322 Dr. Grorerenp on Inscriplions found in Lycia and Phrygia. 
according to Tzerzres,* had among the Lycians the same signification as 
depo, and may therefore probably have been used by the Lycians for <vScib:. 
Consequently the Lycian language, as we find it also in the Lycian cha- 
racters of Caria, would seem to be related to the Lydian; and this is all 
the more probable, from the fact that Homer brings the Lycians into 
connexion with the Trojans in Mysia. Now the Mysians, according to 
Heroporus,t were descendants of the Lydians, and both were of the same 
family with the Carians,t with whom the Lycians§ had many customs in 
common. Srraso || tells us that the Mysian language was a mixture of the 
Lydian and Phrygian; and as the Mysians and Phrygians are made 
Thracian tribes by Strraso,§ so Heropotus** calls the Armenians descen- 
dants of the Phrygians. 
But the Armenian language approaches in its grammatical structure more 
nearly to the European tongues, and especially to the Greek, than to the 
Aramzan, which M. Saint-Martin adduces to assist in his explanation of 
Lycian words. The abundance of vowels in the Lycian language, is of 
itself an argument against a comparison of it with the Aramaan. It much 
rather evinces, in the few remains of it which we possess, the character of 
the Armenian by its impure vowels, its sibilant and aspirated sounds, and 
its unwieldy combination of consonants. Like the Armenian, it appears to 
have neither article nor gender; but, on the other hand, it distinguishes a 
plural with a rich declension by particular terminations, while the pronouns 
are individually expressed, all which is opposed to the character of the 
Aramean language. What is said of the Armenian, viz. that by reason of 
the similarity of its composition, of its tenses, and of its use of the 
participles, it is best calculated for translation from the Greek, seems to 
apply equally to the Lycian. Thus the Jnscriptio bilinguis displays through- 
out the same succession of words in Lycian and Greek, though the Latin 
language might perhaps have been still better calculated for the literal trans- 
lation of our inscriptions. Though the Solymians and Arimians of Homer, 
as all the Cilicians, may have belonged to the Aramzean family of languages, 
yet we have no reason for supposing the Aborigines of Lycia, whom Homertt 
places at enmity with those tribes, to have spoken any other than a branch 
of the Phrygian language. As the Telchinians were skilful workers in ore, 
it may be supposed that the Phenicians, like the Greeks, settled in the 
* Ad Lycophron. y. 1232. + VII. 74. { I.171, and Strabo XIV. 2, 23. 
§ Herod. i. 173. [R75 3. q VII. 3, 2. ae VIL. ++ Il. vi. 
