Part 17

Our analysis of some of the nominal and verbal formations in the Aryan or Indo-European family of speech has taught us that, however mysterious and complicated these grammatical forms appear at first sight, they are in reality the result of a very simple process. It seems at first almost hopeless to ask such questions as why the addition of a mere _d_ should change love present into love past, or why the termination _ai_ in French, if added to _aimer_, should convey the idea of love to come. But, once placed under the microscope of comparative grammar, these and all other grammatical forms assume a very different and much more intelligible aspect. We saw how what we now call terminations were originally independent words. After coalescing with the words which they were intended to modify, they were gradually reduced to mere syllables and letters, unmeaning in themselves, yet manifesting their former power and independence by the modification which they continue to produce in the meaning of the words to which they are appended. The true nature of grammatical terminations was first pointed out by a philosopher, who, however wild some of his speculations may be, had certainly caught many a glimpse of the real life and growth of language, I mean _Horne Tooke_. This is what he writes of terminations:(254)—

“For though I think I have good reasons to believe that all terminations may likewise be traced to their respective origin; and that, however artificial they may now appear to us, they were not originally the effect of premeditated and deliberate _art_, but separate words by length of time corrupted and coalescing with the words of which they are now considered as the terminations. Yet this was less likely to be suspected by others. And if it had been suspected, they would have had much further to travel to their journey’s end, and through a road much more embarrassed; as the corruption in those languages is of much longer standing than in ours, and more complex.”

Horne Tooke, however, though he saw rightly what road should be followed to track the origin of grammatical terminations, was himself without the means to reach his journey’s end. Most of his explanations are quite untenable, and it is curious to observe in reading his book, the Diversions of Purley, how a man of a clear, sharp, and powerful mind, and reasoning according to sound and correct principles, may yet, owing to his defective knowledge of facts, arrive at conclusions directly opposed to truth.

When we have once seen how grammatical terminations are to be traced back in the beginning to independent words, we have learnt at the same time that the component elements of language, which remain in our crucible at the end of a complete grammatical analysis, are of two kinds, namely, _Roots predicative_ and _Roots demonstrative_.

We call _root_ or _radical_, whatever, in the words of any language or family of languages, cannot be reduced to a simpler or more original form. It may be well to illustrate this by a few examples. But, instead of taking a number of words in Sanskrit, Greek, and Latin, and tracing them back to their common centre, it will be more instructive if we begin with a root which has been discovered, and follow it through its wanderings from language to language. I take the root AR, to which I alluded in our last Lecture as the source of the word _Arya_, and we shall thus, while examining its ramification, learn at the same time why that name was chosen by the agricultural nomads, the ancestors of the Aryan race.

This root AR(255) means _to plough_, to open the soil. From it we have the Latin _ar-are_, the Greek _ar-oun_, the Irish _ar_, the Lithuanian _ar-ti_, the Russian _ora-ti_, the Gothic _ar-jan_, the Anglo-Saxon _er-jan_, the modern English _to ear_. Shakespeare says (Richard II. III. 2), “to ear the land that has some hope to grow.”

From this we have the name of the plough, or the instrument of earing: in Latin, _ara-trum_; in Greek, _aro-tron_; in Bohemian, _oradto_; in Lithuanian, _arklas_; in Cornish, _aradar_; in Welsh, _arad_;(256) in Old Norse, _ardhr_. In Old Norse, however, _ardhr_, meaning originally the plough, came to mean earnings or wealth; the plough being, in early times, the most essential possession of the peasant. In the same manner the Latin name for money, _pecunia_, was derived from _pecus_, cattle; the word _fee_, which is now restricted to the payment made to a doctor or lawyer, was in Old English _feh_, and in Anglo-Saxon _feoh_, meaning cattle and wealth; for _feoh_, and Gothic _faihu_, are really the same word as the Latin _pecus_, the modern German _vieh_.

