Greek, Latin, Gothic, German, and Sclavonic tongues: and whatever may be thought of some of his arguments, he may be considered to have established beyond reasonable question a near relationship between the languages of nations separated by the intervention of centuries, and the distance of half the globe, by differences of physical formation and social institutions,—between the forms of speech current among the dark-complexioned natives of India and the fair-skinned races of ancient and modern Europe;—a relationship of which no suspicion existed fifty years ago, and which has been satisfactorily established only within a recent period, during which the Sanskrit language has been carefully studied, and the principles of alphabetical and syllabic modulation upon which its grammatical changes are founded, have been applied to its kindred forms of speech by the Philologers of Germany.
As the Vergleichende Grammatik of Professor Bopp is especially dedicated to a comprehensive comparison of languages, and exhibits, in some detail, the principles of the Sanskṛit as the ground-work and connecting bond of the comparison, it was regarded as likely to offer most interest to the Philologers of this country, and to be one of ​the most acceptable of its class to English students: it was therefore selected as the subject of translation. The execution of the work was, however, opposed by two considerations—the extent of the original, and the copiousness of the illustrations derived from the languages of the East, the Sanskrit and the Zend. A complete translation demanded more time than was compatible with Lord F. Egerton’s other occupations; and as he professed not a familiarity with Oriental Literature, he was reluctant to render himself responsible for the correctness with which the orientalisms of the text required to be represented. This difficulty was, perhaps, rather over-rated, as the Grammar itself supplies all the knowledge that is needed, and the examples drawn from the Sanskrit and Zend speak for themselves as intelligibly as those derived from Gothic and Sclavonic. In order, however, that the publication might not be prevented by any embarrassment on this account, I offered my services in revising this portion of the work; and have hence the satisfaction of contributing, however humbly, to the execution of a task which I consider likely to give a beneficial impulse to the study of Comparative Philology in Great Britain.
The difficulty arising from the extent of the original work, and the consequent labour and time requisite for its translation, was of a more serious description. This, however, has been overcome by the ready co-operation of a gentleman, who adds a competent knowledge of German to eminent acquirements as an Oriental Scholar. Having mastered several of the spoken dialects of Western India, and made himself acquainted with the sacred language of the Parsees during the period of his service under the Presidency of Bombay, Lieutenant Eastwick devoted part of a furlough, rendered necessary by failing health, to a residence in Germany, where he acquired the additional qualifications enabling him to take a share in the ​translation of the Vergleichende Grammatik. He has accordingly translated all those portions of the Comparative Gram mar, the rendering of which was incompatible with the leisure of the Noble Lord with whom the design originated, who has borne a share in its execution, and who has taken a warm and liberal interest in its completion.
The Vergleichende Grammatik, originally published in separate Parts, has not yet reached its termination. In his first plan the author comprised the affinities of Sanskṛit, Zend, Greek, Latin, Gothic, and its Teutonic descendants. To these, after the conclusion of the First Part, he added the Sclavonic. He has since extended his researches to the analogies of the Celtic and the Malay-Polynesian dialects, but has not yet incorporated the results with his general Grammar. The subjects already treated of are quite sufficient for the establishment of the principles of the comparison, and it is not proposed to follow him in his subsequent investigations. The first portions of the present Grammar comprise the doctrine of euphonic alphabetical changes, the comparative inflexions of Substantives and Adjectives, and the affinities of the Cardinal and Ordinal Numerals. The succeeding Parts contain the comparative formation and origin of the Pronouns and the Verbs: the latter subject is yet unfinished. The part of the translation now offered to the public stops with the chapter on the Numerals, but the remainder is completed, and will be published without delay.
With respect to the translation, I may venture to affirm, although pretending to a very slender acquaintance with German, that it has been made with great scrupulousness and care, and that it has required no ordinary pains to render in English, with fidelity and perspicuity, the not unfrequently difficult and obscure style of the original.
H. H. WILSON.
October, 1845.
