APPENDIX C: THE LINGUISTIC METHOD OF THE MYTHOLOGISTS.
Already in § 188, I have given an example of myth-interpretation carried on after the current manner: the instance being the myth of Saramâ, which, on the strength of the alleged derivation of the word, one mythologist regards as a figurative account of the dawn, and another as a figurative account of the storm. This conflict seems typical rather than exceptional. Concerning the true renderings of these early words, philologists are often at issue; and no wonder, considering that according to Prof. Max Müller, Sanskrit is “a language which expressed the bright and the divine, the brilliant and the beautiful, the straight and the right, the bull and the hero, the shepherd and the king, by the same terms.” (Rig-Veda, i, 121.) Examples of the resulting confusion are continually thrust on the attention even of outsiders. The Academy for January 17th, 1885, contains a letter in which, speaking patronizingly of Mr. Dwijender Nath Tagore, a young Hindoo philologist, Prof. Max Müller quotes some passages showing that they are at issue concerning “the original meaning [?meanings] of Mâtri, ‘mother’, Bhrâtri, ‘brother’, and Svasri, ‘sister’.” Here are passages showing the disagreement.
“Max Müller says that the meaning of the word Mâtri is Maker (nirmâtri); we say that its meaning is measurer (parimâtri), . . . . Prof. Max Müller says that the primary meaning of bhrâtri is one who bears a burden, but we say it is bhâgin, or sharer,” etc., etc.
In the same number of the Academy is a letter from Mr. Rhys, Professor of Celtic at Oxford, in which, after quoting Dr. Isaac Taylor’s question—“Does anyone doubt that Odin is the wind?” he says—“My impulse would have been just as confidently to ask, Does anyone still think that Odin is the wind?” And then he refers to the first “among the Norse scholars of the present day” as saying that Odin means primarily heaven, and afterwards the god of wisdom. In a subsequent number of the Academy (February 14th), M. Henri Gaidoz remarks on the scepticism likely to be produced concerning mythological interpretations, Edition: current; Page: [843] when “one says Odin is the heaven; another, Odin is the wind; according to a third, Odin is the storm:” adding that “each of these opinions is supported by a learned etymology which pretends to be the genuine one.”
By way of further showing on what a quicksand rests the vast and elaborate structure of mythological interpretations, let me here place for comparison two translations of the same passage in the Rig-Veda:—
R. V. i, 85, 1. “Those who glance forth like wives and yoke-fellows, they are the powerful sons of Rudra on their way. The Maruts have made heaven and earth to grow, they, the strong and wild, delight in the sacrifices.”
“The Maruts who are going forth decorate themselves like females: they are gliders (through the air), the sons of Rudra, and doers of good works, by which they promote the welfare of earth and heaven: heroes, who grind (the solid rocks), they delight in sacrifices.”
Here we see how readily a language like Sanskrit lends itself to those various figurative interpretations in which the mythologists delight.
Deeper than objections hence arising, is an objection which may be made to the assumption on which philologists at large proceed—the assumption that there exists in all cases, or in nearly all cases, a rational root for a word—a root, that is, to which reason may trace back the word’s origin. Now any one who observes the transformations of words and strange deviations of meanings occurring among ourselves, notwithstanding the restraints imposed by education and by printing, will find reason to challenge this assumption. If at present there goes on what may be called by contrast an irrational genesis of words, we may be sure that in early times such a genesis was active, and that a considerable part of language resulted from it. To help us in conceiving the transformations which then took place perpetually, let us observe a few of the transformations which now take place occasionally.
By gardeners and greengrocers the name artichokes has been abridged to “chokes;” and this name appears even in the bills sent to householders. They have made a still greater transformation of the word asparagus. Misapprehension first led them to call it “asparagrass;” then it became “sparrowgrass;” and finally “grass;” which is the name now current in London among those who sell it. In early days before there had arisen any thoughts about correct speech, or any such check upon change as results from literature, these abbreviated and corrupted words would have replaced the original words. And then, if at a later period search had been made for the origins of them, philologists would inevitably have gone wrong. What more obvious than that the name “choke” given to an Edition: current; Page: [844] article of food, must have had reference to some alleged effect of swallowing it; or what more obvious than that the name “grass” arose from a mistaken classing of the plant with grasses at large?
