|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 12
Yes, or we must renounce the Stagirite.
The birthplace of Aristotle was of course Stag[=i]ra or, as it is now
fashionable to transcribe it, Stageira, as Pope doubtless knew, but
the editors who accuse him of a false quantity in Greek are on the
contrary themselves guilty of one in English. The penultima in English
is short whether it was long or, as in 'dynamite' and 'malachite',
short in Greek.
There is, however, one distinct class of Greek words in which the
Latin rule is not followed. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries
there were scholars who rightly or wrongly treated the Greek accent as
a mark of stress. It is clear that this habit led to an inability to
maintain a long quantity in an unstressed syllable. Shakespeare must
have learnt his little Greek from a scholar who had this habit, for he
writes 'Andr�n[)i]cus' and also
I am mis�nthr[)o]pos and hate mankind.
Of course all scholars shortened the first vowel of the word, and
doubtless Shakespeare shortened also the third. Busby also thus
spoke Greek with the result that Dryden in later life sometimes
wrote epsilon instead of eta and also spoke of 'Cleom�nes' and
'Iphig[=e]n[)i]a'. As a boy at Westminster he wrote
Learn'd, Vertuous, Pious, Great, and have by this
An universal Metempsuchosis.
Macaulay with an ignorance very unusual in him rebuked his nephew for
saying 'metam�rph[)o]sis', and Dr. Johnson, had he been living, would
have rebuked Macaulay. For the sake of our poets we ought to save
'apoth�[)o]sis', which is in some danger. Garth may perhaps be
forgotten,
Allots the prince of his celestial line
An Apotheosis and rights divine,
but 'Rejected Addresses' should still carry weight. In the burlesque
couplet, ascribed in the first edition to the younger Colman and
afterwards transferred to Theodore Hook, we have
That John and Mrs. Bull from ale and tea-houses
May shout huzza for Punch's apotheosis.
It need hardly be said that 'tea-houses' like 'grandfathers' has the
stress on the antepenultimate.
There are other words of Greek origin which now break the rules,
though I believe the infringement to be quite modern. First we have
the class beginning with _proto_. It can hardly be doubted that our
ancestors followed rule and said 'pr[)o]tocol', and 'pr[)o]totype',
and I suspect also 'pr[)o]tomartyr'. There seems, however, to be
a general agreement nowadays to keep the Greek omega. As for
'protagonist' the word is so technical and is often so ludicrously
misunderstood that writers on the Greek drama would do well to retain
the Greek termination and say 'protagonistes'; for 'protagonist' is
very commonly mistaken and used for the opposite of 'antagonist'.
Next come words beginning with _hypo_ or _hyph_. In a disyllable the
vowel is long by the 'apex' rule, as in 'hyphen'. In longer words
it should be short. So once it was, and we still say 'hypocaust',
'hypocrit', 'hypochondria' (whence 'hypped'), 'hypothesis', and
others, but a large group of technical and scientific words seems
determined to have a long _y_. It looks as though there were a belief
that _y_ is naturally long, though the French influence which gives us
't[=y]rant' does not extend to 'tyranny'. I do not know what Mr. Hardy
calls his poem, but I hope he follows the old use and calls it 'The
D[)y]nasts'. It might be thought that 'd[)y]nasty' was safe, but it
is not. Some modern words like 'dynamite' have been misused from their
birth.
Another class begins with _hydro-_ from the Greek word for water. None
of them seem to be very old, but probably 'hydraulic' began life with
a short _y_. Surely Mrs. Malaprop, when she meant 'hysterics' and said
'hydrostatics', must have used the short _y_. Of course 'hydra' which
comes from the same root follows the 'apex' rule.
Words beginning with _hyper-_ seem nowadays always to have a long _y_
except that one sometimes hears 'h[)y]perbole' and 'h[)y]perbolical'.
Of course both in _hypo-_ and in _hyper-_ the vowel is short in Greek,
so that here at least the strange lengthening cannot be ascribed to
the Grecians. The false theory of a long _y_ has not affected 'cynic'
or 'cynical', while 'Cyril' has been saved by being a Christian
name. We may yet hope to retain _y_ short in 'cylinder', 'cynosure',
'lycanthropy', 'mythology', 'pyramid', 'pyrotechnic', 'sycamore',
'synonym', 'typical'. As for 'h[=y]brid' it seems as much a caprice
as '[=a]crid', a pronunciation often heard. Though 'acrid' is a false
formation it ought to follow 'vivid' and 'florid'. The 'alias' rule
enforces a long _y_ in 'hygiene' and 'hygienic'.
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|