OF CERTAIN ENGLISH WORDS. 151 



Barn in the language of the Icelanders, In the dialect of the 

 ancient Dacians-, and in Swedish. Thus much has been ob- 

 served by others. It is a curious circumstance, that Birna is a 

 pregnant woman in the language of the Jolofs, one of the 

 blackest of all the African nations. I have found Asiatic 

 words in this language, and one or two South-American words*. 



Section 2. 



1. Dank, damp, humid, moist, wet. Skinner derives this 

 from the German tunckcn, to dip something into water, &c. 

 Dan is water in the language of the people of New-Guinea, and 

 Don in the languages of the Osetti and Dugori, on Caucasus. 

 The Wyandots, or Hurons of North-America, call a river 

 Yan-Dank-keh, and Yan-Daun-kee-ah. The two Asiatic na- 

 tions, just mentioned, likewise call a river, Don. — The En- 

 glish words, Tank, a large cistern, or bason, and Tankard, a 

 veseel to hold water, are unquestionably of Asiatic original. 

 The word Tank is used in India at this very day. There is a 

 river in Pennsylvania, the Indian name of which is Tunk- 

 hanna. 



2. Naval, belonging to ships. The Kartalini, whom I have 

 already mentioned, and among whom we have found a spe- 

 cimen of an English word, call a ship or vessel, Navee. 



3. Murky, dark, cloudy, wanting light. From the Danish 

 Morel; Johnson. Merkot is night in the Susdalien dialect. -f- 



4. Democratical. I think it has escaped the notice of the 

 English Dictionary-makers, that Demo is the name for men, or 

 people (homines, populusj in the language of the old Persians. 

 I find a great number of English, French, and American 

 (Indian) words in this old language, which Sir William Jones 

 has shown to be Sanscrit. Philosophers will ultimately repose 

 in the belief, that Asia " has been the principal foundery of 

 the human kind ;" and Iran, or Persia, will be considered as 



* See New Views, &c. Preliminary Discourse, p. 73. 



-f- " SuiJalitmis dialectus variis graecis baibaribque verbis a mercaturam in Thracia facientibus 

 » corrupta, ita fere ad Rusicam linguam se habet, uti Iudaeo-Germajiica ad Germanicam." Pallas. 