Agreeing as we must with the philologists that from the beginning dialectical changes have been perpetually transforming words, let us note some of the transformations which dialects of our own language exhibit, that we may help ourselves to imagine what must have resulted from kindred divergences during thousands of years. In the Berkshire dialect, the word “that” has become “thak;” and in the Devonshire dialect “this” has become “thickie.” On referring to “The general table of Grimm’s Law,” as given in Prof. Max Müller’s Science of Language, vol. ii, p. 246, I see no precedent for a change of the s into the k. Passing over this, however, I put a further question. Possibly the additional syllable in the metamorphosed word “thickie” might not prevent identification of it as modification of “this,” when its grammatical uses were studied. But suppose that in conformity with Grimm’s law, which shows that in Gothic th may be represented by d, and in old high German becomes d; suppose, I say, that this word “thickie” became “dickie,” what philologist would then be able to identify it with “this”? Again, in the Somersetshire dialect “uncle” has become “nunk.” Who, in the absence of written language, would find the true derivation of this word? Who would imagine that it had descended from the Latin avunculus? Even were it admitted that the dropping of the first syllable and of the last two syllables, might be suspected without the aid of books (which is extremely improbable), what warrant could be given for supposing a change of the remaining syllable vunk into nunk? Grimm’s law does not show us that v changes into n; and in the absence of books there would be no clue. Once more, in the Somersetshire dialect “if” has become “nif.” Instead of that abridgement commonly undergone by words in course of time, we here have expansion—a prefixed consonant. It seems not unlikely that this change arose from the habit of always using “if” with a prefixed “and”—“and if;” which, quickly spoken, became “an’ if,” and still more quickly spoken “nif;” but though this supposition is countenanced by a change in the same dialect of the word “awl” into “nawl” (which, probably at first “an awl,” became “a nawl”), it does not harmonize with the associated change of “lunch” into “nunch.” But however it has arisen, this growth of “if” into “nif” is one which effectually hides the derivation of the word. Were the Somersetshire dialect to become an independent language, as it might have done in times like those of the primitive Aryans, no philologist Edition: current; Page: [845] could have traced “nif” to its root. The conclusion that “nif,” used as the sign of a hypothetical proposition, was derived from “gif,” meaning to hand over something, would have seemed utterly unwarranted by the meaning, and quite at variance with the laws of phonetic change.
Beyond such obscurations as these, there are obscurations caused by introductions of new words needed in new occupations, institutions, processes, games, etc., which are subsequently transferred to other spheres of use, while their original uses cease. We have an instance in the name “booking-office,” as applied at railway-stations. Why booking-office? Young people cannot say; though people whose memories go back fifty years can. In the old coaching-days, when the accommodation for passengers was small, it was a usual precaution to secure a place one or more days before the day of an intended journey. A clerk entered in a book the passenger’s name, the place taken by him, and the date for which he took it. He was then said to be “booked;” and hence the office was called a booking-office. Railway-managers had at first a slightly modified system. There was a book with paper tickets and counterfoils, of a kind like that now used in post-offices for registering letters. On paying his fare the passenger had his name written on the ticket and counterfoil, and the ticket was then torn off and given to him. This method was in use on the London and North Western Railway (then the London and Birmingham) as late as 1838, if not later. Presently came the invention of that little stamping apparatus which made it economical of time and trouble to adopt the stiff tickets now universally used. The books and booking disappeared, but the name “booking-office” survived. When all who remember pre-railway days are dead, any one who asks the derivation of the word “booking” as thus applied, will be utterly misled if he sets out with the ordinary assumption that the word has arisen by modifications of some word having an appropriate meaning. Railway-business, or rather railway-making, supplies us with another familiar instance. Labourers occupied in excavating cuttings and forming embankments, are called “navvies.” Whence the name? In future times any one who asserts that “navvy” is short for navigator, will probably be laughed at. How is it credible that a man occupied in digging and wheeling earth, should be called by a name which signifies one who sails the seas, and especially one who directs the course of a ship? Yet impossible as this affiliation will seem to those ignorant of recent history, it is the true one. In the days when they were made, canals were thought of as lines of inland navigation—so commonly so, that sometimes a tavern built by the side of a canal was called a “Navigation Edition: current; Page: [846] Inn.” Hence it happened that the men employed in excavating canals were called “navigators,” and for brevity “navvies.” When railway-making began to replace canal-making, the same class of men being employed in kindred work, carried with them this abbreviated name, now no longer having even a remotely appropriate meaning. And the name has eventually been established as applying to any man engaged on earthworks of whatever kind. Now if, even in our times, there are aberrant origins of words—if these are at present numerous among the uncultured, how multitudinous must they have been among early peoples, who, on the one hand, were not restrained by education from making changes, and who, on the other hand, were compelled by the poverty of their vocabularies to use metaphors far more than they are used now! Indeed, as extension of the meanings of words by metaphor has played a chief part in the genesis of language, we may conclude that the metaphorically-derived words which eventually became established and apparently independent, form the most numerous class of words. And we may further conclude that since modifications go on very rapidly in early speech, the connexions of such words with the words from which they were derived were most of them soon lost, and endeavours now made to find their derivations must consequently be futile.
