Leibniz, Humboldt, and the Origins of Comparativism

Series III

AMSTERDAM STUDIES IN THE THEORY AND

LEIBNIZ, HUMBOLDT,

HISTORY OF LINGUISTIC SCIENCE

AND

General Editor E. F. KONRAD KOERNER (University of Ottawa)

THE ORIGINS OF COMPARATIVISM

•

STUDIES IN THE HISTORY OF THE LANGUAGE SCIENCES Edited by Advisory Editorial Board

Ranko Bugarski (Belgrade); Jean-Claude Chevalier (Paris) H. H. Christmann (Tiibingen); Boyd H. Davis (Charlotte, N.C.) Rudolf Engler (Bern); Hans-Josef Niederehe (Trier)

TULLIO DE MAURO and LIA FORMIGARI University of Rome

R. H. Robins (London); Rosane Rocher (Philadelphia) Vivian Salmon (Oxford); Aldo Scaglione (New York)

with the assistance of DONATELLA Dl CESARE, RAFFAELLA PETRILLI and ANNA MARIA THORNTON

Volume 49

Tullio de Mauro and Lia Formigari (eds.) Leibniz, Humboldt, and the Origins of Comparativism

JOHN BENJAMIN$ PUBLISHING COMPANY AMSTERDAM/PHILADELPHIA 1990

Contents

Foreword

vii

Part 1: Leibniz to Hnmboldt

Le voyage de Schreiten: Leibniz et les debuts du comparatisme finno-ougrien Daniel Droixhe Leibniz on Particles: Linguistic form and comparatism Marcelo Dascal Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

Leibniz, Humboldt, and the origins of comparativism I edited by Tullio De Mauro and Lia Forrnigari ; with the assistance of Donatella Di Cesare, Raffaella PetriUi, and Anna Maria Thornton. p. em. (Amsterdam studies in the theory and history of linguistic science. Series III, Studies in the history of the language sciences, ISSN 0304-0720; v. 49) Papers in revised versions of the actual presentations at the Conference on Leibniz, Humboldt, and the origins of Comparativism held in Villa Mirafiori, Rome, Sept. 1986. Includes bibliographical references. Includes indexes. 1. Comparative linguistics -- History -- Congresses. 2. Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm, Freiherr von, 1646-1716 -- Contributions in linguistics -- Congresses. 3. Humboldt, Wilhelm, Freiherr von, 1767-1835 -- Congresses. I. De Mauro, Tullio, 1932. II. Formigari, Lia, 1931III. Conference on Leibniz, Humboldt, and the Origins of Comparativism (1986 : Rome, Italy) IV. Series. P73.lA5 1990 417'.7 -- dc20 89-17687 ISBN 90 272 4532 0 (alk. paper) CIP ��

.

© Copyright 1990 - John Benjamins B.V. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint,:microfilm, or any other means, without written permission from the publisher. ·

3 31

Vulgaris opinio babelica: Sui fondamenti storico-teorici della pluraliti\ delle lingue nel pensiero di Leibniz Stefano Gensini

61

Leibniz and Wilhelm von Humboldt and the History of Comparative Linguistics Robert H. Robins

85

Die Siikularisierung des Tertium comparationis: Eine philosophische Erorterung der Urspriinge des vergleichenden Sprachstudiums Tilman Borsche

103

Descent, Perfection and the Comparative Method since Leibniz Henry M. Hoenigswald

119

Part II: Hnmboldt and the Aftermath

Humboldt et Leibniz: Le concept interieur de Ia linguistique Jiirgen Trabant The Philosophical and Anthropological Place of Wilhelm von Humboldt's Linguistic Typology: Linguistic comparison as a means to compare the different processes of human thought Donatella Di Cesare

135

157

vi

CONTENTS

Wilhelm von Humboldt und das Problem der Schrift Christian Stetter

181

Da Humboldt ai neogrammatici: Continuita e fratture Paolo Ramal

199

Foreword

Part Ill: Comparative Linguistics before and after Humboldt

Representation and the Place of Linguistic Change before Comparative Grammar SylvailJ Auroux

213

The Place of Friedrich Schlegel in the Development of HistoricalComparative Linguistics Konrad Koerner

239

Lautform, innere Sprachform, Form der Sprachen: Il problema della comparazione e classificazione delle lingue in Heymann Steinthal Mario Barba

263

Comparatismo e grammatica comparata: Tipologia linguistica e forma grammaticale Pierre Swiggers

281

Afterword Tullio De Mauro

301

Index Nominnm

311

Index Rerum

319

Index Lingnarnm

327

In September 1986, a Conference on "Leibniz, Humboldt and the Ori­ gins of Comparativism" , sponsored by the Department of Language Sci­ ences of the University of Rome "La Sapienza", was held in Villa Mirafiori, Rome. The papers included in this volume are the revised versions of the actual presentations. Professor R. H. Robins, who unfortunately had been unable to attend, kindly sent us his paper for publication. Both Leibniz and Humboldt are authors in whose work we find a pas­ sionate interest in the history and development of languages combined with a strong theoretical commitment. Mentioning their names in conjunction with the idea of linguistic comparativism appeared to us as a proper way to draw attention to a contribution by these scholars in the history of the subject and also to promote discussion on the relationship of theory and practice in linguistic research in more general terms. In sending the book to press we can say that, thanks to the scholars who attended the Conference and enlivened it, our expectations have been fulfilled. Our special thanks, however, must also be extended to the institu­ tions and people who have made the Conference possible. The University of Rome "La Sapienza", the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche have provided substantial financial support. The secretary of the Department of Language Sciences, Mrs Carolina Vidili, has served with her usual professional skill in the organisation of the Confer­ ence. Donatella Di Cesare, Raffaella Petrilli, and Anna Maria Thornton have worked diligently and strenuously to prepare the final copy of the papers and acted, in all stages, as associate editors. Last but not least men­ tion should be made of the series editor, Konrad Koerner, who spent a large portion of his recent visit to Italy to go through all manuscript print­ outs with his keen eye. Rome, May 1988

Tullio De Mauro Lia Formigari

Part I: Leibniz to Hnmboldt

Le voyage de 'Schreiten'

Leibniz et les debuts du comparatisme finno-ougrien Daniel Droixhe

Universite de Liege

On sait Ia place attribuee i\ Leibniz dans l'histoire de Ia linguistique ou­ ralienne. II fut "l'un des premiers i\ supposer !'existence de rapports histori­ ques entre finnois et hongrois" (Robins 1971:210), relations qu'il etendra en direction du samoyede. H. Arens (1969:98-99) reproduit le passage de Ia fameuse Brevis designatio qui popularisa ses idees en Ia matiere. On vou­ drait, en reexaminant celles-ci, faire le point sur une tradition a laquelle el­ les doivent beaucoup. Ceci permettra notamment de reconsiderer Ia traduc­ tion fran�aise de l'Essai fournie par A. Jacob au debut de sa Genese de Ia pensee linguistique (1973). Le passage en question se refere tout de suite a Tacite et a Ia Germanie. II faut considerer comme une autre grande nation septentrionale les Fin­ nois que Tacite nomme Fenni, et dont il a d6crit avec admiration [lisons: etonnement] les moeurs sauvages, semblables a celles que nous pouvons voir aujourd'hui chez les Lapons sylvestres ou les Samoyedes. (Jacob 1973: 54; Dut. IV/2:192)

Nombre de travaux ont expose !'importance exceptionnelle qu'a prise, dans l'historiographie allemande, un livre place par Arnaldo Momigliano en tete (avec I'Iliade) des "cent ouvrages les plus dangereux qui aient ete jamais ecrits" (v. Ia courte bibliographie dans Etter 1966:150). Depuis que Ia Germanie avail ete revelee aux humanistes, par le pape Pie II, autrement dit Enea Silvio Piccolomini, qu'on va retrouver, puis surtout par Conrad Celtis (1492), celle-ci alimentait toute !'argumentation relative a la nature et a l'origine du peuple allemand, landis que !'ensemble de son oeuvre se muait en repertoire de lieux communs pour la discussion philosophico-mo-

4

5

DANIEL DROIXHb

LEIBNIZ ET LE FINNO-OUGRIEN

rale, chez des commentateurs attitres, quasi professionnels, comme Ber­ negger et son gendre Freinsheim, au XVIIe siecle. Dans le domaine linguistique, Tacite offrait, avec Cesar, un temoigna­ ge crucial concernant l'epineux probleme des rapports ethniques entre Cel­ tes et Germains. Tandis qu'un Hotman de La Tour (1573) faisait s'accorder les deux auteurs sur l'ecart separant langues germaniques et gaulois, lequel devait se rapprocher plutot du breton de Grande-Bretagne, d'autres, com­ me Gronov le jeune, rappelaient que "la britannique fut tres differente de la gauloise, ainsi que le dit Tacite dans la Vie d'Agricola". Le chapitre 46 de la Germanie, qui decrit les Fenni, fut aussi !'objet d'abondants commentai­ res, la question principale etant de savoir si ces populations a la limite de l'animalite pouvaient avoir un rapport historique quelconque avec les Ocr­ mains - qui n'etaient pas eux-memes des mieux !otis, dans la relation de Tacite. Aux frontieres du monde connu se presentent les Peucins ou Bas­ tames, les Venethes et les Fennes. Les deux premieres nations, qui s'eten­ dent de la mer Noire vers le Nord, offrent un degre de civilisation suffisant pour etre comptes dans la famille germanique. Les Peucins, en particulier, "ant une langue, un genre de vie, des etablissements et des maisons tout semblables a ceux des Germains" (ed. Perret 1983: 100). En quoi Tacite ne se trompait pas. Evoquant Ia langue des Estes au chapitre precedent, il a peut-etre voulu, avec autant de raison, marquer sa singularite, son type fin­ nois, par rapport au germanique voisin, quand il ia rapproche de celle des Bretons plutot que des parlers des Sueves. II ne s'aventure pas sur ce sujet, pour ce qui est des Fennes. Chez eux, 'etonnante sauvagerie': "hideuse mi­ sere, salete de tous, torpeur des grands; pas d'armes, pas de chevaux, pas de penates; pour nourriture, l'herbe [ . . . ]" (ibid. ) . On considere generalement comme une conquete importante le fait d'avoir apparente finnois et lapon. Encore faut-il preciser que le premier terme a parfois designe, a l'origine, ce que recouvre aujourd'hui le second. Ce serait Ia cas de Tacite, oil !'appellation de Fenni conviendrait mieux aux populations de !'extreme Nord, designes par les Norvegiens sous le nom de Finn (Meillet & Cohen 1952:281). Le rapprochement ou Ia confusion sont en tout cas tres anciens. Comme le souligne Leibniz en se referant au plus celebre historien des Goths, qui ecrivit au VIe siecle, "Jornandes appelle deja Scridi-Finnois les peuples que nous denommons Lapons". Des specia­ listes du domaine, tels que M. Zsirai ou B . Collinder, ont fait remonter l'apparentement a un Norvegien du IXe siecle, Ottar (ou Othere) de Halogoland, chez qui les Lapons, egalements designes sous le nom de Finnes, sont rapproches pour Ia langue des Careliens du groupe finnois.

Rencontrant cet apparentement chez Joseph-Juste Scaliger (1540-1609) (1599; texte Mite en 1610), G. Bonfante l'a juge 'digne d'un grand esprit' (v. aussi Stehr 1959:16). Et sans doute Ia classification linguistique de la Diatribe sur les langues europeennes occupe-t-elle une place non negligeable dans les etudes finno-ougriennes, d'autant que, comme on a essaye de le montrer (Droixhe 1978:63-64), elle profita d'une bonne diffusion via !'erudition anglaise, de sorte qu'on retrouve le couple finno-lapon chez E. Brerewood (1565?-1613) dans un fameux ouvrage sur Ia diversite des langues et des religions, des 1614. Le terme meme de 'Scridi-Finnois', dans !'interpretation etymologique qu'en donnait Ia tradition, comporte nne idee de dispersion qui va caracte­ riser plus specialement Ia famille finno-ougrienne, importante pour Ia re­ flexion linguistique de Leibniz parce qu'elle offre a celle-d, preoccupee de continuite geographique tendant vers une harmonic generale, l'exemple d'une ancienne unite rompue par l'arrivee de langues d'un autre type (Aarsleff 1982 [1969]:92-93). Reprenons le texte de Leibniz tel qu'il se presente dans Ia traduction que nons suivons, apres qu'on ait annonce Ia 'grande famille' des Fenni.

·

De fait, Scheffer nous a enseigne recemment, en s'appuyant sur l'Ctude de la langue, que Lapons et Finnois avaient une origine commune. Jornandes appelle deja Scridi-Finnois (ce que par un voyage Schreiten avait permis de faire) les peuples que nous d6nommons Lapons. Mais ils Ctendaient da­ vantage leur parente vers !'Orient. Les Hongrois, peuple apparentC aux Finnois, en rnontrent un indice manifeste puisqu'ils sont, d'apres les sour­ ces s(ires de Jornandes, venus de l'intf.rieur �e la Scythie et, cornme on le dit aujourd'hui, de regions proches de la Siberie [ . . . ]. C'est pourquoi, se­ lon moi, l'ancienne grande nation qui s'etendait de !'ocean Baltique a la mer Caspienne a l'arrivee des Slaves ou des Sarmates fut coupee en deux, amputee de toute une partie. (Jacob 1973:54; Dut.IV/2:192)

Rappelons que le Strasbourgeois Johann Scheffer (1621-1678), qui connait bien le monde septentrional puisqu'il enseigne a Uppsala, avait donne en 1673 son Lapponia, qui prend lui-meme appui, avec !'ensemble du comparatisme finnois, sur un certain mouvement de description des langues parlees dans cette region. Citons au mains Erik Schroder et son Lexicon latino-scondicum de 1637 (Papay 1922:4), un vocabulaire !atin­ suedois-finnois de 1644 qu'utilisera Martin Fogel, les travaux, commandes par Ia motivation religieuse classique, de Joh. Tornaeus et d'Eskil Petraeus, eveque d'Abo (Turku, non loin d'Helsinki), vers le milieu du siecle (1648-49), etc. La litterature specialisee conna!t ces noms depuis longtemps.

