It might, no doubt, simplify the problem of the origin of language if we could claim for the whole of it one and the same conceptual origin, but the evidence, if any, would necessarily be of the most evanescent character1. If any of these demonstrative roots can be satisfactorily traced back to conceptual roots, I see no reason to oppose such a process on principle; on the contrary, we know that there is no lack of analogies in ancient and modern languages 2. But until that is done, I can see nothing against the theory which accepts these demonstrative elements as remnants of an earlier stage, if not of language, yet of communication, just as we look upon clicks as survivals of emotional sounds imbedded in the layers of conceptual speech 3. Suffixes, These demonstrative elements appear not only as the material of prepositions, pronouns, Prefixes, and adverbs, but likewise in the shape and Infixes. of suffixes, prefixes, and infixes, which raise a root into a base, and of grammatical terminations, which change a base into a word. Thus from a root KHAN, to dig, a base was formed KHAN-a, meaning originally no more than what might be rendered in modern speech by 'digging-here,' Tóde tɩ kai toû kai vûv. In addition to this, many other bases were thrown out by repeated combinations of predicative and demonstrative elements, such as KHÅN-i, KHÅN-ǎka, KHANana, KHAN-itar, KHA-ta, KHÂ-tra, &c., all being intended originally, it would seem, for no 1 Lectures on the Science of Language, vol. ii. p. 33. 2 Sayce, Introduction, vol. ii. p. 25. 3 Professor Noiré in his Logos (p. 186) pleads strongly and ably for the derivation of demonstrative from predicative roots. more than to predicate digging of something in space and time, and varying in their application according to the tastes of various speakers, families, or villages. We are speaking here of times so far beyond the reach of history, and of intellectual processes so widely removed from our own, that no one would venture to speak dogmatically on what was actually passing in the minds of the early framers of languages when they first uttered these words. It is possible that some of these suffixes were intended from the first for something more special than a mere 'digging-here,' 'digging-now.' Some of them may have been intended from the first for a digging-he,' i. e. a labourer, or for a diggingit,' i. e. a spade, or for a 'digging-now,' i. e. labour, or for a digging-there,' i. e. a hole. But even if this had not been so, we could perfectly well understand how, after centuries of shaking and winnowing, some derivatives would have been used in one, others in another meaning. Even now, many of these derivative suffixes can be used in more than one meaning. Thus KHAN-a means not only a digger, but also a hole; KHAN-i, a digger and a mine. Ludwig. All this is perfectly true, and the highest credit is due to Professor Ludwig for having been Agglutination the first to point out that the suffixes as or Adaptation. well as the personal and case terminations were not all from the beginning so many independent words, each with its own definite meaning, and glued to a root in order to modify its meaning. So far I quite agree with the founder of what has been called the new school of Comparative Philology. But, if I understand him rightly, I cannot quite agree with what seems to be his opinion, namely, that there was in the pro-ethnical Aryan language no agglutination or combination at all. These demonstrative elements must have had their independent existence, quite as much as the predicative roots, and I do not see how we can deny that it was a real act of synthesis which changed KHAN+A into khana, and digging-here' into 'digger.' To suppose that khana, khani, khanana, khanitra, khâtra, &c. all tumbled out ready-made, without any synthetical purpose, and that their differences were due to nothing but an uncontrolled play of the organs of speech, seems to me an unmeaning assertion for which, so far as I can see, Professor Ludwig himself is less responsible than some of his followers1. I fully admit that when we once begin to speak of pro-ethnic formations, real arguments, proof and counter-proof, become very difficult. But even in those nebular regions the intelligible seems to me always preferable to the unintelligible, and whereas we can understand the combination of a root with various demonstrative elements for a more or less definite purpose, it is difficult to realise in any way the promiscuous outpouring of words, agreeing in their predicative elements, but bulging out into suffixes, and afterwards in terminations, without any guiding principle. According to some of the more recent writers on this subject, suffixes and terminations would seem to be like corns and bunions, mere excrescences on the surface of roots, which are there, and require no further explanation, nay, which it is wrong even to attempt to explain. Duttens, Exposants Casuels, p. 214. What must be admitted, however, is that many suffixes and terminations had been wrongly analysed by Bopp and his school, and that we must be satisfied for the present in looking upon most of them as in the beginning simply demonstrative and modificatory. But even thus I should not shut the door altogether against the old theory that some Significative suffixes contained elements of independent Suffixes. significance. I do not think that it has ever been proved that the suffix tara, for instance, of the comparative could have had no connection with the root TAR, to cross 1, and that the suffixes expressing an agent 2 in dâ-tár, So-Táp, dator, and an instrument in da-tram, sickle, had nothing to do with the same root. No one would deny that tirás, trans, across, through, is connected with that root. If then we can form in Sanskrit a compound dyutara, crossing the sky, why not ukkais-tara, crossing what is high, and mahat-tara, exceeding what is great, i. e. greater. If ut-tara (uttára?) in dur-uttara 3 might be called a karmadhâraya, út-tara, the comparative of ut, might be taken as a tatparusha compound. We do not doubt as yet that in ud-ak, upward, a k represents the root AñK, to bend; why then should tara in ut-tara not be derived from the root TAR, to cross? Does any one believe it an accident that while the suffix tar expresses the agent, tram expresses the instrument? I do not deny that other explanations are possible, and that much may be said in their defence; but I cannot 3 Or in uttárah (var. lect. úttirah), Ath. Veda, xlx. 32. 1. Q persuade myself that every new theory is preferable simply because it is new, simply because it differs from Bopp. We must remember that there are many instances in the Aryan languages where an independent word at the end of a compound has been ground down to a mere termination. We still understand the process which gives us such a word as four-fold, German vier-fach, because to fold is still used in the sense of wrapping, and Fach in German in the sense of division. More likely, however, fach is the M. H. G. vach, a fold. This fold comes from the root PARK, in Greek λéк-w, in Latin plec-to, in Gothic fal-tha, where the guttural between 1 and th is lost, as it is likewise in O. Slav. ple-t-ą, while it has been preserved in Goth. flaht, a fold, and in O. H. G. flih-tu, and flah-s, flax. We have the same root in Latin sim-plex, du-plex, and I doubt whether the Romans were more conscious of the radical meaning of plex than the Greeks were of πλάσιος in διπλάσιος. At all events in the Greek a-a, once, where the second element a must have had originally the same meaning, the connection of παξ with any such root as παγ in πήγνυμι, which would correspond with German fach (Goth. fahan, O. H. G. fach), was completely forgotten. In Sanskrit, katur-vaya, fourfold, shows its connection with VI, to weave; sa-krit, once, with KÆRT, to spin; tribhug, threefold, with BHUG, to bend. Then why should not katur-vidha, fourfold, have had a similar origin, and lastly, why should we not admit a significative element even in dhâ of katur-dhâ, four-times, and, if so, likewise in dixa and dix and dixoû? No doubt it is easier to say that |