448 ETHNOLOGY. 



this by the waj' — tbe classification results quite uaturally from a cer- 

 tain antagonistic relation of these vowels, respectively, to the guttural 

 letters, their very test and touchstone. According to the nature of 

 these vowels, the word receives often its characteristic meaning in those 

 Asiatic languages; hence, only vowels of the same class occur in one 

 and the same word. It would lead us too far from our present subject if 

 we should now elucidate more fully the phenomenon under consideration, ^ 

 We wish to make only a few remarks more. This peculiarity extends to 

 adjectives and to verbs — qualities, (positive or negative, as the case may 

 be,) actions, and states of being ; even to postpositions, &c., (direction, 

 tendency, &c.) We could, indeed, illustrate it by hundreds of examj)les, 

 especially in the Central-Asiatic languages, even in the Celtic tongues, 

 particularly the Irish. We might point out a very considerable num- 

 ber of such instances finally de])ending on a certain principle of vowel- 

 harmony. Even in our own ancient and modern languages we can now 

 and then discover some slight and obscure vestiges of that perhaps 

 originally quite extensive phenomenon of significant vowel antagonism. 

 For instance, in the Greek ij-av.p-vq, and p-v/.p-oq ; v-6 and l-i-^ the article 

 6 and ^ ; roi and r?; ; -(>•> and r-zyV; ''Ap-rjq and ^'Ep-tq^ &c.; in Latin, in 

 c«l-idus and gd-idus ; perhaps, also, in the fundamental form homiu 

 and ft'uiin, (implying hcmin : f=h, as in Span. Aembraj) in Hebrew, 

 ^*^n and x^n; Arabic jp and (^ ; \m and h?, (S:c., and other expressions 

 of contrast, negation, or opposite tendencies generally. We also find 

 in German st«mm and stimm — referring to the voices or its absence; 

 in English, the verbs to step and to stop, &c. 



•* Though it is almost evident that 6u\} has not a separate and inde- 

 pendent existence in the language, but is always found combined with 

 pronominal suffixes, such as 6ui]liii^ {her elder sister,) we nevertheless 

 meet also compounds like the following: 6iir)Jja, to have for an elder sister. 

 We may, therefore, safely conclude tliat cuq in ciiijhu and the verb 

 cuiyya is the word which designates an elder sister. Moreover, the form 

 cin)1cu has a parallel expression in ciijcu, which means Ms elder brother ; 

 and as 7iW is identical with 6u in consequence of a very common con- 

 sonantal 2>ermutation, it becomes obvious that c»q, indeed, means elder 

 sister, as ciy is known to signify elder brother. 



^ In the Grusinian language, mama menus father — an apparent anom- 

 aly, owing, perhaps, to a mere interchange of the labials, passing here 

 over into their extremes. Another shifting of the labials, though less 

 in extent, we find in the Asiatic tongues, where we also meet with baba, 

 for father, /a/a for mother, &c. 



'^ By means of such postpositions the declension of nouns is effected 

 in the Ural-Altaic languages. The Dakota cases of declension, if we 

 can use this term, amount likewise to a very rude sort of ag(jlntination, 

 or rather simple adding of the postpositions to the nouns. There can 

 be here no question of any real iufiection or declension, since there is 

 throughout only a kind of loose a^Zhesion, and^ nowhere what we might 

 call a true cohesion. The postpositions are in the written language 