7

DANIEL DROIXHE

LEIBNIZ ET LE FINNO-OUG RIEN

On chercherait en vain, par contre, celui de Schreiten dans les repertoi­ res appropries. Et pour cause: il s'agit du verbe allemand qui signifie "mar­ cher". L'original donne: "Et jam Jornandi Scridi-Finni dicuntur (a cursu, nam schreiten est passus facere) quos hodie .Lappones appellamus" .1 Les Scridi-Finnois sont ainsi nommes a cause des courses auxquelles il s'adon­ nent, notamment pour trouver de Ia nourriture - par reference a "faire des pas". Leibniz suivait ici nne longue tradition interpretative qui remonte, au­ tan! qu'on puisse juger, a Ia Chronique des Lombards de Paul Diacre, du VIII' siecle. On y lisait que ces peuples nordiques tirent leur appellation "du fait de s'elancer" a Ia poursuite des animaux sauvages. "Ce qu'il entend par Ia", commente en 1531 Beatus Rhenanus, le,ma!tre de Ia critique philo­ logique de Tacite a l'epoque (Borst 1960:1073; Schellhase 1976:61-62), "est facile a comprendre". Et de rappeler, comme le fait Leibniz, le sens de "scriten chez les Germains" (p.174). Appartenant a un genre d'homme chez qui les conditions de vie ont essentiellement developpe Ia mobilite, les La­ pons sont encore, selon nne interpretation que Ia culture classique donne de leur nom, des errants, des 'exiles' sortis du berceau ethnique (Richer 1776: 14). La famille finnoise se presente par nature comme etendue et divi­ see. Par qui fut operee Ia liaison avec le hongrois, pour Ia premiere fois? La question a ete souvent discutee, et les affirmations de Leibniz qui feront au­ torite sur le point etaient deja ebranlees dans Ia premiere histoire du com­ paratisme finno-ougrien, celle de E.N. Setiilii, Jaquelle semble rester, soit dit en passant, nne des meilleures introductions aux debuts de ce comparatisme (mais on ne dispose toujours que du texte finnois). II ne pent etre question ici que de rappeler Jes grandes !ignes du debat. Leibniz ecrivait, dans nne Jettre du 1698: "je sais depuis longtemps que le finnois et Je hongrois ont beaucoup de rapport" (Wieselgren 1883:30-31). Le chemin avail sans doute ete ouvert par Ia classification de Scaliger, qui n'appariait pas seulement finnois et lapon, mais Jes mettait dans un groupe de Jangues a problemes, etrangeres aux autres parlers europeens, avec Je hongrois et Je celte (Tabu­ la sexta). Dans le Bref essai comme dans Ia Dissertation sur l'origine des Germains (Dut. IV/2:204), Leibniz attribue Ia decouverte a Comenius, ain­ si que Je fait egalement Johann Georg Eckhart, !'auteur de I'Histoire de !'etude etymologique de !'allemand, collaborateur du precedent et editeur de ses Collectanea etymologica, dans nne oeuvre moins connue, Jes Com­ mentarii de rebus Franciae orienta/is (1729, II/31, chap. 82:437). Paul Hun­ falvy, Je grand specialiste du XIX' siecle, reprit !'attribution (Stehr 1957:17sv.).

Apres que Setiilii ait cherche en vain dans Jes volumineux Opera didac­ tica de Comenius Je franc rapprochement qu'annonI I '" 11 1 n: I;! I

m:

j:l i

,. , , H'

1 '1 '

171

DONATELLA Dl CESARE

HUMBOLDT'S LINGUISTIC TYPOLOGY

and the ways of making connections, to express his own thoughts crea­ tively. s Even though thought can develop only in conformity with syntactic type, it inevitably bears the mark of the speaking individual, of individual speech. In Rede, a dialectic between freedom (Freiheit) of the speaker and regularity (Gesetzmiij3igkeit) of language takes place (Grundziige [GS V:455]).

cally occurring language is, in its turn, achieved only in the individual type of speech. The universal exists only in the individual: "ces deux extremites de nos idees et de nos connoissances, s'expliquent toujours reciproque­ ment, et ne peuvent etre comprises que l'une par le secours de !'autre" (Essai [GS II:340]). Such is the origin of difficulties in linguistic study, which must recognize what is typical within homogeneity. In fact, universal­ ity and individuality in language

7. This dialectic within language leads us to yet another that takes place within language as a whole. It is the dialectic between universality and indi­ viduality. Now we should be able to elaborate the concept of type more fully as well as to grasp the relationships that tie one language to others and that render absurd the division of languages into closed classes. 7.1 Proceeding from the anthropologically conditioned presupposition of mankind's unity, Humboldt is able to affirm the profound homogeneity of all languages (cf. Grundzuge [GS V:383]; Verschiedenheiten [GS VI:246]): Car le genre humain a, de meme qu'une nation et qu'un individu, sa sphere d'idees dont il ne sauroit sortir, et une langue d'un type et d'un caractere determint!:S, avec la difference seulment, que ce type et ce carac­ tere admettent au dedans de leurs limites respectives un nombre ind6finis� sable de varietes par lesquels seuls ils peuvent �tre apperr;Us et approfon­ dis" (Essai [GS III:339-40]).

This passage tells us that there is a general type of language distinct from the general type of a particular historical language, even if Humboldt uses 'allgemeiner Typus' to describe both. The Mexikanische Grammatik allows the most precise specification of the general linguistic type, which is an 'in­ nerer Grundtypus' that must ultimately be identified with the 'Bildung des Satzes' (Mexikanische Grammatik: 177). Every language achieves this fundamental aim differently. Indeed, every language has its own type, its own individual means of making connections, whose general form must be deduced from individual speech. On the other hand, each distinct instance of Rede, in its specificity, achieves the general type of language in a differ­ ent way. Therefore, even though the syntactic type is present in the mind of each speaker, Humboldt suggests that we must assume that there is "eine, wenn gleich innerhalb engerer Griinzen verschiedne individuelle Auffas­ sung des grammatischen Typus" (Von dem grammatischen Baue [GS VI:375]). The general type of language, then, is present only in a particular type peculiar to a historical language; and the general type of the histori-

k6nnen daher nur in der Idee getrennt werden, und man muss, obgleich das Individuelle, als die unmittelbare Tatsache, bloss wahrgenommen, nicht zergliedert ftir den Verstand dargestellt werden kann, doch soviel als moglich beide in ihrer Einheit auffassen" (Grundziige [GS V:394]).

7.2 The dialectic between individual speech and language together with the role that Humboldt ascribes to Rede, the individual, creative act, make it possible to modify the linguistic type in actual speech. The realization of the general type of language cannot be accomplished passively, as Hum­ boldt admits even the existence of individual type, though within certain limitations. From here proceeds the transformation of the functional princi­ ples that organize language. And from here, too, from the knowledge that linguistic type supports a variety of individual realizations, there arises the idea of the co-existence within a single language of several types, several ways of linking.' In the Kawi-Werk where, significantly, Verfahren and Methode tend to supplant the term Typus, Humboldt (GS VII: 144) observes that it is possible to discern the traces of the three types - 'inflec­ tional', 'agglutinating' and 'incorporating' - in most languages: Aile Sprachen tragen eine oder mehrere dieser Fonnen in sich und es kommt zur Beurtheilung ihrer relativen Vorziige darauf an, wie sie jene abstracten Formen in ihre concrete aufgenommen haben oder vielmehr welches das Princip dieser Annahme oder Mischung ist? Diese Unterscheidung der abstracten mOglichen Formen von den concreten wirklich vorhandenen wird, wie ich mir schmeichle, schon dazu beitragen, den befremdenden Eindruck des Heraushebens einiger Sprachen, als der allein berechtigten, welches die andren eben dadurch zu unvollkommen­ eren stempelt, zu vermindern (Kawi-Werk [GS VII:255]).

The co-existence of several types within one system does not threaten the unity of a language, which is a condition of that language's existence. "Jene Einheit aber - Humboldt asserts - kann nur die eines ausschliesslich vor­ waltenden Princips seyn" (Kawi-Werk [GS Vll:161]). What assures the unity of the system in spite of the presence of several types is the predomi-

172

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DONATELLA DI CESARE

HUMBOLDT'S LINGUISTIC TYPOLOGY

nance of one method over others; where such a method "bestimmt vorwal­ tet und zum Mittelpunkt des Organismus wird, da lenkt sie auch den gan­ zen Bau, ·in strengerer oder loserer Consequenz nach sich bin" (Kawi-Werk [GS VII: 144]). The degree of a language's functional coherence depends on the extent to which its type predominates, Sanskrit, Chinese, and the Mex­ ican language (Nahuatl) are, in Humboldt's view, examples for the almost complete
Humboldt sought to determie typological affinities as well, and he distin­ guished them from all other possible relations of similarity between lan­ guages, Anticipating the needs of contemporary linguistic typology (Jakob­ son 1958; Hjelmslev 1963; Skalicka 1979; Coseriu 1980a, 1983), Humboldt refers to languages of the same Gebiet as having only lexical elements in common; languages of the same Stamm as possessing grammatical elements that evince a genetic relationship; languages in which the same Sprachtypus is realized and which share a syntactic connection and so also grammatical organization; languages that are associated only by virtue of the fact that they are human languages (Verschiedenheiten [GS VI:294]), Humboldt carefully distinguishes typological affinity from any other sort of affinity but especially from genetic relationships10 - and thereby Jays the founda­ tions for typological linguistics as an autonomous discipline within linguis­ tics.

7.3 It will have become obvious that a concept of linguistic type such as Humboldt's cannot serve as the theoretical justification for the classifica­ tion of languages, In many passages of his works Humboldt directly opposes such classifications, In his earlier work, possibly under the prevail­ ing influences of the time, Humboldt wants to form "independamment des affinites historiques, des classes naturelles des Jangues telles que les etablis­ sent Jes naturalistes" (Essai [GS III:326]). Yet as early as in his Grundzuge of 1824-26 he juxtaposes the concept of class to that of individuaL Lan­ guages cannot be subdivided like the objects of nature, that are defined according to shared rather than distinctive traits (Verschiedenheiten [GS VI:150-51]), The human world operates on the opposite principle, In it, and in its highest manifestation - language - it is not possible to extract traits between the two poles of universality and individuality that allow the constitution of a kind, of a class, As individual human beings cannot be classified, so also are languages in their individuality not susceptible to clas­ sification, The operation of generalizing would cost language the living indi­ viduality (cf. Grundzuge [GS V:472]) that is its fundamental constitutive principle, Therefore, languages are not different as kinds, but as individu­ als; yet the possibilities of affinities and analogies between languages remains intact, Humboldt speaks of 'gemeinschaftliche Analogie' (Frag­ mente [GS VII:600]), and holds that elements of one language as well as those of many languages can fall under the Jaw of a shared analogy, The co­ existence of several types in one particular language can be offered in evi­ dence, These analogies run through language, as it were, horizontally, but without providing the justification for classifying, In order to avoid any mis­ understanding that might lead to identifying typology with classification,

173

8. The concept of type - for Humboldt as for Goethe before him - con­ stitutes the one essential reference point in the complex sphere of linguistic diversity, The discernment of types, Le., of the ways in which human thought has been realized historically, is a fundamental task of the linguist; and in responding to this anthropologically motivated project, the linguist re-discovers the philosophical as well as historical aspects of his discipline,

NOTES 1.

Coseriu's work has made a decisive contribution toward the correction of the misun· derstanding that has shaped the reception of Humboldt. Cf. esp. Coseriu (1972), but also (1979b, 1980a, 1980b, 1983), Ramat takes up the problem as well (1974:439-40), but even in recent works the mistake persists. It generally occurs in tandem with the identification of linguistic typology with language classification, and the reduction of Humboldt's thoUght to that of his forerunners, in particular the Schlegels. For example see Renzi (1976); Robins (1973:16-17); Sgall (1971, 1986); Skalicka (1979),

2.

The recurring use of tenus such as 'class', 'kind', 'genre' and 'species' bears out their intent to classify. Friedrich Schlegel writes of "zwei Hauptgattungen" (1808:44) and his brother August Wilhelm refers to ''trois classes" {1818:14).

3.

Humboldt's preference for Greek over other languages is well known. His works fre· quently and explicitely state that Greek is the most perfect language, superior even to Sanskrit (Verschiedenheiten [GS VI:241]).

4.

Even in anthropology, as in epistemology and in the theory of language, the inflUence of Kant must not be unduly emphasized. Lia Formigari has led me to realize that Humboldt

174

could not have been unaware of the concept that "Schelling had elaborated in his philosophy of nature. Renzi's thesis (1976, �sp. p.58) on the relationship between the sci� ence of nature and the science of language fails to convince us. According to it, Friedrich Schlegel proceeded from Goethean morphology to th� introduction of typological linguis­ tics. But Renzi (1978:58) himself notes the difference between Goethe and Schlegel: for the latter there is a clear OpJ?OSition between the organic and the mechanical; for Goethe, everything is organic. The distinction is not trivial if we consider its consequences for typological linguistics. Friedrich Schlegel separates 'inflectional' or organic languages i.e., those that have arisen organically - from languages without 'inflection', i.e., with no organic basis. Humboldt, by contrast, views every language as an organism. 5.

This is why it is impossible to agree with Ramat, who ascribes to Humboldt ''una visione sostanzialmente 'fissista'" (1974:439; 1976:49) of language and linguistic development. We shall. return to this point in the discussion of the possibility of several linguistic types co-existing within the same language.

6.

The Mexikanische Grammatik was first discovered some years ago among Humboldt's manuscripts at the Staatsbibliothek Preussischer Kulturbesitz in West Berlin. I am in­ debted to the kindness of Erendira Nansen-Diaz for giving me access to the as-yet unpublished edition that she has prepared.

7.

Humboldt differs from the Schlegels above all in giving priority to syntax (Syntax) over grammar (Grammatik) in linguistic analysis (BeneS 1958:9). Ramat (1974:439-40) has cor­ rectly observed that Humboldt shifts linguistic typology from the level of morphology to the functional level of syntax. But to this must be added an equally· or perhaps more fun­ damental difference: Humboldt's dynamic conception of language prompts him to seek the peculiarity of the syntactic connection not within the system, but within the Rede.

8.

According to Humboldt, creativity informs every linguistic act. In this regard, Steinthal (in Humboldt 1884:624) observes: "Sowohl als Logiker, wie als Aesthetiker war H. in die Frage vertieft: wie bildet sich die Synthese? und so als Sprachforscher: wie ist die Synthese des Satzes (fast hiitte ich gesagt: der synthetische Satz) mOglich? die wirklichen Dinge erscheinen vereinzelt; die Wissenschaft und die Kunst fasst sie synthetisch zusammen: hierauf geht aile Erkenntnislehre und aile Aesthetik. Sprechen ist auch eine kiinstlerische Uebung; die Rede, und zuniichst der Satz, ist eine kiinstlerische Gestalt. Wenn nun H. fragt, wie hat GOthe, Homer seine Synthesen vollzogen? so fragt er auch, wie die Barmanische Sprache die ihrigen vollzieht."

9.

According to Ramat (1974:435) it is possible "scorgere il limite di Humboldt nel non aver operato la distinzione metodologicamente indispensabile tra lingue come realta storiche e tipi linguistici come modelli astratti". For Coseriu (1972, 1980a, 1983) it is Humboldt him­ self who formulated the idea that has now become a fundamental principle of linguistic typology (SkaliCka 1979), namely, that several linguistic types can and do appear within a single language.

