gin of Hippocrates have often passed into the text. As the ignorance of the ancient language increased, a more popular and simple form of composition was necessary for the generality of readers; the Alexiads of Anna Comnena were translated into the vulgar speech; and the same idiom was adopted by Nicetas, who had written his history at first in ancient Greek.*

The intercourse with those nations which at different times invaded the empire, or settled in parts of it, introduced many new words and expressions, and changed the form of the Greek tongue. In the seventh century the Saracens established themselves in Asia Minor, and Iconium became the capital of their new kingdom; they also subdued Syria, and both Syriac and Greek yielded to the language of the conquerors. In the ninth century, the Venetians traded with the Byzantines, and in the reign of Alexius Comnenus they settled in the city and intermarried with some of the noble families. From the ninth to the eleventh centuries, the Bulgarians were engaged in commerce with the Greeks; and the Hungarians succeeded them in the countries which lie between Constantinople and Germany. In the tenth century the Turks extended their conquests from Persia to the Hellespont; and in the eleventh the empire was attacked in the west by Roger the Norman.

Vulgarisms of various kinds had infected the Greek tongue before the sixth century; but as many manuscripts have been destroyed, we are not able to trace the progress of this corruption. Some of the volumes contained what Photius calls λέξεις πεπατημένας, ἀγοραίους, ἐκ τριόδου. The Romans brought with them many new words and peculiarities of sound and idiom; but the changes were chiefly derived from the neglect and inattention of the Greeks themselves. In some districts of the empire, as we learn from an epigram of Palladas, a practice prevailed of clipping, or shortening the final syllables of words.

Τὸν θώ, καὶ τὰς κνή, τὰν τ ̓ ἄσπιδα καὶ δόρυ, καὶ κρα,

Γορδιοπριλάριος ἄνθετο Τιμοθέου.†

The compositions of the vulgar poets, in the later ages of the Byzantine empire, influenced the pronunciation of their countrymen; for, according to the measures of their verses, they used, ἔλεγαν οι ἐλέγασι, λέγεις οι λές, λέγει oι λέ, λέγομεν oι λέμεν, λέγετε or λέτε, λέγουσιν or λέγουν.

The origin of different Italian idioms, the use of auxiliaries, and the termination of various words have been traced by Maffei to Latin modes of speech. Tantum de cartis for tanla carta occurs

*Gronovii Observ. Liber Novus. Salmas. F. L. H. 208.

The words are Oúgana, nvnuidaç, ngavos. See Anthol. Pal. t. iii. part 1. p. 142. Notes.

VOL. XXIII. NO. XLV.

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in Vopiscus; the vulgar, as Salmasius has remarked, were accustomed to say caput de aquila, the head of the eagle.' Volusiano and Gallo are found on coins, as nominatives, instead of Volusianus and Gallus; Satis jam dictum habeo (ho gia detto abbastanza); de Cæsare habeo dictum; habere cognitum Scævolam (aver cognosciuto); cognitum habeo insulas; habere notata; conductos haberet; are cited by Maffei from Plautus, Cicero, Pliny. De Davo audivi (l'ho inteso da Davo), de nocte abiit (partì di notte), are in Plautus and Terence. Hunc Theatrum, hunc prodigium, and other solocisms were introduced before the invasion of Italy by the Goths; and a singular document of the time of Justinian proves the corruption which had already taken place.† The Romaic language likewise contains many forms of ancient date; some, as Coray has shewn, are remains of the dialects. The changes and the omission of letters were probably frequent at an early period among the lower orders ; καλό, κακό, for καλόν, κακόν, were familiar at least to the contemporaries of Aristophanes, though not perhaps adopted by them; as, in one of his Comedies, a Scythian uses, καλό, γλυκερό, πανουργό. (Thesm. 1112, 1187.)

This mode of terminating similar adjectives in o instead of ov may have been common with the barbarian settlers in the empire; and from them, perhaps, the natives derived this vicious pronunciation. With respect, however, to the word exw, so frequently employed as an auxiliary in Romaic, it is not necessary to adopt the opinion of those who think it was particularly used by the ignorant invaders of the empire unable to follow the Greek inflections of the verbs; when we find the Greeks themselves acquainted with such forms as θαυμάσας ἔχω, ἔχεις δου λώσας, ἀτιμάσας ἔχει, γήμας ἔχει, ουτήσας ἔχεις, βεβουλευκώς x. Among other idioms which may be traced back to a distant time, we may mention the practice of adding a to the subjunctive, instead of using the infinitive. We read in Plutarch, Πείθωμεν τὴν Τελεσίππαν ἵνα μένῃ μεθ' ἡμῶν, where, says his last learned editor, va μévy is used for μéve; and in Leo, the author of an epigram in the Anthologia, we meet with the same form, Εἰπὲ κασιγνήτῃ κρατεροὺς ἵνα θῆρας ἐγείρῃ, ut excitet, excitare. It deserves to be remarked that the same mode of expression is in use among the inhabitants of part of France. Jamais en Anjou dans le Craonnais et dans les autres districts de cette province on ne dit je voudrois faire, je voudrois aller, mais, comme le Gree moderne, je voudrois que je ferois, je voudrois que j'irois.§

* Barthii Adversaria, l. iii.