It has been replied to me when I have raised objections of this kind, that philologists distinguish between words of which the roots can be found, and words of which the roots cannot be found. At the time when this reply was given, little force was recognized in my rejoinder, that no trustworthy test is assignable; but I abide by this rejoinder until a trustworthy test is assigned. It seems to me impossible to devise any method by which there may be distinguished words of which it is hopeless to find the derivations, from words of which the derivations may reasonably be sought. Indeed, false derivations sometimes present far more the appearance of true derivations than do many of the derivations which really are true. Here are some extracts from an imaginary dictionary of derivations, which we will suppose to be compiled a century hence.
Burke, v. t. From a root which meant a refuge, usually inclosed, but which from the original sense of inclosure with security came to mean inclosure with suppression. In Icelandic, Swedish, and Danish we have borg, “a fort or castle;” in Anglo-Saxon we have burh, burg; and in middle English we have burgh, borgh, “a place of shelter.” In middle English borwgh meant “a den, cave, or lurking-place,” whence in English came burrow and borough. Anglo-Saxon had also the word beorgan to protect, which, as usual, dropped the terminal syllable. Hence, as borg, burh, burgh meant a place of shelter or fortified place, to beorg meant to protect by inclosure; and this beorg or beorgh changing its guttural (as the Scotch word loch has changed into the English lock), finally became burke. But a place made secure by walls is also a place of imprisonment; and the meaning of Edition: current; Page: [847] being shut in eventually became the predominant meaning. A clear analogy is furnished by the changed use of the word prevent. Of old, as in the Bible (Ps. lix, 10) and in the Church of England service, it meant to go before with the effect of helping, but it now means to go before with the effect of arresting. In like manner to burgh or burke, having originally meant to inclose with the effect of protection, has come to mean to inclose with the effect of suppression. Hence a discussion is said to be burked when it is suppressed. How natural is the connexion of ideas may be perceived at a public meeting, when, to a prosy speaker, there comes a shout of “shut up.” Here there is obviously in this process of burking a speech, an unconscious reference to the original fortified place, which, while it may be shut up to keep out foes, may also be shut up to imprison inhabitants.
Now when, in a few generations, there has been forgotten the story of the murderers Burke and Hare, who suffocated their victims by clapping pitch-plasters on their mouths, this might very well pass for a true derivation. The changes are natural, and not greater than those which continually occur. But let us take another case.
Post, v. t. To put a letter or packet into a place whence it is taken for delivery by public officials. This word is derived from the substantive post, a piece of timber set upright,—a name which was commonly transferred to an upright pillar of iron (at one time not infrequently an old cannon) fixed at the corner of a street or other public place. The hollow iron upright receptacles for letters, which in large towns were placed at the corners of streets, were for this reason called posts. Hence to post a letter meant to put a letter into one of these hollow iron posts; just as to warehouse goods meant to put goods into a warehouse, or to ship a cargo meant to put a cargo into a ship.
I do not see how a century hence any one could, without an elaborate inquiry, detect the fallacy of this derivation; and in the absence of a literature, detection of the fallacy would be impossible. Far less licence is taken than philologists habitually take, and far fewer reasons for scepticism can be assigned. We shall at once see this when we look at some samples of the derivations which are put forth and widely accepted.