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I therefore cannot agree with Renzi's contention (1976:64) that in Bopp's work, as in Humboldt's, "i 'tipi' linguistici coincidono sempre con famiglie genealogiche". It is more likely that genealogical classification supersedes typology because of the Humboldtians' mistaken concept of 'type', on the one hand, and because of studies of genetic kinship, on the other.

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REFERENCES

Adelung, Johann Christoph. 1806-1817. Mithridates oder allgemeine Sprachkunde mit dem Vater Unser als Sprachprobe in bey nahe fiinfhun­ dert Sprachen und Mundarten. 4 Teile. Ed. [beginning with vol.II] by Johann Severin Vater. Berlin: Vossische Buchhandlung. Benes, Brigit. 1958. Wilhelm von Humboldt, Jacob Grimm, August Schleicher. Winterthur: P.G. Keller. Benveniste, Emile. 1952-53. "La classification des langues". Conferences de l'Institut de linguistique de l'Universite de Paris (11). (Repr. in Problemes de linguistique generate by E. Benveniste, vol.I, 99-118. Paris: Gal­ limard, 1966.) Bernhardi, August Ferdinand. 1801-1803. Sprachlehre. 2 vols. Berlin: Friilich. (Repr., Hildesheim: Olms, 1973.) . 1805. Anfangsgrilnde der Sprachwissenschaft. Ibid. Bolelli, Tristano. 1965. Per una storia della ricerca linguistica: Testi e note introduttive. Napoli: Morano. Borsche, Tilman. 1981. Sprachansichten: Der Begriff der menschlichen Rede in der Sprachphilosophie Wilhelm von Humboldts. Stuttgart: Klett­ Cotta. Cassirer, Ernst. 1945. "Structuralism in Modern Linguistics". Word 1 .99120. Coseriu, Eugenio. 1968. "Adam Smith und die Anfiinge der Sprach­ typologie". Wortbildung, Syntax und Morphologie: Festschrift zum 60. Geburtstag von Hans Marchand ed. by Herbert E. Brekle & Leonhard Lipka, 46-50. The Hague: Mouton. . -.--. 1972. "0ber die Sprachtypologie Wilhelm von Humboldts: Bin Beitrag zur Kritik der sprachwissenschaftlichen Oberlieferung". Beitriige zur vergleichenden Literaturgeschichte: Festschrift fUr Kurt Wais zum 65. Geburtstag, 107-35. Tiibingen: M. Niemeyer. . 1974. Synchronie, Diachronie und Geschichte: Das Problem des Sprachwandels. Miinchen: Wilhelm Fink. . 1979a. "Synchronie, Diachronie und Typologie". Sprache: Struktu­ ren und Funktionen by E. Coseriu, 77-90. Tiibingen: G. Narr. . 1979b. "Semantik, innere Sprachform und Tiefenstruktur". Ibid. , 177-86. --. 1979c. "Humboldt und die moderne Sprachwissenschaft". Arnold Cikobavas (dabadebis 80 c'listavisadmi midzghvnili k'rebuli)(= Festschrift A. Cikobava) , 20-29. Tbilissi. --

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. 1980a. "Der Sinn der Sprachtypologie". Typology and Genetics of Language ed. by Thorben Thrane, Vibeke Winge et a!., 157-70. Copenhagen: The Linguistic Circle of Copenhagen. . 1980b. "Partikeln und Sprachtypus: Zur strukturell-funktionellen Fragestellung in der Sprachtypologie". Wege zur Universalienforschung: Sprachwissenschaftliche Beitriige zum 60. Geburtstag von H. Seiler, 199206. Tiibingen: G. Narr. . 1982. "Naturbild und Sprache". Das Naturbild des Menschen ed. by Jorg Zimmermann, 260-84. Miinchen: Wilhelm Fink. . 1983. "Sprachtypologie und Typologie von sprachlichen Ver­ fahren". Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft, Sprachtypologie und Textlin­ guistik: Festschrift fUr Peter Hartmann, 269-79. Tiibingen: G. Narr. De Mauro, Tullio. 1965. lntroduzione alia semantica. Bari: Laterza. -Finck, Franz Nikolaus. 1910. Haupttypen des Sprachbaus. Leipzig: G.B. Teubner. (Repr., Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1961.) Forrnigari, Lia. 1977. La logica del pensiero vivente. Bari: Laterza. Gipper, Helmut. 1965. "Wilhelm von Humboldt als Begriinder modemer Sprachforschung". Wirkendes Wort 15.1-19. & Peter Schmitter. 1979. Sprachwissenschaft und Sprachphilosophie im Zeitalter der Romantik. Tiibingen: G. Narr. Goethe, Johann Wolfgang. 1790. Die Metamorphose der Pflanzen. Goethes Werke, vol.I. Weimar: Weimarer Ausgabe, 1887-1919. . 1794. Zur Morphologie. Goethes Werke, vol.I. Ibid. . 1795. Erster Entwurf einer allgemeinen Einleitung in die vergleichende Anatomie. Goethes Werke, vol.I. Ibid. Hjelmslev, Louis. 1963. Sproget: En introduction. Charlottenlund: The Nature Method Center. Humboldt, Wilhelm von. 1859. Wilhelm von Humboldts Briefe an F.G. Welcker. Ed. by Rudolf Haym. Berlin: R. Gaertner. . 1884. Die sprachphilosophischen Werke Wilhelm's von Humboldt. Hrsg. und erkliirt von Dr. H. Steinthal. Berlin: F. Diimmler. . 1903-36. Gesammelte Schriften. Ed. by Albert Leitzmann for the PreuBische Akademie der Wissenschaften. Berlin: B. Behr. (Cited as GS plus volume.) Plan = Plan einer vergleichenden Anthropologie [1795] ; GS I, 12. Herrmann und Dorothea = Asthetische Versuche. Erster Teil: Ober Goethes Herrmann und Dorothea [1798]; GS II, 2.

Berichtigungen und Zusiitze = Berichtigungen und Zusiitze zum ersten Abschnitte des zweiten Bandes des Mithridates iiber die kantabrische oder baskische Sprache [1811]; GS III, 8. Ankiindigung = Ankiindigung einer Schrift iiber die vaskische Sprache und Nation nebst Angabe des Gesichtspunktes und Inhalts derselben [1812] ; GS III:288-99. Essai = Essai sur les langues du nouveau continent (1812]; GS Ill, 9. Vergleichendes Sprachstudium = Ober das vergleichende Sprachstudium in Beziehung auf die verschiedenen Epochen der Sprachentwicklung [1820]; GS IV, l . Mexikanische Sprache = Versuch einer Analyse der mexikanischen Sprache [1821] ; GS IV, 4. Grundziige = Grundziige des allgemeinen Sprachtypus [1824-26] ; GS V, 14. Die Sprachen der Siidseeinseln = Ober die Sprachen der Siidseeinseln [1828] ; GS VI, 4. Affinities = An Essay on the best Means of ascertaining the Affinities of Oriental Languages [1828]; GS VI, 7. Verschiedenheiten = Ober die Verschiedenheiten des menschlichen Sprachbaues [1827-29] ; GS VI, 10. Von dem grammatischen Baue = Von dem grammatischen Baue der Sprachen [1827-29]; GS VI, 12. Kawi-Werk = Ober die Verschiedenheit des menschlichen Sprachbaues und ihren Einflufi auf die geistige Entwicklung des Menschengeschlechts [1835]; GS VII, 1. Fragmente = Fragmente der Monographie iiber die Basken [1801-1802]; GS VII, 2. Ivaldo, Marco. 1980. Wilhelm von Humboldt: Antropologia filosofica. Napoli: Edizioni Scientifiche Italiane. Jakobson, Roman. 1958. "Typological Studies and their Contribution to Historical Comparative Linguistics". Proceedings of the Eighth Interna­ tional Congress ofLinguists ed. by Eva Sivertsen, 17-25. Oslo: Oslo Uni­ versity Press. (Repr. in Selected Writings by R. Jakobson, vol.I, 523-32. The Hague: Mouton, 1971.) Leroux, Robert. 1958. L'anthropologie comparee de Guillaume de Hum­ boldt. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Marino, Luigi. 1976. "Wilhelm von Humboldt e l'antropologia comparata". Wilhelm von Humboldt nella cultura contemporanea ed. by Luigi Heil­ mann, 11-41. Bologna: II Mulino.

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Milewski, Tadeusz. 1976. "Presupposti per una linguistica tipologica". La tipologia linguistica ed. by Paolo Ramat, 193-238. Bologna: Il Mulino. Morpurgo-Davies, Anna. 1975. "Language Classification in the Nineteenth Century" . Current Trends in Linguistics ed. by Th.A. Sebeok, vol.XIII: Historiography of Linguistics, 607-716. The Hague: Mouton. Ramal, Paolo. 1970. "Tipologia strutturale". LeSt 5.315- 25. . 1974. "Attualita del pensiero di Wilhelm von Humboldt a propo­ sito della tipologia linguistica". Proceedings of the Eleventh Interna­ tional Congress of Linguists ed. by Luigi Heilmann, vol.I, 439-43. Bologna: Il Mulino. . 1976a. "Del problema della tipologia linguistica in Wilhelm von Humboldt e d'altro ancora". Wilhelm von Humboldt nella cultura con­ temporanea ed. by Luigi Heilmann, 43-65. Bologna: Il Mulino. . 1976b. "Introduzione". La tipologia linguistica ed. by Paolo Ramal, 7-46. Bologna: Il Mulino. . 1984. Linguistica tipologica. Bologna: Il Mulino. . 1985. "Wilhelm von Humboldts Sprachtypologie". ZPSK 38.590610. . 1986. "Is a Holistic Typology Possible?". FoL 20. 3-14. Ramisvili, Guram. 1981. "Uber die philosophischen Grundlagen der Sprachanthropologie". Logos semantikos: Studia linguistica in honorem Eugenio Coseriu, vol.II, 269-73. Berlin & New York: De Gruyter; Madrid: Gredos. Renzi, Lorenzo. 1976. "Storia e obiettivi della tipologia linguistica". La tipologia linguistica ed. by Paolo Ramat, 47-78. Bologna: Il Mulino. Robins, Robert H. 1973. "The History of Language Classification". Cur­ rent Trends in Linguistics ed. by Thomas A. Sebeok, vol.XI: Diachronic, Areal and Typological Linguistics, 3-41. The Hague: Mouton. Schlegel, August Wilhelm. 1818. Observations sur Ia langue et Ia litterature provenqales. Paris: Librairie grecque-latine-allemande. (Repr., Tiibingen: G. Narr, 1971.) Schlegel, Friedrich. 1808. Ueber die Sprache und Weisheit der Indier. Heidelberg: Mohr & Zimmer. (Repr. , with an introduction by Seba­ stiano Timpanaro, Amsterdam: J. Benjamins, 1977.) Sgall, Peter. 1971. "On the Notion 'Type of Language'". TLP 4.75-87. . 1986. "Classical Typology and Modern Linguistics". FoL 20. 15-28. Skalicka, Vladimir. 1976a. "Un 'costrutto tipologico"'. La tipologia linguistica ed. by Paolo Ramat, 303-310. Bologna: Il Mulino.

--. 1976b. "Tipologia linguistica e sviluppo linguistico". Ibid. , 109-14. --. 1979. " Uber den gegenwartigen Stand der Typologie". Typologische Studien by V. Skalicka, ed. by Peter Hartmann, 312-34. Wiesbaden: F. Vieweg. . 1986. "Ist eine Typologie mi:iglich?". FoL 20.81-86. Steinthal, Heymann. 1850. Die Classification der Sprachen, dargestellt als die Entwickelung der Sprachidee. Berlin: F. Diimmler. . 1860. Charakteristik der hauptsiichlichsten Typen des Sprachbaues. Zweite Bearbeitung der Classification der Sprachen. Ibid. Swiggers, Pierre. 1985. "Categories grammaticales et categories culturelles dans Ia philosophic du langage de Humboldt: Les implications de Ia 'forme grammaticale'". ZPSK 38.729-36. Telegdi, Zsigmond. 1970. "Humboldt als Begriinder der Sprachtypologie". Theoretical Problems of Typology and the Northern Eurasian Languages ed. by Laszl6 Deszi:i & Petr Hajdu, 25-34. Amsterdam: R.B. Griiner. Trabant, Jiirgen. 1985. "Nachwort". W. v. Humboldt, Vber die Sprache: Ausgewiihlte Schriften ed. by J. Trabant, 159-174. Miinchen: Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag. Uspenskij, Boris Andreevich. 1962. Principles of Structural Typology. The Hague: Mouton.

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SUMMARY

Guided by his anthropological interests, Humboldt founds linguistic typology on the diversity of human nature. Language, which belongs to all human beings and is the highest, clearest and most tangible form of thought through which human creativity is revealed, offers him a promising avenue for investigating such a diversity. The diversity that language presents in the form of historical languages becomes the object of comparative linguistics, which through the comparison of different languages aims at finding the historically realized ways in which human thought has been proceeding. Humboldt derives the criteria of his comparative method from Goethe's morphology, from which he takes in particular the concept of "Typus". A comparative linguistic study must take into account languages as organic wholes. Each language is a "Form", a network of analogies, one interwo­ ven with the other, which constitute a peculiar world-view. Moreover, form has not only a synchronic but also a diachronic dimension; it is to be

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assumed that form shapes and reshapes substance analogically, in accor­ dance with the principle that simultaneously characterizes its structure and guides its actual structuring. This principle is the type, which governs the formation of the organic whole. It is to be sought where it is clearly man­ ifest: that is, in the syntactic connection of speech. The linguistic type (i.e. the particular way in which thought proceeds, the way in which connections occur within a language) ought to be identified in speech (Rede), as the creative act par excellence. From the acknowledgement that a linguistic type supports a variety of individual realizations arises the idea of the co-exis­ tence, within a single language, of several types or several ways of linking. Traces of the three types - 'inflectional', 'agglutinating' and 'incorporat­ ing' - can be found in most languages. What assures the unity of a lan­ guage, in spite of the presence in it of several types, is the predominance of one type over the others. The degree of a language's functional coherence depends on the extent to which a type predominates. A concept such as "linguistic type" cannot serve as a theoretical basis for a classification of languages. In many passages of his work Humboldt directly opposes such a classification: inasmuch as they are individual, languages are not susceptible of classification. ·

Wilhelm von Hnmboldt nnd das Problem der Schrift Christian Stetter

Technische Hochschule Aachen

DaB sich Humboldts Sprachphilosophie ausgehend vom Fragment Ober Denken und Sprechen (1795/96) aus zwei hauptsachlichen Quellen entwic­ kelt, der Transzendentalphilosophie Kants und Fichtes einerseits und der in der Abhandlung Ober den Ursprung der Sprache (1772) entfalteten Anthro­ pologie Herders andererseits, kann als gesichert vorausgesetzt werden (cf. Stetter 1988a). Auf diesen heiden Quellen baut das in der Akademie-Vor­ lesung von 1820 umrissene Programm einer allgemeinen Sprachkunde auf, das explizit erstmals im Essai sur les langues du nouveau continent von 1812 formuliert worden war. Ihr zentrales Anliegen ist das Studium der "faculte du langage de l'homme" (Essai § 9 = GS III:308), der Sprachfiihigkeit, deren erste, fiir sein Denken bestimmend bleibende Definition Humboldt bereits im Wallenstein-Brief an Schiller vom September 1800 gelingt. Sie ist die F3.higkeit, innere Gedanken und Empfindungen und auBere Gegen� sHinde vermOge eines sinnlichen Mediums, das zugleich Werk des Men� schen und Ausdruck der Welt ist, gegenseitig aus einander zu erzeugen, oder vielmehr seiner selbst, indem man sich in beide theilt, klar zu wer­ den" (Humboldt, WW V:198).

