THE ASIATIC JOURNAL. JANUARY-APRIL, ON THE CAUSES OF ORIENTAL WORDS EXISTING IN Or all the various theories in which speculation and ingenuity have indulged, few have been more contradictory than that of the origin of languages: each has rather cut than unloosed the Gordian knot, but none has discovered the mystery of its composition. It is sufficient for our purpose, that the formation of language must have been gradual, and proceeded from simple apprehensions to more abstract peculiarities, and that, in consequence of lapse of time, the discordant interests of nations, and the migratory, and of course often novel, life, to which many tribes were habituated, any modern attempt to retrace the primitive tongue by means of monosyllabic vocables common to several must be accounted a futile research after the impossible. This, however, will by no means be the case if we confine ourselves to an inquiry into the connexion of languages, and to an investigation of the causes which have occasioned this manifest interblending of some with the others. It will be true, that we shall meet many phenomena which cannot be explained, which will be the natural result of our imperfect information; but if, on the other hand, we ascertain facts which may almost be raised to the rank of axiomatic truth, and observe those facts to be still further verified by the genius and terms of the languages themselves, we can scarcely doubt the correctness of the inferences to be drawn from such stable > premises. Whatever was the history of the most ancient Sanskrit, whether it was indigenous to India, whether, according to Vans Kennedy's hypothesis, it originated in Babylonia, or whether, in earlier forms, it was almost identical. with the Zend, are points for the determination of which history has withholden her clue; yet it is by no means the less certain that either it or some cognate dialeet had, at some periods, an overwhelming influence on the tongues of different people, the effect of which is to this day very disAsiat. Jour. N.S.VOL. 13. No. 49. B cernible. It has been endeavoured to solve its influence on the Greek, the Latin, and European languages, by the hypothesis that the ancient Pelasgic was either the same or a dialect of it. Vans Kennedy calls the Pelasgi the ancestors of the Thracians, and Strabo affirms the Getæ to have spoken the same tongue as the Thracians; Ovid also states the dialect of the Mosi to have been Thracian; and that Moesia was a province of Thrace is undeniable. Heyne on Homer (Il. ' 301) conjectures the Pelasgi to have settled among the Thracians of Europe; but Herodotus could not decide what language they spoke. Some derive it from Asia Minor; others from middle Asia, by means of a race of emigrants at a remote period, which migration in distant antiquity Vans Kennedy as pertinaciously denies. But he urges, that the earliest specimens of the Thracian language, compared with the Teutonic, display an affinity which goes far towards the establishment of the required proofs that the one originated from the other. of the readings of Herodotus, however (which reading the many mutual resemblances in grammatical forms and in words apparently prove to be correct), the Germans are averred to be of Persian extraction, and this notion is still cherished by some of the best scholars in Germany. Still, this will but little affect the theory respecting the Pelasgic or Thracian tongue; for if the Pelasgic was the older Sanskrit, the same resemblances would occur as we detect in the modern Persian, although not to the same extent in the latter, as to the quantity of similar words. Klaproth, in his Asia Polyglotta, ranks the Curds among the Indo-Germani, whom (vol. ii, p. 42) he thus describes: "Seine wohnsitze fangen auf Zeilon an, gehen über Vorder-Indien und Persien, über den Kaukasus nach Europa, welchen Erdtheil er fast ganz inne hat, biszu den Shetland inseln, dem Nord-kap und Island. Zu ihm gehören Indier, Perser, Afga'nen, Kurden, Meder, Osseten, Armenier, Slawen, Deutsche, Dänen, Schweden, Normänner, Engländer, Griechen, Lateiner, und alle von Lateinern abstammenden völker Europa's. In verschiedenen Ländern ist dieser Stamm mit alten Ureinwohnern gemischt." Of the Curds he says, "Sie bewohnen Kurdistan, mehrere Provinzen des westlichen und nördlichen Persiens, und sind in Mesopotamien, Syrien, und den östlichen Gegenden von klein Asien zerstreut." Now, whether he be or not correct as to the particular place whence he deduces this stock, he has fully established the analogy of language in the tables which he has given, leading us thus, in another way, much to the same conclusion on which others have insisted. As our inquiry depends not on the particular origin of the people who influenced the languages of Europe, we must content ourselves with authorities for retracing the terms thus introduced to their sources. The result of Vans Kennedy's inquiry is, that neither the brahminical literature nor religion was indigenous in India, but that both were intro duced by colonists, who had migrated from Babylonia, who brought with them their sacred books, their civil