THE AUTHOR’S PREFACE.
I contemplate in this work a description of the comparative organization of the languages enumerated in the title page, comprehending all the features of their relationship, and an inquiry into their physical and mechanical laws, and the origin of the forms which distinguish their grammatical relations. One point alone I shall leave untouched, the secret of the roots, or the foundation of the nomenclature of the primary ideas. I shall not investigate, for example, why the root i signifies “go” and not “stand”; why the combination of sounds stha or sta signifies “stand” and not “go.” I shall attempt, apart from this, to follow out as it were the language in its stages of being and march of development; yet in such a manner that those who are predetermined not to recognise, as explained, that which they maintain to be inexplicable, may perhaps find less to offend them in this work than the avowal of such a general plan might lead them to expect. In the majority of cases the primary signification, and, with it, the primary source of the grammatical forms, spontaneously present themselves to observation in consequence of the extension of our horizon of language, and of the confronting of sisters of the same lingual stock separated for ages, but bearing indubitable features of their family connection. In the treatment, indeed, of our European tongues a new epoch could not fail to open upon us in the discovery of another region in the world of language, namely the Sanskṛit, of which it has been demonstrated, that, in its ​grammatical constitution, it stands in the most intimate relation to the Greek, the Latin, the Germanic, &c.; so that it has afforded, for the first time, a firm foundation for the comprehension of the grammatical connection between the two languages called the Classical, as well as of the relation of these two to the German, the Lithuanian, and Sclavonic. Who could have dreamed a century ago that a language would be brought to us from the far East, which should accompany, pari passû, nay, sometimes surpass, the Greek in all those perfections of form which have been hitherto considered the exclusive property of the latter, and be adapted throughout to adjust the perennial strife between the Greek dialects, by enabling us to determine where each of them has preserved the purest and the oldest forms?
The relations of the ancient Indian languages to their European kindred are, in part, so palpable as to be obvious to every one who casts a glance at them, even from a distance: in part, however, so concealed, so deeply implicated in the most secret passages of the organization of the language, that we are compelled to consider every language subjected to a comparison with it, as also the language itself, from new stations of observation, and to employ the highest powers of grammatical science and method in order to recognise and illustrate the original unity of the different grammars. The Semitic languages are of a more compact nature, and, putting out of sight lexicographical and syntactical features, extremely meagre in contrivance; they had little to part with, and of necessity have handed down to succeeding ages what they were endowed with at starting. The triconsonantal fabric of their roots (§. 107.), which distinguishes this race from others, was already of itself sufficient to designate the parentage of every individual of the family. The family bond, on the other hand, which embraces the Indo-European race of languages, is not indeed less universal, but, in most of its bearings, of a quality infinitely more refined. The members of this race inherited, from the period of their earliest youth, ​endowments of exceeding richness, and, with the capability (§. 108.), the methods, also, of a system of unlimited composition and agglutination. Possessing much, they were able to bear the loss of much, and yet to retain their local life; and by multiplied losses, alterations, suppressions of sounds, conversions and displacements, the members of the common family are become scarcely recognisable to each other. It is at least a fact, that the relation of the Greek to the Latin, the most obvious and palpable, though never quite overlooked, has been, down to our time, grossly misunderstood; and that the Roman tongue, which, in a grammatical point of view, is associated with nothing but itself, or with what is of its own family, is even now usually regarded as a mixed language, because, in fact, it contains much which sounds heterogeneous to the Greek, although the elements from which these forms arose are not foreign to the Greek and other sister languages, as I have endeavoured partly to demonstrate in my “System of Conjugation.”
