Page:Language and the Study of Language.djvu/387

X.] its substantial independence, is so modified in signification and restricted in application as to form an auxiliary or adjunct to another root (which was shown in the  last lecture  to be a frequent phenomenon in the isolating languages), is marked by an accented letter, as A ' : thus, in the English, shall like would be represented by A '  + A; shall have put, by A '  + A '  + A: the interposed sign of addition indicating the closeness of relation between the elements. The position of the accented letters in the formula would point out whether the auxiliaries are placed after the main word, as in Burmese, or before it, as in Siamese, or on either or both sides, as sometimes in Chinese.

If, now, the formative element is combined with the radical into a single word, it is indicated by a small letter, which is put before or after the capital which stands for the root, according to the actual position of the elements in combination. Thus, if we represent true by A, untrue would be aA; truly or truth would be Aa; untruly, aAb; untruthfully, aAbcd; and so on. Expressions of this kind belong to the agglutinative type of structure; and they are, it is plain, capable of very considerable variation, so as to be made to denote the various kinds and degrees of agglutination. It is possible, for example, to distinguish the endings of inflection from those of derivation, or elements of pronominal from those of predicative origin, by the use of a different series of letters (as the Greek) to indicate one of the classes: thus, truths might be Aaα, but truthful Aab; babalarumdan, in Turkish (see above, p. ), might be Aαβγ, but sevishdirilememek, Aabcdef. An adroit use of such means of distinction might enable one even to set forth with sufficient clearness the peculiarities and intricacies of polysynthetic tongues.