The English Language Part 24

_Plurals in _-es__:--

_Original root._ _Plur._ _Sing._

Apsid- apsid_es_ apsis Cantharid- cantharid_es_ cantharis Chrysalid- chrysalid_es_ chrysalis Ephemerid- ephemerid_es_ ephemeris Tripod- tripod_es_ tripos.

_Plurals in_ -a:--

_Original root._ _Plur._ _Sing._

Dogmat- dogmat_a_ dogma Lemmat- lemmat_a_ lemma Miasmat- miasmat_a_ miasma[23]

-- 161. _Miscellaneous elements._--Of miscellaneous elements we have two sorts; those that are incorporated in our language, and are currently understood (_e.g._, the Spanish word _sherry_, the Arabic word _alkali_, and the Persian word _turban_), and those that, even amongst the educated, are considered strangers. Of this latter kind (amongst many others) are the Oriental words _hummum_, _kaftan_, _gul_, &c.

Of the currently understood miscellaneous elements of the English language, the most important are from the French; some of which agree with those of the Latin of the fourth period, and the Greek in preserving the _French_ plural forms--as _beau_, _beaux_, _billets-doux_.

_Italian._--Some words of Italian origin do the same: as _virtuoso_, _virtuosi_.

_Hebrew._--The Hebrew words, _cherub_ and _seraph_ do the same; the form _cherub-im_, and _seraph-im_, being not only plurals but Hebrew plurals.

Beyond the words derived from these five languages, none form their plurals other than after the English method, _i.e._, in _-s_: as _waltzes_, from the German word _waltz_.

-- 162. The extent to which a language, which like the English, at one and the same time requires names for many objects, comes in contact with the tongues of half the world, {106} and has, moreover, a great power of incorporating foreign elements, derives fresh words from varied sources, may be seen from the following incomplete notice of the languages which have, in different degrees, supplied it with new terms.

_Arabic._--Admiral, alchemist, alchemy, alcohol, alcove, alembic, algebra, alkali, a.s.sa.s.sin, from a paper of Mr. Crawford, read at the British a.s.sociation, 1849.

_Persian._--Turban, caravan, dervise, &c.--_Ditto._

_Turkish._--Coffee, bashaw, divan, scimitar, janisary, &c.--_Ditto._

_Hindu languages._--Calico, chintz, cowrie, curry, lac, muslin, toddy, &c.--_Ditto._

_Chinese._--Tea, bohea, congou, hyson, soy, nankin, &c.--_Ditto._

_Malay._--Bantam (fowl), gamboge, rattan, sago, shaddock, &c.--_Ditto._

_Polynesian._--Taboo, tattoo.--_Ditto._

_Tungusian_, or some similar Siberian language.--Mammoth, the bones of which are chiefly from the banks of the Lena.

_North American Indian._--Squaw, wigwam, pemmican.

_Peruvian._--Charki=prepared meat; whence _jerked_ beef.

_Caribbean._--Hammock.

_Ancient Carian._--Mausoleum.

-- 163. In -- 157 a distinction is drawn between the _direct_ and _indirect_, the latter leading to the _ultimate origin_ of words.

Thus a word borrowed into the English from the French, might have been borrowed into the French from the Latin, into the Latin from the Greek, into the Greek from the Persian, &c., and so _ad infinitum_.

The investigation of this is a matter of literary curiosity rather than any important branch of philology.

The ultimate known origin of many common words sometimes goes back to a great date, and points to extinct languages--

_Ancient Nubian (?)_--Barbarous.

_Ancient Egyptian._--Ammonia.

_Ancient Syrian._--Cyder.

_Ancient Syrian._--Pandar.

{107} _Ancient Lydian._--Maeander.

_Ancient Persian._--Paradise.

-- 164. Again, a word from a given language may be introduced by more lines than one; or it may be introduced twice over; once at an earlier, and again at a later period. In such a case its form will, most probably, vary; and, what is more, its meaning as well. Words of this sort may be called _di-morphic_, their _di-morphism_, having originated in one of two reasons--a difference of channel, or a difference of date. Instances of the first are, _syrup_, _sherbet_, and _shrub_, all originally from the _Arabic_, _srb_; but introduced differently, viz., the first through the Latin, the second through the Persian, and the third through the Hindoo.

Instances of the second are words like _minster_, introduced in the Anglo-Saxon, as contrasted with _monastery_, introduced during the Anglo-Norman period. By the proper application of these processes, we account for words so different in present form, yet so identical in origin, as _priest_ and _presbyter_, _episcopal_ and _bishop_, &c.

