Lectures on The Science of Language 23

Lectures on The Science of Language 23

Well, a great deal has been written to find out where this Ophir was; but

there can be no doubt that it was in India. The names for _apes_,

_peacocks_, _ivory_ and _algum_-trees are foreign words in Hebrew, as much

as _gutta-percha_ or _tobacco_ are in English. Now, if we wished to know

from what part of the world _gutta-percha_ was first imported into

England, we might safely conclude that it came from that country where the

name, _gutta-percha_, formed part of the spoken language.(190) If,

therefore, we can find a language in which the names for peacock, apes,

ivory, and algum-tree, which are foreign in Hebrew, are indigenous, we may

be certain that the country in which that language was spoken must have

been the Ophir of the Bible. That language is no other but Sanskrit.

 

_Apes_ are called, in Hebrew, _koph_, a word without an etymology in the

Semitic languages, but nearly identical in sound with the Sanskrit name of

ape, _kapi_.

 

_Ivory_ is called either _karnoth-shen_, horns of tooth; or _shen habbim_.

This _habbim_ is again without a derivation in Hebrew, but it is most

likely a corruption of the Sanskrit name for elephant, _ibha_, preceded by

the Semitic article.(191)

 

_Peacocks_ are called in Hebrew _tukhi-im_, and this finds its explanation

in the name still used for peacock on the coast of Malabar, _togëi_, which

in turn has been derived from the Sanskrit _śikhin_, meaning furnished

with a crest.

 

All these articles, ivory, gold, apes, peacocks, are indigenous in India,

though of course they might have been found in other countries likewise.

Not so the _algum-tree_, at least if interpreters are right in taking

_algum_ or _almug_ for sandalwood. Sandalwood is found indigenous on the

coast of Malabar only; and one of its numerous names there, and in

Sanskrit, is _valguka_. This _valgu_(_ka_) is clearly the name which

Jewish and Phœnician merchants corrupted into _algum_, and which in Hebrew

was still further changed into _almug_.

 

Now, the place where the navy of Solomon and Hiram, coming down the Red

Sea, would naturally have landed, was the mouth of the Indus. There _gold_

and _precious stones_ from the north would have been brought down the

Indus; and _sandalwood_, _peacocks_, and _apes_ would have been brought

from Central and Southern India. In this very locality Ptolemy (vii. 1)

gives us the name of _Abiria_, above _Pattalene_. In the same locality

Hindu geographers place the people called _Abhîra_ or _Âbhîra_; and in the

same neighborhood MacMurdo, in his account of the province of Cutch, still

knows a race of _Ahirs_,(192) the descendants, in all probability, of the

people who sold to Hiram and Solomon their gold and precious stones, their

apes, peacocks, and sandalwood.(193)

 

If, then, in the Veda the people who spoke Sanskrit were still settled in

the north of India, whereas at the time of Solomon their language had

extended to Cutch and even the Malabar coast, this will show that at all

events Sanskrit is not of yesterday, and that it is as old, at least, as

the book of Job, in which the gold of Ophir is mentioned.(194)

 

Most closely allied to Sanskrit, more particularly to the Sanskrit of the

Veda, is the ancient language of the Zend-avesta,(195) the so-called

_Zend_, or sacred language of the Zoroastrians or Fire-worshippers. It

was, in fact, chiefly through the Sanskrit, and with the help of

comparative philology, that the ancient dialect of the Parsis or

Fire-worshippers was deciphered. The MSS. had been preserved by the Parsi

priests at Bombay, where a colony of fire-worshippers had fled in the

tenth century,(196) and where it has risen since to considerable wealth

and influence. Other settlements of Guebres are to be found in Yezd and

parts of Kerman. A Frenchman, Anquetil Duperron, was the first to

translate the Zend-avesta, but his translation was not from the original,

but from a modern Persian translation. The first European who attempted to

read the original words of Zoroaster was Rask, the Dane; and after his

premature death, Burnouf, in France, achieved one of the greatest triumphs

in modern scholarship by deciphering the language of the Zend-avesta, and

establishing its close relationship with Sanskrit. The same doubts which

were expressed about the age and the genuineness of the Veda, were

repeated with regard to the Zend-avesta, by men of high authority as

oriental scholars, by Sir W. Jones himself, and even by the late Professor

Wilson. But Burnouf’s arguments, based at first on grammatical evidence

only, were irresistible, and have of late been most signally confirmed by

the discovery of the cuneiform inscriptions of Darius and Xerxes. That

there was a Zoroaster, an ancient sage, was known long before Burnouf.

Plato speaks of a teacher of Zoroaster’s Magic (Μαγεία), and calls

Zoroaster the son of _Oromazes_.(197)

 