The act of ploughing is called _aratio_ in Latin; _arosis_ in Greek: and I believe that _arôma_, in the sense of perfume, had the same origin; for what is sweeter or more aromatic than the smell of a ploughed field? In Genesis, xxviii. 27, Jacob says “the smell of my son is as the smell of a field which the Lord has blessed.”

A more primitive formation of the root _ar_ seems to be the Greek _era_, earth, the Sanskrit _irâ_, the Old High-German _ëro_, the Gaelic _ire_, _irionn_. It meant originally the ploughed land, afterwards earth in general. Even the word _earth_, the Gothic _airtha_,(257) the Anglo-Saxon _eorthe_, must have been taken originally in the sense of ploughed or cultivated land. The derivative _ar-mentum_, formed like _ju-mentum_, would naturally have been applied to any animal fit for ploughing and other labor in the field, whether ox or horse.

As agriculture was the principal labor in that early state of society when we must suppose most of our Aryan words to have been formed and applied to their definite meanings, we may well understand how a word which originally meant this special kind of labor, was afterwards used to signify labor in general. The general tendency in the growth of words and their meanings is from the special to the more general: thus _gubernare_, which originally meant to steer a ship, took the general sense of governing. _To equip_, which originally was to furnish a ship (French _équiper_ and _esquif_, from _schifo_, ship), came to mean furnishing in general. Now in modern German, _arbeit_ means simply _labor_; _arbeitsam_ means industrious. In Gothic, too, _arbaiþs_ is only used to express labor and trouble in general. But in Old Norse, _erfidhi_ means chiefly _ploughing_, and afterwards labor in general; and the same word in Anglo-Saxon, _earfodh_ or _earfedhe_, is labor. Of course we might equally suppose that, as laborer, from meaning one who labors in general, came to take the special sense of an agricultural laborer, so _arbeit_, from meaning work in general, came to be applied, in Old Norse, to the work of ploughing. But as the root of _erfidhi_ seems to be _ar_, our first explanation is the more plausible. Besides, the simple _ar_ in Old Norse means ploughing and labor, and the Old High-German _art_ has likewise the sense of ploughing.(258)

Ἄρουρα and _arvum_, a field, would certainly have to be referred to the root _ar_, to plough. And as ploughing was not only one of the earliest kinds of labor, but also one of the most primitive arts, I have no doubt that the Latin _ars_, _artis_, and our own word _art_, meant originally the art of all arts, first taught to mortals by the goddess of all wisdom, the art of cultivating the land. In Old High-German _arunti_, in Anglo-Saxon _ærend_, mean simply work; but they too must originally have meant the special work of agriculture; and in the English _errand_, and _errand-boy_, the same word is still in existence.

But _ar_ did not only mean to plough, or to cut open the land; it was transferred at a very early time to the ploughing of the sea, or rowing. Thus Shakspeare says:—

“Make the sea serve them; which they _ear_ and wound With keels.”

In a similar manner, we find that Sanskrit derives from _ar_ the substantive _aritra_, not in the sense of a plough, but in the sense of a rudder. In Anglo-Saxon we find the simple form _âr_, the English _oar_, as it were the plough-share of the water. The Greek also had used the root _ar_ in the sense of rowing; for ἐρέτης(259) in Greek is a rower, and their word τρι-ήρ-ης, meant originally a ship with three oars, or with three rows of oars,(260) a trireme.

This comparison of ploughing and rowing is of frequent occurrence in ancient languages. The English word _plough_, the Slavonic _ploug_, has been identified with the Sanskrit _plava_,(261) a ship, and with the Greek _ploion_, ship. As the Aryans spoke of a ship ploughing the sea, they also spoke of a plough sailing across the field; and thus it was that the same names were applied to both.(262) In English dialects, _plough_ or _plow_ is still used in the general sense of waggon or conveyance.(263)

We might follow the offshoots of this root _ar_ still further, but the number of words which we have examined in various languages will suffice to show what is meant by a predicative root. In all these words _ar_ is the radical element, all the rest is merely formative. The root _ar_ is called a predicative root, because in whatever composition it enters, it predicates one and the same conception, whether of the plough, or the rudder, or the ox, or the field. Even in such a word as _artistic_, the predicative power of the root _ar_ may still be perceived, though, of course, as it were by means of a powerful telescope only. The Brahmans who called themselves _ârya_ in India, were no more aware of the real origin of this name and its connection with agricultural labor, than the artist who now speaks of _his art_ as a divine inspiration suspects that the word which he uses was originally applicable only to so primitive an art as that of ploughing.

