Inc.x. SOCIETYOF BIBLICAL ARCHEOLOGY. [1889.I7esthe Cheese, cantrsed 1 =^=.ber ot diiJects, andwasspread
overa wider arearr.ir; 3 rr=«silT :rrac-«»d.
To return : the 5:ra wricihas ^rcer^cse the greatest possible
abrasion. viz_£, recals tie act t~.i: the Accadian gi-gem,a sort
of demon. beccc:esi-i-mnra.oc ras^ii :r.tothe Assyrian tongue;
and in Accadias nseli.it is trccaiLe that ex, '■lord," is worn
downfroman or_rlna! gev.jestas as. '"crte. = Gis (gaS), "one."
Under/ the Mandarin Icxxaagivessomehundredandfiftyhomo
phones,mostof which rraybe reduced to older formswithinitial
c or m. Thusthe Mandarin / or mi. • little, • feeble," " the young
and delicate." "to benefit." '"to disticgxiiih.* "to glance at";
whichis pronounced mgd,£?. ni. in the cited dialects,presupposes
a form with initialG on the one hand,and a form with initial
m (n) on the other. Now this is what we actually find in the
Accadian GU sahnt, " little,5" "young.' of which the weak form
would be mi (ma, mu);cp. the Mandarin mi, "fine," "small";
mi, "small" "delicate;"and,withN = M, nun, "smalL" The
Mindarin yu, "young," "delicate," which also presupposes an
initial g (gu = Accadian gi, " little," " young,"), is thus ultimately
a double of i, ni, "little," "young." We may further compare
ya or a, " second," " inferior," " junior," andthe Accadian a, maru,
" young," "' son." Thediversitywhichmarksthe Chinese vocabu
laryis gTeatly diminishedwhen the words are reduced to their
oldest accessible forms, which are given, ex hypothesi, in the
Accadian. The modification of originally identical forms, and
a consequent multiplication of synonymous expressions; in other
words, the continual evolution of new terms fromthe somewhat
straitenedstockof primitive language,is precisely whatwe expect,
and what we find, in Chinese as compared with its Accadian
archetype.
The other meanings assignedto the character i, ni, confirm
these views. "Tobenefit," surely answers verywell to ga (gi),
iullumu,ga, paiahu, andmu, "to give,"mun,"benefit"(see p. 75
in/r.), andgar, mar, iardku,"togive"; while "to distinguish,"
* I have already mentionedthat forms like kingi, "thecountry" or
"homeland,"implyan Accadian nasalisationof initial g, exactly corresponding
to what we see in the Chinese nga,ngei, etc. We may thusexplain the
AccadianNANGA,Assyriannagfl,"district,""country." NA = MA = ga, mAtu,
"land";so that nanga = NA (or Ni) + GA (nga) ; cp. Chinese ni, "earth,'
"soil."
68