or advise; and the Swedish rad' is the same as the Latin 'ratio,' reason. The meaning of ordo is illustrated by the German ordnung, which is the setting of a thing in its 'ort' or place: airt' is still used in the north of England for the place or quarter of the wind. The Greek udor' is the same as water, and may be found in the names of many European rivers-the Oder, the Eyder, the Adour, and the Douro: for the changes which vowels undergo in the translation of a word from one language to another is well exemplified in the Latin conjunction ac,' which becomes in German auch,' in English 'eke,' and in Swedish 'ok.' Ceylon is spelled both Khundi and Candi, Ganges both Gunga and Ganga; Morocco is spelled by the Moorish emperor in his letter to George IV., Marakah, and Fez is Fass. The Latin casa ' passes readily through the German 'haus,' which retains one of its vowels, into the English house,' which retains neither; and 'cutis' travels through the Frankish 'hut' and the German 'haut,' till it arrives at the English hide,' without one of the letters with which it set out; so 'quod' becomes what,' and jam is converted into the German schon; and although not a letter is preserved, yet the sound remains much the same. It might seem a hopeless task to deduce 'four' from 'tessares,' and yet the process of its descent may be easily shown. The Greeks themselves changed 'tessares' into 'tettares' and 'pisures;' it is no wonder, then, that in the Oscic dialect it became 'petor,' in old German 'fedwor,' and thence in English four.' The preposition 'ex' was first changed by the Germans into aus,' and then by the English into 'out;' and 'via,' which according to Varro was anciently written 'veha,' became in German 'weg,' and then in English way.' Our adjectives, much, more, and most, are a compound of Latin and Greek, through the intervention of the German : The two last are much the same as the modern German mehr and meiste; but our 'much' comes in from another quarter- it is derived from the Latin 'multus,' through the Spanish 'muchas.' This language, indeed, furnishes many examples of a similar transition: for instance, 'valiente' is the intermediate step between the Latin 'valens' and the English valient;' tumba' between the Italian 'tombolare' and the English 'tumble;' 'hierro' between the Latin ferrum' and the English 'iron.' But formerly many words were used in Spain which were absolutely English, though they have since become dissimilar. Thus in the translation of the Bible, in 1478, by Bonifacio Ferrer, the modern 'frutos' is 'fruyts;' 'siervos,' is 'servents;' 'frentes' is 'fronts;' linatge' we have turned into lineage; but 'spirits' and 'plagues' are letter for letter the same.' The etymology of 'other' 1 M'Crie's Reformation in Spain, p. 414. may exemplify the manner in which corruption creeps on from one language to another. In Latin it is 'alter' and 'altera;' the Spaniards combined both in altra;' the French altered it to 'autre ;' in modern Spanish it became 'otra,' and in English 'other.' But how much their own native language is subject to the same universal law of corruption, in spite even of the strongest fence of religious tradition, may best be shown by the history of Compostella. To that capital of Galicia the body of St. Jago, that is to say, James the Less, was reported, by a cunningly devised fable of the priests, to have been transported in a ship without human aid, in order to be buried. Hence the place became sacred to Giacomo Postolo, that is, Jacobus Apostolus; and by abbreviation it became Compostella. But this is nothing to an instance of our own talent at abbreviation, with which we are more familiar. Lammas-day was the day dedicated to St. Peter in prison. The mass, therefore, which was said on that day, was called the St. Peter ad vincula-mass; but the English, says Holinshed, love brevity, and so have cut off all but the last two syllables. We have already seen that James is transformed by the Spaniards into Jago; but who would think that James and Lapo have a common origin, and mean one and the same person? yet James is derived from Iachomo, or Giachomo, which is only a soft pronunciation of Jacobus; and Lapo is said by the commentators on Dante to be a corruption from Jacopo, which is another form of Jacobus. Other instances there 6 are in modern history of very singular metamorphoses suffered by the names of some persons, though facts and dates are too numerous, at such a recent epoch, to permit a doubt of their identity. Thus the Greek emperor Isaac (Angelus, 1185), is styled by Villehardouin 'Sursac,' which may be derived from the French sire,' or the Greek 'tkur,' melted into his proper name; and the further corruptions of Tursac' and 'Corserac' will instruct us, says Gibbon, what licence may have been used in the old dynasties of Assyria and Egypt.' The same historian cites a passage from Cantacuzene, concerning the first wife of Andronicus the younger, who ascended the throne of Constantinople in 1328. She was the daughter δεκοσ ντι μπρέζειν ; in which letters the classical scholar will have some difficulty in recognising the Duke of Brunswick: the modern Greeks are in the habit of substituting Nt for D, and Mp for B. But similar substitutions of one consonant for another occur without end in the ancient dialects; K for P, P for M, F for Th, P for T, R for L, S for Th, D for B.2 Sometimes B and sometimes T was added at the beginning.3 The Romans changed D into R; for Midday, which was written Medidies' in the Ten Tables, afterwards became Meridies.' The Afghauns change it into L, as we are assured by Mr. El 1 Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, xi. 198. 2 Κοιον for ποιον, οππατα for ομματα, φλαται for θλαται, σπολη for στολή, κριβανον for κλιβανον, σεος for θεος, οδελος for οβελος. * Βροδον for ροδον ; and therefore Wordsworth derives Βαλτος, a marsh, from αλς, and βελη from ελη, το for oι. phinstone; but the eastern Afghauns have some permutations peculiar to themselves, which sometimes disguise a word in such a manner as to render it a matter of difficulty to discover its etymology. Nobody, says he, would suppose that ghwug,' an ear, could be derived from the Persian 'gosh ;' from which, however, it is clearly deducible.' The change of M into B is another substitution of one consonant for another, wholly dissimilar to it in sound; which shows how far a word may be altered without destroying its identity. Castalio remarks, that the Greek word for a rope, 'camelus,' is retained in the French word added, in the English too. 'cable 2:' he might have Nor is there Nor is there any thing incredible in the derivation; since we know that the same word, as a proper name, is sometimes pronounced Camel,' and sometimes Campbell.' Two terms in most frequent and universal use, and therefore most likely to be constant in their orthoepy, may be selected to illustrate the changes, which it is possible for a word to undergo in its passage through several languages; 'Father' and 'God.' 1. 'Father' in Greek and Latin, is Pater;' but in English, an aspirate is inserted after each of the two first consonants: for F is only another form of Ph. In the Irish Celtic the rule is, that if a small vowel immediately follows a consonant in the beginning of a word, that consonant is not pronounced: this rule being extended to A, 'Father' became 'Athair' 1 Account of Caubul, p. 305. |