PREFACE. XXXV 



iElfric and Alfred is dead could encourage a foreigner 

 to such experiments. 



It is said by those who had opportunities of know- Accents, 

 ing, that the painful accentual system devised by the 

 late J. M. Kemble was abandoned by him before his 

 death. It was, indeed, opposed to the elementary laws 

 of vocalization ; for it is known to all, who have gone 

 fully into the subject, that a prefix, if accented itself, 

 affects the accentuation and the vocalization of any 

 word with which it is compounded. The subject might 

 be largely illustrated and its essential laws developed 

 from the Oriental languages ; but I will confine my- 

 self to that which is now before us. There can be no 

 reasonable doubt but that 'pilbe, wild, and Deep, deer, 

 were pronounced with the vowels long, and the ridiculous 

 theory that a vowel before two consonants is short 

 by nature, can mislead but few ; it amounts to this, 

 that we never could say Beast, Least, but must pro- 

 nounce those words, Best, Lest. These two words pdbe, 

 Deop, being compounded and formed into one, retained 

 the accent and full sound on the syllable most impor- 

 tant to the sense, and may be found in the genitive 

 singular under the form pilbpey.^ Thus the aflix Deoji 

 lost its proper accent because a more powerful claim- 

 ant had become it close neighbour. Another example 

 is found in pitan, to vepvoacli, which, as appears from 

 Layamon," had its vowel by nature long. This word 

 is often compounded with the preposition Mc, which 

 by defect of grammatical knowledge among the old 

 penmen commonly appears as eb- ; Layamon ^ exhibits 

 the compound still retaining the long vowel ; but the 

 Paris Psalter ^ spells ebpitt:, where, according to the 



CE, 258, line 10. 

 Layamon, 21311. 



* Ofte heo heom on smiten, 

 Ofte heo heom atwiten. 



Layamon, 2G584. 

 ' Psalm cxviii. 39. 