↑ Quoted in Morhof. de Pat. Liviana.

Herod. i. 27. Eurip. Med. 33. Soph. Ed. T. 577. ib. 699. Ed. C. 701. This form, as Mr. Knight observes, is not found in Homer: et Atticorum venia dixerim, recentiorum magis barbariem, quam veterum elegantiam sapit.' Prol. sec. 148,

Zalikoglu, Dict. Grec. et François.

The

The use of "As in the sense of 'let' so common in Romaic, occurs in Theophanes, a writer of the ninth century, and in Constantine Porphyrogennetus who lived in the tenth.* Other Romaic words and expressions are found in the same work of Theophanes; as, cápavra, forty,' Táva 'I take,' xaλoxaígiov, 'summer,' σημισείου for ἡμισέως, ευφήμουν for ευφημοῦσι, and the termination in ty, for sov, as μανδύλιν, παιδίν, θυσιαστηρίν. In Constantine we find the Romaic ἦτον for ἦν, βασιλέα the accusative used instead of the nominative βασιλεύς, σικώνειν, ferre, ἀρχοντόπουλοι filii archontum, xawouрyeiv, novum facere.

It appears, therefore, from these instances that the barbarisms of the language were not confined to the lower orders; but were employed in writing even by persons of rank and education. The treatise De Administrando Imperio,' from which some of the preceding vulgarisms are selected, was addressed by Constantine, one of the most learned of the Greek emperors, to his son. The two best scholars of the last days of the Byzantine monarchy, Constantine Lascaris and Bessario used the same depraved idiom; the epistle of the latter to the preceptor of the sons of Thomas Palæologus is written entirely in modern Greek. Philelphus, indeed, assures us, that the courtiers and ladies of rank at Byzantium spoke the ancient language with purity and elegance; but we also know that they likewise employed the vulgar idiom of their times, differing very little from that which is still in use.

It is, however, owing to the cultivation of the language, which was continued to the late period mentioned by Philelphus, that the affinity of the Romaic to the Hellenic is much greater than that of the Italian to the Latin. Amidst the corruptions of the neoteric Greek, we observe in almost every sentence words strictly Hellenic, many of which are recognised by every reader as in use among the best writers of the language, and still retaining their form unaltered; there are also others of frequent occurrence in later Greek writers and in Romaic, the date of which is more ancient than is commonly supposed, This part of the subject might be illustrated by many curious examples: a few are subjoined, Nepó, Nnpó,' water.' No other word is ever used in Romaic to denote water.' 'Ev vnpois μuxois, in humidis recessibus,' occurs in Lycophron; and Νηρεύς, Νηρίον, Νηρηΐδες, Νηρίτης, have

See the work, De Administrando Imperio, edited by Meursius. From one of the Prefaces of Coray now before us, we select the following instances, shewing how ἵνα, θέλω, ἔχω, "Ας are used in Romaic. Ἐλπίζω ὅτι θέλει εὑρεθῆ ὅστις μέλλει νὰ καθαρίση, I hope that some one will be found, who is about to cleanse.'Orav ʼn yλwooα παρήκμαζεν, ἢ εἶχεν ἤδη παράκμασει. • When the language was declining, or had already declined.' Ας με συγχωρήσῃ ὁ φίλος Γαζὴς νὰ σημείωσω. Let Gazi allow me to remark.' 'Aç or 'Aps is corrupted from "Apes. "Apes idov in St. Matthew, would be Ας ἴδωμεν in Romaic.

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all significations referring to the same thing. Salmasius and Hemsterhuys assign a great antiquity to the word. In vulgari -profecto lingua,' says the latter, 'non pauca sunt ab ultima retro antiquitate repetenda; sicuti cum aquam appellant Nepo': de qua voce vide sis Hesychium.'

"Aλoyo, a horse.' It is found in Diogenes Laertius, a writer of the third century, applied to a beast of burthen.' In the Scholiast on the Ajax Mastigophorus of Sophocles, it bears the signi fication of horse.'

Πολλὰ τὰ ἔτη, is the ordinary salutation in the present day in Greece. It was used in the acclamations of the Greek councils; and ἔτη πολλὰ, Ιουστινιανέ, is the cry of one of the factions at Byzantium. In convoking the ecclesiastical synods, the emperors employed the phrases τὴν ἡμετέραν Θειότητα, τῇ ἡμετέρᾳ ἡμερότητι. Similar formulæ occur in neoteric Greek.

