Note (return) — Replies.

"It is to be remarked, that almost all the words of the British tongue agree either with the Greek or Latin. It is this strong similarity of features between their own language and those of Greece and Italy, that has induced so many of my countrymen to claim for it the honour of being the mother-tongue of all, and to scorn all examination which did not commence with this confession. Even the late learned Dr. Owen Pugh has, in his Dictionary, by arbitrarily selecting certain syllables as the roots of all Cumrian words, done much to foster this overweening conceit. The system was carried to its extreme point of absurdity by the Rev. Edward Davies, who by the help of such syllables expected to unravel the mysteries of all languages. This failure has I hope paved the way for the more sober consideration of the question, which, if worked out fairly, will in my opinion establish the claim of the Cumrian tongue, if not to be the mother of all tongues, at least to be a valuable branch of the Caucasian tree of languages. Now, had the two races, the Roman and Cumrian, remained always separate, a comparative etymology would have been an easy task; for no more would be necessary than to put the similar roots, having the same meaning, side by side. But, unfortunately for the scholar who undertakes to prove the question, the Romans were in this island four hundred years, colonised it partly, and partly gave it their own form of civilisation. As before mentioned, the inhabitants adopted with avidity the Roman dress, language, and literature. That language must therefore be supposed to have entered deeply into the composition of the present Cumrian tongue. The sceptical examiner may therefore reasonably object, that any similarity between the two languages might have originated in the adoption of that of Rome by the British provincials. In answer to this I refer in the first place to Lloyd's reasoning, quoted in the note," viz. that the same similarity exists between the Latin and the Erse [see Newman, in the Classical Museum, vol. vi.]. "In the second place to the fact, that Wales and Cornwall do not appear to have been occupied, like the rest of England, by the Romans."... "Still, however, the long residence of the Romans in the island, with the known influence always produced by such a state of things, renders every statement grounded on the similarity alone of the languages of the two races, the conquered and the conquerors, liable to suspicion. I have therefore been compelled to enter upon an exceedingly difficult investigation, which, if successful, must prove the radical identity of the Latin and Cumrian tongues. The proof is this: If there are derivative words in the Latin, of which we must seek the primitives in the Cumrian, and if these primitives be shown to furnish an explanation of many words before inexplicable on etymological principles. For example, if the word 'to tread' under various forms be found, with the meaning 'to trample with the feet,' in most of the western languages of Europe, and have no noun to base itself upon in these languages, and yet the noun 'traed the feet' be found in one of them, the inference is irresistible that the verb in all its forms was derived from this root. To deny this would be equivalent to a denial that the Latin verb calcare came from calx, 'the heel.' In the following list, such words alone, with a few exceptions for the sake of etymological illustration, have been introduced. It might have been indefinitely extended, but the difficulty was to confine the examples within moderate limits."—Williams on One Source of the Non-Hellenic Portion of the Latin Language.[2]