Rev. Epwarp Hincxs on Persepolitan Writing. 121 
softening down of mag, as I shall have occasion to shew hereafter ; on this, how- 
ever, no stress should be laid, as it is not a word properly belonging to the lan- 
guage of J., but transferred from another language. The same root appears in 
maz, part of the word mazda, but it also appears with a different letter in the 
superlative ma3ishta. Probably the original form, of which this is a softening 
down, was magiwistas, the positive being formed on the analogy of the Latin 
suad-vis, or Greek 7dus, for 76-Fis. The word Sdti is the Greek gat: ; the ori- 
ginal form was gvati or gwati, from which both this Greek form, and the Gothic 
quat, as well as the Latin zmgwit, and the Persian gu, guften, are all derived. 
Again, the word dzZamid, adveniat, is the third person singular, potential or 
optative, from dézam, compounded of the preposition @, ad, and zam, “‘ to come,”’ 
which is not found in Latin or Greek,* but is the Sanscrit gam, Gothic guiman, 
and the Anglo-Saxon cuman. We have thus the three letters in question, all in 
different words, representing the hard g of a parent language, akin to the 
European languages. It must, therefore, be by the help of transcriptions alone 
that the value of each can be ascertained. 
The transcriptions to be looked to are those in II., in Greek writings, and in 
the modern languages of the country. In order that the transcriptions in II. 
should be available for this purpose, it is necessary to use the precaution of not 
assuming the value of any of these letters, in the inquiry into the powers of the 
characters of II. To this I have carefully attended; I have used as data the 
values of the other letters of I., but have carefully refrained from using as such 
the values of any of these three letters. 
The letter z of Lassen occurs in the names Zaraka and Udrasmi or mis, in 
both of which it is transcribed by s. I read the names in II. Hrsa.ra.an.ka 
and Wa.ra.s.wi.s. In explanation of this I would observe that the syllable Zr 
signifying in II. “land,” is here prefixed to the name of the first of these 
people, as it is in other cases substituted for an equivalent prefix, ga or Sa. I 
* Unless, indeed, it appears in ve for gven. The difficulty is in the interchange of the nasals 
at theend. That vivo was gvigvo (whence the preterite in 2a? and supine in zctw7), connected with 
vigeo, and with the Gothic gziva, “ living,” our “‘ quick,” admits of no question ; and this is in San- 
scrit jiv; in Greek 4F, dropping the guttural, and Zz, softening down the guttural and dropping 
the labial. There would, therefore, be no difficulty ina Latin vem representing the Gothic quem ; 
but I am not aware of there being authority for changing the m of a Latin root into 2. 
VOL. XXI, Q 