Diese Definition findet sich nicht zufallig an diesem Ort. DaB Sprache das bildende Organ des Gedanken ist, bestimmt diese zunachst logisch als notwendige Bedingung des Denkens, mithin der Erkenntnis, sowohl "des Einzelnen in abgeschlossener Einsamkeit" wie der Gesellschaft (cf. Grund­ ziige §§ 25 und 31-32). Doch impliziert der beriihmte "Hauptsatz" der hum­ boldtschen Sprachphilosophie, der ja aus der zitierten Definition der Sprachfahigkeit unmittelbar folgt, die Einsicht, daB jedwede Erkenntnis, insofern sie nur als sprachlich vermittelte moglich ist, dem vermittelnden

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HUMBOLDT UND DAS PROBLEM DER SCHR!Ff

Medium nicht nur ihre logische Strukturierung verdankt, damit auch lnter­ pretierbarkeit und Kritisierbarkeit, sondern daB dariiber hinaus die Art sei­ ner Geburt den Gedanken als asthetisches Produkt ausweist, als Resultat des Spiels der Einbildungskraft mit den Formen der je verfiigbaren Spra­ che. lm Akt der Artikulation empfangt er nicht ll\lr, abhiingig vom jeweils entfalteten diskursiven Zusammenhang, seine definitive logische Form, mithin Geltung, sondern dariiber hinaus das Gepriige einer bestimmten as­ thetischen Gestalt, in der sozusagen ein OberschuB an Deutungsmoglichkei­ ten im Signifikanten angelegt ist, den kein logisch linearisierter Diskurs je­ mals auszuschopfen imstande ware. Zwar wird das Wort in der Rede "als Gauzes" vernommen, d.h. logisch kategorisiert, jedoch als artikuliertes Gauzes.

Diese Einsicht ist bereits in Humboldts Uberlegungen zur Asthetik vor­ bereitet. Das 'Reich der Wirklichkeit' begreift er in der Schrift Ueber Go­ thes Hermann und Dorothea (1798) als nur extensional erfaBbare Menge von Objekten. Dies ist strikt kantisch gedacht: die Erscheinung fiir sich ist da, 'gegeben' in Kants Terminologie; als solche braucht sie sich nicht "durch Ursache und Folge zu rechtfertigen". "Die Welt zerfallt in Tatsa­ chen", wird analog ein Jahrhundert spiiter der junge Wittgenstein formulie­ ren und der Logik damit das sie fundierende Extensionalitiitsprinzip lie­ fern.2 Demgegeniiber ist das 'Reich des M6glichen', der Phantasie dadurch gekennzeichnet, daB seine Elemente, wie Humboldt in Anlehnung an Kants Begriff des transzendentalen Ideals (KrV B 599ff.) formuliert, "nicht anders, als unter der Bedingung eines durchgiingigen inneren Zusammen­ hangs gedacht werden" k6nnen. Dergestalt als 'moglich' entworfene Ge­ genstande sind daher "im strengsten und einfachsten Sinne des Worts idea­ lisch" (WW II: 139), das entwerfende Organ ist die Einbildungskraft. Urn die Qualitiit einer cognitio clara et distincta gewinnen zu k6nnen,' muB der Gedanke nach dem zitierten ersten Hauptsatz und dem daraus entwickelten sog. 'Urtypus aller Sprachen' im Wort veriiuBert werden. Die­ ses wird als im intersubjektiven Gebrauch schematisierte Gestalt Objekt und bleibt aufgrund seiner Funktion doch subjektiv; es bezeichnet, was es bedeutet, aber bildet es nicht ab. Diese Funktion ware, da das Wort verall­ gemeinerte Gestalt ist, objektiv zu nennen. Ebensowenig indiziert es ledig­ lich eine von ihm giinzlich unabhiingige Bedeutung: Vielmehr gibt das Wort AnlaB, sich unter ihm einen Gegenstand "nach den verschiedensten An­ sichten" ( WW II:62) vorzustellen. Jedoch ist aufgrund der 'bestimmten Ge­ stalt' des Wortes das Feld der durch seine AuBerung in der verbundenen Rede eroffneten Denkm6glichkeiten begrenzt' durch die in der betreffen­ den Sprache moglichen Redeverbindungen, d.h. die M6glichkeiten, den betreffenden Term unter eine syntaktische Kategorie zu subsumieren, und durch den Reichtum an Oppositionen, die ihn innerhalb des 'W6rtervor­ raths' des Sprachsystems charakterisieren. Die mit einem einzigen Wort ausgelegten Moglichkeiten, einen Gegenstand zu denken, grenzen in der Tat ans Unendliche - die moderne Linguistik beginnt erst, diese in Hum­ boldts oben zitierter Kennzeichnung der Artikulation ausgesprochene Ein­ sicht zu bestiitigen. Zurecht begreift Humboldt daher das Wort als Individuum einer Welt sui generis

Nun ist dasjenige - so schreibt Humboldt - was die Artikulation dem blossen Hervorrufen seiner Bedeutung [ . . . ] hinzufiigt, dass sie das Wort unmittelbar durch seine Form als einen Teil eines unendlichen Ganzen, ei� ner Sprache, darstellt (Grundzuge §36 = GS V:384).

Artikulation beruht auf dem Prinzip der Identifizierung von Signifikanten­ formen nach MaBgabe minimaler Differenzen zu anderen in der langue schematisierten Signifikanten. Humboldt begreift Sprache daher bereits im Essai als System sich differentiell bestimmender Terme, denen durch ihren Gebrauch in der parole allererst ein bestimmter Wert zugemessen wird (cf. Essai §14 = GS III:322, Anm.; Grundziige 91ff. = GS V:421ff.). Jede Sprache ist somit eine in bestimmter Weise organisierte Struktur, 'structure organique' in der Terminologie des Essai (§14 = GS III:321), in Humboldts sonst geliiufiger Bezeichnungsweise ein 'organischer Bau', in dem, wie es in der Akademievorlesung von 1820 heiBt, jedes "nur durch das Andre, und Alles nur durch die eine, das Ganze durchdringende Kraft besteht" (WW III:3): das Sprachverm6gen. Jeder konkrete 'organische' Sprachbau ist dessen Produkt; es verkniipft die Elemente der Struktur im Wege ihrer Artikulation zu einem System, denn das grundlegende Verfah­ ren der faculte du langage beim Aufbau des Systems ist die Analogie. Be­ reits im Essai formuliert Humboldt das Grundprinzip, daB in einer Sprache (langue) alles ohne Ausnahme auf einer Analogie beruhe (Essai §14 = GS III:321). Die Artikulation jedes Terms kann nicht anders als in Analogie zu bereits bestehenden erfolgen - mag diese nun dem einzelnen Sprachbe­ wuBtsein noch erkennbar oder nur noch historisch rekonstruierbar sein. Der 'asthetische UberschuB' an Signifikanz, den der sprachlich artikulierte Gedanke gegeniiber seiner logischen Geltung aufweist, verdankt sich so der Vernetzung seiner Elemente im System der je.veiligen Sprache.1

zwischen der erscheinenden ausser, und der wirkenden in uns in der Mit­ te", das "insofern mit einem Kunstwerk Aehnlichkeit hat, als es durch eine

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CHRISTIAN STETIER sinnliche, der Natur abgeborgte Form eine Idee mOglich macht . . . " (WW Il:60, 62).

Seine Vernetzung im System der Sprache, die in der Sprachstruktur ange­ legten intensionalen Deutungen des Terms durch andere bereiten - wie Humboldt im Fragment iiber Latium und Hellas (1806) formuliert - den Zusammenhang allererst vor, "den das Denken in der Welt zu fin den, und in seinen Erzeugnissen hervorzubringen bemiiht ist" (ebd. 63). Die Sprache determiniert nicht das Denken; dies ware eine irrige Vor­ stellung, die die Humboldt-Rezeption zumal des 20. Jahrhunderts aller­ dings lange beherrscht hat. Ihr System von Termen, ihre Netze von Analo­ gien bieten vielmehr der Einbildungskraft Formen an, die, wenn sie zweck­ miiBig gebraucht werden - fiir den Kantianer Humboldt ist dies niemals auf eine Regel zuriickzufiihren -, zu sinnvollen Gedanken gebildet werden konnen. Beziiglich Humboldts Sprachphilosophie hat man gelegentlich von ei­ nem Widerspruch zwischen organischer und struktureller Sprachbetrach­ tung gesprochen (cf. etwa Giels und Mattsons Kommentar in WW V:463) - zu Unrecht. Wenn er Sprache als organischen Bau bezeichnet, dann be­ greift er sie als System, dessen Struktur allerdings ganz 'im Sinne des Orga­ nismus-Begriffs Kants auf einen bestimmten Zweck bin organisiert ist, eben den der Bildung des Gedanken. Aus diesem Grunde weist er in den Grund­ ziigen (Humboldt, 1824-26) auf die Isomorphic von sprachlicher und logi­ scher Artikulation bin. Der 'Geist' bildet den Gedanken, indem er das kon­ tinuierliche diskursive Denken in Grundteile zerlegt, "deren Zusammenfii­ gung Iauter solche Gauze bildet, welche das Streben in sich tragen, Theile neuer Ganze zu werden" . In dieser Form begegnen sich Denken und sprachliche Artikulation "wie in einem verkniipfenden Mittel" ( Grundziige §21 = GS V:375). Die Artikulation des Gedanken kann auf die des sprach­ lichen 'Ausdrucks' abgebildet werden, wei! beide - mit dem friihen Witt­ genstein zu sprechen - dieselbe 'logische Form' haben.' Erst in dieser Ab­ bildung wird der Gedanke klar und deutlich, und zwar auch fiir den Den­ kenden selbst. 'Es' denkt sozusagen in ibm, was aber, wird ibm erst durch die Funktion der Versprachlichung verstandlich. So ist "das Sprechen eine nothwendige Bedingung des Denkens":6 Der Gedanke ist der sinnvolle Satz.7 Im AnschluB an Herder und, wie man hinzufiigen muB, von vomher­ ein in Opposition zur bald sich positivistisch in zahllosen Detailuntersu­ chungen verlierenden historisch-vergleichenden Sprachwissenschaft (einige

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Hinweise darauf finden sich in der Akademie-Vorlesung von 1820 und in den Grundzilgen; cf. Stetter 1988a) deutet Humboldt Sprache anthropolo­ gisch als Medium der Bildung des Menschengeschlechts. Der Sinn des . ver­ gleichenden Sprachstudiums konne nicht nur darin liegen, die Verschieden­ heit der Sprachen als 'naturhistorische Erscheinung' zu beschreiben. Selbst dies ware i.ii. schon vie! verlangt, denn es erforderte, wie Humboldt im Es­ sai oder spater in den Grundzugen zeigt (Essai §§14ff. = GS III:321ff.; Grundzuge §§56ff. = GS V:400ff.), vollstandige synchronische Strukturbe­ schreibungen einzelner Sprachen auf den Gebieten Lautsystem, Wortervor­ rat und Syntax sowie auf dieser Basis Strukturvergleiche verschiedener Sprachen. Im Gegensatz zu Bopp oder Grimm fordert Humboldt also eine systematische synchronische Linguistik. Die Verschiedenheit der Sprachen miisse dariiber hinaus, so besagt das in der Akademie-Vorlesung von 1820 entfaltete Programm, philosophisch als 'intellectuell-teleologische Erscheinung' (WW III:6ff.) begriffen wer­ den; dies erforderte eine Beschreibungsperspektive, die die Differenzen des Formenreichtums der einzelnen Sprachen unter dem Gesichtspunkt der daraus resultierenden Konsequenzen fiir die Artikulation von Gedanken darstellte. Eine Grundfigur der herderschen Preisschrift aufgreifend vergleicht Humboldt das menschliche Sprachvermogen mit dem 'Naturinstinct der Thie­ re'. Der Sprachsinn, dessen Produkt die je einzelne Sprache ist, sei gleich­ sam ein "intellectueller Instinct der Vernunft" (ibid. 11). Das Subjekt, dem er zuzuschreiben ist, ist auf der h6chsten fiir Humboldt denkbaren Allge­ meinheitsstufe die Nation. Die philosophische Bedeutung der Sprache liegt fiir ihn ja darin, daB in ihren schematisierten Formen zwar die Spuren indi­ vidueller Einbildungskraft, der die "faculte du langage" unter asthetischem Gesichtspunkt zugerechnet werden muB, eingegraben sind, daB diese je­ doch - wie dies die Theorie des 'Urtypus der Sprachen' beschreibt - im intersubjektiven Gebrauch so verobjektiviert werden, und zwar Terme ebenso wie ihre Kombinations-, mithin Interpretationsmoglichkeiten,s daB sich daraus ein iiberindividuelles Allgemeines bildet, das eine Menge von Sprachsubjekten allererst zu einer Sprachgemeinschaft vermittelt. Das We­ sen der Sprachen, so schreibt Humboldt in den Grundzugen, scheine ibm verkannt, der geistige Process ihrer Entstehung nur scheinbar erkHirt und ihre machtige Einwirkung auf das Gemiith unrichtig gewiirdigt zu werden, wenn man das Menschengeschlecht als zahllose zu derselben Gattung ge­ h6rende Naturen, und nicht vielmehr als Eine in zahllose Individuen zer­ spaltene (betrachte]. (GS V:383)

