12 



improbable that the primitive meaning of fa% sa% cfw^, or |uv, scan-, 

 — as well as of tor, tur-, ter-, tres, tree, three, may have been 

 ^'protruding," — and the secondary meaning, "a heap" or "an as- 

 semblage," — "two" denoting division, and "three," collection. 



The second character is identical in form wnth another sibilant, the 

 Greek ¥^ and its form is, as it were, a rude hieroglyph of a tree with 

 three branches. The Chinese word for tree is the sibilant syllable 

 fu^, as if from .sAoo-ting forth or pro-^r-uding. Among the other 

 meanings of fu'', which convey the idea of thrusting or darting, are 

 the following: a kind of spear; name of a bow; to kill; light. 



The connection of E and I with the sibihints is shown by the fre- 

 quent interchange of the V and J sounds in Sanscrit and other lan- 

 guages. Another interesting evidence of this connection may pos- 

 sibly be found in the following quotation from Haldeman's Analytic 

 Orthography : " There is an apparent interchange of initial E and S 

 between French and English, which cannot be accounted for on 

 any theory of the elements. It occurs in 



"Etrange, epagneul, epeler, etendard, ecosse. 

 Strange, spaniel, spell, standard, Scotland."* 



+ , fi, ten. This character strikingly resembles the Roman X, 

 in form, and in hieroglyphic as well as numeric value. 



Remarkable as many of these resemblances are, some of them are 

 doubtless accidental, and it would be unwise hastily to assume that 

 any of them, or that all combined, furnish sufficient evidence that 

 the Greek and Roman alphabets, and the Arabic digits were bor- 

 rowed from the Chinese. The danger of being misled by mere 

 resemblance is patent to every one who is at all familiar with the long 

 catalogue of exploded etymology, and a sense of that danger will 

 render every prudent philologist very cautious in giving his un- 

 qualified adhesion to any novel theory, until it is corroborated by an 

 irresistible weight of evidence. That such evidence can be found 

 among the records and inscriptions of Eastern and Central Asia, — 

 provided this supposed genesis of alphabetic writing is correct, — is 

 highly probable; and points of similarity that are so curious and 

 striking, should stimulate the investigation that is necessary to ascer- 

 tain the cause of that similarity. 



The foregoing comparison may perhaps be regarded as inconclusive, 

 from the fact that many of the hieroglyphs might have been adopted 

 with nearly equal propriety for a variety of different letters. For 



* See Trans. Amer. Phil. Soc, Vol. XI, p. 300. See also the same article, p. 

 324, for examples of the glottosis of i' to J. 



