PART IITHE ETYMOLOGIESBOOK ION GRAMMAR
ON GRAMMAR
Grammardid not appear as a separate body of knowledge until a late period in the Greek civilization. The merest ground-work of the science had sufficed to meet all the demands of education, of philosophy, and of a literature in course of production; for its development it was necessary to await a period of literary criticism. When the Alexandrian scholars began to compare the idiom of Homer with that of their own day, the requisite stimulus for the scientific study of language was given, and grammar may be regarded as dating from the Alexandrian age.
What was at that time termed grammar, γραμματική, included far more than the modern science; it was the study of literature at large. The grammarian might have nothing to do with what we call grammar, but be a student of textual criticism or mythology. Any sort of study undertaken for the purpose of elucidating the poets was grammatical. Like the modern professor of literature, the only invariable characteristic of the grammarian was his literary point of view.[155]
The grammatical studies of the Romans were patternedclosely after those of the Greeks; the Greek terminology and organization of the science were adopted without change. The Roman interest in the subject was no doubt heightened by the fact that the Roman culture was a bilingual one; thus a broad basis for the study was furnished, and naturally much attention was given to the derivation of words. A large number of scholarly works was produced, and the inferiority of the borrowed Roman culture is perhaps less noticeable in this department than in any other.
It was inevitable that this ‘grammar’, in a condensed form, should come to be used in common education. Its outlines, however, were rather vague, and many of its departments did not lend themselves to the concise statement necessary in a text-book. The first Greek school grammar, the τεχνὴ γραμματικὴ[156]of Dionysius Thrax, which was destined to be the basis of all the school grammars of antiquity, appeared about 80 B.C. It is noticeable that although the definition of grammar that is given[157]is the definition of the grammar of the scholars, the subjects actually treated are little more than the parts of speech. It was natural that there should be this gap between promise and performance. For a long time no doubt this mere outline was filled in by the oral interpretation of the masterpieces in the manner of the scholars; but when these ceased to be studied, in the early medieval period, the study of grammar was confined to the material offered in the text-books.[158]
The first of the Romans to produce a school grammar was Remmius Palaemon, who flourished in the first half of the first century. He had many successors in the later centuries of the Roman Empire, and the literary tradition of the school grammar continued unbroken into the Middle Ages. The most influential exponent of the subject was Aelius Donatus, whoseArs, written in the fourth century, was used throughout the Middle Ages. The chief writers of grammatical texts in the centuries preceding Isidore were Victorinus, Donatus, Diomedes, Charisius, and Martianus Capella in the fourth; Consentius and Phocas in the fifth; and Cassiodorus in the sixth. No new contributions were being made to the science, and these writers had no other resource than to copy their predecessors, which they did in a slavish manner.[159]The verbal similarity in all of them is so strong that it is impossible to trace with certainty the immediate source of any one of the later writers.
Isidore’s account of grammar is of somewhat more than the average length[160]found in these text-books, but its lack of solid substance, in which it differs from the books of the fourth century, measures the decline in intellectual grasp and thoroughness of the two intervening centuries. Donatus, Servius, and even Capella, stick closely to the technique of the subject and are thorough-going; their books are calculated to afford a severe discipline to the student. But in Isidore a feebleness in handling the subject is evident; he is apparently unaware of the superior importance of such subjects as conjugation and declension, and he is very easily led into confusion by the trains of thought suggested by his frequent derivations.[161]
Chapter 2. On the seven liberal arts.[175]
1. The disciplines belonging to the liberal arts are seven. First, grammar, that is, practical knowledge of speech. Second, rhetoric, which is considered especially necessary in civil causes because of the brilliancy and copiousness of its eloquence. Third, dialectic, called also logic, which separates truth from falsehood by the subtlest distinctions.
2. Fourth, arithmetic, which includes the significance and the divisions of numbers. Fifth, music, which consists of poems and songs.
3. Sixth, geometry, which embraces measurements and dimensions. Seventh, astronomy, which contains the law of the stars.
Chapter 3. On the ordinary letters.
1. The foundations of the grammatic art are the ordinary letters, which elementary teachers[176]are occupied with, instruction in which is, as it were, the infancy of the grammatic art. Whence Varro calls itlitteratio. Letters are signs of things, symbols of words, whose power is so great that without a voice they speak to us the words of the absent; for they introduce words by the eye, not by the ear.
