Note 246 — Chapter IX · THE FAMILIES OF LANGUAGES.

Lassen, Indische Alterthumskunde. Renan, 219 seqq. Klaproth builds an argument for the Northern origin of the Arians on the word “birch,” which bears an analogous name “not only in the German and Slavonic tongues, but also in the Sanskrit—b’hurjja.... It seems birch was the only tree the invaders recognised, and could name, on the south side of the Himalaya; all others being new to them. The inference may be right or wrong—it is, at all events, ingenious.” Garnett’s Essays, p. 33. See Klaproth, Nouv. J. Asiat. v. 112. Pictet, Orig. Ind. i. 217. The fact that the words for oyster are derived from the same root in the European languages (Gk. ὄστρεον, Ang.-Sax. ostra, Irish oisridh, Cymr. œstren, Russ. üstersü, French huître, Germ. Auster, &c.), but not in the Sanskrit or Indian branch of the Arian family,—would seem to show that there was a great separation of Eastern and Western Arians before the family had reached the shores of the Caspian. A similar fact is observed in the name for flax, (Gr. λίνον, Lat. linum, Goth. lein, Ang.-Sax. lîn, Cym. llin, Russ. lenû, &c.), and shows that the Western Arians were the first of the family to desert pastoral for agricultural pursuits. Id. pp. 320, 516. Few studies are more interesting than the “linguistic palæontology,” which thus enables us to revive the form of an extinct language and civilisation.