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Die anthropologische Funktion der Sprache wird man danach nur be­ greifen, wenn man die Verschiedenheit der einzelnen Sprachen und Sprachtypen als in diese gelegte strukturelle Bildungsmittel im Sinne des herderschen Gesetzes der Progression der Gattung• nimmt. In ihnen arti­ kuliert der Sprachsinn der Nationen 'Weltansichten' aus. Um dies zu verstehen, mull der Prozell der Artikulation noch einmal genauer betrachtet werden: In die Priigung des Wortes geht "die ganze Art der subjektiven Wahrnehmung der Gegenstiinde iiber" (GS V:387). Die Analogie, die seiner Bildung zugrunde liegt, vernetzt den Term in bestimm­ ter Weise mit anderen. So repriisentiert - in Begriffen der peirceschen Se­ miotik gesprochen - jeder Term eine gelungene Abduktion,JO in der die logische Geltung eines Gedankenabschnitts dadurch zur Deutlichkeit ge­ bracht wird, daB er in die bestimmte Form des Wortes gefaBt, also indivi­ dualisiert wird und vor dem Ohr sinnliche Geltung gewinnt. Dies wiederum affiziert das Gefiihl. Sinnliche und Empfindungsgeltung kann andererseits wie das Wort nur besitzen, sofern es auch logisch gilt. Miiglich ist dies Humboldt im semiotischen Schliisselparagraphen der Grundzuge erliiutert - nur dadurch, daB "dieser Sinnen- und Gefiihlsgehalt zugleich, und wie­ der synthetisch, als Stoff vernichtet und als Form erhalten wird" (GS V:420), - eine der riitselhaftesten Aussagen Humboldts, die erst verstand­ lich wird, wenn man bedenkt, daB seine Sprachidee - wie oben bereits an­ gedeutet - vollstandig aus der kantischen Asthetik entwickelt ist. Die be­ schriebene Transformation des Staffs in Form ist aus logischen Grunden er­ forderlich; Sinnlichkeit und Intellektualitiit wiiren anders nicht zu vermit­ teln, und so ist dies nach Humboldt "das Werk der Einbildungskraft [ . . . ] , der Vermittlerin der entgegengesetzten Naturen in der Menschheit" (ibid.). Die hier beziiglich der verschiedenen Geltungsdimensionen des Wortes be­ riihrte Problematik hat in allgemeiner Form Kant im Schematismus-Kapitel der Kritik der reinen Vernunft ausfiihrlich eriirtert, und hieraus ergibt sich unmittelbar die Liisung des Problems: Die Formung der sinnlichen und Ge­ fiihlsgeltung des Wortes kann nur qua Schematisierung geschehen. Der Term ist nichts anderes als das Produkt der in seine Priigung eingegangenen Analogien. Jeder AnalogieschluB aber beruht auf einer partiellen Identitiit, mithin auch partiellen Differenzen. Daher ist die jedes einzelne Wort cha­ rakterisierende differentielle Vernetzung im Sprachsystem sein Schema .ll Hierin liegt der Grund dafiir, daB, wie Humboldt formuliert, "jedes Wort einer Sprache eine gewisse Weite fiir die Miiglichkeit verschiedenarti­ ger Vorstellungen besitzt" (GS V:418), denn sein Schema gestattet durch­ aus verschiedenartige Anwendungen in der Rede.

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[Daher ist Verstehen] kein Zusammentreffen der Vorstellungsweisen in ei� nem untheilbaren Punkt, sondern ein Zusammentreffen von Gedanken� spharen, von welchen der allegemeinere Theil sich deckt, der individuelle­ re Oberragt (GS V:418-19).

Im organischen Bau einer jeden Sprache, in den sie charakterisieren­ den morphologischen, lexikalischen oder syntaktischen Strukturen ist die Arbeit der je individuellen Einbildungskraft zu einer iiberindividuellen Struktur verobjektiviert, und so wie jede individuelle Sprachpriigung eine spezifische Weltansicht, niimlich die Wahrnehmungsperspektive des einzel­ nen, repriisentiert, so entfaltet die 'structure organique' der Sprache eine besondere nationelle Weltansicht. Hieraus ergibt sich unmittelbar der zwei­ te, durch Liebrucks sogenannte 'Hauptsatz' der Sprachphilosophie Humboldts: Durch denselben Act, verm6ge welches der Mensch die Sprache aus sich heraus spinnt, spinnt er sich in dieselbe ein, und jede Sprache zieht urn die Nation, welcher sie angeh6rt, einen Kreis, aus dem es nur insofern hinaus­ zugehen m6glich ist, als man zugleich in den Kreis einer andren Sprache hinilbertritt" (GS V:387-88).

"Hierin ist", nach Humboldt, "der Grund und der letzte Zweck aller Sprachuntersuchung enthalten" (WW III:20). Ihr Ziel kann nur darin beste­ hen, im Wege des Sprachvergleichs das Subjektive einer jedeu in besonde­ ren Sprachformen artikulierten Weltansicht auszusondern und das Objekt, die Summe alles Erkennbaren, "m6glichst rein davon auszuscheiden" (ibid., 20-21). Erst in diesem teleologischen Zusammenhang, damit zugleich aber auch - wie der erste 'Hauptsatz' belegt - an systematisch zentraler Stelle gewiunt das Thema der Schrift fiir Humboldt Interesse. Dessen Verfol­ gung, iiuBerlich angeregt durch die Entzifferung der Hieroglyphenschrift durch Young und Champollion, f6rdert in seinem Werk Spuren eines, mit Derrida zu reden, Logozentrismus zutage, der sich in latentem Wider· spruch zu der bislang skizzierten, durch das Prinzip der Differenz charakte­ risierten Sprachidee Humboldts befindet, und es k6nnte sein, daB dieser Widerspruch die Ursache fiir manche Briicke in seinem Alterswerk ist, et­ wa das Auseinandertreten von 'Nominal-' und 'Pronominalansicht' der Sprache, Relikte universalgrammatischen Denkens in den Grundzugen und in der Schrift Vom grammatischen Baue der Sprachen (1827-29) , letztlich die fiir unser Thema bedeutsame Opposition von 'innerer' und 'auBerer' Sprachform.

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Eingangs der Schrift Ueber den Zusammenhang der Schrift mit der Sprache (1823-24) skizziert Humboldt wiederum die oben beriihrte Idee ei­ ner progressiven, anthropologischen 'Gesetzen' folgenden 'geistigen Bil­ dung' der Gattung Mensch (cf. GS V:31-32). Dem Sprachstudium kommt in dieser Hinsicht besondere Bedeutung zu, wei! Humboldt die Verschie­ denartigkeit von Sprachstrukturen und -typen als Indiz eines unterschiedli­ chen, je spezifischen nationellen Sprachsinns begreift. Die Idee, die histo­ risch vorliegenden Erfahrungen von in ihrem Typ differenzierenden Spra­ chen, insbesondere die strukturellen Differenzen zwischen den amerikani­ schen und indoeuropiiischen Sprachen, teleologisch zu deuten, hatte Hum­ boldt bereits in der Akademie-Vorlesung Ueber das Entstehen der gramma­ tischen Formen von 1822 ausfiihrlich entwickelt, und in Konsequenz dieser Konzeption widerspricht er - wie der Brief an A.W. Schlegel vom 30. Dez. 1822 belegt - . sowohl Jacob Grimms Idee eines sukzessiven Sprach­ verfal!s vom vermeintlichen Hochstand des Germanischen zu den nivel!ier� ten Formen des Neuhochdeutschen oder gar Eing!ischen wie auch Schlegels Auffassung eines strikten Unterschieds zwischen agglutinierendem und flektierendem Sprachtypus (cf. WW V:260f.). "Das Wesen der Sprache", so formuliert Humboldt den Grundgedanken seiner Konzeption 1820,

WW III: B). So implizierte etwa Bopps Arbeit iiber das Konjugationssy­ stem der indoeuropiiischen Sprachen den SchluB, daB sich die Flexionsen­ dungen in deren Verbalsystem aus urspriinglich agglutinierten Pronominal­ formen entwickelt haben. Sprachentwicklung deutet Humboldt dergestalt als sukzessive Ausson­ derung verschiedener Typen von sprachlichen Zeichen. Waren zuniichst im Schema des Wortes die objektive Funktion der Gegenstandskonstituition und die je subjektive Perspektive und Geltung fiir das jeweilige Individuum miteinander verwoben, so werden diese Funktionen im Zuge der Progres­ sion der Sprachen getrennt. In der Aussonderung formaler Typen mit rein syntaktischer Funktion verobjektiviert der Sprachsinn der Nationen not­ wendige Bedingungen der Gedankenbildung, so daB sich am Ende der Ent­ wicklung aller Sprachen in den universellen formalen Typen das transzen­ dentale Subjekt in Form einer Universalgrammatik selbst zur Erscheinung gebracht hiitte. Nirgends zeigen sich die dogmatischen Ziige in Humboldts Denken deutlicher als in diesem Zusammenhang. Hatte er im Essai von 1812 noch sehr klar demonstriert, daB der Begtiff einer Universalgrammatik notwen­ digerweise leer sein miisse (GS II:308), so verdichten sich im Kapitel iiber die "Redeverbindung" der Grundzilge und insbesondere in der Schrift Von dem grammatischen Baue der Sprachen, die Liebrucks (1965:14) sehr deut­ lich als den eigentlichen 'Skandal' in Humboldts Werk empfunden hat, Mo­ tive, die in der Tat als Antizipation der chomskyschen Idee substantieller Universalien gelten miissen.12 Wenn er auch betont, daB "nur der ge­ schichtliche Weg", d.h. empirische Detailstudien, "wesentlich zur Erkennt­ nis des Sprachbaues" fiihren konne ( GS V :450), und wenn er auch die Re­ de als das "in der Natur zuerst und urspriinglich Gedachte" (S.447) be­ greift, in dieser Einsicht also die moderne Sprechhandlungstheorie antizi­ piert, so postuliert er andererseits doch unvermittelt eine logische Gram­ matik und folgt hierin der aristotelischen Reduktion des Logos auf den lo­ gos apophantikos: "Die Gesetze des Denkens enthalten die Grundbestim­ mungen der Grammatik" (GS V:451), und was Wunder, daB er diese am besten im Griechischen, der "vollkommensten al!er Sprachen" (ibid.), realisiert sieht. Umstandslos liiBt er "die vier ersten Casus der Declination von selbst und nothwendig aus der Kategorie der Relation" flieBen (S.452) und tadelt das Sanskrit, daB es "Verben des Gebens, statt sie mit der Dop­ pelbeziehung des Dativs zu verkniipfen, oft mit dem Genitiv construirt" (GS VI:342). Die Regression von der kantischen Idee der Kategorie zur aristo-

besteht darin, die Materie der Erscheinungswelt in die Form der Gedan­ ken zu giessen; ihr ganzes Streben ist formal, und da die W6rter die Stelle der Gegensttinde vertreten, so muss auch ihnen, als Materie, eine Form entgegenstehen, welcher sie unterworfen werden (WW 111:13).

Die Formalisierung des Gedanken kann auf drei verschiedene Weisen geschehen, die Humboldt als Progressionsstufen im herderschen Sinn ver­ steht: 1) Die Form des Satzes wird "in Gedanken hinzu verstanden". Fiir diese strukturelle Moglichkeit hat sich beispielsweise das Chinesische in sol­ cher "Reinheit, RegelmiiBigkeit und Konsequenz" entschieden, daB es sich "durch diese Vorziige", so versucht Humboldt diesen 'Skandal' in seinem System zu heilen, "unbedingt den vollkommensten Sprachen an die Seite" stellt (GS V:321). 2) Die Satzform wird durch "in sich bedeutende Wor­ ter", die neben dieser syntaktischen Verwendung auch lexikalisch ge­ braucht werden, "mithin als Stoff' bezeichnet. So werde z.B. in der Karai­ bensprache der Term daco einmal als tempusanzeigendes grammatisches Morphem verwendet (aveiridaco = wenn du wiirst), zum anderen aber als Lexem (oruacono daco = am dritten Tage; cf. WWIII:35). 3) Die Satzform wird durch "Worter grammatischer, also formaler Bedeutung" man wiir­ de heute eher von grammatischen Morphemen sprechen - bezeichnet (cf.

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telischen ist offenkundig. Freilich ist zu bedenken, daB die logischen Para­ doxien einer derartigen Konzeption erst ein Jahrhundert spiiter, niimlich in Wittgensteins Tractatus, deutlich werden.n Bedeutsam wird die Schrift fiir Humboldt nicht nur, wei! sie die in der 'Cultur', der Bearbeitung der Sprachen gemachten Fortschritte sichere und verbreite, sondern wei! sie dariiber hinaus "den Grad der erreichbaren Vollkommenheit" der Sprachen fordere und steigere (GS V :33). "Es hat mir", so eroffnet er die Akademie-Vorlesung Ueber die Buchstabenschrift und ihren Zusammenhang mit dem Sprachbau von 1824,

V: 113). Ihr Vorzug gegeniiber anderen Schrifttypen bestehe darin, "die rei­ ne Gedankennatur der Sprache" durch keinerlei bildlichc Vorstellungen zu st6ren, dem Denken des Begriffs "Vogel" beispielsweise durch die Form der graphischen Repriisentation die Vorstellung eines Storchs oder Greif­ vogels zu unterschieben. Sie allein fiihre dem Sprachsinn das Prinzip der Artikulation bis zur letztm6glichen Ebene, der der Phoneme, "rein und an­ schaulich" vor Augen:

bei dem Nachdenken tiber den Zusammenhang der Buchstabenschrift mit der Sprache immer geschienen, als wenn die erstere in genauem Verhalt­ niss mit den Vorzligen der letzteren sHinde, und als wenn die Annahme und Bearbeitung des Alphabets, ja selbst die Art und vielleicht auch die Erfindung desselben, von dem Grade der Vollkommenheit der Sprache, und noch urspriinglicher, der Sprachanlagen jeder Nation abhienge. (GS V:J07)

Wie der Sprachtyp Riickschliisse auf den ihn produzierenden Sprachsinn zuliiBt, so nach Humboldt auch die Wahl des Schrifttypus. Es sei ein beden­ kenswertes Phiinomen, daB wahre Bilderschrift ailein in Aegypten einheimisch war [ ] dass die Figu­ renschrift sich auf den Osten Asiens beschrankt [ . . . ] , dass es in dem iibri­ gen Asien seit den iiltesten Zeiten mehrere Buchstabenschriften gab, und dass Europa urspriinglich gar keine Schrift besass, aber sehr friih gerade diejenige empfieng und bewundernswiirdig benutzte, welche die Fort­ schritte der Sprache und die Ideenentwicklung am meisten bef6rdert (GS V:33-34). ...