2. The use of the letters was invented in order to remember things. For things are fettered by letters in order that they may not escape through forgetfulness. For in such a variety of things all could not be learned by hearing and held in the memory.
4. Latin and Greek letters have evidently come from the Hebrew. For among the latteralephwas first so named; then [judging] by the similarity of sound it was transmitted to the Greeks asalpha; likewise to the Latins asa. For the borrower fashioned the letter of the second language according to similarity of sound, so that we can know that the Hebrew language is the mother of all languages and alphabets.[177]
7. The letter Υ Pythagoras of Samos first made, after the model of human life, whose lower stem denotes the first of life, which is unsettled and has not yet devoted itself to the vices or the virtues. The double part which is above, begins in youth; of which the right side is steep, but leads to the blessed life; the left is easier, but leads down to ruin and destruction....
8. Among the Greeks there are five mystic letters.[178]The first is Υ, which denotes human life, of which we have justspoken. The second is Θ, which denotes death. For judges used to place this letter, theta, at the names of those whom they condemned to death; and it is called theta ἀπὸ τοῦ θανάτου,i.e., from death. Whence also it has a weapon through its middle,i.e., the sign of death. Of which a certain one speaks thus:
O multum ante alias infelix littera theta!
O multum ante alias infelix littera theta!
O multum ante alias infelix littera theta!
9. The third is Τ, indicating the shape of the cross of the Lord.... The remaining two, the first and the last, Christ claims for himself. For he is himself the beginning, himself the end, saying: “I am α and ω,” for they pass into one another in turn, and alpha passes in regular succession to ω and again ω returns to alpha; in order that the Lord might show in himself that he was the way from the beginning to the end and from the end to the beginning.
Chapter 4. On the Latin alphabet.
17. The nations gave the names of the letters in accordance with the sound in their own language, noting and distinguishing the sounds of the voice. After they had noted them, they gave them names and forms; and they made the forms in part at pleasure, in part according to the sound of the letters; as, for example, i and o, of which one has a slender stem, just as it has a thin sound; the sound of the other is gross (pinguis), just as its form is full.
Chapter 5. On grammar.
1. Grammar is the science of speaking correctly, and is the source and foundation of literature.[179]This one of the disciplines was discovered next after the ordinary letters, so that those who have already learned the letters may learn by it the method of speaking correctly. Grammar took its name from letters, for the Greeks call letters γράμματα.
4. The divisions of the grammatic art are enumerated by certain authorities as thirty; namely, eight parts of speech, the articulate voice, the letter, the syllable, metrical feet, accent, marks of punctuation, signs and abbreviations, orthography, analogy, etymology, glosses, synonyms, barbarisms, solecisms, [other] faults, metaplasms, schemata, tropes, prose, metres, fables, histories.
Chapter 6. On the parts of speech.
1. Aristotle first taught two parts of speech, the noun and the verb. Then Donatus defined eight. But all revert to these two chief ones, that is, to the noun and the verb, which indicate the person and the act. The remainder are appendages, and trace their origin to these.
2. For the pronoun arises from the noun and performs its function, asorator,ille. The adverb arises from the noun, asdoctus,docte. The participle from the noun and verb, aslego,legens. But the conjunction and preposition and interjection are included in those mentioned.[180]Many therefore have defined five parts because these are superfluous.
Chapter 21. On critical marks (notae sententiarum).
1. In addition there were certain marks in the writings of celebrated authors, which the ancients set in poems and histories to discriminate among the passages. A mark is a separate form placed like a letter, to indicate some judgment about a word, thought or verse. There are twenty-six marks used in annotating verses, which are enumerated below with their names.[181]
Chapter 22. On shorthand.
1. Ennius[182]first invented 1,100 shorthand signs. The use of the signs was that scribes wrote whatever was said in public meeting or in court, several standing by at one time and deciding among themselves how many words and in what order each should write. At Rome Tullius Tiro, Cicero’s freedman, was the first to invent shorthand, but only for prepositions.[183]
2. After him Vipsanius Philargius and Aquila, Maecenas’s freedman, each added a number of signs. Then Seneca, collecting them all and arranging them and increasing their number, raised the total to 5,000. The signs (notae) are so-called because theydenotewords or syllables by marks,[184]and bring them again to thenoticeof readers, and they who have learned them are now properly callednotarii.