and religious institutions; he urges also, that the zodiacal signs used by ancient nations were invented by the Chaldees. Other theorists, however, invert the order of progression, whilst they assent to the comparative uniformity of the general mythological system prevalent in India, Ethiopia, Egypt, and Babylonia; yet, from the scriptural documents, we should certainly imagine that Babylonia has the most decided claims to priority. How, unless at the general dispersion, the rudiments of this cumbrous system passed onwards to different tracts, must ever remain among the mysteries of antiquity,-a mystery too dark for us to hope otherwise to raise its veil. But if Asia Minor was peopled from Babylonia, according to this hypothesis, and if from thence the Pelasgi conveyed their eustoms to Thrace, Greece, Etruria, and Latium, and if from thence, hordes penetrated farther into Europe, it will be evident that the Pelasgi must have affected the various dialects of those among whom they became incorporated. Still we cannot prove the Pelasgic to have been Sanskrit, nor the Sanskrit to have prevailed in Babylonia, although neither assumption be devoid of its probability: for, as to the first, as ancient authors in general admit the connexion between the Pelasgic and Greek, it is manifest from inherent evidence, that the Greek must have been indebted for its structure and copia verborum to some other language, which must either have been the Sanskrit itself, or some dialect allied to it in a most extraordinary manner; and as to the second, Diodorus Siculus alludes to a sacerdotal tongue, ga diaλextos, in use among the Babylonian hierophants; and we actually find many roots common to the Sanskrit and Semitic family, although their grammars differ toto calo, which might induce us to harbour the idea that the sacerdotal tongue of Babylonia was the same as that of India, into which these parts of the language of the com. mon Babylonians incidentally insinuated themselves. This will, however, corroborate Kennedy's notion of its passage from Babylonia to India. How know we to a certainty the tongue of the pure Chaldees, who became admixed with the Babylonians? It has been elsewhere shewn that their names are capable of an interpretation from the Sanskrit. By the concurrent testimony of historians we are also certified, that the rites of Zoroaster extensively prevailed in Babylonia; therefore, as the Zend and Sanskrit belonged to the same family, another clue to the solution of the problem is afforded to us. Baron Cuvier supposes, on the other hand, the Pelasgi to have originally come from India, and that, in crossing the mountains of Persia, they penetrated as far as the Caucasus, whence, embarking on the Black Sea, they descended on the coasts of Greece. But it seems that this hypothesis is solely founded on the frequent occurrence of Sanskrit words in Greek. From whatever quarter the Pelasgi may have come, Thrace, if we follow the indications of history, must be admitted to have been their first European settlement, nor can we reasonably doubt their Asiatic origin. From them, therefore, probably, flowed many of the Asiatic terms with which the Greek and Latin abound, which became interblended with the vernacular tongue of the Greeks, among whom the Pelasgi arrived. Asiatic Thracians were in the army of Xerxes, and according to Herodotus, Phrygians and Bithynians belonged to the Thracian stock. Herodotus calls the Asiatic Thracians the most numerous race in the world, except the Indians, and the dominion of this nation was so extensive, that it will adequately account for the influence which it has been presumed to have exerted on the speeches of other people. In process of time they spread themselves over Europe under different names; for the Mosi, the Daci, the Tribulli, and the Getæ have been referred to this family. If we examine the Greek mythos logy, we shall find continual allusions to them: Thamyris, Orpheus, and Musæus were Thracians, and at Samothrace they instituted the mysteries of the Cabiri. The oracle of Dodona is called by Strabo Пexyvidguμœs ↑ Homer denominates Dodonæan Jove tλaryizós; and the Pelasgi are said to have worshipped a rude stone, and to have introduced religious rites the first into Greece. Bishop Marsh conjectures the Pelasgi to have crossed the Hellespont, where the land on both sides was visible, and thus to have peopled Greece; and Kennedy imagines the separation of Greeks, Latins, and Thracians to have occurred about 1,100 A.C. His idea that at one time the Greeks, Latins, Hetrurians, and Thracians spoke the same tongue, is perfectly consentaneous to the result of his re searches; yet in each case it must have undergone changes, when it passed from its original seat to other people. Thus Kennedy enumerates 208 Sanskrit words in Greek which are not found in Latin, and 188 in Latin which are not found in Greek: a circumstance sufficient in itself to show the parent-stock, and the influence of foreign intercourse upon it. That ther Latin and Greek were dialects of one and the same language, few philolo gists will deny; but the difference