We shall now examine another family of words, in order to see by what process the radical elements of words were first discovered.

Let us take the word _respectable_. It is a word of Latin not of Saxon, origin, as we see by the termination _able_. In _respectabilis_ we easily distinguish the verb _respectare_ and the termination _bilis_. We then separate the prefix _re_, which leaves _spectare_, and we trace _spectare_ as a participial formation back to the Latin verb _spicere_ or _specere_, meaning to see, to look. In _specere_, again, we distinguish between the changeable termination _ere_ and the unchangeable remnant _spec_, which we call the root. This root we expect to find in Sanskrit and the other Aryan languages; and so we do. In Sanskrit the more usual form is _paś_, to see, without the _s_; but _spaś_ also is found in _spaśa_, a spy, in _spashṭa_ (in _vi-spashṭa_), clear, manifest, and in the Vedic _spaś_, a guardian. In the Teutonic family we find _spëhôn_ in Old High-German meaning to look, to spy, to contemplate; and _spëha_, the English spy.(264) In Greek, the root _spek_ has been changed into _skep_, which exists in _skeptomai_, I look, I examine; from whence _skeptikos_, an examiner or inquirer, in theological language, a sceptic; and _episkopos_, an overseer, a bishop. Let us now examine the various ramifications of this root. Beginning with _respectable_, we found that it originally meant a person who deserves _respect_, _respect_ meaning _looking back_. We pass by common objects or persons without noticing them, whereas we turn back to look again at those which deserve our admiration, our regard, our respect. This was the original meaning of _respect_ and _respectable_, nor need we be surprised at this if we consider that _noble_, _nobilis_ in Latin, conveyed originally no more than the idea of a person that deserves to be known; for _nobilis_ stands for _gnobilis_, just as _nomen_ stands for _gnomen_, or _natus_ for _gnatus_.

“With respect to” has now become almost a mere preposition. For if we say, “With respect to this point I have no more to say,” this is the same as “I have no more to say on this point.”

Again, as in looking back we single out a person, the adjective _respective_, and the adverb _respectively_, are used almost in the same sense as special, or singly.

The English _respite_ is the Norman modification of _respectus_, the French _répit_. _Répit_ meant originally looking back, reviewing the whole evidence. A criminal received so many days _ad respectum_, to re-examine the case. Afterwards it was said that the prisoner had received a respit, that is to say, had obtained a re-examination; and at last a verb was formed, and it was said that a person had been respited.

As _specere_, to see, with the preposition _re_, came to mean respect, so with the preposition _de_, down, it forms the Latin _despicere_, meaning to look down, the English _despise_. The French _dépit_ (Old French _despit_) means no longer contempt, though it is the Latin _despectus_, but rather _anger_, _vexation_. _Se dépiter_ is to be vexed, to fret. “_En dépit de lui_” is originally “angry with him,” then “in spite of him;” and the English _spite_, _in spite of_, _spiteful_, are mere abbreviations of _despite_, _in despite of_, _despiteful_, and have nothing whatever to do with the spitting of cats.

As _de_ means down from above, so _sub_ means up from below, and this added to _specere_, to look, gives us _suspicere_, _suspicari_, to look up, in the sense of to suspect.(265) From it _suspicion_, _suspicious_; and likewise the French _soupçon_, even in such phrases as “there is a soupçon of chicory in this coffee,” meaning just a touch, just the smallest atom of chicory.

As _circum_ means round about, so _circumspect_ means, of course, cautious, careful.

With _in_, meaning into, _specere_ forms _inspicere_, to inspect; hence _inspector_, _inspection_.

