A PHILOLOGICAL INQUIRY.
BY
JOHN STUART BLACKIE,
PROFESSOR OF GREEK IN THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH.
EDINBURGH: SUTHERLAND AND KNOX.
LONDON: SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, AND CO.
MDCCCLII.
EDINBURGH: T. CONSTABLE,
PRINTER TO HER MAJESTY.
“Sit omnibus rebus suum senium, sua juventus; et ut verbaverbis, sic etiam sonis sonos succedere permittamus.”—Bishop Gardiner.
“This new pronunciation hath since prevailed, whereby weEnglishmen speak Greek, and are able to understand one another, whichnobody else can.”—Thomas Fuller.
“Maxime cupio ut in omnibus Academiis nostris hodierna Græcorumpronuntiatio recipiatur.”—Boissonade.
“Neque dubitamus quin Erasmus,si in tantam Græcæ pronuntiationis discrepantiam incidisset,vulgarem usum intactum et salvum reliquisset.”—Seyffarth.
“Ich gebe der neugriechischen Aus-sprache im Ganzen bei weitemden Vorzug.”—Thiersch.
“Neque enim de cœlo dilapsa ad nos pervenit Græcorum lingua, sede patria sua una cum omnibus quæ habemus subsidiis, suo vestita cultuprodiit, quem tollere aut immutare velle esset imperium in linguamliberam exercere.”—Wetsten.
“Die sogenannte Erasmische Aus-sprache, wie es in Deutschlanderscheint, ist völlig grundlos, ein Gebilde man weiss nicht von wannenes kam, ein Gemische welches jeder sich zustutzt nach eigner Lust undWillkühr.”—Liscov.
It is purely as a practical man, and with a direct practical resultin view, that I venture to put forth a few words on the vexed questionof the Pronunciation of Greek. He were a frigidpedant, indeed, who, with the whole glorious literature of Hellas beforehim, and the rich vein of Hellenic Archæology, scarcely yet opened inScotland, should, for the mere gratification of a subtle speculativerestlessness, walk direct into this region of philological thorns.So far as my personal curiosity was concerned, Sir John Cheke, wraptin his many folded mantle of Ciceronian verboseness, and the RightReverend Stephen Gardiner’s prætorian edicts in favour of Greeksounds,[1]and the βή ϐή of the old comedian’s Attic sheep, might have been[Pg 6]allowed to sleep undisturbed on the library shelves. I had settledthe question long ago in my own mind on broad grounds of common sense,rather than on any nice results that seemed obtainable from theinvestigations of the learned; but the nature of the public duties nowimposed on me does not allow me to take my own course in such matters,merely because I think it right. I must shew to the satisfaction ofmy fellow-teachers and of my students, that I am not seeking after anephemeral notoriety by the public galvanisation of a dead crotchet;that any innovations which I may propose are in reality, as so oftenhappens in the political world also, and in the ecclesiastical, amere recurrence to the ancient and established practice of centuries,and that whatever opinions I may entertain on points confessedly opento debate, I entertain n