upon coins of the fifth or sixth century before Christ prove an earlier origin, 80. In the fifth century before Christ, when the Greeks began to write prose histories, the Ionic dialect was in its vigor. Accordingly Herodotus wrote in it. 81. Owing however to the universal superiority of Athens, the Attic dialect subsequently became the prominent one, the one most cultivated by foreigners, and looked upon as the common language of Greece. 82. At this time the Alexandrian grammarians commenced their operations on Homer--discovering and collating old manuscripts. Zenodotus, first Librarian, edited a new edition on the basis of their labors, in the reign of Ptolemy II. 83. Under Ptolemy V, appeared the edition of Aristophanes, and under Ptolemy VII, in the second century before Christ, the celebrated one of Aristarchus, the basis of all subsequent editions. 84. The great fault of the Alexandrian critics was that they did not ascertain the true sources of the old Greek, nor cultivate an acquaintance with those foreign languages which contained its elements, but erased whatever was contrary to their own style of speaking. 85. Bentley and his successors did well to restore the digamma, but they erred in not extending their labors to other emendations in the orthography, as the digamma alone creates disproportion. 86. Priscianus makes the Aeolian digamma, a prefix of B to words commencing with P, as BP'HTP for 'PHTOP. But it is evident also that there was a custom of writing AF for AB and Ar. 87. The digamma was called Aeolian, because it continued to be used by that tribe after it had fallen into disuse elsewhere; but there is conclusive evidence that it was used anciently by both Dorians and Ionians. 88. The accents were invented two hundred years before Christ, by Aristophanes a Byzantian grammarian, to teach the pronunciation of the more modern dialect to foreigners. 89. It is difficult to give the precise force of accents in pronunciation. The modulation indicated by them is of so delicate a character, that many disputes have arisen respecting it. Hermann makes the acute accent a sign of emphasis, and the grave a sign of no emphasis; but he is inconsistent with his own theory. 90. The ancient languages, especially the Greek, as they approached nearer to nature, were more melodious in tone than the modern. 91. The peculiar beauty of the Homeric dialect was thought to be essential to epic poetry, and was imitated by others who followed, yet in so bungling a manner as often to obscure the sense and destroy the harmony of their compositions. 92. It can be shown that epenthesis and metathesis, etc. are mere inventions of the grammarians, and did not exist in the Homeric age. 93. The Homeric language was, it is true, an advanced state of the Greek, but from the lack of more ancient monuments, we cannot measure the advancement. Yet we cannot suppose the words to have been modified by arbitrary changes, but rather, in order to be universally understood, to have been the words used in common life. 94. The Alexandrian doctrine, which makes the contract form the primitive one, and derives, for example, σóßw from ow, and ẞólo from ßã, is no more proper, than to make the latin words mavolo and mevolo from malo and nolo, by epenthesis of vo. 95, 96. In the ancient language all words seem to have received an augment in the second case, either by the addition of a new syllable or the division of an old one. Example, σῶμα σώματος, τριήρης τριήρος. And all nouns in is anciently made this termination in Tos, but they gradually softened down into This last termination is an invention of the grammaηος. rians. 97. The contracted syllable can be resolved only into its original elements-ɛ and ou into ɛɑ or ɛɛ, and ao or ɛo, not into si and ov. So xoάtos is resolved into xάgatos, and not into κράατος, etc. 98. Nouns ending in s have their accusative in da or iv. The iv comes in this way: -ιδεν –ιδαν –ιδν -ιν. The ending of latin genitives in is, results from a modern iwranioμós. Formerly it was Venerus instead of Veneris. 99. So from this iotaxiouós they write Mithridatis instead of Mithridates; and the modern Greeks make 7, v, ɛɩ, oi, vɩ the same in pronunciation as . 100. Aspirated letters or gutturals were frequently interchanged for each other, as σ and o̟, F and F, musasum and musarum, μουσάFων and μουσάων. 101. Afterwards this was expressed simply by a period, μουσάων, etc. The Etruscans knew not the letter o. They wrote for gnaros, gnarures; hence the latin genitive gnarorum. 102. It has always been difficult to explain the genitive termination οιο. Some refer it to the Thessalian, others to the Boeotian dialect. But without doubt the F was used in singular as well as in plural words, and the dot which designated its absence would be changed into . 103. Thus óyo Fo -λóyo.o -λóyolo. The genitive olo never occurs except where the o is short by position as well as by nature, which indicates that of was originally short. 104. Patronymics and verbals in as, a, ns have one origin. The genitives aos, εos, ao, so all come from a Fos. 105. Nouns in ɛus or ɛFs in Homer, retain in the oblique cases the original mode, no contraction occurring except in the dative plural. 106. Patronymics in dns and sidas in Pindar, etc. appear κατὰ διάστασιν in consequence of the digamma. 107. Nouns in vs and v, formerly made their genitive in uFos. Hence questuvis and fructuvis for questibus and fructibus. 