With _ad_, towards, _specere_ becomes _adspicere_, to look at a thing. Hence _adspectus_, the aspect, the look or appearance of things.

So with _pro_, forward, _specere_ became _prospicere_; and gave rise to such words as _prospectus_, as it were a look out, _prospective_, &c. With _con_, with, _spicere_ forms _conspicere_, to see together, _conspectus_, _conspicuous_. We saw before in _respectable_, that a new word _spectare_ is formed from the participle of _spicere_. This, with the preposition _ex_, out, gives us the Latin _expectare_, the English _to expect_, to look out; with its derivatives.

_Auspicious_ is another word which contains our root as the second of its component elements. The Latin _auspicium_ stands for _avispicium_, and meant the looking out for certain birds which were considered to be of good or bad omen to the success of any public or private act. Hence _auspicious_, in the sense of lucky. _Haru-spex_ was the name given to a person who foretold the future from the inspection of the entrails of animals.

Again, from _specere_, _speculum_ was formed, in the sense of looking-glass, or any other means of looking at oneself; and from it _speculari_, the English _to speculate_, _speculative_, &c.

But there are many more offshoots of this one root. Thus, the Latin _speculum_, looking-glass, became _specchio_ in Italian; and the same word, though in a roundabout way, came into French as the adjective _espiègle_, waggish. The origin of this French word is curious. There exists in German a famous cycle of stories, mostly tricks, played by a half-historical, half-mythical character of the name of _Eulenspiegel_, or _Owl-glass_. These stories were translated into French, and the hero was known at first by the name of _Ulespiègle_, which name, contracted afterwards into _Espiègle_, became a general name for every wag.

As the French borrowed not only from Latin, but likewise from the Teutonic languages, we meet there side by side with the derivatives of the Latin _specere_, the old High-German, _spëhôn_, slightly disguised as _épier_, to spy, the Italian _spiare_. The German word for a spy was _spëha_, and this appears in old French as _espie_, in modern French as _espion_.

One of the most prolific branches of the same root is the Latin _species_. Whether we take _species_ in the sense of a perennial succession of similar individuals in continual generations (_Jussieu_), or look upon it as existing only as a category of thought (_Agassiz_), _species_ was intended originally as the literal translation of the Greek _eidos_ as opposed to _genos_, or _genus_. The Greeks classified things originally according to _kind_ and _form_, and though these terms were afterwards technically defined by Aristotle, their etymological meaning is in reality the most appropriate. Things may be classified either because they are of the same _genus_ or _kind_, that is to say, because they had the same origin; this gives us a genealogical classification: or they can be classified because they have the same appearance, _eidos_, or _form_, without claiming for them a common origin; and this gives us a morphological classification. It was, however, in the Aristotelian, and not in its etymological sense, that the Greek _eidos_ was rendered in Latin by _species_, meaning the subdivision of a genus, the class of a family. Hence the French _espèce_, a kind; the English _special_, in the sense of particular as opposed to general. There is little of the root _spaś_, to see, left in a _special train_, or a _special messenger_; yet the connection, though not apparent, can be restored with perfect certainty. We frequently hear the expression _to specify_. A man specifies his grievances. What does it mean? The mediæval Latin _specificus_ is a literal translation of the Greek _eidopoios_. This means what makes or constitutes an _eidos_ or species. Now, in classification, what constitutes a species is that particular quality which, superadded to other qualities, shared in common by all the members of a genus, distinguishes one class from all other classes. Thus the specific character which distinguishes man from all other animals, is reason or language. Specific, therefore, assumed the sense of _distinguishing_ or _distinct_, and the verb _to specify_ conveyed the meaning of enumerating distinctly, or one by one. I finish with the French _épicier_, a respectable grocer, but originally a man who sold drugs. The different kinds of drugs which the apothecary had to sell, were spoken of, with a certain learned air, as _species_, not as drugs in general, but as peculiar drugs and special medicines. Hence the chymist or apothecary is still called _Speziale_ in Italian, his shop _spezieria_.(266) In French _species_, which regularly became _espèce_, assumed a new form to express drugs, namely _épices_; the English _spices_, the German _spezereien_. Hence the famous _pain d’épices_, gingerbread nuts, and _épicier_, a grocer. If you try for a moment to trace _spicy_, or _a well-spiced_ article, back to the simple root _specere_, to look, you will understand that marvellous power of language which out of a few simple elements has created a variety of names hardly surpassed by the unbounded variety of nature herself.(267)