The close relationship between the Classical and Germanic languages has, with the exception of mere comparative lists of words, copious indeed, but destitute of principle and eritical judgment, remained, down to the period of the appearance of the Asiatic intermediary, almost entirely unobserved, although the acquaintance of philologists with the Gothic dates now from a century and a half; and that language is so perfect in its Grammar and so clear in its affinities, that had it been earlier submitted to a rigorous and systematic process of comparison and anatomical investigation, the pervading relation ​of itself, and, with it, of the entire Germanic stock, to the Greek and Roman, would necessarily have long since been unveiled, tracked through all its variations, and by this time been understood and recognised by every philologer. For what is more important, or can be more earnestly desired by the cultivator of the classical languages, than their comparison with our mother tongue in her oldest and most perfect form? Since the Sanskrit has appeared above our horizon, that element can no longer be excluded from a really profound investigation of any province of language related to it; a fact, however, which sometimes escapes the notice of the most approved and circumspect labourers in this department. We need ​not fear that that practical and profound research in utrâque linguâ, which is of most importance to the philologer can suffer prejudice by extension over too many languages; for the variety vanishes when the real identity is recognised and explained, and the false light of discrepancy is excluded. It is one thing, also, to learn a language, another to teach one, i.e. to describe its mechanism and organization. The learner may confine himself within the narrowest limits, and forbear to look beyond the language to be studied: the teacher's glance, on the contrary, must pass beyond the confined limits of one or two members of a family, and he must summon around him the representatives of the entire race, in order to infuse life, order, and organic mutual dependency into the mass of the languages spread before him. To attempt this appears to me the main requirement of the present period, and past centuries have been accumulating materials for the task.
The Zend Grammar could only be recovered by the process of a severe regular etymology, calculated to bring back the unknown to the known, the much to the little; for this remarkable language, which in many respects reaches beyond, and is an improvement on, the Sanskrit, and makes its theory more attainable, would appear to be no longer intelligible to the disciples of Zoroaster. Rask, who had the opportunity to satisfy himself on this head, says expressly (V. d. Hagen, p. 33) that its forgotten lore has yet to be rediscovered. I am also able, I believe, to demonstrate that the Pehlvi translator (tom. II. pp. 476, et seq.) of the Zend Vocabulary, edited by Anquetil, has frequently and entirely failed in conveying the grammatical sense of the Zend words which he translates. The work abounds with singular mistakes; and the distorted relation of Anquetil’s French translation to the Zend expressions is usually to be ascribed to the mistakes in the Pehlvi interpretations of the Zend original. Almost all the oblique cases, by degrees, come to take rank as nominatives: the numbers, too, are sometimes mistaken. Further, we find forms ​of cases produced by the Pehlvi translator as verbal persons, and next these also confounded with each other, or translated by abstract nouns. Anquetil makes, as far as I know, no ​remark on the age of the Vocabulary to which I advert; while he ascribes to another, in which the Pehlvi is interpreted through the Persian, an antiquity of four centuries. The ​one in question cannot therefore be ascribed to any very late period. The necessity, indeed, of interpretation for the Zend must have been felt much sooner than for the Pehlvi, which remained much longer current among the Parsee tribes. It was therefore an admirable problem which had for its solution the bringing to light, in India, and, so to say, under the very eye of the Sanskrit, a sister language, no longer understood, and obscured by the rubbish of ages;—a problem of which the solution indeed has not hitherto been fully obtained, but beyond doubt will be. The first contribution to the knowledge of this language which can be relied on—that of Rask—namely, his treatise “On the age and authenticity of the Zend Language and the Zend-Avesta,” published in 1826, and made generally accessible by V. d. Hagen’s translation, deserves high honour as a first attempt. The Zend has to thank this able man (whose premature death we deeply deplore) for the more natural appearance which it has derived from his rectification of the value of its written characters. Of three words of different declensions he gives us the singular inflections, though with some sensible deficiencies, and those, too, just in the places where the Zend forms are of most interest, and where are some which display that independence of the Sanskṛit which Rask claims, perhaps in too high a degree, for the Zend; a language we are, however, unwilling to receive as a mere dialect of the Sanskṛit, and to which we are compelled to ascribe an independent existence, resembling that of the Latin as compared with the Greek, or the Old Northern with the Gothic. For the rest, I refer the reader to my review of Rask’s and Bohlen’s treatises on the Zend in the Annual of Scientific Criticism for December 1831, as also to an earlier work (March 1831) on the able labours of E. Burnouf in this ​newly-opened field. My observations, derived from the original texts edited by Burnouf in Paris, and by Olshausen in Hamburgh, already extend themselves, in these publications, over all parts of the Zend Grammar; and nothing therefore has remained for me here, but further to establish, to complete, and to adjust the particulars in such a manner that the reader may be conducted on a course parallel with that of the known languages, with the greatest facility towards an acquaintance with the newly-discovered sister tongue. In order to obviate the difficulty and the labour which attend the introduction of the learner to the Zend and Sanskrit—difficulty sufficient to deter many, and to harass any one—I have appended to the original characters the pronunciation, laid down on a consistent method, or in places where, for reasons of space, one character alone is given, it is the Roman. This method is also perhaps the best for the gradual introduction of the reader to the knowledge of the original characters.
