Sounds and Inflections of the Cyprian Dialect. 33 



Coll. 59, i, cannot be determined, as the origin of the word 

 is uncertain. (See § 34, 2.) 



Trep' for irepl in the third of the cases cited, irep' 'HSdXiov 

 is poetical ; but the reading seems certain. Cf. Pindar, Pj't/i. 

 iii., 42 ; Trep^ avra^ ; Neni. xi., 51 irepoSoiq. If with Allen 

 {On Greek Versification in Inscriptions, p. 1 50) we take Coll. 

 71 as a metrical inscription (see Allen, p. 46), we shall then 

 have elision of the final £ of irore, although it is written in the 

 text. This practice of writing the elided vowel is common 

 ' even in inscriptions written in Greek characters. See exam- 

 ples collected by Allen, p. I27ff. 



aX(X)' €TV')(^ a Kijp Coll. 68, 3, and ttot epela-Tj^; 68, i, are 

 omitted as too uncertain. See p, 2. 



The character of the Cyprian syllabary did not admit of the 

 expression of elision except in case of words so closely con- 

 nected in sense as to be written as one, like a ■ po ■ i • = dcf)' 

 Mi, etc. But most words were not so written. Inscriptions 

 which show care even separate the words by a divisor. Thus 

 words ending in -kg-, -8e, -ere, etc., would have to be written -ke ' 

 -te', -se', even if by elision the final e disappeared, since the 

 Cyprian had no way of expressing a final consonant without 

 a following e. Hence the expression of elision in case of 

 words written separately like c5Se eKepae {o ' te ' \ e ' kc re' se'); 

 wore eppe^a (po 'te' | e've' re 'xa ') was a practical impossibility. 



So also in case of final -a. 7rci{v)r e;^ev, for instance, could 

 be written only pa ' te' \ e ' ke ' ne ', which would give 7rd{v)re 



This fact accounts perhaps for the apparent retention of 

 final short vowels in cases where they might be expected to 

 suffer elision. 



2. Crasis is apparently certain in TctTrl for ra eV/ Coll. T^y. 

 In place of Deecke's TD,aipi (for tS 'Oaipi) Coll. 45, i, 

 Hall (your. Ain. Or. Soc, xi., p. 216) after a re-examination of 

 the inscription in New York now reads tcS 'OvacripL. Yet it 

 is difficult to reconcile this reading with Hall's original fac- 

 simile (Plate viii., 34) as reproduced by Schmidt {Satmnlnng 

 Kyprischer hischriften, xx., 6). 



163 