Chapter 27. On orthography.
1. Orthography is Greek, and it means in the Latin correct writing; for ὀρθή in the Greek means correct, and γραφή means writing. This branch of knowledge teaches us how we ought to write. For as the art[185]treats of the inflection of the parts of speech, so orthography deals with the knowledge of writing, as, for example,
ad, when it is a preposition, takes the letterd; when it is a conjunction, the lettert.
2.Haud, when it is an adverb of negation, is terminated by the letterdand is aspirated at the beginning; but when it is a conjunction, it is written with the lettertand is without aspiration.
7. Forsitan ought to be written withnat the end, because its uncorrupted form isforte si tandem.
Chapter 29. On etymology.
1. Etymology is the derivation of words,[186]when the force of a verb or a noun is ascertained through interpretation. This Aristotle called σύμβολον, and Cicero,notatio, because it explains the names of things;[187]as, for example,flumenis so called fromfluere, because it arose from flowing.
2. A knowledge of etymology is often necessary in interpretation, for, when you see whence a name has come, you grasp its force more quickly. For every consideration of athing is clearer when its etymology is known. Not all names, however, were given by the ancients in accordance with nature, but certain also according to whim, just as we sometimes give slaves and estates names according to our fancy.
3. Hence it is that the etymologies of some names are not found, since certain things have received their name not according to the quality in which they originated, but according to man’s arbitrary choice. Etymologies are given in accordance with cause, asregesfromregere, that is,recte agere; or origin, ashomobecause he is from the earth (humus); or from contraries, aslutum(mud) fromlavare—since mud is not clean—andlucus(sacred grove), because being shady it has little light (parum luceat).
4. Certain words also were formed by derivation from other words; asprudensfromprudentia. Certain also from cries, asgraculus(jackdaw) fromgarrulitas. Certain also have sprung from a Greek origin, and have changed over into the Latin, assilva,[188]domus.
5. Other things have derived their names from the names of places, cities, or rivers. Many also are drawn from the languages of foreign peoples; whence their derivation is perceived with difficulty; for there are many barbarous words unknown to the Greeks and Latins.
Chapter 32. On barbarism.
1. Barbarism is the uttering of a word with an error in a letter or in a quantity: a letter, asfloriet, whenflorebitis correct; a quantity, if the first syllable is prolonged instead of the middle one, aslatebrae,tenebrae. And it is called barbarism from the barbarian peoples, since they were ignorant of the purity of Latin speech; for each nation becoming subject to the Romans, transmitted to Rome along with their wealth their faults, both of speech and of morals.
Chapter 37. On tropes.
1. Tropes are so named by the grammarians from a Greek word which in Latin meansmodi locutionum. They areturned from their own meaning to a kindred meaning that is not their own. And it is very difficult to comment on the names of them all, but Donatus gave for practice a list of thirteen selected from the whole number.
2. Metaphor is the assumption of a transfer of meaning in some word, as when we saysegetes fluctuare(the grain-fields billow),vites gemmare, when we do not find any waves or gems in these things, but the words are transferred from the old application to a new one. These and other tropical forms of speech are veiled with figurative cloaks with reference to the things to be understood, with the view that they may exercise the intelligence of the reader, and may not be cheap because they are unadorned and easily apprehended.
22. Allegory is the saying of things that do not belong to the matter in hand (alienoloquium), for one thing is said, another is understood; as,tres in littore cervos conspicit errantes, where the three leaders of the Punic war, or the three Punic wars are indicated; and in theBucolics,aurea mala decem misi,i.e., ten pastoral eclogues to Augustus. There are many species of this figure, of which seven are conspicuous: irony, antiphrasis, enigma, charientismus, paroemia, sarcasmus, astysmus.
23. It is irony where the thought is given a contrary meaning by the manner of speech. By this figure something is said cleverly, either in the way of accusation or insult, as the following:
Vestras, Eure, domos, illa se jactet in aulaAeolus, et clauso ventorum carcere regnet.
Vestras, Eure, domos, illa se jactet in aulaAeolus, et clauso ventorum carcere regnet.
