206 EEV. J. IVERACH MDNflO, M.A.^ ON THE WITNESS OF 



pre-Seniitic-Inclo-European may be the d of the accusative used 

 to compensate for the loss of the t. 



If the i of qcL-ni be the genitive form of the verbal, noun it is 

 particularly interesting, because Hebrew adopted the genitive 

 form of ending for plural masculine nouns, and does not now 

 distinguish cases by their endings. But there is another 

 explanation, as we shall see. 



Here, in this particular type of verb, while the old passive 

 meaning of Gain is distinctly remembered by the writer of 

 Genesis, and the noun used accord ingl}^, the verbal noun con- 

 tained in the verb itself has changed the old nominative ending 

 u into % ; and this is true in Hebrew of all this class of verbs 

 which end in a vowel. But this % may have been originally the 

 ai of the passive transferred to the end of the stem, as in 

 Sanscrit. If this were so, it would prove a very ancient date for 

 the original expression. 



Along with this change there also arose a shifting of the 

 accent, as is seen in the imperative Pf-p, qeneh, so that the 



long cl before the n becomes a very short, indistinct vowel. 



All these phenomena are present in Indo-European. 



Here I may say that the discovery of the original vowels in 

 the parent language of Indo-European by the philologists 

 engaged in these studies has proved of the greatest value. It 

 laid a scientific basis for the comparison of the vowel-sounds in 

 Semitic and Indo-European. What in the latter has hitherto 

 been a meaningless array of interconnected sounds yields up its 

 original forms with meanings in the light of Semitic. 



Observe also that Sanscrit, with its gunct and vrddhi or vowel- 

 strengthening — a and d prefixed to i and 2t with their modifica- 

 tions — is an invaluable witness, along with the preservation in 

 Arabic of the original forms of the verbal nouns in ai and au, to 

 the feeling in all these languages that the ai and au sounds 

 belonged to the words. The meaning passed out of mind, the 

 feeling remained ; hence such curious forms as XeKoLira, wliere 

 the oi combines active and passive together. The philological 

 value, then, of such a statement as is before us in Genesis iv, 

 where the original passive form in Cain is preserved, and its 

 passive meaning remembered, along with the later development 

 of the verb, cannot be over-emphasized. That transitional stage 

 is such as corresponds with that of Sanscrit, when it transferred 

 the i of the passive from the middle of the stem to the end, and 

 this holds whether we regard the i of qd-ni-thi as the old geni- 

 tive form or the transferred passive. 



