INTRODUCTION.

other languages, has Verbs, Pronouns, Nouns, &c. The confusion about the Verb arises from the agglutinative nature of the language; but still, as was said just now, there are in Dutch, and also in English, instances of agglutination and contraction exactly as in Basque. as in Basque. If I want to say, "Hebt gy het hem gezegd" (Have you it to him said), I pronounce the Auxiliary with the Pronouns in one wordhy't'm. The apostrophe represents the sound of e in 'begin;' writing the word with e's, we have hyetem, which is just as the Basques do. 'Ain't' and 'Won't,' and the old English 'nist,' for 'I did not know,' are, it is truc, exceptional forms, but they also serve to explain what happens in the Basque flection, where it is the logical consequence of a prolonged want of culture of the language. No one knowing any longer how the Basque flections were composed, the silly theory arose that they had only a conventional signification, in other words, that they had no signification at all; and this theory has adherents even in our days. Now that it has been discovered how the flections are formed, it is easy to analyze them, and when Liçarrague says, "Uste duc cein othoitz daidiodala orain neure Aitari" (Matt. xxvi. 53), "Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my father,"-we know that, daidiodala is the first person singular of the present indicative of edin, 'can,' preceded by d, 'it.' Thus, dadi (Liçarrague writes daidi); o is him ;' d is 'I' (when final always t-dudit, 'I can it'); la is that; a is a binding vowel. The

INTRODUCTION.

translation, beginning at the end, is thus: that I to him. can it After patient investigation, the difficulties little by little vanish; and if some points remain without a satisfactory explanation, the same may be said perhaps of many other languages, even cultivated ones.

It is to be regretted that the Basque Provinces do not take much interest in philological studies; the two periodicals started a few years ago prove this clearly enough, the whole series of 1881 containing nothing about the language.

The sources for the study of the Basque are plentiful enough to give a complete view of what the language is and what it was during a certain period; unfortunately this period is not a long one; the oldest printed book (Poésies Basques, Dechepare) bears the date of 1545, and, as far as I know, no manuscript of an earlier date exists. We have thus not only the oldest Basque book, but the oldest form of the language. The next in rank of age, but the most important of all Basque books, is the New Testament, translated by Liçarrague, 1572. Much later, in 1643, we find Axular's Gucroco Guero, 1st ed., the most readable perhaps of all Basque books. These are the three most interesting publications in the Basque language. About the origin of Basque very little, or nothing, is to be said; the probability or possibility that Basque is the ancient Iberian was pointed out by Larramendi, and formulated by W. von Humboldt as a linguistic axiom in the following words:"The terms, Iberian people' and 'Basque

INTRODUCTION.

speaking people,' have the same value," (Prüf., p. 177) ; and again, "The ancient Iberians were undoubtedly Basques" (Prüf., p. 120). As nothing whatever is known of the Iberian language, as no so-called Iberian coin is even read with certainty, except the bilingual ones, as no inscription is deciphered, it is mere pretence to talk about an Iberian language. We want, in order to compare two things, to know at least something of both of them; and still we find the most sweeping assertions made even after Humboldt's theory had been discussed, with all respect due to the name of the eminent linguist. Mr. Luchaire, Professeur d'Histoire au Lycée de Bordeaux, says, "Constatons simplement la parenté incontestable des deux langues" (Origines linguistique de l'Acquitaine).-Incontestable! and we know not a word of Iberian.

Let us hope to arrive at better results now that a large number of inscriptions have been found in the neighbourhood of Este, Verona, and Padua. This interesting discovery proves once more the large area occupied by the so-called Iberians.

As lately the question has been revived in an English periodical, whether the Basques are or were of a dark or of a fair complexion, I may repeat here what I asked nearly ten years ago in my Dictionary, when quoting the words Billusgorri, Buluzkorri, 'naked,' and Larrugorri or Narrugorri, 'naked; the first signifying 'red-hair,' the second 'red-skin;'-would this not prove that the Basques are, or were, of a fair complexion?