,

Humboldts Hierarchic von Sprachtypen agglutinierender, isolierender und flektierender Sprachtypus - entspricht eine Hierarchic von Schriftty­ pen: Bilder- und Begriffsschrift, danach die Figuren-, schlieBlich die Buch­ stabenschrift. In seiner Auffassung der Schrift scheint Humboldt damit ganzlich von der europiiischen Tradition bestimmt zu sein. Es sei "das tonende Wort ( . . . ] gleichsam eine Verk6rperung des Gedanken, die Schrift eine des Tons" (GS V:109). Dies liest sich wie eine Ubersetzung der beriihmten Passage aus Aristoteles' Peri hermeneias, wonach die Elemente der gesprochenen Rede 'Symbola' der Eindriicke der Seele seien, die Elemente der Schrift wiederum Symbole derjenigen der Rede.14 Durchaus im Sinne dieser vielzi­ tierten Textstelle definiert Humboldt die Buchstabenschrift als "einfaches, durch keinen Nebenbegriff zerstreuendes Zeichen des Zeichens" ( GS

Das alphabetische Lesen und Schreiben - so Humboldts Resiimee n6thigt in jedem Augenblick zum Anerkennen der dem Ohr und dem Auge fiihlbaren Lautelemente, und gew6hnt an die leichte Trennung und Zu­ sammensetzung derselben; es macht daher eine vollendet richtige Ansicht der Theilbarkeit der Sprache in ihre Elemente in eben dem Grade allge­ mein, in welchem es selbst tiber die Nation verbreitet ist. (GS V:115)

Insbesondere vermag allein die Buchstabenschrift die reinste Form der Flexion, niimlich die Binnenflexion, den ganzen von der Indogermanistik beschriebenen Mechanismus von Ablaut, Schwund-, Dehnstufe etc. ada­ quat zu reprasentieren. Indem so die Buchstabenschrift dem Sprachsinn sein formales Prinzip sinnlich vor Augen fiihrt, befriedigt sie gewisserma­ Ben das ihm immanente Streben nach Formalitiit, und so bewirkt sie dassel­ be wie die Auspriigung rein grammatischer Sprachzeichen, niimlich der Ideenentwicklung "einen eigentlichen Schwung" (WW III:39) zu geben. Wiederum ist dies ganz im Sinne der kantischen Asthetik gedacht: die Ein­ bildungskraft wird befliigelt, wei! sich die ihr gegebenen Formen als zweck­ miiBig fiir das Geschiift der Gedankenbildung erweisen. Herders Anthropologie weist auch hier den Weg. Die Schrift ist ab­ gesehen von ihren praktischen Zwecken - Medium geistiger Bildung des Menschengeschlechts. Zum einen konstituiert sie, indem sie Uberlieferung erm6glicht, den Raum der Geschichte. Zum anderen wirkt sie als Medium formaler Bildung. Sie macht ein "ganz anderes Nachdenken" tiber Sprache moglich, "als wenn das verhallende Wort bloss im Gediichtniss eine blei­ bende Stiitte findet'' (GS V:109). Ihr Gebrauch wirkt auf den Sprachsinn zuriick. Mehr oder weniger vollkommen fiihrt sie diesem das formale Prin­ zip der Gedankenbildung, die Artikulation von Einheiten, vor Augen und bietet damit dem Geist in der Auspriigung schriftlicher Einheiten ein Indiz fiir die mehr oder weniger gelungene Ubereinstimmung der sprachlichen mit der logischen Gliederung der Rede, die, wenn der Gedanke vollkom­ men gebildet sein soli, "wie aus Einer Form gegossen seyn" miissen (ibid.). Augenfiillig korrespondiert der Vorrang, den Humboldt der Buchsta­ benschrift einriiumt, dem, den er dem flektierenden Sprachtypus zumiBt. In

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diesem Sinne ware er, zumindest auf den ersten Blick, der Epoche des La­ gozentrismus bzw. Ethnozentrismus zuzurechnen. Wie vertriige sich dies aber mit den einleitend skizzierten, auf dem Prinzip der Differenz aufbau­ enden Grundziigen seiner Sprachphilosophie? Die genaue Lektiire der humboldtschen Texte zur Schrift gibt keine eindeutige Antwort. Den dargestellten "logozentrischen" Motiven wider­ sprechen andere. Insbesondere zeigt sich, daB Humboldts Definition der Schrift im allgemeinen keineswegs von Derridas Kritik am Mythos der Re­ prasentation getroffen wird:

se als "Buchstabe" terminologisiert,1' doch rein distinktiv. Im Abschnitt tiber das "Lautsystem" der Grundziige ist dieser Gesichtspunkt in aller Klarheit entwickelt. "Jeder Laut hat [ . . . ] eine eigne Sphiire, in welcher er einen bestimmten, aber bei weitem nicht den einzig mi:iglichen Punkt ein­ nimmt" (GS V:401). Die Okonomie des Ton- bzw. Lautsystems16 zeigt sich jedoch erst bei der Bildung von Silben bzw. Worten. Die 'Vollkommenheit' eines phonologischen Systems bemiBt sich allein an seinem Potential der Bedeutungsdifferenzierung (cf. insbesondere GS V:403ff.), ist also ein ab­ geleiteter Wert. Nicht einmal hinsichtlich der Repriisentation grammati­ scher Formen kann der Buchstabenschrift ein prinzipieller Vorrang gegen­ iiber der Figurenschrift eingeraumt werden. Diese ist ebenso wie jene durch das Prinzip der Arbitraritat des Zeichens bestimmt; in der Entwick­ lung der chinesischen Schrift wurde ein urspriinglich gewiB gegebener iko­ nischer Sinn bestimmter Radikale getilgt, diese konventionalisiert. DaB das Zeichen ·J..c "Mensch" bedeutet, ist seiner Gestalt nicht zu entnehmen, denn im Zeichen fiir das Pluralmorphem ( 111 ) wird dasselbe Schema kei­ neswegs ebenso gedeutet. Eine strukturelle Oberlegenheit ki:innte der Buchstabenschrift nur dann eingeraumt werden, wenn die Anzahl gramma­ tischer Forrnen in einer Sprache unendlich ware. Dann allerdings gabe sie ein Verfahren an die Hand, diese Menge mit endlichen Mitteln zu repra­ sentieren. Gegeniiber jedem beliebig graBen 'Wi:irtervorrath' muB aber die Anzahl grammatischer Morpheme kleiner, also endlich sein. Diese sind durch Figuren ebenso darzustellen wie durch Buchstabenkombinationen, die graphische Distinktheit der Figuren vorausgesetzt. Zurecht definiert Humboldt 'Schrift' im engeren Sinn als "Zeichen, welche bestimmte Wi:irter in bestimmter Folge andeuten". Denn dies ist die fiir die Bestimmtheit des Gedankens hinreichende Bedingung. Das Wort, nicht das Phonem, ist fiir Humboldt das logische Individuum in der Sprache (cf. Grundziige §72 = GS V:410). An einer Stelle in den Grundziigen anti­ zipiert Humboldt sogar die durch die Gestaltpsychologie des 20. Jahrhun­ derts beeinfluBte Idee eines 'ganzheitlichen' Lesens:

Unter Schrift im engsten Sinne kann man nur Zeichen verstehen, welche bestimmte W6rter in bestimmter Folge andeuten . Nur eine solche kann wirklich gelesen werden. Schrift im weitUi.ufigsten Verstande ist dagegen die Mitteilung bloBer Gedanken, die durch Laute geschieht (GS V:34).

Eine Auffassung der Schrift als 'Zeichen fiir Zeichen' laBt sich hieraus nicht ableiten - im Gegenteil: Die Extension des Begriffs 'Schrift' iiber­ steigt bei Humboldt die von 'Sprache'. Deren Begriff beschrankt er "bless auf die Bezeichnung der Gedanken durch Laute"; unter 'Schrift' dagegen versteht er "jede andere Bezeichnungsart der Gedanken, so wie die der Laute selbst" (GS V:35). Dies kehrt, selbst wenn Spraclie das in der Ent­ wicklung der Gattung friiher ausgepragte Zeichenmedium ist, ihr Verhalt­ nis zur Schrift geradezu urn. Auch wenn diese "urspriinglich immer Be­ zeichnung der Sprache" ist, so konnen sich doch, selbst im Sinne der 'enge­ ren' Definition, Schriften entwickeln, in denen der Gedanke nur in der gra­ phematischen Repriisentation seine individuelle Bestimmtheit erhalt, wah­ rend beziiglich Schreibendem und Entzifferndem ein Spielraum mi:iglicher lautlicher Reprasentationen gegeben ist. Die Figurenschrift des Chinesi­ schen ist dafiir das klassische Beispiel. Explizit beschreibt Humboldt diesen Fall, und dennoch bleibt die bier­ mit schwer vereinbare Bevorzugung der Buchstabenschrift - schwer zu vereinbaren, weil Humboldt bei ihrer Wiirdigung ausdriicklich von ihren praktischen Vorteilen, die allerdings auf der Hand liegen, absieht (cf. GS V:108). Nur auf den ersten Blick kann Humboldts Argumentation in der Vorlesung Ober die Buchstabenschrift iiberzeugen. Die dart reklamierte Parallelitat von Bestimmtheit der "Idealitat" und Vollkommenheit des "Tonsystems", aus der er den Vorzug der Buchstabenschrift gegeniiber andren Schrifttypen ableitet, triigt. Auch wenn das Alphabet "ein mehr oder weniger vollstandiges System von Ti:inen" reprasentiert (cf. GS V:403), so ist der Wert des Phonems, das Humboldt charakteristischerwei-

Wort kann [namlich in logischer Hinsicht] allerdings auch als unteilbares Ganzes genommen werden, wie man auch in der Schrift wohl den Sinn ei­ ner Wortgruppe erkennt, ohne noch ihrer alphabetischen Zusammenset­ zung gewiB zu sein .. . (GS V:384) .

Sieht man von Praktikabilitatsgriinden wie leichterer Erlernbarkeit ab, die allerdings betrachtlich sind, ist die These des Vorzugs der Buchstaben-

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CHRISTIAN STETTER

vor der Figurenschrift nicht zu hal ten. Hinsichtlich der Artikulationsfiihig­ keit sind beide Systeme iiquivalent. Diese These ist - wie gezeigt - aus Humboldts sprachphilosophi­ schen Annahmen nicht ableitbar. Es bleibt eine Erkliirung des Wider­ spruchs: die historische Situation, aus der heraus Humboldt dachte. Fiir ibn ist der Begriff der biirgerlichen Nation durch die Merkmale gemeinsamer Abstammung und einer Sprache definiert, deren Identitiit - wie die Grundziige (GS V:379f.) zeigen - durch ein und dasselbe Lautsystem ver­ biirgt ist. In ibm liegt, dank des Spiels der Einbildungskraft, der Appell des Vernehmens 'derselben' Sprache an das Gefiihl, mag sich die logische Gel­ tung des in ihr Gesagten auch his zum Widerspruch ausdifferenzieren. Hinzu kommt die den indoeuropiiischen Sprachen eigentiimliche Bin­ nenflexion, die dem Chinesischen fremd ist und die in der Tat durch das Sy­ stem der Buchstabenschrift 6konomisch erfaBt werden konnte. Der von der Identitiit einer Sprache her gedachte Begriff der Nation ein Gebilde wie das chinesische Reich nicht iibertragbar. Die logo­ auf war zentrischen Spuren in Humboldts Denken sind historisch-politischer, nicht sprachphilosophischer Natur. Die pragmatische ZweckmiiBigkeit der durch eine beliebige Anzahl von Dialekten substituierbaren Figurenschrift fiir das Reich der Mitte iiberstieg seinen Erfahrungshorizont. Von daher blieb ihm auch die Einsicht verschlossen, daB sich in der chinesischen Schrift, etwa beim Verfassen von Gedichten, deren iisthetische Form wesentlich auf den mit den Schriftzeichen verbundenen Konnotationen beruht, ein 'Spiel der Differenzen' mit graphischen Radikalen entwickelt, das der Buchstaben­ schrift fremd ist. Der his heute kaum realisierten Modernitiit seines sprachphilosophi­ schen Denkens tut diese Beschriinkung keinen Abbruch. ANMERKUNGEN !.

2.

Die Logik abstrahiert, da sie cine 'Aussage' nur unter a priori gegebenen Wahrheitskrite� rien betrachtet, natiirlich legitimerweise von dieser Dimension und kann so eine 'Sach aw ge' als Abstraktion aus einer Menge extensional oder (in schwB.cherer Version) intenstow nal iiquivalenter Aussagen begreifen (cf. Lorenz 1970:81ff.).

�

Dies geht natiirlich auf Freges Vorbild zuriick (cf. Begriffsschrift, §5). Die Definition der 'Bedingtheit', d.h. der Subjunktion, beruht auf dem ExtensionaliHitsprinzip. Doch bleibt dessen philosophische Bedeutung aufgrund der definitorischen Vorgehensweise Freges unexpliziert. Dies leistet der Text Wittgensteins dann in aller Radikalitat.

195

3.

Zur Bedeutung Leibniz' fur Asthetik und Erkenntnistheorie des 18. Jahrhunderts, cf. Borsche (1981:!56ff.).

4.

Mag dieses innerhalb dieser Grenzen prinzipiell wiederum unendlich sein, faktisch ist es immer endlich.

5.

Cf. Tractatus 2.18. Bin 'realistisches' MiBversUindnis dieser Rede von 'Abbildung' wird durch unsere folgenden Satze ausgeschlossen. Tatsachlich dUrften die sprachphilosophiw schen Dbereinstimmungen zwischen Humboldt und schon dem friihen Wittgenstein weit grOBer sein als immer angenommen. Doch bedfirfte dieses Thema einer eigenen Untersu­ chung.

6.

Cf. Grundziige §25, GS V:377. Humboldts Formulierung ist durchaus irn strengen fonnalw logischen Sinn zu lesen.

7.

Cf. Tractatus 4. Bei der Konzeption des Sinnbegriffs geht der friihe Wittgenstein dann freilich andere Wege; dies ist durch die Themenstellung des Tractatus bedingt. Doch bis hierin ist die Parallele zwingend. Das 'ist' im Satz 4 ist kein Versehen; wie der vorhergew hende Satz 3.5 belegt, ist 4 zu lesen als: die Ausdriicke 'Gedanke' und 'sinnvoller Satz' sind aquivalent.

8.

Der Gedanke, daB erst seine Verkniipfung mit anderen Tennen einen sprachlichen Term interpretierbar machen, ist systematisch insbesondere von Charles Sanders Peirce (1839w 1914) im Begriff der Interpretantenrelation entwickelt worden. Cf. hierzu Stetter 1983: 288ff.

9.

Cf. das 'vierte Naturgesetz' bei Herder (1979 [17?2]: 100ff.). Alle vier sag. 'Naturgeset­ ze' des zweiten Teils der Preisschrift, die weniger miBverstiindJich als Grundsi:itze einer Theorie der Evolution der Gattung Mensch zu bezeichnen waren, sind bier in ihrem sy­ stematischen Zusammenhang zu betrachten.

10.

