OP LANGUAGES. 



57 



of explaining the subsequent deviations appearing in their 

 ultimate development. The Hungarian Nene " elder sister " 

 reveals the common origin and mutual relationship between 

 Hungarian, and Samoyedic as well as the divergence 

 which took place afterwards. The Samoyedic Tebena and 

 Nena 63 " elder brother" and " elder sister," are derived 

 from Teb, " man," Ne, " woman," 64 and Na the genderless 

 term for consanguinity. The origin of the Hungarian 

 Nena " elder sister," can thus be traced to the primitive 

 genderless expression of consanguinity. 



Concrete languages are without terms equivalent to 

 * ' brother " and (( sister." Such expressions which we find 

 in abstract languages describe a condition peculiarly appli- 

 cable to the close relationship between brother and sister. 

 The brother Bhrdtri (from bhrd with the Kritaffix tri) is 

 thus in Sanskrit the " supporter of the sister," and Svasri 

 sister 65 (from su + as and the Kritaffix ri) " the soother, 

 consoler of the brother/' I do not contend, that these terms 

 were applied from the first to denote consanguinity ; their 

 very pertinent signification suggests a later origin. There 

 may have been, and most likely there were used in primeval 

 times other, perhaps even concrete, terms, but if the latter 

 has ever been the case, the innate tendency towards abstrac- 

 tion removed also such expressions from the language and 

 replaced them by such abstract words as Bhrdtri, Svasri, &c. 

 The terms Adelphos and Agastor were preferred in Greek, as 

 the word Phrdter m was employed in another sense. 



Having thus laid stress upon the important position 

 which terms of kinship occupy in a language, it must be 



(63) Nena denotes at times in Samoyedic dialects " younger sister." 



(64) Compare the Hungarian N"6 and the Chinese Nu. 



(65) " Sushthu asyati sodarayasam iti svasa," see Lingayya Suri's Linga- 

 bhattiyam. I prefer this derivation to that of sva stri. The affix ri in 

 svasri corresponds to the tri in bhratri. Compare besides others Theodor 

 Benfey's " Vollstandige Grammatik der Sanskrit Sprache," page 159. 



(66) The Greek possessed the word phrater, but used instead of it adelphos 

 (from a and delphys uterus), agastor, both which signify uterinus, kasis and 

 kasignStss. 



8 Iff; 