BASQUE GRAMMAR.

CHAPTER I.

The Basque Language.

THE Basque Language, spoken in our days on both slopes of the Pyrenean Mountains, stands as yet absolutely isolated, but belongs to the agglutinative languages. There are six principal dialects, differing little the one from the other, from a philological point of view, but differing enough in their extreme varieties to make the one with difficulty intelligible to the other. These dialects are, the Biscaian, the Guipuzcoan, the Labourdin, the Souletin, the Navarrese, and the Low-Navarrese.

CHAPTER II. The Alphabet.

The original Basque Alphabet is unknown, but it may possibly be found one day in the so-called Keltiberian inscriptions. The Latin Alphabet has been adopted, with some slight differences.

The five vowels are pronounced as in Italian. The Souletin dialect alone pronounces as French ❝, or German ü.

2

BASQUE GRAMMAR.

The Consonants are also pronounced as in Italian, with the exception of, (1) g, which is always pronounced hard, as in 'go,' even before e and i; (2) of z, which has the sound of English 8; (3) of ch, which is pronounced like sh in 'shall,' preceded by t. The French-Basque dialects write tek. (4) of j, which the Spanish-Basque dialects pronounce like the Spanish jota (), and the French-Basque dialects like y in 'year.' Palatal n is pronounced like Spanish ñ, or gn in French agnean.

CHAPTER III.

The Phonetic System.

K.-Original k, when final and followed by a suffix, is converted into t, or is eliminated: ack, they,' followed by n, 'of,' makes aen, for acken, 'of them;' echeak, 'the houses,' followed by ra, towards,' makes echectara, and not echeakara. Most dialects do not like hiatus, and they introduce (after dropping of k) a y, and instead of aen they say ayen; duyala, for dukala, that thou hast.' The Biscaian dialect sometimes keeps the k: gizonakaz=gizonetaz, 'by the man.'

When is not primitive, but when it proceeds from h, then medial is allowed: arkume, lamb,' from ari-hume, 'sheep-child.'

II.-The aspirated has been preserved in the FrenchBasque dialects; the others have dropped it; e.g., hi, 'thou,'

THE PHONETIC SYSTEM.

3

is i in Biscaian and in Guipuzcoan. Final h becomes : dakark, 'thou bearest it,' from d-ckar-h; final h stands for hi, 'thou.' Initial h, coming in consequence of agglutination or composition in the middle of the word, is hardened to k, or is eliminated; e.g., zora-heria becomes zora-keria, madness.' When is thrown out the same result follows as with k, i.e. a hiatus is produced and then prevented by inserting y: d-aroa-h-o-t becomes daroakot (see final ), then daroayot (see initial ), 'I have taken it from him.' Some dialects keep the k; e.g., nindukan, thou hadst me.' Others drop it, and replace it by y ninduyan, from n-indu-h-n.

Tis dropped before k; bat and kide make bakid, 'common.'

N becomes m before b, p-nombait, from non-bait, 'somewhere;' and before k, l, r, f, the n is dropped-nora, 'where to from non ra; gizonarekin for gizonarenkin, 'with the man;' aitzitik, from aitzin-tik, 'on the contrary.' Z before z becomes t: elzan, for ezzan, he was not.' R.-No word begins with r; there are two kinds of r, one hard, the other soft. The hard one is doubled when at the end of the word and when a suflix follows: lur, 'earth;' lurra, the earth.' Soft r is never doubled; it is found in some few words-ur, 'water;' or, 'dog;' zur, 'wood;' ura, 'the water; ora, 'the dog' zura, the wood.' The pronunciation of this r is very soft, it is nearly a d. Vis seldom used, and has been replaced by b.

F is considered as not being a Basque letter; there is only one word with f, which looks, however, really like Basque-farra, laugh' (substantive).