This name of Oromazes is important; for Oromazes is clearly meant for

_Ormuzd_, the god of the Zoroastrians. The name of this god, as read in

the inscriptions of Darius and Xerxes, is _Auramazdâ_, which comes very

near to Plato’s Oromazes.(198) Thus Darius says, in one passage: “Through

the grace of Auramazda I am king; Auramazda gave me the kingdom.” But what

is the meaning of _Auramazda_? We receive a hint from one passage in the

Achæmenian inscriptions, where Auramazda is divided into two words, both

being declined. The genitive of Auramazda occurs there as _Aurahya

mazdâha_. But even this is unintelligible, and is, in fact, nothing but a

phonetic corruption of the name of the supreme Deity as it occurs on every

page of the Zend-avesta, namely, _Ahurô mazdâo_ (nom.). Here, too, both

words are declined; and instead of _Ahurô mazdâo_, we also find _Mazdâo

ahurô_.(199) Well, this _Ahurô mazdâo_ is represented in the Zend-avesta

as the creator and ruler of the world; as good, holy, and true; and as

doing battle against all that is evil, dark, and false. “The wicked perish

through the wisdom and holiness of the living wise Spirit.” In the oldest

hymns, the power of darkness, which is opposed to _Ahurô mazdâo_ has not

yet received its proper name, which is _Angrô mainyus_, the later

_Ahriman_; but it is spoken of as a power, as _Drukhs_ or deceit; and the

principal doctrine which Zoroaster came to preach was that we must choose

between these two powers, that we must be good, and not bad. These are his

words:—

 

“In the beginning there was a pair of twins, two spirits, each of a

peculiar activity. These are the Good and the Base in thought, word, and

deed. Choose one of these two spirits; Be good, not base!”(200)

 

Or again:—

 

“Ahuramazda is holy, true, to be honored through veracity, through holy

deeds.” “You cannot serve both.”

 

Now, if we wanted to prove that Anglo-Saxon was a real language, and more

ancient than English, a mere comparison of a few words such as _lord_ and

_hlafford_, _gospel_ and _godspel_ would be sufficient. _Hlafford_ has a

meaning; _lord_ has none; therefore we may safely say that without such a

compound as _hlafford_, the word _lord_ could never have arisen. The same,

if we compare the language of the Zend-avesta with that of the cuneiform

inscriptions of Darius. _Auramazdâ_ is clearly a corruption of _Ahurô

mazdâo_, and if the language of the Mountain-records of Behistun is

genuine, then, _à fortiori_, is the language of the Zend-avesta genuine,

as deciphered by Burnouf, long before he had deciphered the language of

Cyrus and Darius. But what is the meaning of _Ahurô mazdâo_? Here Zend

does not give us an answer; but we must look to Sanskrit, as the more

primitive language, just as we looked from French to Italian, in order to

discover the original form and meaning of _feu_. According to the rules

which govern the changes of words, common to Zend and Sanskrit, _Ahurô

mazdâo_ corresponds to the Sanskrit _Asuro medhas_; and this would mean

the “Wise Spirit,” neither more nor less.

 

We have editions, translations, and commentaries of the Zend-avesta by

Burnouf, Brockhaus, Spiegel, and Westergaard. Yet there still remains much

to be done. Dr. Haug, now settled at Poona, has lately taken up the work

which Burnouf left unfinished. He has pointed out that the text of the

Zend-avesta, as we have it, comprises fragments of very different

antiquity, and that the most ancient only, the so-called Gâthâs, can be

ascribed to Zarathustra. “This portion,” he writes in a lecture just

received from India, “compared with the whole bulk of the Zend fragments

is very small; but by the difference of dialect it is easily recognized.

The most important pieces written in this peculiar dialect are called

Gâthâs or songs, arranged in five small collections; they have different

metres, which mostly agree with those of the Veda; their language is very

near to the Vedic dialect.” It is to be regretted that in the same

lecture, which holds out the promise of so much that will be extremely

valuable, Dr. Haug should have lent his authority to the opinion that

Zoroaster or Zarathustra is mentioned in the Rig-Veda as Jaradashṭi. The

meaning of jaradashti in the Rig-Veda may be seen in the Sanskrit

Dictionary of the Russian Academy, and no Sanskrit scholar would seriously

think of translating the word by Zoroaster.

 

At what time Zoroaster lived, is a more difficult question which we cannot

discuss at present.(201) It must suffice if we have proved that he lived,

and that his language, the Zend, is a real language, and anterior in time

to the language of the cuneiform inscriptions.

 

We trace the subsequent history of the Persian language from Zend to the

inscriptions of the Achæmenian dynasty; from thence to what is called

_Pehlevi_ or _Huzvaresh_ (better Huzûresh), the language of the Sassanian

dynasty (226-651), as it is found in the dialect of the translations of

the Zend-avesta, and in the official language of the Sassanian coins and

inscriptions. This is considerably mixed with Semitic elements, probably

imported from Syria. In a still later form, freed also from the Semitic

elements which abound in Pehlevi, the language of Persia appears again as

_Parsi_, which differs but little from the language of _Firdusi_, the

great epic poet of Persia, the author of the Shahnámeh, about 1000 A. D.

The later history of Persian consists entirely in the gradual increase of

Arabic words, which have crept into the language since the conquest of

Persia and the conversion of the Persians to the religion of Mohammed.

 

The other languages which evince by their grammar and vocabulary a general

relationship with Sanskrit and Persian, but which have received too

distinct and national a character to be classed as mere dialects, are the

languages _of Afghanistan_ or the _Pushtú_, the language of _Bokhára_, the

language of the _Kurds_, the _Ossetian_ language in the Caucasus, and the

_Armenian_. Much might be said on every one of these tongues and their

claims to be classed as independent members of the Aryan family; but our

time is limited, nor has any one of them acquired, as yet, that importance

which belongs to the vernaculars of India, Persia, Greece, Italy, and

Germany, and to other branches of Aryan speech which have been analyzed

critically, and may be studied historically in the successive periods of

their literary existence. There is, however, one more language which we

have omitted to mention, and which belongs equally to Asia and Europe, the

language of the _Gipsies_. This language, though most degraded in its