As in this work the languages it embraces are treated for their own sakes, i.e. as objects and not means of knowledge, and as I aim rather at giving a physiology of them than an introduction to their practical use, it has been in my power to omit many particulars which contribute nothing to the character of the whole; and I have gained thereby more space for the discussion of matters more important, and more intimately incorporated with the vital spirit of the language. By this process, and by the strict observance of a method which brings under one view all points mutually dependent and mutually explanatory, I have, as I flatter myself, succeeded in assembling under one group, and in a reasonable space, the leading incidents of many richly-endowed languages or grand dialects of an extinct original stock. Special care has been bestowed throughout on the German. This care was indispensable to one who, following Grimm’s admirable work, aimed at applying to it the correction and adjustment that had become necessary in his theory of relations, the discovery of new affinities, or the more precise definition of those discovered, and to catch, with greater truth, at every step of grammatical progress, the ​monitory voices of the Asiatic as well as the European sisterhood. It was necessary, also, to set aside many false appearances of affinity; as, for example, to deprive the i in the Lithuanian geri of its supposed connection with the i of Gothic, Greek, and Latin forms, such as gôdai, ἀγαθοι, boni (see p. 251, Note †, and compare Grimm I. 827. 11); and to disconnect the Latin is of lupis (lupibus) from the Greek ις of λύκοις (λύκοι-σι). As concerns the method followed in treating the subject of Germanic grammar, it is that of deducing all from the Gothic as the guiding star of the German, and explaining the latter simultaneously with the older languages and the Lithuanian. At the close of each lecture on the cases, a tabular view is given of the results obtained, in which every thing naturally depends on the most accurate distinction of the terminations from the base, which ought not, as usually happens, to be put forward capriciously, so that a portion of the base is drawn into the inflection, by which the division becomes not merely useless, but injurious, as productive of positive error. Where there is no real termination none should be appended for appearance sake: thus, for example, we give, §. 148, p. 164, the nominatives χώρα, terra, giba, &c., as without inflection cf. §. 137. The division gib-a would lead us to adopt the erroneous notion that a is the termination, whereas it is only the abbreviation of the ô (from the old â, §. 69.) of the theme. In certain instances it is ​extraordinarily difficult in languages not now thoroughly understood to hit on the right divisions, and to distinguish apparent terminations from true. I have never attempted to conceal these difficulties from the reader, but always to remove them from his path.
The High German, especially in its oldest period (from the eighth to the eleventh century), I have only mentioned in the general description of forms when it contributes something of importance. The juxta-position of it in its three main periods with the Gothic, grammatically explained at the close of each chapter, is sufficient, with a reference also to the treatise on sounds intended to prepare and facilitate my whole Grammar, after the model of my Sanskrit Grammar. Wherever, in addition, explanatory remarks are necessary, they are given. The second part will thus begin with the comparative view of the Germanic declensions, and I shall then proceed to the adjectives, in order to describe their formations of gender and degrees of comparison; from these to the pronouns.
