" TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 87 
The great ethnological fact respecting Assyria—its language—was then treated of. 
Dr. Hincks considered the Assyrian language to belong to a family akin to that of 
the Syro-Arabian languages hitherto known, rather than to that family itself. He 
first pointed out what it had in common with all these languages. It had verbal 
roots, which were normally triliteral, but of which some letters might be mutable or 
evanescent, whence arise different classes of irregular verbs. These roots admitted 
not only the simple conjugation, but others in which radical letters are doubled, 
other letters added, or both these modifications made at once. From these roots 
verbal nouns are formed, either by a simple change of the vowels, or by the addition 
of letters, such as are called in Hebrew Heemantic. 
It agreed with the Arabian more closely than with any other Syro-Arabian lan- 
guage in three respects :—Ist. In forming the conjugations, consonants are inserted 
among the radical letters, as well as prefixed to them. This takes place regularly in 
Arabic, but in Hebrew only where the first radical is a sibilant. 2nd, The termina- 
tion of the aorist varies as in Arabic; different verbs taking different vowels between 
the second and third radicals, while the first radical sometimes terminates the verb ; 
and sometimes takes after ita oru. 3rd. The forms of the plural vary, and the 
cases of nouns differ in a manner which resembles, in some measure, what takes 
place in Arabic. 
The Assyrian language differed from all the Syro-Arabian languages known 
hitherto in the following respects :—I1st. Where they have 4, it has s in a variety of 
instances, and.especially in the pronouns and pronominal affixes of the third person— 
si, si, sunu; su, sa, si, sun and sin, most of which resembles forms in other languages, 
if only h be substituted for s. 
The same difference occurs in the characteristic of the causative conjugation. In 
these respects, but not by any means generally, the Assyrian agrees with the 
Egyptian, and through it with the modern Berber. 2nd. The Assyrian has no pre- 
fixes, such as 6 for in, J for to, which occur in all the Syro-Arabian languages. In 
place of these it has separate prepositions; and to avoid the awkwardness of joining 
these to the prenominal affixes, and perhaps for greater clearness, nouns are inserted, 
forming compound prepositions, as ina kirbisu ‘‘in its midst ”’ for “in it”? Com- 
pound prepositions may be used also before other nouns, as ina kirib biti, ‘‘ in the 
midst of the house” for ina biti. Sometimes the Assyrian uses affixes as substitutes 
for prepositions. Instead of ana, to or for, before a noun, isk may be added. Thus 
‘for a spoil” is expressed indifferently by ana shallati and shallatish. This last 
form has much of the nature of an adverb and has some resemblance to the Hebrew 
noun with He locative*. 3rd. The Syro-Arabian languages made frequent use of a pre- 
terite, in which the distinctions of number and person are confined to the end of the 
root ; but the Assyrian rejects it, or at least uses it in an exceedingly sparing manner. 
On this account Dr. Hincks proposed to consider the Benoni participle, masculine, 
_ singular, in regimen as the root. 4. The varieties in the termination of the future are 
not connected with any particles that may precede them, but of themselves indicate 
different tenses. The termination in w is certainly a pluperfect. Thus where men- 
tion is made of “ that Marduk Baladan whom I had defeated in my former campaign,” 
the verb is askunu ; but whenever ‘‘ I defeated ’’ occurs in the simple narration askun, 
askuna, or in a different conjugation, astakan is used. This law has been fully esta-~ 
blished. The addition of a seems not to change the sense ; it is added to every verb 
when what it governs follows it, and to some verbs even where it precedes it. These 
are chiefly such as denote locomotion. : 
The resemblance of the most common Assyrian prepositions and of the pronouns 
to Indo-European forms is curious, and points to a common though remote origin. 
The Babylonian inscriptions are in the same language as the Assyrian. This was 
probably the court language at Babylon; but the common people most probably 
used the Chaldean language, in which some parts of the books of Ezra and Daniel 
are written. 
* Since this was written Dr. Hincks has been led to alter his views as to the final ma, 
which is not connected with the pronominal affix, but with the verb that precedes it, of which 
it modifies the sense; thus addin-su-ma is not “1 gave to him,” but “ when I had given to 
him,” or “ having given to him.”—(June 1853.) 
