28 EEADB ON BASQUES 



was still occasionally practised by old-fashioued people in out-of-the-way localities. It is 

 now generally regarded as a symbolic recognition and acknowledgment of paternity. 



The difference of opinion just noted may be taken as an illustration of the divergence 

 of view which characterizes the discussion of every subject connected with the Basques. 

 The controversy is not so much like a pitched battle in which two contending hosts strive 

 with each other for the victory, as an Ishmaelite warfare in which every man's hand is 

 against his neighbor. Even the identity of the Basqiies with the Iberians is disputed by 

 M. Vinson as a theory which has no foundation in fact — the very term Iberian being, he 

 insists, a vague, indefinite expression of which the meaning is obscure. On that point, 

 however, the weight of manifold testimony is overwhelmingly against M. Vinson. It is 

 true that, with respect to the language spoken by the Iberians, we are still sadly in the 

 dark. The inscriptions which pass for Iberian or Celtiberian do not readily admit of inter- 

 pretation by means of Basque. According to Canon Taylor, the alphabets known as Gaul- 

 ish and Iberian were due to the Greek colonists of Massilia and Emporia. M. Vinson 

 says that they are manifestly of Phoenician origin. Doubtless they would be so ultimate- 

 ly in any case, but that in a country where the Phoenicians played for centuries so im- 

 portant a part, there should be some such trace of Tyrian or Sidonian, as well as of Car- 

 thaginian influence, was only to be expected. Besides, at the remote date when the colonies 

 above mentioned were founded, the Greek characters were hardly distinguishable from 

 their Cadmean prototypes. 



There is, indeed, no direct proof that the Basques are a surviving relic of a far-speak- 

 ing Iberian race, the pre-Celtic occupant of nearly all Western Europe. But the circum- 

 stantial evidence is of considerable value. Long since, Wilhelm von Humboldt drew 

 attention to the prevalence of what he deemed to be Euskariau elements in the geograph- 

 ical names of eastern and northern Spain, which became mixed with Celtic in the Celti- 

 berian region and wholly Celtic where the Iberians had been thrust out or absorbed by the 

 intruders. Among such elements are asla (a rock), as in Asturias, Astorga, etc ; ura 

 (water) as in Iluria, Verurium ; Uuriu (a fountain), as in Iturissa, Turiaso, etc. Pa, étant, 

 etania, gis, ilia and via, are among the most frequent Euskarian terminations, while the ini- 

 tial syllables most commonly met with are al, ar, as, bae, bi, bar, her, cal, ner, sal, si, tat 

 and tu. 



Now, if along with the evidence, afforded as well by local names as physical character- 

 istics, of the presence in Western Europe and especially in the Iberian peninsula of a pre- 

 Celtic race of Basque affinities, it could be shown that any of the Celtic dialects bore 

 traces of Iberian intermixture, the proof of the Iberic theory would be, if not complete, at 

 least considerably strengthened. On this point Dr. Beddoe writes : " Anthropologists 

 have long been awaitiag the appearance of some philologist fully qualified to determine 

 the important problem whether there be really Euskarian and Iberian elements in the 

 Cymric language, or, if so, whether it be equally or more potent in the Gaelic and Erse. 

 The existence of such an element had been boldly ascribed and superciliously denied or 

 ignored until receatly Professor Ehys has answered our call with the assurance that the 

 element which physical phenomena have led us to look for does really exist, and that it 

 is to be found in Gaelic rather than Kymric, and in Pictish rather than in Gaelic ; and 

 that the Iberian symptoms among the Silures must be accounted for by their having been 

 in part, at least, Gaelic before they became Kymric in language. Professor Ehys's opinion 



