on the Etymology of the word Sublimis. 359 



shortened into sus." Now, I contend that retrovorsum was ne- 

 ver contracted into rursum, but into retrorsum, backwards; as 

 being compounded of retro, and the perfect participle of verto 

 or vorto, which was originally versus, a, um ; and as for supervor- 

 sum, it is a word of the Doctor's own manufacturing, as it never 

 appears to have been used by any author ; at least I can find no 

 traces of it in the best Latin dictionaries. But, even though 

 it had existed, it would have given, by abbreviation, superorsum 

 (according to the analogy of retrorsum) and not sursum *. 



The examples which Dr PARR gives of sus in composition are, 

 " suscipio," which, he says, is, Capio susum, " I take up ;" " sus- 

 pendo," is susum pendo, " I hang up ;" " sustineo" is susum teneo, 

 " I hold up." Suscito is, by SCALIGER'S own confession, susum 

 cito, " I stir up ;" and as specie begins with an s, the final letter 

 of sus contracted, (abbreviated, the Doctor should have said, for 

 it is not contracted,) from susum, is omitted upon the above men- 

 tioned principle of avoiding, as the old Romans avoided, the ge- 

 mination of the same letter." It is surprising that Dr PARR did 

 not advert to the practice of the Greeks, in changing the final 

 of the prepositions It and trvv into p and 7 before certain mutes ; 

 and also of converting it into whatever liquid the word with 

 which it was joined commenced with. They even omitted the 

 i of the preposition a-vv before <r and a mute ; as ffv-ffrg,rsvopcu ; 

 (rv-ffvau, &c. In like manner, I imagine, the b of the preposition 



* The venerable Dr HUNTER of St Andrew's has also shewn, in some notes upon 

 VIRGIL, that Dr PARR'S derivation of sub from iT6 is incorrect. After giving several 

 examples similar to those already quoted, he observes, " It may be further remarked, 

 that SURSUM, upward, is not, as Dr PARR supposes, superrwsum, but subrorsum. 

 Supervorsum would express, not in a direction FROM below or UPWARD, but in a di- 

 rection OVER." The coincidence of opinion between Dr HUNTER and myself, on se- 

 veral points in the present discussion, is to me the more gratifying, as his notes were 

 wholly unknown to me, till communicated by our common friend the Rector of the 

 High School of Edinburgh, after I had sent for his perusal the present examination. 



VOL. X. P. II. Z Z 



