ROOTS OF LANGUAGE. 26y 



been estimated to present as many as 850 roots, or, accord- 

 ing to Benfey, just about twice that number.* On the other 

 hand, Max Muller, as a result of more recent researches, 

 professes to have reduced the total number of Sanskrit roots 

 to I2i.t 



It is needless to give further instances. For these. are 

 enough to show that, even if we were to regard the analytic 

 powers of comparative philology as adequate to resolve all 

 the compounds of a language into its primitive elements 

 the estimate of Pott would probably be high above the mark, 

 when he states that on an average the roots of a language 

 may be taken at a thousand.f Seeing that Chinese only 

 contains in its whole vocabulary half that number of words, 

 and that both Hebrew and English have similarly yielded 

 each about five hundred radicals in the crucible of more 

 modern research, I think we may safely reduce the general 

 estimate of Pott by one-half, and probably would be nearer 

 the truth if we were to do so by three-quarters, or more. At 

 all events, we may be satisfied that the total number of 

 radicals sufficient to feed the most luxuriant of languages is 

 expressible in three figures ; and this, as we shall presently 

 see, is enough for all the purposes of my subsequent discussion. 



Passing on now from the question of number to that of 

 character, we have first to meet the question — What are these 

 roots .? Are they the actually primitive words of pre-historic 

 languages, or are they what Max Muller has aptly termed 

 " phonetic types " 1 Here again we encounter a difference of 

 opinion among philologists. Thus, for instance. Professor 

 Whitney tells us that the Indo-European languages are all 

 descended from an original monosyllabic tongue, and, there- 

 fore, that " our ancestors talked with one another in simple 

 syllables, indicative of ideas of prime importance, but wanting 

 all designation of their relations." § On the other hand, it is 



• See Max Muller, Science of Thought^ p. 332. 

 t Ibid., p. 404. 



\ Ethmolo^ische Forschttngen, ii., s. 73, et scq. He here quotes Varro to the 

 effect that the roots of Latin amount to about a thousand. 

 § Language and the Study of Language, p. 256, 