As the peculiarities of inflection of the latter must have, for the most part, already been discussed in the doctrine of the universal formation of the cases, inasmuch as they are intimately connected and mutually illustrative, what will remain to be said on their behalf will claim the less space, and the main compass of the second division will remain for the verb. To the formation and comparison of words it is my intention to devote a separate work, which may be considered as a completion of its antecedent. In this latter the particles, conjunctions, and original prepositions, will find their place, being, I consider, partly offshoots of pronominal roots, and partly naked roots of ​this class of words, and which will, therefore, be treated in this point of view among the pronominal adjectives. It is likely that a chasm in our literature, very prejudicial to inquiries of this kind, may be shortly filled up by a work ready for the press, and earnestly looked for by all friends of German and general philology, the Old High German Treasury of Graff. What we may expect from a work founded on a comprehensive examination of the MS. treasures of libraries national and foreign, as well as on a correction of printed materials, may be gathered from a survey of the amount contributed to knowledge in a specimen of the work, small, but happily selected, “The Old High German Prepositions.”
F. BOPP.
Berlin, 1833.
* ↑ Saṅskṛita signifies “adorned, completed, perfect”; in respect to language, “classic”; and is thus adapted to denote the entire family or race.” It is compounded of the elements sam, “with,” and kṛita (nom. kṛitas, kṛitâ, kṛitam), “made,” with the insertion of a euphonic s (§§. 18. 96.).
* ↑ Frankfort. a. M. 1816. A translation of my English revision of this treatise (“Analytical Comparison of the Sanskrit, Greek, Latin and Teutonic Languages,” in the “Annals of Oriental Literature,” London 1820.) by Dr. Pacht, is to be found in the second and third number of the second annual issue of Seebode’s new Record of Philology and Pædagogical science. Grimm’s masterly German Grammar was unfortunately unknown to me when I wrote the English revision, and I could then make use only of Hickes and Fulda for the old German dialects.
* ↑ Rask has been the first to supply a comprehensive view of the close relationship between the Germanic and the Classical Languages, in his meritorious prize treatise ”On the Thracian Tribe of Languages,” completed in 1814 and published in 1818, from which Vater gives an extract in his Comparative Tables. It cannot be alleged as a reproach against him that he did not profit by the Asiatic intermediary not then extensively known; but his deficiency in this respect shews itself the more sensibly, as we see throughout that he was in a condition to use it with intelligence. Under that deficiency, however, he almost everywhere halts halfway towards the truth. We have to thank him for the suggestion of the law of displacement of consonants, more acutely considered and fundamentally developed by Grimm (§. 87., and see Vater, §. 12.).
* ↑ We refer the reader to the very weighty judgment of W. von. Humboldt on the indispensable necessity of the Sanskrit for the history and philosophy of language (Indische Bibl. I. 133). We may here borrow, also, from Grimm’s preface to the second edition of his admirable Grammar, some words which are worthy of consideration (I. vi.): “As the too exalted position of the Latin and Greek serves not for all questions in German Grammar, where some words are of simpler and deeper sound, so however, according to A. W. Schlegel's excellent remark, the far more perfect Indian Grammar may, in these casce, supply the requisite corrections. The dialect which history demonstrates to be the oldest and least corrupted must, in the end, present the most profound rules for the general exposition of the race, and thus lead us on to the reformation, without the entire subversion of the rules hitherto discovered, of the more recent modes of speech.”