between them simply arose, as in the former cases, from the admixture of the tongues spoken by the children of the soil with that of the new colonists or invaders. Pliny affirms the Pelasgi to have brought letters to Latium: in this Pelasgic alphabet, the first ele ments of the Devanagari have recently been supposed to have been contained; for it is manifest that the Devanagari is a highly artificial arrange! ment, and never could have been an original alphabet. But how great is the confusion of hypotheses leading to the same conse quenoe! Klaproth and others conceive that Japhetic tribes brought the Sanskrit from the north-west to India, blending with it the language of the aborigines; Colebrooke, that it is deducible from a primeval tongue, variously refined in different climates, where it accepted different names;→→→ and some few, that it proceeded from the Zend. Mohammed Fani affirms the Persians and Indians to have originally spoken the same language Langlés imagines that the Sanskrit came from western Asia (perhaps Bac triana), and was introduced by the Magi expelled by Darius; Adelung makes it proceed from the north to the south of India; and Rudiger calcu lates it to have been the parent of a hundred languages or dialects. Of these various hypotheses, few inquirers into ancient literature can hesitate to state, that that of Colebrooke is the only one countenanced by probability and adequate to the solution of the great problem,-as to the influence of the Sanskrit on various Asiatic and European languages. Hence it is by no means extraordinary that we should discover a vast multitude of our ordinary expressions which are critically referible to it; that thence we should be able etymologically to explain terms with us often long past from their primitive significations. But other tongues have considerably influenced the languages of Europe; and many, among whom is Webster, have applied the Hebrew to the solution of their etymologies. The authors embodied in the Myvyrian archæology state their lore to have been detailed in Hebraic, and it cannot be denied that in the Celtic many affinities to the Hebrew may be found. But notwithstanding these concessions, the question remains, how far is the faet true? To a person conversant with Hebrew, Syriac, and Arabic, it would be difficult, without historical helps, to decide from which of these the similar terms may have proceeded: therefore, we must rely solely on historical evidence. We perceive a connexion in the trading voyages of the Phoenicians and Carthaginians, and perhaps even in the migratory lives of the Celts themselves, ere they reached their most distant European settlements, during which they may not improbably have had intercourse with people speaking a cognate dialect, who frequented their coasts for commercial purposes. But, as far as we may judge from Phoenician and Carthaginian ružová, the Arabic seems to have been the most closely allied to their dialect. When we also call to mind the intercourse between the Greeks and Syrians, that between the Syrians and Romans, that, likewise, between the Romans and several Arabian tribes, we perceive at the same time other sources from whence such an admixture may have flowed. To Spain we are indebted for many Arabic words; and another cause of the introduction of Asiatic words may be traced to the roving Europeans, among whom were the Anglo-Saxons or Vangarians, who entered into the service of the emperors of Constantinople, where they necessarily must have become acquainted with Arabs and other Orientals: for not simply these, but Nubians and mercenaries of every kind were enrolled in the Byzantine armies. Some Arabic words appear to have been introduced by people speaking Persian, because in our language they bear the Persian pronunciation of the Arabic, and an immense number must have been communicated by the crusaders. Adelung, in his Mithridates (vol. i. pp. 244-247), has ably shewn the Eastern origin of the Gipsy tongue, comparing it closely with the dialects. of Multan, the Sanskrit, the Malabar, and other idioms, occasionally also with the Sclavonic. This must necessarily be admitted among the causes producing the effect on which we insist. Nor can the voyages of the Normans in the middle ages be denied to have been another cause of foreign words having been transplanted into different European tongues. To which we may add, that the constant influx of Asiatics to those parts of Europe near Turkey, and even to other parts, could not have failed in generating, by a gradual process, a similar effect upon them. Much less can we suppose that the communications which took place between various regions of the ancient world, for the purposes of commerce, literature, and state-policy, should have left no vestiges of such communications behind them, or that the voyages of the Carthaginians, Cyreneans, and others, could have been so frequently undertaken without in some degree blending the different idioms of the visitors and the visited. Could the traffic of the Arabs to India, and their transportation of foreign commodities across their deserts to |