Cf. Verschiedenheiten §47 (WW 111:200ff.): "Das Wort ist kein Gegenstand, vielmehr den Gegensti:inden gegeniiber etwas Subjektives, dennoch soU es im Geiste des Denkenden ein Objekt, von ihm erzeugt und auf ihn zuriickwirkend werden. Es bleibt zwischen dem Wort und seinem Gegenstande eine so befremdende Kluft, das Wort gleicht, allein im Einzelnen geboren, so sehr einem blossen Scheinobjekt, die Sprache kann auch nur so zur Wirklichkeit gebracht werden, dass an einen gewagten Versuch ein neuer sich an­ kniipft".

11.

Auf dieser Basis IieBe sich der 'dunkle' Begriff der inneren Sprachform ohne Schwierigw keiten explizieren. Auch dies muB allerdings einer weiteren Studie vorbehalten bleiben.

12.

H.W. Scharfs Kritik an Chomskys Versuch, seiner Idee einer generativen Grammatik durch Bezug auf das bekannte Diktum aus der Einleitung ins Kawi-Werk philosophische Aura zu verschaffen (Scharf 1977), bleibt natiirlich hiervon ganz unberiihrt. Chomsky hatte sich in der Tat eher auf den grammatischen Bau berufen kOnnen.

13.

Wittgenstein zeigt, daf3 sich die Weltabbildung, damit den Satz, ermOglichende logische Form nicht mehr sagen, d.h. deskriptiv erfassen HiBt. Sie kann sich nur noch zeigen (cf. hierzu Stetter 1988b).

14.

Zwar hat H. GUnther versucht, die 'reprasentative Lesart' dieser Stelle zu modifizieren, m.E. jedoch nicht iiberzeugend. Das tauta des bei Aristoteles folgenden iibemachsten Satzes bezieht sich zwar, wie GUnther (1983:25-26) richtig feststellt, sowohl auf grammata wie aufph6nai, doch faBt es lediglich diese heiden Arten als semeia zusammen und grenzt

,,

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CHRISTIAN STETTER

HUMBOLDT UND DAS PROBLEM DER SCHRIIT

197

sie gegeniiber den pathemata bzw. den diese erzeugenden pragmata jlb� ·Inwiefem diese semeia etwas bedeuten, ist aber im ersten Satz gesagt.

SUMMARY

15.

Cf. Grundziige §§56ff. [GS V: 400ff.]: "Alphabet" = "System ihrer [der Sprache] articu� lirten Laute" (400).

16.

Humboldt verwendet, obwohl er 'Laut' und 'Ton' sorgfiiltig unterscheidet, beide Begriffe synonym.

This essay compares Humboldt's view of language with that of script. It is shown in what way his conception of language follows from his idea of esthetics derived from Kant's Kritik der Urteilskraft. Following Derrida, the idea ofthe relativity of "sprachliche Weltansichten" (linguistic conceptions of the world) is in opposition to the tradition of logocentrism; it is based on the principle of difference. This seems to be in contradiction with Hum­ boldt's view of the alphabetic script. It is shown however that his idea of script is compatible with that of language, and that his high esteem of the alphabetic script results from the specific historical situation at the begin­ ning of the 19th century.

BffiLIOGRAPIDE

Borsche, Tilman. 1981. Sprachansichten: Der Begriff der menschlichen Re­ de in der Sprachphilosophie Wilhelm von Humboldts. Stuttgart: Klett­ Cotta. Gunther, Hans. 1983. "Charakteristika von schriftlicher Sprache und Kom­ munikation". Schrift, Schreiben, Schriftlichkeit: Arbeiten zur Struktur, Funktion und Entwicklung schriftlicher Sprache hrsg. von K. B . Gunther & H. Gunther. Tubingen: M. Niemeyer. Herder, Johann Gottfried. 1979. Ober den Ursprung der Sprache. Text, Materialien, Kommentar. Hrsg. von W. Pross. Munchen: C. Hanser. Humboldt, Wilhelm von. 1903-36. Gesammelte Schriften, hrsg. PreuBische Akademie der Wissenschaften, 17 Bde. Berlin: Behr. (Zitiert als GS). ---. 1960. Werke in fiinf Biinden. Hrsg. von A. Flitner & K. Giel. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. (Zitiert als WW). Uebrucks, Bruno. 1965. Sprache und Bewuf3tsein. Bd.2. Frankfurt am Main: Akademische Verlagsanstalt. Lorenz, Kuno. 1970. Elemente der Sprachkritik. Frankfurt am Main: Suhr­ kamp. Scharf, Hans Werner. 1977. Chomskys Humboldt-Interpretation: Ein Beitrag zur Diskontinuitiit der Sprachtheorie in der Geschichte der neueren Linguistik. Diss., Univ. Dusseldorf. Stetter, Christian. 1983. "Peirces semiotische Schemata". History of Semio­ tics ed. by Achim Eschbach & Jiirgen Trabant, 277-310. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins. ---. 1988a. "Uber Denken und Sprechen: Wilhelm von Humboldt zwi­ schen Fichte und Herder". In Vorbereitung. ---. 1988b. "Die logisch-semiotische Problemstellung in Wittgensteins Tractatus". In Vorbereitung.

Da Humboldt ai neogrammatici Continuita e fratture Paolo Ramat

Universita di Pavia I

Rispetto al quadro cronologico generate del convegno il mio coi:J.tribu­ to risulta forse un po' eccentrico, trattando il periodo da Humboldt ai Neo­ grammatici. Tuttavia proprio l'adozione di un punto di vista contrastivo, se non proprio comparativo in senso stretto, risulta spesso utile per mettere pili chiaramente a fuoco le rispettive peculiaritii. Spero quindi di non essere del tutto fuori tema. Il titolo della presente comunicazione riprende, parafrasandolo, quello del primo capitolo del bel libro che Lia Formigari ha dedicato al linguaggio nella filosofia della Romantik (Formigari 1977). Nella sua storia della lin­ guistica del 1869 Theodor Benfey (1809-1881) sottolineava il cambiamento metodologico radicale (oggi alcuni parlerebbero di mutamento di 'para­ digma scientifico') intervenuto con la linguistica storico-comparata, che per prima avrebbe dato digniti\ scientifica allo studio delle lingue rifondando su altre basi anche quanto di giusto si poteva trovare nella linguistica prece­ dente. Un giudizio analogo troviamo anche in un outsider non digiuno di lin­ guistica quale Friedrich Engels (1820-1895) pili o meno negli stessi anni: in una delle ultime pagine dell'Anti-Diihring (1878) egli contrappone decisa­ mente la ricerca linguistica degli ultimi sessant'anni, da Franz Bopp (17911867) Jacob Grimm (1785-1863) e Friedrich Diez (1794-1876) in poi, alla 'grammatica tecnica' del signor Diihring con tutte le sue minuzie e arbitra­ rieti\. In una lettera a Karl Kautsky (1854-1938) del 1891 egli prevede inol­ tre che l'impiego del metodo comparativo (nella fattispecie per quello che riguarda lo studio del diritto) fara finalmente saltare i vecchi schemi qegli studiosi di preistoria (Ramal 1983:186).

.,

'

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Cio e vero - nell'uno come nell'altro giudizio critico - da un punto di vista strettamente fattuale e positivista: che e poi quello che interessava sia allo storico della linguistica che a! filosofo del materialismo dialettico, !'uno e l'altro fondando il loro giudizio sulla grande scoperta - grazie appunto a! metodo comparativo - dell'esistenza di leggi evolutive. II metodo compa­ rativo permette infatti per Ia prima volta di costituire una solida base di dati su cui fondare le affermazioni d'ordine generale. Come e nolo, tale giudizio diventera poi communis opinio nei manuali di storia della linguistica, almeno fino agli anni '60 di questo secolo - in molti dei quali manuali si fara incominciare Ia storia della linguistica tout court con Bopp e i primi comparatisti, relegando a! massimo tra i precursori i due precedenti secoli. Ma come per molti altri cosiddetti 'mutamenti di paradigma scientifico' Ia realta e pill complessa, molto pill articolata e sfumata. Tra Ia linguistica del 18' secolo e quella del Romanticismo esistono, certamente, contrappo­ sizioni rna anche - come e stato sottolineato ormai da molti studiosi (cf. Formigari 1977:VIIsg.) - notevoli continuita, a cominciare dall'idea di confrontare lo sviluppo della lingua ad un processo naturale, che inizia a prender piede gia nell'ultimo trentennio del lS' secolo, per esempio coi fra­ telli August Wilhelm von Schlegel (1767-1845) e Friedrich von Schlegel (1772-1829; cf.Bahner & Neumann 1985:128sg.). Da qui si sviluppera poi !'idea di un'assoluta autonomia delle regole di trasformazione dei suoni come fenomeni naturali, che e Ia premessa per Ia scoperta della regolarita delle leggi fonetiche. II termine stesso di 'comparazione' (Vergleichung) e 'comparato' e di tradizione settecentesca: Johann Gottfried Herder (1744-1803) nella Abhandlung uber den Ursprung der Sprache (1772) parla di una 'philoso­ phische Vergleichung' delle lingue per arrivare a comprendere Ia mentalita e le caratteristiche spirituali dei popoli, secondo un programma che oggi potremmo chiamare di etnolinguistica e che fu proprio anche di Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767-1835). Johann Severin Vater (1771-1826), professore di teologia e bibliotecario a Konigsberg, distingue fra 'allgemeine Sprach­ lehre' e 'vergleichende Grammatik' subordinando Ia seconda ai concetti generali della prima (Ramal 1974). La dimensione comparativa nasce dunque, prima che nella prospettiva propria della linguistica storica, in quella filosofica della varietas linguarum (v. sopra Gensini: [000-000]) e si trasformera progressivamente nella prima via via che i successi della grammatica storica indoeuropea faranno passare in secondo piano ogni altra problematica.

A proposito della dimensione storica della comparazione, e stato detto che Franz Bopp fa della grammatica comparata senza storia linguistica mentre Jacob Grimm fa storia linguistica senza grammatica comparata (Schlerath 1986:9). Ma anche in questo caso, a! di Ia dell'elegante slogan, le cose stanno in modo pill complicato di una semplice alternativa. Bopp, che come Humboldt rivendicava alia linguistica piena autonomia cioe indipen­ denza da preoccupazioni d'altro ordine (come era stato, per esempio, in Leibniz), dice espressamente in una nota lettera del 1815 a Karl J. H. Win­ dischmann (1775-1839) - un anno prima del Conjugationssystem! - di vo­ ler fare dello studio delle lingue uno studio 'filosofico e storico' (cioe tanto generale quanto empirico) (Bahner 1985:472-73), ed e innegabile che alia base della comparazione, sia nel Conjugationssystem, col tentativo di di­ mostrare l'origine della coniugazione in una agglutinazione del verbo copu­ la a basi verbali, sia nella Vergleichende Grammatik del 1833, vi siano istan­ ze di ordine generale, o come si diceva allora, filosofico (cf. Antinucci 1975). In questo senso Bopp si avvicina molto a Wilhelm von Humboldt, col quale sono del resto ben noti anche i rapporti personali di reciproca stima. A chiarire come i due intendono il rapporto tra comparazione e storia e in­ teressante citare un passo della lettera indirizzata a Bopp dopo Ia recensio­ ne di quest'ultimo alia Deutsche Grammatik di Jacob Grimm (Bopp 1827; cf. Bahner & Neumann 1985:193):

200

Die Fortsetzung Ihrer Rezension ist vortrefflich. Die wahrhaft neue Methode, deren Einftihrung man gr6sstentheils Ihnen dankt, die Umwand­ lungen der Sprache aufzusuchen u . bis ins kleinste Detail zu verfolgen, entwickelt sich mit jeder Ihrer Arbeiten mehr u. verbreitet ein helleres Licht iiber das Sprachstudium. [ . . . . ] Es liegt immer mehr am Tage, welch einen Vorzug Sie vor Grimm schon darin besitzen, dass Sie das Studium von der Wurzel aus auffassen, da Grimm Ieider es nur von einem Zweige aus ergreift u. bei der mangelnden Kenntnis des Indischen, nicht einmal in die Tiefe gehOrig zuriickgehen kann. Es ist unendlich zu bedauern, dass Grimm nicht in einer Zeit schrieb, wo das Studium des Sanskrit ihm gewiss nicht fremd geblieben seyn wiirde, aber zu bewundern, dass er ohne das­ selbe so unglaublich viel leistete (corsivo mio:P.R.).

Si veda a questo proposito quanto Grimm stesso scrive a Karl F.W. Lachmann (1793-1851) circa Ia 'recensione' di Bopp alia Deutsche Gramma­ tik (Leitzmann 1927:510; Schlerath 1986:16): Bopps abhandlung, wiewohl keine recension meines buches, ist ehren­ werth und mir ganz recht, sie fiihrt meine, natiirlich sehr schwache verglei­ chung mit dem sanskrit weiter aus und berichtigt. Dber manches wird sich

202

PAOLO RAMAT streiten lassen. Allein was er rnir zugestehet, _ist schon viel und genug, wenn ich bedenke wie naturalistisch und auf gut gliick ich aus dem deut� schen in das sanskrit hinein gehauen babe (corsivo mio:P.R.).

Per Bopp come per Humboldt, il quale anche a! termine della lettera ora ricordata sottolinea Ia necessitil di unire Ia dimensione speculativa a quella storica, lo studio comparative ha necessariamente una base storica, pur rispondendo a finalitii d'ordine speculative, filosofico, universale e a priori rispetto all'approccio empirico. Ancora una citazione da Humboldt: Das geschichtliche Studium kann zwar niemals Vollstandigkeit gew§.hren [ . .. ]. Es muss aber durch das vergleichende Sprachstudium dreierlei geschicht­ lich dargestellt werden: 1. wie jede Sprache die verschiedenen, bei dem Bediirfniss der Rede vorkommenden Aufgaben lOst? ( . . . ] 2. wie und wo­ ran die Sprachen, welchen wir einen Iangen Zeitraum hindurch folgen k6nnen, Veranderungen in ihrem Inneren erfahren haben? 3 . welche Ver­ schiedenheiten in Wortbau und Redefi.igung die naheren und entfernteren Verwandtschaftsgrade in Sprachen gemeinschaftlicher Abkunft zulassen? (Humboldt 1963:Ill, 65-66; cf. Swiggers 1985:732).