* ↑ I give the Zend expressions according to the system of representation explained in §.30., annexing the original characters, which are exhibited in type for the first time in this book, and which were lately cut at the order of the Royal Society of Literature by R. Gotzig, according to the exemplar of the lithographed M.S. of M. Burnouf. I give the Pehlvi words exactly according to Anquetil (II. 435): AVE ahmâkĕm, "pov," P. rouman (ef. p. 502, roman, "nos"), A. "je," "moi," ahulya, "bonis" (with dual termination, &. 215), P. avaék, A. "bon," "excellent;" altê, "hi," "," P. varman, "is," A. "lui;" Frau anhem, "I was," or also "I am," P. djanounad, "he is," A. "il est;"> anheus, "mundi," P. akhé, A. "le monde;" fro»»» avalshanm," horum," P. varmouschan, "," A. "eux;" spssssy baraiti, "fert," P. dadrouneschné, "the carrying" (eschné, in Pehlvi, forms abstract substantives), A. "il porte," "il erecute," "porter;" wbis, "twice," P. dou, "two," A. "deux;" bérétebio su, baratilyo, "ferenti- bus?" (unquestionably a plural dative and ablative), P. dadrouneschné, "the carrying," A. "porter;" wote, "tui," P. tou, "tu," A. "toi;" hre tácha, "eaque," (neut. 3. 231), P. zakedj, A. "ce;" psy jato, "the smitten" (cf. Sansk. halas from han), P. maitouned, "he smites," A, "il frappe" rosy janat, "he smote," P. maitouneschné, "the smiting," A. "frapper" zanthra, "per genitorem," P. zarhounad, "gi- s gnit," A. "il engendre," oss stri, "femina," P. vakad, A. "femelle," pss strim, "feminam," P. vahad, A. "femelle;" foss átáram, "stellarum," P. setaran, A. "les étoiles;" susugudd fra-dátái, "to the given," or "especially given," P. feraz deheschné (nomen actionis), A. " donner abondamment gulthanam, "mundorum," P. quehan (cf.), A. "le monde," spf prowe gatimcha, "locum- que," P. gah, A. "lieu" nars, "of the man," P. guebna hamat advak, A. " un homme;" as nara, "two men," P. guebna hamat dou, A. "deux hommes;" náirihananm, “feminarum." P. nai- rik hamat sé, A. "trois (ou plusieurs) femmes;" / thryanm, "trium," P. sevin, A. "troisième;" fel vahmemcha, "præcla- rumque," P. néueschiné, "adoratio," A. "je fais nénesch;" swissly vah- mái, "præclaro," P, néacsch, honam, "adorationem facio," A. "je bénis et fais néaesch.” I do not insist on translating the adjective Nu valima by "præclarus," but I am certain of this, that vahměn and vahmâi are nothing else than the accusative and dative of the base vahma; and theat vahmâi could be the first person of a verb is not to be thought pos- sible for a moment. Anquetil, however, in the interlinear version of the be- ginning of the V. S. attempted by him, gives two other evident datives com- pounded with the particle as cha, "and," as the first person singular of the present, viz. psujesnaothrâi-cha, po vstupu vald fraiastoya-cha (see §. 164.), by "placere cupio," "vota facio. One sees then, from the example bere adduced, the number of which I could with ease greatly increase, that the Pehlvi Translator of the said Vocabulary has, no more than Anquetil, any grammatical acquaintance with the Zend language, and that both regarded it rather in the light of an idiom, poor in inflexions; so that,as in the Pehlvi and Modern Persian, the grammatical of the members of a sentence would be to be gathered rather from their position than from their terminations. And Anquetil expressly says (II. 415.): "La construction dans la langue Zende, semblable en cela aux autres idiomes de l'Orient, eat astreinte à peu de regles (!). La for- mation des tems des Verbes y est à peu près la même que dans le Persan, plus trainante cependant, parce qu'elle est accompagnée de toutes les voyelles (!). How stands it, then, with the Sanskrit translation of the Jzeschine made from the Pehlvi more than three centuries before that of Acquetil. This question will, without doubt, be very soon answered by M. E. Burnouf, who has already supplied, and admirably illustrated (Nouv. Journ. Asiat., T. III. p. 321), two passages from the work in a very interesting extract from its Commentary on the V. S. These pas- sages are, however, too short to permit of our grounding on them over- bold influences as to the whole; moreover, their contents are of such a nature that the inflexionless Pehlvi language could follow the Zend ori- ginal almost verbatim. The one passage signifies, "I call upon, I mag- nify the excellent pure spell, and the excellent man, the pure and the strict, strong like Dámi (? cf. Sansk. upamana, "similarity;" and V. S., p. 428, dámóis drujo) Izet." It is, however, very surprising, and of evil omen, that Neriosengh, or his Pehlvi predecessor, takes the feminine genitive dahmayás as a plural genitive, since this expression is evidently, as Burnouf rightly remarks, only an epithet of afritóis. I abstain from speaking of the dubious expression dámôis upamanahé, and content myself with having pointed out the possibility of another view of the construction, different from that which has been very profoundly discussed by Burnouf, and which is based on Neriosengh. The second passage signifies, “I call upon and magnify the stars, the moon, the sun, the eternal, self-created lights!”
