154 
Wisconsin Academy of Sciences , Arts and Letters. 
It should further be borne in mind that the three identical roots which 
furnish us with the earliest specimens of the Greek -xa- perfect are also 
Sanskrit roots in -d, which form the perfect in -au. Thus we have side by 
side the roots 
6ra- (Ion., Att. 6rrj-) sthd- 
Sco- dd- 
3 7 ]- 
And the perfects 
s6rr/xa 
Sad coxa 
TeSrfxa 
(re Seiko) 
dhd- 
tasthdu 
dadau 
dadhau 
It would seem as though these possessed some innate tendency to join 
to themselves a completing element, and if that be so what other element 
can this be for the Greek than xa, and what can xa be but the particle xev 
in its weak form ? 
4. As to the non occurrence of xa with the perfect indicative in any 
historical monuments of the Greek language, we need not feel any surprise, 
such ’as Curtius does, in his critique of this theory, in his Zur KritiJc der 
neuesten Sprachforschung, p. 152 f. Curtius considers in fact that the non¬ 
occurrence of the particle with the perfect indicative is sufficient ground 
for condemning the whole theory, which he proceeds to do very summarily. 
But let us consider a moment. By the very terms of the hypothesis, it 
must have been at a period considerably prior to the oldest monuments of 
the Greek language that the particle xa become united with the already 
existing perfect inflection to form the - xa- perfect. At that time the par¬ 
ticles xa, ar and very likely many others enjoyed a much freer use and 
wider application than later, when the language had become more stereo¬ 
typed. Certainly at the beginning of the historical period of the Greek 
language xsv and av had become appropriated to certain distinct uses and 
were confined to them. Not only do we not find either xev or civ with 
the perfect indicative in Homer, but it is only with the greatest difficulty 
that we succeed in gathering together a few instances of its use with the 
present and future indicative. Even if we had discovered one or two in¬ 
stances of it with the perfect indicative it would not have materially 
favored our theory. 
It seems to me, therefore, that Osthoff’s theory exhibits an unusually 
keen perception and fine appreciation of the principles governing linguistic 
development, and that, while it cannot, any more than Brugmann’s, be 
called a demonstration, yet it is as probable and even more instructive. 
Hartmann’s theory. 
Hartmann’s theory appeared first in Kuhn's Zeitschrift, vol. xxviii. 
p. 284, in a brief article entitled Wieder einmal das x- Perfectum. 
Hartmann starts with the declaration that the -xa- perfect could take its 