Vestras, Eure, domos, illa se jactet in aula
Aeolus, et clauso ventorum carcere regnet.
And whyaula(palace) if it iscarcer(prison)! It is made clear by the manner of speech, for the manner of speech sayscarcer.Jactet in aulais irony, and the whole is expressed in a contradictory manner of speech by the figure of irony which mocks by praising.
24. Antiphrasis is language to be understood to the contrary, as,lucus(sacred grove), since it is without light (lux) because of the excessive gloom of the woods....
25. Between irony and antiphrasis there is this difference, that irony indicates by the manner of speaking alone what is meant, as when we say to a man doing ill, “Bonum est quod facis”. But antiphrasis indicates the contrary not by the voice of the speaker, but only in the words, whose derivation is the opposite [of their meaning].
Chapter 39. On metres.
4. Whatever is measured by verse feet is a poem (carmen). It is thought that the name was given because it was pronounced rhythmically (carptim), or ... because they who sang such things were supposed to be out of their minds (mente carere).
9. ... [The hexameter] excels the rest of the metres in authority, being alone of them all fitted as well to the greatest tasks as to the small, and with an equal capacity for sweetness and delight.... It is also older than the other metres. It is proved that Moses was the first to use it in the song of Deuteronomy, long before Pherecydes and Homer. Whence also it is evident that the making of poems was older among the Hebrews than among the nations. Since Job, too, who goes back as far as Moses, sang in hexameter verse, [using] the dactyl and the spondee.
12. Hecataeus of Miletus is said to have been the first among the Greeks to compose this metre; or, as others think, Pherecydes of Syros, and this metre before Homer was called Pythian, after Homer, heroic.
17. It is manifest that David the prophet was the first to compose and sing hymns in praise of God. Later among the nations Timothoe who (quae) lived in the time of Ennius, long after David, wrote the first hymns in honor of Apollo and the Muses.Hymniis translated from the Greek to the Latin aslaudes.
25. Among grammarians they are wont to be calledcentoneswho [take] from the poems of Homer and Virgil with a view to their own works, and put together in patchwork fashion many bits found here and there to suit each subject.
26. Proba, wife of Adelphos, composed at great length a cento from Virgil about the structure of the universe and the gospels,[189]the subject-matter being made up verse by verse, and the verses being arranged appropriately to suit the subject-matter. And a certain Pomponius, among other poems (otia) of his own pen, wroteTityrusfrom the same poet in honor of Christ.
Chapter 41. On history.
1. History is the story of what has been done, and by its means what has taken place in the past is perceived. It is called in the Greekhistoria, ἀπὸ τοῦ ἱστορεῖν, that is from seeing (videre) and learning (cognoscere). For among the ancients no one wrote history unless he had been present and witnessed what was to be described. For we understand what we see better than we do what we gather by hearsay.
2. For what is seen is told without lying. This discipline belongs to grammar because whatever is worth remembering is entrusted to letters....
Chapter 42. On the first writers of history.
1. Moses was the first among us to write a history of the beginning of the world. Among the nations Dares Phrygius was the first to publish a history of the Greeks and Trojans, which they say was written by him on palm-leaves.
2. And after Dares, Herodotus is considered the first historian in Greece. After whom Pherecydes was famous, at the time when Esdras wrote the law.
Chapter 43. On the usefulness of history.
1. Histories of the heathen do no harm to their readers where they tell what is useful. For many wise men have put past deeds into their histories for the instruction of the present.
2. Besides, in history the total reckoning of past times and years is embraced and many necessary matters are examined in the light of the succession of consuls and kings.
Chapter 44. On the sorts of history.
1. There are three sorts of history. The doings of one day are calledephemeris. Among us this name isdiarium....
2. What is arranged according to separate months is calledkalendaria.
3.Annalesare the deeds of the years, one by one. For whatever was related in the commentaries from year to year as worthy of memory, in peace and war, by sea and land, they named annals from the deeds of a year.
4. But history is a thing of many years or times, and through diligence in it the yearly commentaries are put into books. Between history and annals there is this difference, that history belongs to the times which we see, and annals belong to years which our age does not know. Whence Sallust is made up of history; Livy, Eusebius and Hieronymus of annals and history.