GOTHIC LANGUAGE. 



and' of Afiatic ongiii ; fliat they I'fcJ the fume langua^rc 

 derived from the piiinival language of Afia : and thii he 

 gives not merely a^ the confequence of hisown jiiveftigatioH, 

 Imt as a coincidence of concluiions, through diflerent media, 

 by perfons uliolly unconnected.'' We knew not v.hether 

 this great man was aware of the great finiilitude fublilting 

 between the Gothic and the Celtic tongues. From his 

 filence we may conclude that he was not : and if lie had 

 feen fpccimcns of them, analyfed fimilur to th it above, he 

 would have deemed the relcmblance a furpriilng conlirm- 

 ation of his theory. 



We conclude, in the fecond place, from the above analyfis, 

 that the Gothic had a clofe affinity to the Greek and Latin. 

 And in- William .foncs gives it as his opinion, that the 

 Greek, Litin, and Gothic originated in one and the fame 

 language ; namely, the ancient language of Perlia. Thefe 

 three languages, therefore, originally refembled each other, 

 not merely becaufe they borrowed fonie words one from the 

 other, but becaufe they had the fame words, plirales, and 

 even conllruition, in confequence of having derived them 

 from a common tongue. And here we camiot help men- 

 tioning one feature in wiiich the ancient Gothic bore a very 

 lingular refemblance to the Greek in the time of Homer, or 

 that dialed of the Greek (namely, the jEolic ), from which the 

 Latin was principally derived : we mean the mucli difputcd 

 yEolic dijamma. In the Oriental languages gutturals 

 abounded ; theie, by degrees, loftened into a mere afpn^ate ; 

 and for this afpirate was, in very numerous inftancos, fub- 

 Ifituted a laihil letter tu or %<, or J', or *. Tiius khdfin, a 

 iin^, degenerated into hdn f and being introduced into Greek 

 in the form of a.-/-f, or Kixa-i-, was pronounced yxvcsj, 

 i^xvxTj-i'. While the oral Greek was thu,, corrupted, the 

 written retained tha afpirate ; and as the works of Homer 

 became the fubjed: of univerfal lludy, the true orthography 

 triumphed over the caprice of oral founds. But the Latins 

 had no fuch monument of genius as the Iliad to itudy : the 

 corruptions of pronunciation, therefore, prevailed, and the 

 digair.ma was univerfally fubtlituted for the afpirate. Thus 

 ir>-', i't/.'.7, W^-^x, -vefpira. The digamma was alfo pre- 

 fixed to a broader open vowel, and always inferted between 

 a diphthong, as oi , pronounced o'wis, ovis ; or/o.-, ivoinos, 

 miium ; o.<o , woiios, v'uus. Now, this fame digamma runs 

 through the Gothic language, which ihews that a great 

 part of it, through fome channel or other, was derived from 

 the Greek, about the early age in which the Lutin fparated 

 into a diftiucl dialect. We Ihall give a few- examples of 

 this facl. The Greek a»^;i, in Gothic, is written conft)rm- 

 ably to the corrupt pronouuciatlon of ix;i>:^,f:in ; c.(f,ff>ir,ire, 

 is iviiian i Ksjiiv, (which is equivalent to asx-.-Jiv) is '■jj.ihfgiin, 

 trtjcen ; -oyai^fia, nuaurlgan ; hence the Englifh, to work. 



But though the Greek may have the fame form and 

 bafis with the Gothic ; and though by fome communica- 

 tions, now unknovvu, it may have enriched liie Gothic with 

 its own early improvements, yet the dialect dignified with 

 this name is only the remains of the Gothic tongue, debafed 

 by a llrong mixture of Greek and Latin terms, a century 

 or two after the cominencem.ent of the Chri'lian era. The 

 Goths who ufed it lived in Wallachia, a country in which 

 Roman colonies had been planted, and which was conti- 

 guous to the provinces of Greece. A3 the verfion of Ul- 

 philas, contained in the " Codex Argenteus," is the only 

 repofitory of this dialed, it is worth while to hear what 

 Michaells fays of it in his " Remai'ks on the Ancient Ver- 

 fions," Marlh's triuidation, vol. ii. p. 142. " In the " Co- 

 dex Argenteus," m.iny words are adopted immediately 

 fitom the Greek. Here I underftand, not fuch us La\e been 



common to the Gcnr.an and the Greek from the earllefl 

 ages of antiquity, and <hcw either an original relation, or 

 original connection between the two nations, but fuch 

 Greek words as arc found in no other German dialedt titan 

 that of the " Codex Argenteus," and have been transfcrrcfi 

 from the Greek, after the complete formation of both 

 languages : for inllancc, cst^l, father, ams, ihr Jhoul/ler, -«-, . 