Διάλεγμα in Romaic signifies Εκλογή, selectio. It was used in the same sense, thirteen centuries ago, by Stephanus Byzantinus. Tupos, 'circle,' in Romaic: employed also with the same meaning by Menander and the Alexandrians.

"Аonроi, money,' a word derived by the Byzantines from the Latin. Good money was called 'probum et asperum.' In probo et aspero solvere, occurs in Seneca.

Пlopvoxóros is used by Menander; and many words, according to Coray, are formed in Romaic in a similar manner, as Metoxóπos, Χαροκόπος, Στενοκόπος, Σταυροκοπῶ.

'Opopiaios was lately discovered by Hase in a writer of the twelfth century; it is, he remarks, insolita vox; but it occurs in an Athenian inscription published by Chandler and Wilkins, the date of which precedes the archonship of Euclid.

Tapos is used by the Byzantines and modern Greeks in the sense of suvoucía. It bore a similar meaning in ancient times. (Villoison, Proleg. ad Hom. xxxviii.)

Exopoda. This word is always written and pronounced in Romaic Exópoa. It occurs in the same form in the Septuagint, Num. x. 15. and in the Geoponica: and in the compounds, ¿píorxopdov σκορδόπρασον in Dioscorides.

Karex is used in Athenæus in the sense of ' I know.' Hodiernis Græcis, maxime Cretensibus, xaréxw est plane synonymum verborum olda, yiyvarxa. (Coray, in Athen.)

'Idiopa, dignity, gravity, respectability of appearance,' in modern Greek. In the poem of Erotocritus,* we read,

Πεζοὶ μὲ ζάλα μετρητὰ καὶ διῶμα πορπατοῦσαν,

'Pedestres pedetentim et cum gravitate incedebant.' The word This poem, as Col. Leake says, is one of the most esteemed in Romaic. It is certainly one of the longest: it consists of 10,000 lines.

ἰδίωμα,

idiana, according to Coray, was used also in a similar sense by Theopompus.

Yap, fish,' in Romaic. 'Oάpiov, a small fish,' is found in St. John's Gospel, vi. v. 9.

Πάντα is used now for πάντοτε; it occurs in Lucian in this sense twice.

The ancient Greeks applied χειρομάχαν πληθὺν to those who obtained their living by their own hands. The Greeks now use χερομάχος.

You, the common word for 'bread' in Romaic. In the Septua+ gint version of Job, wuòs has the same meaning.-c. xxii. v. 7. 'Ao, silver,' in Romaic. The word occurs in Eusebius, Ε. Η. 1. 1. καὶ μετὰ ταῦτα προσέταξε δοθῆναι ἀυτῷ χρυσὸν καὶ ἄσημον.

Xgóvos, a year,' in modern Greek. The use of it, instead of Evaros, is found also in the same work of Eusebius.

Kgari, wine,' in Romaic. Kgaua, a word of the same meaning, was used in the time of Justin Martyr for wine.' "Tdatos xa! xgáμatos, Aquæ et vini.' Apol. 2. et Græci recentiores xgaoí, et xgάoιov pro vino simpliciter dicunt.' Gataker Adv. Post. c. v. p. 452.

'Avaoτpoon, in ancient Greek, has the sense of the French word cercle, and the Italian, conversazione. Neo-Græci,' says Coray, • συναναστροφὴν eodem usurpant sensu.

Αλύπητα has the signification in modern Greek of ἀφειδῶς. In the passage of Eschylus,

Εψου· μηδὲ λυπηθῇς πύρι,

unde unos declarandum est ex Neogræcorum lingua, Ne parce. (Coray in Athen. 1. ix. c. 17.)

Σπαθή is the usual word to express a sword in Romaic. Σπάθη autem vox pura Græca est. (See Jul. Pollux. 10, 31. Fabroti, Gloss. Cedreni.)

Kapáß, the common term in Romaic to denote a ship or vessel. Scapha a Græcis jurisconsultis xápaßoi dicuntur.' (Heinsii Ex. Sacræ in Act. Apos. 320.)

There are two subjects connected with the present inquiry, namely, the pronunciation of the letters of the language, and the accentual mode of reading and speaking, on which we shall beg leave to offer a few concluding remarks.

I. AI and E are pronounced alike by the modern Greeks; Villoison has shewn that they were confounded in the time of Augustus; and, in an epigram of Callimachus, exe answers in echo to vaixi The similarity of sound prevailed at a much earlier period; we find AAKMENIAHΣ on the Sandwich marble; and in an anK 3 cient