312 Dr Pi'ichard on the Varieties 



" (1.) The relation of affinity, or, as it has been termed by 

 German writers, the Stammverwandschaft, or family relation of 

 languages, subsists between idioms which have a great propor- 

 tion of their elements or roots common to all of them, together 

 with a general resemblance in grammatical structure. It is gene- 

 rally allowed that nations, whose idioms have this sort of affinity, 

 are allied in origin. Groups of idioms thus related are termed 

 Families of Languages. 



" One strongly marked family of languages consists of the 

 dialects termed collectively the Semitic. To this belongs the 

 Hebrew, the Chaldee, the Aramean or Syriac, and the Geez 

 or Ethiopic. 



" Another family of languages is the Indo-European, in whicb 

 are included various idioms both of Europe and Asia, whose 

 near affinity has been thought to prove a kindred origin in na- 

 tions long ago separated from each other. It has been chiefly 

 during the last twenty years that the near affinity of this class 

 of languages has been discovered. They form a most extensive 

 group, including, 1*^, tlie Sanskrit and all its dialects in India ; 

 ^d^ the ancient Zend or Medo- Persian language, and all the 

 idioms now spoken in Persia and Arminea ; 3J, the Greek and 

 Latin languages, and all the dialects sprung from them ; 4^A, the 

 Sclavonic, the origin of the Russian, Polish, and Bohemian lan- 

 guages ; 6th, the Teutonic languages ; Qth, the Celtic dialects, 

 which belong, if I am not mistaken, to the same family, though 

 on this subject there is some dispute. 



" We have next to consider analogy between languages. 

 Many idioms which are entirely distinct from each other, being 

 completely different in their vocabularies, and having i^yt or 

 perhaps no words in common, are yet found to bear to each 

 other a striking resemblance in their grammatical structure. 

 This resemblance is such as to admit of no other term than that 

 of analogy, and such languages cannot be said to belong to the ■ 

 same family ; they constitute particular classes of languages. I '^ 

 shall mention some examples of this relation. 



" 1. A strongly-marked class of languages are those termed 

 monosyllabic, the words belonging to which are monosyllables, 

 uttered without any inflection of termination, and with merely a 

 sort of intonation to express the relations of words to each other. 



