But

and other places which the Dorians had ruled, it very largely partook of the Doric. everywhere it had this common property, that it was compounded of several dialects. Hence it appears, that after the times of Alexander the Great, no speech could really be a dialect, if that name be properly applied, and, therefore, that the Alexandrian could not be such. The speech of Alexandria was in common use, and, undoubtedly, had several peculiarities, both in what it drew from the ancient dialects, and in new materials entering into its constitution. But a dialect is defined by learned men to be, a certain diversity or idiom of a common language, used in some particular place, and by some particular people, which can thereby be distinguished from other great divisions of the same nation.h Ancient grammarians give the same representation of a dialect. If it be so, it is easy to see that the language of the Alexandrian Jews, which, very lately, a learned man

h Sturz. de Dial. Alex. p. 18.

i Schol. Aristoph. Nub. 317: Aíaλexrós kori Qwvñs xagaxTǹg ibuxós. (A dialect is a way of speaking belonging to a nation.)

Sturz. de Dial. Alex. p. 22. "Certum igitur est," &c. (It is certain, therefore, that those Jews were a people of Alexandria, in some respect peculiar, limited by certain

has chosen to call a dialect in this sense, cannot be so named, inasmuch as it altogether wants the national stamp-the χαρακτὴς ἐθνικός. For it was used, not by Greeks, but by persons of Jewish extraction. But if the name dialect be applied-as it has been by many in our times-to express merely a variety of language, of whatever kind that variety may be, without reference to the χαρακτὴς ἐθνικός, then there exist many later dialects of the Greek tongue; for, under the sway of the Macedonians, a new idiom sprang up almost everywhere. But all the varieties of that later tongue, as I have already remarked, are uniformly alike in this respect, that they mix together in very different ways, and enrich, by new additions, what belonged to the respective dialects of more ancient times. In the common speech there occur traces of all the dialects except the Æolic, which, it is probable, had ceased to be much used in conversation and the ordinary intercourse of life. That the Doric prevailed above the rest, will be matter of wonder to no one who remembers, that to it the Macedonian tongue was most allied.

boundaries, and distinguished from other nations; nor can it be doubted, accordingly, that their language may rightly be called a dialect.)

Of all the dialects, the Ionic is that of which fewest remains are met with, and that dialect seems to have previously, by degrees, fallen out of ordinary use, or to have coalesced with the language of the Attics. But these points, which cannot be explained without an extensive apparatus, I must not prosecute further.

To this later speech, the grammarians have given no name, nor is that to be looked for from those whose purpose, in their commentaries, was to discuss the language merely of writers and learned men. I observe, however, that, in our own time, two names have been applied to it by persons of learning; the one by Fischer, who has distinguished it by the appellation of the Macedonian and Alexandrian dialect; the other, by the learned Sturzius, who prefers the name xo, the common.m The two names given by Fischer, that author seems to have considered appropriate, partly from the confusion of the dialects of Greece, under the influence of the Macedonian power-which confusion produced a new way of speaking, and partly from the Alexandrian Jews having made especial use of

1

1 Prolus. N. T. Nr. 30, 31.

m

Page 19, 29, 52.

the new idiom in their writings, whence, we know, many things were derived by the apostles and evangelists. But in both of the names there is some degree of ambiguity. Before their invasion of Greece, the Macedonians used a peculiar language, which is said by grammarians to have greatly resembled the ancient Doric dialect, so that the old Macedonian speech ought to be distinguished from the new. The appellation of the Alexandrian dialect is too limited, and fails of expressing what ought to be expressed. By this name one might easily be led to suppose that the common speech proceeded from Alexandria, which was by no means the case. It is true, indeed, that the Alexandrian Jews adopted it in writing; but we know that it was used not only by writers, but by the people, so that its name must not depend on the few authors by whom alone it was employed. The appellation given it by Sturzius seems deserving of utter disapprobation. We have already found that grammarians have used the expression, ἡ κοινή δίαλεκτος, the common dialect, in another sense, applying it, not to the vulgar speech. which, after the times of Alexander, began to be adopted in common life, but rather to the language employed by writers, who had almost

all conformed to the Attic. I am not much concerned about the name; I hold it enough to have given a clear exposition of the thing.

Hitherto I have spoken of the origin and character of the later speech in general-I now proceed to the sources from which a knowledge of it may be derived. These may be divided into three kinds, according to their respective use and importance, in enabling us rightly to ascertain the character and peculiarities of the common speech. The first comprehends the common authors-oi zovó, that is, those who wrote after the age of Alexander, at the head of whom is Aristotle. From these, only a few things can be adduced for rightly illustrating the character and force of the later speech; for the works of all of them are to be considered as written in a dialect peculiarly Attic, not pure and uncorrupted, however, but mixed with many words and meanings hitherto new, adopted from the vulgar practice in speaking. These, indeed, are to be reckoned faults in the diction of the common authors, but not to be disregarded by one who would investigate and understand the common language. I forbear to adduce examples-they will elsewhere find a suitable place. This one thing let me add, that these authors are not all alike available for il