PHILOLOGICAL GENIUS OF THE MODERN GREEK LANGUAGE. 15 
Tig @ for d7ico. apa for é\avva. 
pas 33 HPA. yruTove —,,_ ex TOW = exVw from dvTds. 
In these cases of initial curtailment it will be seen that the vowel which falls 
off, as in the case of the American “cute,” is generally a very feeble one, such 
asin rapid pronunciation is little missed. Sometimes, however, it is a diphthong, 
though never an accented one, as in pardw for aiwarda, dév for ovbder, yuadds for 
atyahds, and some others. It may even be a whole syllable, like the Italian 
scuro for obscuro, aS in ddoxKados for didacKados.* 
Proposition XVI.—But the end of the word presents to a hasty speaker 
even greater facilities than the beginning for a popular amputation, of which 
tendency the final m and s of the ancient Roman poets afford familiar examples. 
And here we find a remarkable analogy pervading old Roman, Italian, and 
modern Greek. As the Roman dropt his final m, producing the Italian domino, 
from the perfect form dominum, so the modern Greek regularly drops the final 
v, which with him corresponds to the Latin m, and says xcadé for xcadov; and 
not. only so, but in diminutives he drops regularly the complete last syllable 
ov, so that all diminutives which are paroxytones in classical Greek, come 
out with a sharp acute accent on the final syllable. . Thus zaidéov becomes 
Tal, Kpaciov, kpaci,t just as in Italian amavit becomes amd, potestatem, 
podesta, and so forth. When the original word has the oxytone accent, as in 
motapos, Kepahy, the accent of the curtailed diminutive lies on the penult 
* The following examples from Italian illustrate the same tendency to initial curtailment in 
languages set free from the control of strict literary aristocracy :— 
bieco for obliquum. 
scuro > obscurum. 
sciocco »  exscuccus, 
badia »  abbadia. 
cagioné » occasione. 
stivali »  estivale. 
riecld0 5) Clrricius: 
Lamagna ,, Alemannia, 
rame »  eramen. 
nemico », inimico, 
stimare »  eestimare. 
state » estate. 
sperto »  esperto. 
spietato »,  dispietato. 
sbarcare »,  disbarcare, and other compounds with dis. 
romita, »  eremita, 
stra (French frés) ,, extra, as in straordinario, and other compounds. 
mentre » dum-interim (Diez). 
+ The historic steps in the process were zravd~ov, maidiv, raid, the intermediate form appearing 
generally in THEODORUS. 