It is said that the Aryan word which in Sanskrit is Dyaus, eventually became Tŷr in Old Norse. This may be true; though to establish such a strange genealogy seems to call for more evidence than has survived during the lapse of thousands of years, filled with numerous migrations and consequent social changes. One may admit it as possible that our word daughter comes from an ancient word duhitar, milker, from duh, to milk; though in accepting this conclusion we have to suppose that an earlier word for daughter (which must have existed before the Aryans reached the cattle-keeping stage) was replaced by this new word, notwithstanding the inapplicability of the new word to daughters in childhood and to married daughters. Prof. Max Müller may be right in tracing back the various European names for the moon to a primitive name which in Sanskrit is mâs; and it may be, as he says, that “this mâs in Sanskrit Edition: current; Page: [848] is clearly derived from a root mâ, to measure, to mete” (Science of Language, i, 7); though if, as he supposes, “the moon was originally called by the farmer the measurer,” we must suppose either that before the Aryans reached the farming stage and also the stage at which the general use of measures had generated the conception of measuring, there existed no name for the moon, or else that the pre-existing familiar name had its place usurped by this unfamiliar metaphorical name: the usurpation being one which suggests the probability that in America “shooting-iron” will by-and-by replace rifle. But without contesting the correctness of these derivations, one may naturally ask by what criterion they are distinguished from the false derivations given above:—nay, may even naturally ask how it happens that the false ones have a greater apparent probability than these alleged true ones.
Fully to appreciate the linguistic method of interpreting myths, we must, however, contemplate an example. Here is an abbreviated passage from the Lectures on the Science of Language, vol. ii, pp. 395-9.
“From rik in the sense of shining, it was possible to form a derivative ríkta, in the sense of lighted up, or bright. This form does not exist in Sanskrit, but as kt in Sanskrit is liable to be changed into ks, we may recognize in riksha the same derivative of rik. Riksha, in the sense of bright, has become the name of the bear, so called either from his bright eyes or from his brilliant tawny fur. The same name, riksha, was given in Sanskrit to the stars, the bright ones. . . . Now, remember, that the constellation here called the Rikshas, in the sense of the bright ones, would be nomonymous in Sanskrit with the Bears. . . . You will now perceive the influence of words on thought, or the spontaneous growth of mythology. The name riksha was applied to the bear in the sense of the bright fuscous animal, and in that sense it became most popular in the later Sanskrit, and in Greek and Latin. The same name, in the sense of the bright ones, had been applied by the Vedic poets to the stars in general, and more particularly to that constellation, which in the northern parts of India, was the most prominent. . . . The Hindus also forgot the original meaning of riksha. It became a mere name, apparently with two meanings, star and bear. In India, however, the meaning of bear predominated, and as riksha became more and more the established name of the animal, it lost in the same degree its connection with the stars.”
So that setting out from the root rik shining and the derivative ríkta (which might have existed in Sanskrit but did not), and assuming that the changed derivative riksha was applied to the bear because of his “bright eyes,” or “brilliant tawny fur” (traits which do not distinguish him from other animals), we have built up for us by various other assumptions and suggestions the interpretation of the Great Bear myth!
To complete our conception we must not forget a certain postulate with which this method of interpretation sets out;—the postulate, namely, that there were originally certain roots supernaturally given. Says Prof. Max Müller—“nothing new Edition: current; Page: [849] has ever been added to the substance of language . . . all its changes have been changes of form . . . no new root or radical has ever been invented by later generations, as little as one single element has ever been added to the material world in which we live . . . in a very just sense, we may be said to handle the very words which issued from the mouth of the son of God, when he gave names to ‘all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field!’ ” (Science of Language, vol. i, 28-9). Hence the implication is that while those divisions of language which we know anything about, have arisen by processes of evolution, there was a special creation preceding the evolution—an endowment of linguistic capital in the shape of roots having abstract meanings. Further, we are taught that mankind lost their original ability to frame abstract ideas and use the corresponding abstract words; and that whether or not there was any other “fall of man,” there was a linguistic fall of man.
Thus as a basis for the “science” of language, we are asked to accept the Hebrew legend of the creation. Then the linguistic theory built upon this foundation of legend, is used as a key to the “science” of religion; which “science” of religion sets out with absolute negations of the two fundamental methods of science. It asserts, as innate in the primitive man, a religious consciousness which instead of being proved to exist by an induction from many cases is not exemplified in a single case; and for the established deduction from the laws of thought, that the development of ideas is from concrete to abstract, it substitutes the assertion that the development of religious ideas has been from the abstract to the concrete. Lastly, the conclusions reached by taking a modified Babylonian superstition as a postulate, and reasoning by inverted scientific methods, we are asked to accept instead of the conclusions which observation of the languages and religions of rude tribes of men everywhere force upon us!