912 Dynamic Theory. 



specific to abstract and general, language must have taken the same 

 course. Thus, infants of all nations have named their parents Pa and 

 Ma, and such words have been adopted by the elders. This is undoubt- 

 edly the course of nature. Words must at first have been involuntary 

 articulations, and without definite signification, until by their accidental 

 or natural association with objects, they became attached to them in the 

 mind. There is in the Aryan stock a foot pa, which signifies to nour- 

 ish ; and from this root are said to be derived such words as pap, pa, 

 papa, parent, father ; Latin, pater ; Sanscrit, pitar, &c. This statement 

 would imply that men first got the abstract idea of nourishing and be- 

 ing nourished, and then with great discrimination applied the word they 

 attached to that idea, to objects which they found concerned in the busi- 

 ness of nourishing. In the history of language we do come to a -period 

 when this sort of thing is done ; but it certainly could not have been 

 done at the very first. Thus, parent may have come from pa, but the 

 first signification of pa could not have been to nourish or to bring forth; 

 but the word simply attached itself to a visible, tangible object, the 

 mother or father. The idea of that object being a nourisher would oc- 

 cur later, and when it did occur, the idea of nourishing in general ( or 

 begetting ) would be associated with the first one that had been named, 

 and his name would be applied thenceforward to the idea. 



Pa and ma are the words which, with their derivatives and corruptions, stand for 

 father and mother in most of the languages of the earth. Amongst the different African 

 languages the following are used for father: papa, paba, baba, pa, fa, fafe, fafa, ba, da, 

 'dadye, wawa, dada, nda, ada, bawa, ata, inba, babi, tada, oda, abba. For mother the fol- 

 lowing are used: ni, ne, nana, na, mana, kara, ba, nde, nga, ma, noe, de, iya, yeye, ye, 

 nene, ayo, nna, mo, meya, nno, onyi, onya, ya, aye, am, bina, mama, mma, ondsunei, om- 

 sion, aai, nya, inya, kunyun, ua, yuma, inna, ina, ene, ama, omo, omma. Among the 

 non-Aryan nations of Asia, there is again the same remarkable agreement. In Turkish 

 father is baba, and so it is in parts of India, and in Java. In Thibet dhada is father, and 

 ma is mother. Other words used for father in different parts of Asia are, mama, ama, 

 bapa,pha, aba, apa, babai, abo, appa, amma, ma, &c. In Chinese it is fu. Words for 

 mother ai'e,ma,ana,deda,eme,ibu,ama,ami,ani(,yu,enya, appe, avve,amo, &c. In 

 Chinese it is mu. 



In almost all languages the words for father, mother, baby, &c. , are 

 clearly derived from the sounds whi^h babies automatically speak when 

 they first begin to articulate. 1 Lubbock's idea that pa " to nourish " is 

 a derivative of pa the noun, is certainly more probable than the con- 

 trary view. Dr. Noah Webster attributed the adoption of the words 

 for father and mother so nearly alike, among remote and unrelated na- 

 tions, to the fact that such words are simply the most easy, and there- 

 fore the earliest automatic articulations of children; and he says that if 

 all such words were lost they would speedily be replaced without any 

 communication or convention for that purpose. 



Savages have few or no general terms. Thus it is said the Brazilian 

 tribes had " separate names for different parts of the body, and for al, 1 



1 See Lubbock Origin of Civilization. 



