The Scottish Celtic review

202 The Laws of Auslaut in Irhh.Also between preserved consonants, the vowels of unaccentedsyllables are largely thrown out.The origin o{ caraid may be visibly represented by the followingseries of forms: (1) caraj-at-i, (2) cara-at-i, (3) cara-it, (4)caraith with a nearly suppressed, carid.In the same way, the 1st and 2nd plur. conjunct flexion caram,caritli, and the 3rd plur. absolute flexion car'd, may be tracedback respectively to curaj-mn-as, caraj-at-e, caraj-an-ti. InIrish, in which the tendency to obliterate the ancient distinctionsof conjugation may be early observed, this mutilation, if not causedby the natural shortness of the forms of the 1st conjugation, wascertainly facilitated by it. Also, in Gothic, forms like liaha,haham, hahand, are best explained by assuming a transition fromthe weak conjugation to the strong in which the Old High Germanhas not participated. All European languages, however, show atendency to make the originally dissyllabic mark of the presentaya monosyllabic through mutilation.Very interesting in connection with the Irish 2nd conjugation,of which we have now treated, is the Irish root ta (to be), whichEbel (Gramm. Celt., p. 488) has, strange to say, explained as do-a(«=root as), whilst it really corresponds to the Indo-Germ. std.For whilst Irish sc, sr, si, sn, sm, remain intact in the anlaut,primitive nI, in the cases etymologically reliable, is always representedby a single t, as, e.g., in tiagu^Gi: crrelxw, tamun=0\dSax. starrw. In regai'd to the development of the signification ofIr. td, I would like to call attention to Ital. stato, &c. O'Donovan,without knowing the etymology of the word, says (Ir. Gramm.,p. IG-t) :" In all sentences in which existence is combined withlocality td is to be used " ; so that, even now-a-days, a trace of theprimitive signification is preserved. From this root are derivedthe 1st pers. sing. pres. tdu, tdo, to, and also tu. Usually, it ispreceded by the preposition i n-, used relatively (itdu, in quosum), or the preposition ad (aid, attd, sum, as it were a Lat. asto).To Ir. tdu, corresponds as to form the Lith. stdju, but also Lat.sto, which certainly is contracted from stao. In Greek also, Curtiusacknowledges a pa.ssing-over of verbs in /j.i into the analogy ofcontracted verbs, as, e. g., into 7ei?, lei (Verb. i. 154). In this wayare formed especially the conjunctives (Vrw, tlOw, SiSw, a-rw,OS), Soi), and also in the aor. pass. , &c. It is by viewing themin such a light as this that we can, likewise, best explain thedifference between Homeric forms like 0)/;;y and Qelofxev (cf. Cur-