ON THE COMPARISON OF ASIATIC LANGUAGES. DARE 
monest and closest ties of mutual consideration, deference, and 
love. 
In one word let me thank Major Conder for all the information 
that he has brought together, and, by-and-by, if we meet again 
before a great many years, I hope we shall find ourselves nearer 
to a common view in regard to the curious points to which he has 
directed our attention this evening. (Applause.) 
Mr. Tueo. G. Prncues.—I must say that, after listening to what 
Dr. Legge has said, I feel very diffident in speaking; for I have 
not had his wide reading, being, in fact, very much of a specialist, 
and bound down to that speciality by routine work. I have 
listened with a great deal of pleasure to Major Conder’s very 
instructive paper. I was unable to read it right through before I 
came here, and, consequently, I have not so perfect a knowledge 
of its contents as I should desire. On reading such a paper as 
this a great many isolated points naturally occur to one, and 
among them there are such questions as this: why is it that the 
Akkadians, when speaking of the precious metals, generally say 
“ gold and silver,” whilst the Assyrians and Babylonians, amongst 
whom they lived, always say “silver and gold?” Then there is 
a very interesting point in connection with another word—the 
name of a well-known animal, the horse—why do the Akkadians 
write the name of that animal with three characters rather than 
with one ? They call him, apparently, ‘the animal of the country ” 
—(the words have been translated “the animal of the East,” but 
that I do not believe to be the correct rendering). Then, again, 
among other questions, there is that of the Akkadian name for God. 
This, in that language, is a word of two syllables, namely, Dingir, 
of which the Sumerian form is Dimmer. Some time ago I formed 
the opinion that the first syllable, din or dim, was none other than 
the word for spirit, and gir or mer, means, in Akkadian, strong. 
Therefore it would seem as if the Akkadians regarded the greater 
Gods as ‘‘ the strong spirits.” In this connection I may mention 
that the greater part of the polytheism of the Assyrians and 
Babylonians seems to have been of Akkadian origin, and that is a 
question that I hope to have the pleasure of touching upon before 
this Institute. It is one of considerable importance and worthy 
of a certain amount of research. Of course, in a great many other 
isolated points in this paper, I have seen things with which I could 
hardly agree, and which seem to me to want improvement. But 
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