I say “out of a few simple elements,” for the number of what we call full predicative roots, such as _ar_, to plough, or _spaś_, to look, is indeed small.

A root is necessarily monosyllabic. Roots consisting of more than one syllable can always be proved to be derivative roots, and even among monosyllabic roots it is necessary to distinguish between primitive, secondary, and tertiary roots.

A. Primitive roots are those which consist—

(1) of one vowel; for instance, _i_, to go;

(2) of one vowel and one consonant; for instance, _ad_, to eat;

(3) of one consonant and one vowel; for instance, _dâ_, to give.

B. Secondary roots are those which consist—

(1) of one consonant, vowel, and consonant; for instance, _tud_, to strike.

In these roots either the first or the last consonant is modificatory.

C. Tertiary roots are those which consist—

(1) of consonant, consonant, and vowel; for instance, _plu_, to flow;

(2) of vowel, consonant, and consonant; for instance, _ard_, to hurt;

(3) of consonant, consonant, vowel, and consonant; for instance, _spaś_, to see;

(4) of consonant, consonant, vowel, consonant, and consonant; for instance, _spand_, to tremble.

The primary roots are the most important in the early history of language; but their predicative power being generally of too indefinite a character to answer the purposes of advancing thought, they were soon encroached upon and almost supplanted by secondary and tertiary radicals.

In the secondary roots we can frequently observe that one of the consonants, in the Aryan languages, generally the final, is liable to modification. The root retains its general meaning, which is slightly modified and determined by the changes of the final consonants. Thus, besides _tud_ (_tudati_), we have in Sanskrit _tup_ (_topati_, _tupati_, and _tumpati_), meaning to strike; Greek, _typ-tō_. We meet likewise with _tubh_ (_tubhnâti_, _tubhyati_, _tobhate_), to strike; and, according to Sanskrit grammarians, with _tuph_ (_tophati_, _tuphati_, _tumphati_). Then there is a root _tuj_ (_tunjati_, _tojati_), to strike, to excite; another root, _tur_ (_tutorti_), to which the same meaning is ascribed; another, _tûr_ (_tûryate_), to hurt. Then there is the further derivative _turv_ (_tûrvati_), to strike, to conquer; there is _tuh_ (_tohati_), to pain, to vex; and there is _tuś_ (_tośate_), to which Sanskrit grammarians attribute the sense of striking.

Although we may call all these verbal bases roots, they stand to the first class in about the same relation as the triliteral Semitic roots to the more primitive biliteral.(268)

In the third class we shall find that one of the two consonants is always a semivowel, nasal, or sibilant, these being more variable than the other consonants; and we can almost always point to one consonant as of later origin, and added to a biconsonantal root in order to render its meaning more special. Thus we have, besides _spaś_, the root _paś_, and even this root has been traced back by Pott to a more primitive _aś_. Thus _vand_, again, is a mere strengthening of the root _vad_, like _mand_ of _mad_, like _yu-na-j_ and _yu-n-j_ of _yuj_. The root _yuj_, to join, and _yudh_, to fight, both point back to a root _yu_, to mingle, and this simple root has been preserved in Sanskrit. We may well understand that a root, having the general meaning of mingling or being together, should be employed to express both the friendly joining of hands and the engaging in hostile combat; but we may equally understand that language, in its progress to clearness and definiteness, should have desired a distinction between these two meanings, and should gladly have availed herself of the two derivatives, _yuj_ and _yudh_, to mark this distinction.