108. Hence also sibi, tibi, nobis, vobis. So ubi from FaFt. 109. P and are often interchanged for each other. In declining nouns in vs, the Attics made ɛws for vos; hence εos. 110. Masculine adjectives in vs making their genitive in vos, made their feminine in via and ɛɩα-ɛα and & being an Attic refinement. II. ANALYSIS OF HUG'S ARGUMENT RESPECTING THE KNOWLEDGE AND USE OF LETTER-WRITING BY HOMER, AND THE UNITY OF THE ILIAD. The shield of Achilles, the cup of Nestor, and the shield of Agamemnon seem to prove a knowledge of the arts of design in the heroic age. But as writing was no more used than among the knights of the middle ages, little or no allusion is made to it throughout the poems. Rousseau's use of this fact in the Odyssey, to show that the possibility of an epistolary correspondence between Ulysses and his wife would destroy the story, loses all its plausibility when we remember that the ar rangements of Calypso's post office department may not have been very perfect, and a verbal message by the mail carrier might have been as useful as a letter. The onμara Lúyga,* even if they do not prove a knowledge of writing, prove, 1. A preparation for such an art, two generations before the Trojan war, which renders its speedy introduction highly probable, and 2. The existence of writing materials which might have been employed as well in writing as in marking, and as well in great works as in small. This fact evinces a dawn of the art, and it is very natural to suppose that Grecians who traveled in Egypt or Phenicia before Homer, or at least Homer himself, should have perfected the art. Whatever may be said of the preservation in the memory of songs such as would naturally fix themselves in the mind, it is difficult to conceive how a purely statistical document, like the catalogue of ships, could be either composed or transmitted to posterity without the aid of writing. That it has been accurate The ly preserved we may learn from the fact, that it has several times been referred to, to settle boundaries. Such a document would be valued only by statesmen and geographers of subsequent ages, and would not possess that share of popular favor, which would occasion its frequent and general recitation. laws which enjoined the commission of it to memory did not exist until the age of Solon, and while they fail to account for its original preservation, were particularly designed to preserve it from manuscript interpolation. At the same time, from the great difficulty attending the art at its dawn, and from the rareness and costliness of manuscripts so late as the time of Plato and Aristotle, it is reasonable to infer that no more of the Iliad was written out than was absolutely necessary. Oral tradition was no doubt at first the chief means of preservation. There were probably more who committed single rhapsodies to memory, than there were who committed the whole, and the more diffused was the knowledge of the art of writing, the less frequent was the commission of anything more than particular passages. The rhapsodists probably confined themselves to the most popular parts, until compelled by law to recite the whole. Such were the disjecta membra which Pisistratus was to reduce to order, and they must have been scattered fragments of single original poems, and not individual songs collected together to * Odyssey, B. VI. Aristot. Rhet. Lib. I. c. 15. Eustath. in Hom. T. I. p. 263. frame two great poems, as will appear from an examination of the Iliad. The theme announced by the poet, Achilles' wrath, does not necessarily confine him to that one event, but includes also the appeasement of his anger with its attendant circumstances. The poet makes this simple announcement of his subject, because he takes it for granted that it will be understood as comprehending all. The fact that the story seems to be sung rather than written, is no proof of the poet's ignorance of writing. It is one peculiar art of the poet to conceal from his readers the pains he has taken in writing and rewriting his performance. Episodes apparently unnecessary to the entireness of the plot, furnish no argument against the unity of the composition. What is necessary is not the scale by which to judge of a poem. The genius of the poet, and his regard for the taste of his hearers, might lead him to introduce much that is not strictly necessary to the plan proposed. An analysis of the structure of the poem will confirm its unity. It might at first view be supposed that the catalogue of the ships would be as appropriate to any other epic of the war of Troy as the Iliad. But we find in the midst of it,* a description of Achilles peculiarly appropriate to the subject proposed for the Iliad, and in perfect accordance with its design, and this passage marks the catalogue as a part of the same poem. It is often said, that the account of the duel between Paris and Menilaust is of itself a complete rhapsody. But this duel is a preparation for a general contest to be afterwards described, and is alluded to in the next book, and in subsequent parts of the Iliad, in a manner that proves it to have been an essential part of the entire poem. The battle described in the fourth and fifth books may be said to have no peculiar fitness to the action of the Iliad, but to be any one among the many skirmishes which occurred during the war of Troy. But it is most intimately connected with the events of the preceding book from which it directly resulted; and besides Apollo appeals to Achilles' angry retirement from the field in order to encourage the fleeing Trojans to rally. A similar allusion to the present condition of Achilles reanimates the Grecians when they have become disheartened. In this way the poet is constantly exhibiting his design, and the connection between the various parts is so intimate that one could not be omitted without another. * B. II. 685. § B. IV. 509. † B. III. B. IV. 155, 235, 269. B. VII. 351 |