1885.1 ^^1 [Brinton, 



§ 16. Humboldt's Essay o^r the America!^ Yerb. 



The essay oa the Americaa verb translated in the following 

 pages has never previously appeared in print, either in German 

 or English. The original MS. is in the Royal Library at Berlin, 

 whence I obtained a transcript. The author alludes to this essay 

 in several passages of his printed works, most fully in his "Letter 

 to M. Abel-Remusat " (1826), in which he says : 



" A few years ago, I read before the Berlin Academy a memoir, 

 which has not been printed, in which I compared a number of 

 American languages with each other, solely with regard to the 

 manner in which they express the verb as uniting the subject 

 with the attribute in the proposition, and from this point of 

 view I assigned them to various classes. As this trait proves to 

 what degree a language possesses grammatical .forms, or is near 

 to possessing them, it is decisive of the whole grammar of a 

 tongue." 



On reading the memoir, I was so much impressed with the 

 acuteness and justness of its analysis of American verbal forms 

 that I prepared the translation which I now submit. 



In the more recent studies of the American verb which have 

 appeared from the pens of Friedrich Miiller, J. Hammond Trum- 

 bull and Lucien Adam, we have the same central element of 

 speech subjected to critical investigation at able hands. But it 

 seems to me that none of them has approached the topic with the 

 broad, philosophic conceptions which impress the reader in this 

 ess?iy of Humboldt's. Although sixty years and more have 

 elapsed since it was written, I am confident that it will provide 

 ample food for thought to the earnest student of language. 



