Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 11.djvu/144

Rh slight gradations. The influence of mixed populations is often seen to tell upon their language ; and sometimes race distinctions do not tally with those of dialect ; thus the ^Eolians of the Peloponnesus adopted a dialect essentially Dorian, while the Dorians of Halicarnassus spoke Ionian. It is often a matter of dispute under which head a partic ular dialect shall be placed, and whatever division may be made, connecting links are sure to be found between mem bers of different groups.

&mdash;This is usually subdivided into four chief dialects : (1) Lesbian, (2) Thessalian and (?) Macedonian, (3) Bœotian, (4) Elean and Arcadian. It has been maintained by some high authorities, e.g., by Kirchhoff, that Lesbian alone ought to be considered Mblic, and that not only Elean and Arcadian, which Ahrens admits come nearer to Doric, but even Boeotian and Thessalian ought to be ranked as Doric. On the other hand, Professor E. Curtius denies to /Eolic the character of a dialect, and holds that it is rather a name for those remains, preserved in different localities, of the more ancient form of the language, and that everything which was not Doric or Ionic was called by the ancients JEolic. We shall find, however, that some of the distinctive features of the Lesbian dialect, which has the fullest right to be called ^Eolie, were certainly not primitive, but of later origin, so that we can hardly accept this view. The extent to which various dialects admit of being grouped together will be best examined after a survey of their special characteristics.

Lesbio-Æolic.&mdash;The sources for this dialect are (1) inscriptions, and (2) the statements of grammarians, based mainly upon quotations from Alcseus and Sappho. Of the former, there are only three of great importance, one found at Mytilene, recording the return of some exiles in the time of Alexander the Great (Corpus Inscrip. Grccc., No. 2166); another found at Pordoselena, an island close to Lesbos, of a few years later (ib., 2166c) ; and a third, of the same date as the first, found at Eresus and edited by Conze and Sauppe. The poets are of great value, because they appear to have written in the pure dialect of their country, and not to have framed a conventional language for themselves. The 28th and 29th idylls of Theocritus, called by the scholiast ./Eolic, are naturally a more suspicious source. The grammarians with one accord lay stress upon the tendency to barytone pronunciation as a mark of holism. The word is accented on the last syllable : for ffo(p6s, 6v/j.6s, AxAAeus, /3apvs, and the like, the Lesbians said adcpos, OV/AOS, AxiAAevy, ftdpvs. This tendency has often been adduced, along with the loss of the dual, to prove a closer connexion of ./Eolic than of any other Greek dialect with Latin ; it is rather a striking proof of the danger of drawing such deductions from phenomena of purely independent origin (cf. Schrader in Curtius s Studien, x. 259). The grammarians also tell us that /Eolic did not use the rough breathing. The in scriptions date from a time when the aspirate was not written ; and the MSS. are not sufficiently trustworthy to give us much help. But there are instances enough in which a tennis preceding a syllable which in ordinary Greek begins with the rough breathing appears in /Eolic as an aspirate Ahrens quotes nine, besides the article and the demonstrative and relative to show that aspiration was not unknown. It is to be noticed that in all these instances the rough breathing represents a primitive s or j. The same authorities assert that /Eolic was distinguished by its retention of the digamma, and hence this letter is called by Quintilian and Priscian &quot;/Eolium digammon ;&quot; but inscriptions show that, though more common in /Eolic than in Ionic, it was much less faithfully retained in the former than among the Boeotians and Dorians. Before p it was commonly hardened into j3, between vowels vocalized into v. Of the distinctively /Eolic phonetic laws, the following deserve special notice. When in other dialects has originated in Sj, it usually appears as er8 ; /3pi&amp;lt;r8a = /$i a. Liquids are very frequently doubled, usually as a result of assimilation: e.g., vvvff or &amp;lt;rv, as eyevvaro, urtwas, /j.-fjufos (cf. mcnsis), e/x/ii, &pyevvos ; vv = vj, as Ktvvos, KK IVVW (so rpBeppw); vv = vf, as y&vvos = yovv6s. 2cr is retained, where primitive, while Attic often drops it : peffffos, f&amp;lt;r&amp;lt;rovTai, JWos. IT assimilates a following p. instead of being assimilated by it: 6inrara ! =i &amp;gt;/j.^.ara (oV-yUara), yp6irira.Ta.= ypd/jL/AaTa. (ypa.rj&amp;gt;-fj.aTa). Before ff, v generally passes into i, forming a diphthong with a preceding vowel : TaAais, Att. raAas for Ta.Xa.v-s ; irais, Att. iras for TTO.VT-S, SO irpeiroiaais = irpeTrovT-iav-s, ff6&amp;lt;pa.is, Att. ffo&amp;lt;f&amp;gt;a.s for crofidv-s, tyotffi, Att. Ae yotxn. Of the vowels, a is sometimes retained, when it has been &quot;dulled&quot; in Attic, e.g., 8ra. (=**ore), vird=vir ; but more commonly it passes into o, especially when in contact with liquids, e.g., ffrpSros, t&amp;lt;pQop- 6at, bfjivdaQ-riv (^dva^vrjffQ^vai} this may be regarded as a char acteristic mark of holism ; o often becomes v, e. g, #&amp;lt;r8os = oos ; so d.irvS6fj.evai ; a is retained as in Ionic, when Ionic has 77, but TJ has its proper place where it has originated in a lengthened e, e.g., afj. ir6tv, ffrdav ( = arr-f]i]v). For ei and o TJ and co are commonly used : ffvfj.&amp;lt;f&amp;gt;epr)v, xtp, KTJVOS, lapavos, K&pos. The t of diphthongs is often omitted : &ddea = a.ji6tia ; Aax^c for Aaxohjv (cf. the popular Attic TroeiV). In contraction ao becomes a, KpoviSa; eo ev, /SeAevs ; oo co, avdpuirw. The apparent diseresis of diphthongs is sometimes due to a retention of the uncontracted form ; some times, as in 6 iSa in Alcajus, & i in inscriptions, it is real. In noun-inflexion, besides the changes produced by these phonetic laws, we may notice the loss of the dual, and also a tendency to metaphrastic forms, especially the accusative in v from consonantal stems. In verb -inflexion there is a 2d sing, in -ado, fXfffQa, but not the Doric 1st plur. in -fj.es ; the 3d plur. ends in -icn (as noticed above); and contracted verbs commonly follow the earlier conjugation in -pi, &amp;lt;f&amp;gt;ir)/j.i, So/ci yuco/u (the grammarians add, but probably incorrectly, yeaifj.i). The general character of /Eolic was much less hard and vigorous than that of Doric ; it was distinguished by a quick tripping utter ance, as contrasted with the Doric slow deliberateness ; the verse of the /Eolic poet abounds in dactyls and anapaests. To the Athenians the language of Lesbos seemed somewhat outlandish, so that, though it was doubtless an exaggeration, it was not an absurd one, for Plato (Protag., 341c) to represent Prodicus as saying of Pittacus are AeV/Sios $iv /cat ev (fxavfj Papfidpu Tf6pafj.[j.ti&amp;gt;os.