 v\here even the j is retained from llu- Greek terminatio:;. 

 Spyre'iJans, bnJJuls, 7~v:il:: ; rhalizo, cajler, fxiio; j maito, 

 greater, ^uf..» ; ujLiJ'ais, (K-ora<r<o:,) liotot, bill of divonr. 

 This betrays not a dialecl that was ufed in Germany, or ii 

 the North, but that of a nation that lived in the ncighbou."- 

 hood of the Greeks. Even the mode of exprcfljn^r tl.»- 

 found of «_j, in the " Codex Argenteus," is purely Gree':, 

 aid never ufed in Germany, where the Latin orthography 

 has been received ; for finger is written in that manufcript 

 fsgi; as the Greeks would have cxprefli-d it by a douLie 

 gamma.'' Ulphilas is faid to have invented the character* 

 of this dialed ; which are evidently a mixture of the 

 Greek and Latin, alphabet. The ufe of fuch character* 

 was natural, if the dialect which they exfjrcflcd contained a 

 great mixture of the languages to which they properly- 

 belonged. 



This reprefentation muil greatly diniinifh our veneration 

 for the Gothic, as far as it can be known by us ; yet, in 

 this light, it demands our attention and refpect as the un- 

 doubted parent of the Eng'.ilh tongue. Neverthelef?, 

 we are hence compelled to regard the Gothic and the 

 Anglo-Saxon as but corrupt channels by wliich the term* 

 of Greece and Rome have been imported into our own 

 language. There are, indeed, thofe who confider them in 

 this humble and degraded llatc, as claiming the dignitv of 

 original, ancient, and independent languages. And Mr. 

 Home Tooke, in particular, in his celebrated work on 

 grammar, has attempted to induce the public to receive 

 corruptions from Greek and Latin in the dark apes, as the 

 original words of a Northern language ; whence Greek 

 and Latin have, according to him, themfelves been derived. 

 The merits of this quellion will more properly be difcufTcd 

 under the articles Gua.mmaii and GucF.K. But if the; 

 account we have given of the Gothic be jiiit, we (hall want 

 no other evidence to convince us that the theory of Mr. 

 Tooke, as far as this quellion is concerned, (and it forms 

 a very leading feature of his fyftem,) is not only erroneous, 

 but ridiculous and abfurd. 



GoTitir Med<dj. See MK.r).\L. 



Gothic Muf:c. When fig. Eximcno calls fugues and 

 canons Gothic compofitions, he does not difgrace their ilruc- 

 ture any more than he would our cathedral.s bv calling then* 

 Gothic buildings. Let fujjues hebaniihed from the theatre- 

 and private concerts, if he i>leafes, but let them remain in 

 the church as ;^dillinct Ipecics of comjiotitioii, where they 

 were firft generated, and where tliey can never become 

 vulgar or obfolete. The ftylc is naturally grave, requires 

 mufical learning, and will, by the folemnity of the words 

 antl place of [jertormance, continue to be reverenced and 

 refpccted. It is allowed that variety is more wai-.tcd in n-.uliG 

 than in any other art, and by totally excon.muiiicaling 

 canons and fugues from the church, the art would lofe one 

 capital fource of vametv, as well as ingenuity ; and intelli- 

 gent hearers be bereaved of a folenm Ityle of mulic, to b« 

 heard no w heix- elfe. 



GOTHINI, or GoTHVNl, in AtxunS Cecgmpky, a n.iir,e 

 given to the Goths. They were called Getor.es by Taci- 

 tus and .luftin, and Cuttones by Pliny. Claudian calls them 

 GothunL 



GOTHLAND, 



