OF THE YORUBA LANGUAGE. 



51 



if its credibility be admitted, is it not evident that the Yoruba must be older than any of 

 the Indo-European languages'? Cfr. Chin., le, to arrange, to descend to, to fix, to exert ones 

 strength, laws; te, earth, low, level; Sans., pratli, to he extended; Gr., xkaruf, Ifya; Lat., latus, 

 lego, lex; Fr., plat; Eng., flat, lay, broad. The two principal meanings of /.fy,„, are repre- 

 sented by Yor. le, to lay, and li, to say. 



72. 1)e, to cover. Bit, to be Had;. Cfr. A. S.. deorc, dark; Scotch, dim. See Wedge- 

 wood's discussion of Dun, for some remarks on the connection between the ideas of cover- 

 ing and darkness. 



73. DUEO, from da, to become, iro, standing. The a, and i are contracted into u, by the eu- 

 phonic rule ([noted under § 71. Wedgewood quotes as analogous, typts, durus, and Turk. 

 <1 umiak, to continue, stay, endure. The application of the two rules of assimilation, would 

 produce both forms, typo and dure, from da iro. The Yor. duro does not appear to be used 

 iii the sense of Lat. durus, but dilu, to congeal, may perhaps be its equivalent, for di signi- 

 fies to be, become, be changed, and as 1 and r are mutually interchangeable, In = ru or ro. 

 If tor the di in dilu, we substitute its equivalent die, to be, Ave obtain dfolu which is curi- 

 ously coincident with Sans, djal, to be cold; Lat. gelu; Fr., geler ; Eng., chill, icily. Even 

 without any commutation of letters we may obtain the French form, for elc, hardness 

 (from e, that which, le, is hard), added to die, would make tele, to become hard = geler. 



74. E, or ai (a, that which, i, not), " a prefix attached to verbs to form nouns of a ne<?a- 

 tive meaning. . . . Hoots with this prefix are also used imperatively; as, aiwi, do not speak, 

 keep silence /"* Other Yoruba negative forms, arc mah, n, o, o. Cfr. Gr., «, privative, ^, 

 <>'); Eat., in-, ne, non ; Eng., no. 



75. EMI, or Ml.— These forms are used indiscriminately for I, my, and me. The con- 

 tracted form is rarely used in the nominative, except in repeating something that has been 

 said, lint " as the objective pronouns are generally governed by a preceding word to which 

 they are closely attached in pronunciation, the contracted forms are, for the most part, 

 made by eliding the initial vowel of the pronoun, so that it may be more closely joined 



to the governing word The full or primary forms are employed as possessive* only 



when the relation of possession is expressed by the preposition ti, of,"f 



There are three other forms of the nominative, — the euphonic mo, m5, and the future, 

 or negative ij ; and two forms for each cast; of the plural, the full form, awa, for all the 

 cases, and the contracted forms, a for the nominative, and \va for the possessive and objec- 

 tive. The form y " appears to be a. modification of cmi. The manner in which it is formed 

 is seen in the subjunctive phrase, ki emi ri, that I see, which is frequently contracted to ki 

 em' ri, and ki 'm 'ri; and is still more frequently pronounced ki y ri."} 



We are thus enabled to trace a, pretty satisfactory etymological connection between Chin. 



Uowun, p. 13. 



f Id., p. 21. 



t M ., p. 19. 