-- 165. _Distinction._--The history of the languages that have been spoken in a particular country, is a different subject from the history of a particular language. The history of the languages that have been spoken in the United States of America, is the history of _Indian_ languages. The history of the languages of the United States is the history of the Germanic language.

-- 166. _Words of foreign simulating a vernacular origin._--These may occur in any mixed language whatever; they occur, however, oftener in the English than in any other.

Let a word be introduced from a foreign language--let it have some resemblance in sound to a real English one: lastly, let the meanings of the two words be not absolutely incompatible. We may then have a word of foreign origin taking the appearance of an English one. Such, amongst others, are _beef-eater_, from _boeuffetier_; _sparrow-gra.s.s_, _asparagus_; _Shotover_, _Chateau vert_;[24] _Jerusalem_, _Girasole_;[25] _Spanish {108} beefeater_, _Spina befida_; _periwig_, _peruke_; _runagate_, _renegade_; _lutestring_, _l.u.s.trino_;[26] _O yes_, _Oyez!_ _ancient_, _ensign_.[27]

_Dog-cheap._--This has nothing to do with _dogs_. The first syllable is _G.o.d_=_good_ transposed, and the second the _ch-p_ in _chapman_ (=_merchant_) _cheap_, and _East-cheap_. In Sir J. Mandeville, we find _G.o.d-kepe_=_good bargain_.

_Sky-larking._--Nothing to do with _larks_ of any sort; still less the particular species, _alauda arvensis_. The word improperly spelt _l-a-r-k_, and banished to the slang regions of the English language, is the Anglo-Saxon _lac_=_game_, or _sport_; wherein the _a_ is sounded as in _father_ (not as in _farther_). _Lek_=_game_, in the present Scandinavian languages.

_Zachary Macaulay_=_Zumalacarregui_; _Billy Ruffian_=_Bellerophon_; _Sir Roger Dowla.s.s_=_Surajah Dowlah_, although so limited to the common soldiers, and sailors who first used them, as to be exploded vulgarisms rather than integral parts of the language, are examples of the same tendency towards the irregular accommodation of misunderstood foreign terms.

_Birdbolt._--An incorrect name for the _gadus lota_, or _eel-pout_, and a transformation of _barbote_.

_Whistle-fish._--The same for _gadus mustela_, or _weazel-cod_.

_Liquorice_=_glycyrrhiza_.

_Wormwood_=_weremuth_, is an instance of a word from the same language, in an antiquated shape, being equally transformed with a word of really foreign origin.

-- 167. Sometimes the transformation of the _name_ has engendered a change in the object to which it applies, or, at least, has evolved new ideas in connection with it. How easy for a person who used the words _beef-eater_, _sparrow-gra.s.s_, or _Jerusalem_, to believe that the officers designated by the former either eat or used to eat more beef than other people (or at least had an allowance of that viand); that the second word was the name for a _gra.s.s_, or herb of which _sparrows_ were fond; and that _Jerusalem_ artichokes came from Palestine.

What has just been supposed is sometimes a real {109} occurrence. To account for the name _Shotover-hill_, I have heard that Little John _shot over_ it. Here the confusion in order to set itself right, breeds a fiction. Again, in chess, the piece now called the _queen_, was originally the _elephant_. This was in Persian, _ferz_. In French it became _vierge_, which, in time, came to be mistaken for a derivative, and _virgo_=_the virgin_, _the lady_, _the queen_.

-- 168. Sometimes, where the form of a word in respect to its _sound_ is not affected, a false spirit of accommodation introduces an unetymological _spelling_; as _frontispiece_[28] from _frontispecium_, _sover_eig_n_, from _sovrano_, _colle_a_gue_ from _collega_, _lant_h_orn_ (old orthography) from _lanterna_.

The value of forms like these consists in their showing that language is affected by false etymologies as well as by true ones.

-- 169. In _lambkin_ and _lancet_, the final syllables (_-kin_ and _-et_) have the same power. They both express the idea of smallness or diminutiveness. These words are but two out of a mult.i.tude, the one (_lamb_) being of Saxon, the other (_lance_) of Norman origin. The same is the case with the superadded syllables: _-kin_ is Saxon; _-et_ Norman. Now to add a Saxon termination to a Norman word, or _vice versa_, is to corrupt the English language.

This leads to some observations respecting--