The Thessalian dialect is known only by a few inscriptions, the most important of which were discovered by Leake and Rangiibe. It forms a kind of link between Lesbian and Boeotian, doubling liquids, changing a into o, and dropping the j of diphthongs with the former, but agreeing with the latter in the use of an infinitive in -/j.ev. It is also characterized by the use of on for a ; e.g., Airovv for Air^AAcoi, ovdovfj.a. a.vd(i}fj,a ; cf. dTrb Tas rovv rayoTiv yvovfj.as; and the genitive sing, ends in -01 (for oto) instead of -on ; e.g., AvTiyfveioi favTos, Ato&quot;xuAts ^arvpot. The general character of the dialect confirms the tradition that the earlier common home of the Lesbians and the Boeotians was in Thessaly.

The Bœotian dialect is knownmainly from inscriptions. The scanty Booot fragments of Corinna have come down to us mixed with Ionic forms ; and the specimens of the Boeotian dialect given by Aristophanes in the Acharnians and Eubulus inhis Antiopa are still more corrupted by an intermixture of Attic. The Boeotians differed from the Lesbians in many not unimportant points. (1) They had no tendency to throw the accent back. (2) They liked the rough breathing. (3) They retained an earlier r, or changed it into 0, where the Lesbians had a: (4) A Lesbian &amp;lt;r8 ( = ) appears in Boeotian as 85. (5) The Lesbian doubling of liquids and change of vs to is are unknown in Boeotian. (6) In inflexion Boeotian retains -ao and -au&amp;gt;v, which Lesbian contracts. (7) The Boeotian genitives are e /xovs, reovs, iovs, the Lesbian ep.e0ev, &amp;lt;re6ev, tOev. Further, Boeotian changes to t before vowels, v to ou, TJ to ei, ei to i, and 01 to u, all which changes are unknown to Lesbian ; cf., e.g., Boeot. Oi6s, novves, ovfj.es, avedeiKf, iroe iTas, fiacriXios, TV Sdfj.o, fvKid, &c. As against these numerous differences there are but few points of resemblance, except such as would be shared by all the Dorian dialects. A few peculiar words shared by both are noticed by Beerman (Curt., Stud., ix. p. 85), and he lays stress upon their agreement in -fj.ev (1 plur.) as contrasted with the Doric -fj.es, on the feminine terminations -is and -co (&quot;Aeis, 2aVc/&amp;gt;co, Mai/rco, &c. ), and on the common use of patronymic adjectives instead of the genitive of the father s name. But it may fairly be said that these Avould not have been regarded as sufficient indications of a close connexion, unless the traditional evidence in its favour had been so strong. We must assume that the Lesbian emigrants changed their language more rapidly than those who had moved less far from their earlier home.

The Elean dialect is represented by Strabo (viii. p. 333) as being also JEolic. This tradition is decidedly rejected by Ahrens, and is very doubtful. The most recent discussion of the question (by Schrader in Curtius s Studien, x. 267 sqq. ) advocates the theory that the Eleans separated from the rest of the Greeks at a time ante cedent to the distinction between JEolic and Doric. This practically coincides with the view of Ahrens that, while it has many points of contact with Doric, and especially with Laconian, it is really a dis tinct dialect, and is confirmed by the inscriptions, of which the most important are the ancient bronze plate brought back from Olympia by Sir W. Gell (C. I. G. 11) recording a treaty between the Eleans and the Herseans, and the recently discovered inscription of Damocrates, edited by Kirchhoff (Archccol. Zcit., 1876). It agrees with Lesbian in the nom. sing. masc. in a, reAe crra, and the ace. plur. masc. in ois (-oip) for ov-s. It resembles the northern Doric in the use of ev with the ace. , in the apocope of irepl to trap, and in a heteroclite dat. plur. in -ois (aycavotp), and Laconian in a complete retention of the digamma, (changed in the later inscrip tions to /3), in the change of final s into p (e.g., Toip, &oip, n-po^ffoip, fSoiKiap^FoiKias), and in the change of a medial s into the rough breathing (iro-fiaorffcu = iroiTi(ra(T9ai). The last two, and also the use of /3 for f, are much less usual in the early than in the later inscriptions ; and the same is the case with Laconian ; hence the phenomena point rather to a later action of one dialect upon the other than to a close original connexion. Much light may be