"Professor Newman, in his _Regal Rome_, has drawn attention to the
subject; but his induction does not appear sufficiently extensive to
warrant any decisive conclusion respecting the position the Celtic
holds as an element of the Latin,"--
he could not have known that the same writer has, in the sixth volume of
the _Classical Museum_, continued the comparison at great length; and as
that work falls into the hands of but few, I shall transcribe some passages
which may throw light on the subject:
"It has for some years been recognised, at least by several English
scholars, that there is a remarkable similarity between the Celtic
languages and Latin. In the case of Welsh it was, I believe, at first
supposed that the words must have been introduced by the Roman dominion
in Britain; but when the likeness was found to exist in the Erse, and
that the Erse was even more like to Latin (as regards the consonants)
than the Welsh is, this idea of course fell to {358} the ground. The
scholar and physiologist, who pressed into notice the strong
similarities of the Celtic to the European languages, and claimed a
place for Celtic within that group, Dr. Prichard, has naturally fixed
his attention with so much strength on the _primitive_ relations of all
these tongues, as to be jealous and suspicious of an argument, which
alleges that the one has borrowed from the other. Some ten years ago,
by his favour, I read a MS. of a vocabulary (the composition of Dr.
Stratton, formerly of Aberdeen), which compared the Gaelic with the
Latin tongue in alphabetical order without comment or development. From
this vocabulary Prichard gives an extract in his chapter on the Italian
nations, and finds it entirely to confirm his views that the Roman
language has not suffered any larger admixture by a foreign action.
What is or was Dr. Stratton's opinion, I never heard. His vocabulary
first suggested to me the value of this inquiry, and that is all.
Having now been led to a fuller examination of the Welsh and Gaelic
dictionaries, I find not only a far greater abundance of material
(especially in the Welsh) than I could have imagined; but also, that by
grouping words aright, conclusions result such as I had not expected,
and adverse to those of Dr. Prichard."
Professor Newman, as T. H. T. has observed, confined himself to a tabular
view of Celtic and Latin words; but the grammatical structure and formal
development of the two languages have not been overlooked in the
philological literature of England. These interesting inquiries have been
pursued by Dr. Prichard, in his elaborate treatise on the _Eastern Origin
of the Celtic Nations_, and the Rev. W. D. Conybeare, (in his _Theological
Lectures delivered in Bristol College in 1831-33_) has shown that it is by
thus analysing the grammatical structure, which forms the very skeleton of
languages, rather than by confining our attention to mere vocabularies,
that we may best detect their true affinities, and has illustrated this
doctrine by a few Welsh examples. In the _West of England Archaeological
Journal_ is exhibited (I believe by the same author) the identity of verbal
forms in the Welsh and Latin languages.
Nevertheless, Archdeacon Williams maintains that two languages may have a
common vocabulary, but different grammars[3]:
"The Latin language, whether from Pelasgic or Achaean influence, adopted
at an early period the Hellenic grammar; and, under the skilful hands
of the bilingual Ennius, became that polished interpreter of thought,
which yields in regularity and majesty to the Greek alone. The Cumri
either retained, which is more probable, a still more ancient, or
invented a grammar, now peculiar to themselves. This, although it be
simple and scientific in the highest degree, is so completely at
variance with all the other grammars of the civilised world, that
scholars who have to acquire it late in life feel the strongest
repugnance to its forms and principles, and are tempted to regard a
language more fixed and unchangeable in its principles than any other
existing, as more slippery and grasp-escaping than the Proteus of the
Grecian mythology."
Since I wrote these extracts, I have been much gratified by the perusal of
Archdeacon Williams's _Gomer_, which I recommend to all interested in this
inquiry.