* ↑ The simple maxim laid down elsewhere by me, and deducible only from the Sanskrit, that the Gothic ô is the long of a, and thereby when shortened nothing but a, as the latter lengthened can only become ô, extends its influence over the whole grammar and construction of words, and explains, for example, how from dags, “day” (theme DAGA), may be derived, without change of vowel, dôgs (DŌGA), “daily”; for this derivation is absolutely the same as when in Sanskrit râjata, “argenteus,” comes from răjata, “argentum,” on which more hereafter. Generally speaking, and with few exceptions, the Indian system of vowels, pure from consonantal and other altering influences, is of extraordinary importance for the elucidation of the German grammar: on it principally rests my own theory of vowel change, which differs materially from that of Grimm, and which I explain by mechanical Laws, with some modifications of my earlier definitions, while with Grimm it has a dynamic signification. A comparison with the Greek and Latin vocalism, without a steady reference to the Sanskrit, is, in my opinion, for the German more confusing than enlightening, as the Gothic is generally more original in its vocal system, and at least more consistent than the Greek and Latin, which latter spends its whole wealth of vowels, although not without pervading rules, in merely responding to a solitary Indian a (septimus for septamas, quatuor for chatvâr-as τέσσαρ-ες, momordi for mamarda).
* ↑ I refer the reader preliminarily to my two last treatises (Berlin, Ferd. Dümmler) “On Certain Demonstrative Bases, and their connection with various Prepositions and Conjunctions,” and “On the Influence of Pronouns on the Formation of Words.” Compare, also, C. Gottl. Schmidt’s excellent tract “Quæst. Gramm. de Præpositionibus Græcis,” and the review of the same, distinguished by acute observations, by A. Benary, in the Berlin Annual (May 1830). If we take the adverbs of place in their relation to the prepositions—and a near relation does exist—we shall find in close connection with the subject a remarkable treatise of the minister W. von Humboldt, “On the Affinity of the Adverbs of Place to the Prepositions in certain Languages.” The Zend has many grammatical rules which were established without these discoveries, and have since been demonstrated by evidence of facts. Among them it was a satisfaction to me to find a word, used in Sanskrit only as a preposition (ava, “from,”) in the Zend a perfect and declinable pronoun (§. 172.). Next we find sa-cha, “isque,” which in Sanskṛit is only a pronoun, in its Zend shape AVE ha-cha (§. 53.), often used as a preposition to signify “out of”; the particle AVE cha, “and,” loses itself, like the cognate que in absque, in the general signification. “Remark.—What in §. 68. is said of the rise of the u or o out of the older a is so far to be corrected according to my later conviction, that nothing but a retroactive influence is to be ascribed to the liquids; and the u and the o, in forms like plinṭemu (mo), plintỵu, are to be exempted from the influence of the antecedent consonants.”
* ↑ The arrangement thus announced, as intended, has undergone, as will be seen, considerable modification.—Editor.
This work was published before January 1, 1929, and is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago.
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