Ma anche per quanto riguarda Jacob Grimm si pub dire che, almeno in linea teorica, Ia sua impostazione non diverge da quella- di Humboldt e Bopp: nella Prefazione alia prima edizione della Deutsche Grammatik (1819) egli distingue nello studio scientifico della grammatica tre momenti: quello fi!osofico-speculativo, quello critico (cioe normative) e quello stori­ co che descrive lo svi!uppo (Sonderegger 1985:52). Le differenze con Bopp e Humboldt, rilevate anche dai diretti protagonisti, sono differenze di ac­ cento piuttosto che di impostazione di fondo, dovute anche a! fatto che Grimm e principalmente non un indoeuropeista rna un germanista, animato fra l'altro da intenti nobilmente nazionalistici tipici del Romanticismo che raccoglie i fermenti verso le varie autonomie nazionali esistenti all'interno dell'impero asburgico (Bahner 1985:466-67; Wiesinger 1985:521-22; Souder­ egger 1985:45). Per contro l'indoeuropeista Bopp, cui erano peraltro del tutto estranei gli interessi e gli entusiasmi anche civili di un Grimm o di uno Humboldt, si serve della comparazione interlinguistica per ricostruire Ia forma originaria (e in essa trovare conferma delle sue ipotesi generali) ed e quindi naturalmente meno interessato a seguire nei particolari Ia storia in­ lerna di questa o quella lingua. Non e ora il caso di addentrarsi nella discus­ sione circa l'impostazione filosofica che traspare nella Deutsche Grammatik e nelle altre opere di Grimm, soprattutto nella Akademievorlesung del 1851, Uber den Ursprung der Sprache, dove vi e i1 tentative, peraltro non

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riuscito, di unire Ia tesi tradizionale della progressiva decadenza della lin­ gua originaria con le risultanze della linguistica storica che mostrano invece un progredire delle forme (cf. Gessinger 1985:665sgg., il quale riporta an­ che brani della corrispondenza di Grimm con Humboldt a proposito di questo specifico problema, che mostra come ancora alia meta del secolo persistessero preoccupazioni d'ordine filosofico, per non dire ideologico, caratteristiche della linguistica settecentesca [v. anche Telegdi 1985:56162]). All'altezza di Humboldt, Bopp e Grimm, si e verificato pertanto un importante cambiamento nell'accezione del termine, pur tradizionale, di 'comparazione' (Vergleichung), cosi come lo si trovava per esempio in Frie­ drich W. J. Schelling (1775-1854), pur !oro contemporaneo - sui piano cronologico, non certo su quello ideologico-politico! Questi, filosofo della Restaurazione postnapoleonica, vede nella comparazione interlinguistica il mezzo per provare l'unitii originaria della coscienza collettiva del genere umano (sia pure con l'eccezione delle lingue amerindiane ed asiatiche . . . : v. Formigari 1977:70-71). AI di Iii delle profonde differenze con Ia filosofia del linguaggio illuminista, giustamente sottolineate da Lia Formigari (1977: VIII), per quello che riguarda il concetto di comparazione, anche Schelling ne fa un uso strumentale, teso a dimostrare una tesi predeterminata, non un procedimento metodologico fornito in se di capacitil euristica. Con Bopp, e piu ancora con Grimm e con Humboldt, il metodo comparative si e affran­ cato invece da presupposti di carattere ideologico e l'accento tende sempre piu a cadere sulla differenza delle lingue poste a confronto - anche per i motivi storico-politici interni alia Germania cui accennavo piu sopra non solo sulla !oro omogeneitii sostanziale. In Schelling troviamo un uso ideo!ogico, astorico e in una prospettiva che si colloca volutamente a! di Iii dell'orizzonte fenomenico, come reazio­ ne a! naturalismo linguistico settecentesco, del concetto di parentela lin­ guistica e di quello ad esso ormai strettamente connesso di comparazione. In un certo senso e proprio tale uso, cosi contrario alia prassi scientifi­ ca ormai invalsa (Ia Einleitung in die Philosophie der Mythologie e del 1826), a facilitare, a rendere necessaria per i linguisti, Ia separazione della filosofia del linguaggio dalla ricerca linguistica empirica e storica (Formigari 1977:72-73). Tale separazione Iibera Ia strada alia seconda e, ancor piu, alia terza generazione di linguisti (quella dei Neogrammatici) per uno studio materia­ le, empirico, delle lingue; studio cui stanno di fronte notevo!issimi problemi

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pratici, senza piu il fardello delle preoccupazioni filosofiche ed ideologiche. Nello stesso anno (1850) in cui Schelling pubblica le sue Vorbemerkungen zu der Frage tiber den Ursprung der Sprache, nelle quali sono riprese le tesi della Philosophie der Mythologie circa Ia parentela delle lingue umane in un ordine ideale, l'ormai anziano Jacob Grimm, osservando Ia situazione dall'interno, come addetto ai lavori, inizia Ia sua lezione alla Accademia di Berlino sull'origine del linguaggio - un tema classico, ancora ricorrente ­ parlando della profonda trasformazione (durchgreifende Umwiilzung) veri­ ficatasi nella linguistica, come nella botanica e nell'anatomia comparate, rispetto a quando Herder esattamente settanta anni prima aveva trattato lo stesso tema, nella stessa sede. Torniamo con cio ai giudizii di Benfey ed En­ gels (rna gia anche di Humboldt) gia ricordati, circa lo sviluppo della lin­ guistica. Nel clima positivista postromantico - scrive Benfey - 'Ia considera­ zione astrattamente filosofica delle cose ando progressivamente perdendosi per dar luogo a quella scientifica [cioe storico-positivista]', (Benfey 1869:323; v. Bahner & Neumann 1985:7). Nella incipiente divisione tra fi­ losofia e linguistica gia a! momento della sua pubblicazione postuma (1836) l'Introduzione alia lingua kavi di Humboldt e un'opera sorpassata, nel suo tentativo di sintesi tra problematica filosofica e analisi storica (Trabant 1985:576-77). Se per Humboldt il confronto tra le lingue, il 'vergleichendes Sprach­ studium', e ancora, per dirla con le parole gia di Adelung nella prefazione a! Mithridates ( 1806), un mezzo per riconoscere cio che e caratteristico di ciascuna lingua (Ramat 1974:109) e se lo studio di tutte le lingue e per lui un mezzo per conoscere "i confini della spirito umano" (Verlato 198384:610n.10), queste preoccupazioni d'ordine filosofico sono ormai scompar­ se nello studio comparato dei Neogrammatici. Per Humboldt il confronto interlinguistico serve ad evidenziare la diversita della Geisteskraft dei varii popoli e del suo realizzarsi in quanta em!rgeia; anzi, proprio l'esistenza di questa differenza (Verschiedenheit) fonda !a necessita di una comparazione interlinguistica - a base storica poiche Ia differenza stessa e conseguenza delle diverse condizioni storiche in cui i popoli si sono sviluppati. Per i Neo­ grammatici il confronto interlinguistico e il mezzo per recuperare, in base a rigide regale di corrispondenze fonetiche, una protolingua, vista come pro­ datto finito, come i!rgon e non come eni!rgeia. Anche !a ricezione di Grimm da parte dei Neogrammatici e indicativa in questa sensa. Essi sottolineano in Grimm principalmente il modo con cui

egli tratta Ia fonetica storica (rotazione consonantica, meccanismi dell'apo­ fonia) trascurando il quadro ideologico-culturale in cui si inquadra latotali­ ta dell'opera di Grimm - cioe da un Jato lo spirito nazional-romantico del­ la ricerca sulle origini della nazione tedesca: "nella nostra patria contro na­ tura divisa . . . ", come egli scrive nella Geschichte der deutschen Sprache (1848; cf. Bahner & Neumann 1985:143); dall'altro Ia problematica filosofi­ co-speculativa circa le origini del linguaggio e l'ipotesi di decadenza da uno stato linguistico originario di perfezione cui gia accennavo. Nella Geschi­ chte der germanischen Philologie (1891) cosl scrive Hermann Paul (18461921):

205

Durch Grimm war mit einem Male eine imponierende Fiille von regelmas­ sigen Lautentsprechungen zwischen den verschiedenen Dialekten und Zeitraumen nachgewiesen und was das Wichtigste war, diese Fiille war nicht erreicht durch zuf31liges Herausgreifen, sondern durch eine konsequente Durcharbeitung des Materials, die Regelmiissigkeit erschien also als etwas im Wesen der Sprache Begriindetes und davon Unzertrennliches. (Paul 1891:88; cf. Bahner & Neumann [1985:9] e anche Fleischer [1985:4921).

Come si vede, una valutazione che coincide strettamente con quella gia ricordata dal Benfey. Per Hermann Paul, e per i Neogrammatici in genere, il solo approccio scientifico alia lingua e quello storico: e in questa sensa essi possono richia­ marsi a Grimm come al !oro predecessore - ancorche il concetto di storia in Grimm non sia quello positivista, di accertamento di dati di fatto oggetti­ vi, pl'oprio dei Neogrammatici; rna indubbiamente e propria anche di Grimm Ia cura del certum storico: un esempio di cio e costituito dalla cura filologica nella edizione dei testi quale prerequisito indispensabile per una linguistica storica non fantasiosa. Esattamente venti anni �opo Ia Geschichte der deutschen Sprache di Grimm (1848), anche Wilhelm Scherer (1841-1886) pubblica un'opera dallo stesso titolo: qui sono scomparsi i romantici entusiasmi per il periodo delle origini come momenta edenico del germanesimo. L'accento e sulle leggi storiche che determinano causalisticamente e meccanicamente l'evolu­ zione, come hanno. ben vista le scienze naturali: siamo nel 1868, alia vigilia o quasi delle Morphologische Untersuchungen di Karl Brugmann (18491919) e Hermann Osthoff (1847-1909), il manifesto del gruppo dei Neo­ grammatici! Del pari sono scomparsi nell'opera di Scherer i problemi glot­ togonici sull'origine del linguaggio che ancora nel 1850 occupano Grimm e che collegano Grimm alia tradizione settecentesca e poi a Johann Georg

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Hamann (1730-1788), Humboldt, Schelling, ecc. Nel 1866 fu fondata la So­ ciete de Linguistique de Paris e nel suo statuto veniva, come e noto, stabili­ to che nessuna comunicazione riguardante l'origine del linguaggio poteva essere arnnnessa. In Grimm l'approccio storico alla lingua e funzione della storia di un popolo nella sua generalita, per cui anche la Deutsche Grammatik del 1818 e - come egli scrive al suo maestro Friedrich Carl von Savigny (1779-1861) - "nicht sowohl eine Grammatik als eine Geschichte der Sprache" (Cheru­ bim 1985:680): la lingua e una testimonianza pili viva che non ossa, armi o tombe per ricostruire la storia di un popolo (Grimm 1848:4; v. Wiesinger 1985:521), come gia aveva affermato Humboldt. Per Paul e i Neogrammati­ ci, invece, la storia di una lingua e la disciplina che la studia - la linguistica storica - diventano oggetto di ricerca in se e per se (anzi l'oggetto per ec­ cellenza della ricerca linguistica): la comparazione e lo strumento tecnico mediante il quale raggiungere il momenta iniziale di questo sviluppo storico per poi da esso discendere fino allo stato attuale - con un cammino che e, anche programmaticamente, inverso a quello cercato da Grimm (cf. Cheru­ bim 1985:682). Riassumendo quindi e schematizzando l'evoluziorie del concetto di si comparazione - con tutti i rischi che simili operazioni comportano . . . possono sostanzialmente individuare tre fasi significative per il costituirsi di tale concetto in termini scientificamente rilevanti: 1) Il progetto razionalistico di una lingua universale, da Cartesio a John Locke (1632-1704), a Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716) - di cui considera il confronto interlingui­ non mi sono occupato in questa sede stico come vOlto a provare la sostanziale omogeneita e le comuni origini del­ le lingue umane: il confronto e sostanzialmente astorico, ancorche sia vero - come sottolinea giustamente De Mauro (1965:57) - che Leibniz ebbe chiaramente coscienza della dimensione storica delle lingue arrivando ad impostare programmi di ricerche storico-filologiche quali un Glossarium Etymologicum della lingua tedesca. Ma quando egli afferma: "Io credo ve­ ramente che le lingue siano lo specchio migliore dello spirito umano" (cit. in De Mauro 1965:58), egli non pensa in termini di relativismo linguistico, bensi a una specie di dizionario mentale avente validita universale. Infatti il brano ora citato cosi prosegue (cit. in De Mauro 1965:58):

2) Dalla crisi dell'interpretazione logicizzante ed universalistica del lin­ guaggio emerge il relativismo storico-culturale del Romanticismo: la diver­ sita delle lingue e anche diversita di strutturazione dei contenuti; il pensie­ ro, in fondo, non preesiste al linguaggio, rna ne e condizionato nella sua stessa forma. E' questa sostanzialmente la posizione anche di Humboldt, pur se mitigata ancora dal riconoscimento della fondamentale identita, o omogeneita, delle lingue umane in quanto tali, tutte copia (Abbild) del Iin­ guaggio umano come facolta generale, caratteristica della specie (Ramat 1984:178). In questa prospettiva di relativismo la comparazione interlin­ guistica e una necessitii pratica con profondo valore conoscitivo. E l'accento cade per Humboldt sulle Verschiedenheiten des menschlichen Sprachbaues, non certo sulle omologie di fondo (Ramat 1984:175). Su questa linea si col­ loca anche Jacob Grimm, con una maggiore accentuazione della prospetti­ va storica e ricostruttiva - in questo a differenza, per esempio, anche di Rasmus Kristian Rask (1787-1832) il cui studio comparato e impostato pili in un senso tipologico e sincronico con inclusione delle fasi Iinguistiche mo­ derne (Sonderegger 1986: 129-30), o di Bopp che non prende in considera­ zione per la sua grammatica comparata il vedico rna il sanscrito classico in quanto questo rispecchierebbe meglio il tipo linguistico indiano. 3) A partire da Franz Bopp, di cui pure abbiamo visto gli interessi teo­ rid d'ordine generale, si sviluppa sempre pili una comparazione dotata di una sua propria tecnica. Questa tende col tempo ad imporsi come disciplina autonoma e, nel clima positivista della seconda meta del 19o secolo, a costi­ tuirsi come Ia scienza linguistica tout court in un contesto culturale nel quale la storia e vista anche e soprattutto come sviluppo simile a quella che e l'evoluzione biologica degli organismi viventi. A parte si collocano i tentativi di proseguire la complessa visione del linguaggio di Humboldt al di la della posizione positivista della linguistica storico-comparativa: figure come Karl Ferdinand Becker (1775-1849), Karl Wilhelm Ludwig Heyse (1797-1855), Heymann Steinthal (1823-1899) e an­ che Hans Conon von der Gabelentz (1807-1874), che si sforza di reagire all'esclusivismo del metodo storico-comparativo (Hassler 1985:567sgg.), ri­ masero per lungo tempo ai margini del dibattito linguistico e furono per molto tempo di fatto ignorate. Nel giii ricordato "Auseinanderfallen von Philosophic und Sprachwissenschaft" cui allude Trabant (1985:577), la lin­ guistica filosofica si trasforma progressivamente in psicologia del linguaggio (Formigari 1977:113) e la philosophische Sprachvergleichung non ha pili senso: cio che importa e ormai la vergleichende Sprachwissenschaft.

[e credo] che una rigorosa analisi dei significati delle parole possa mostra­ re, meglio di ogni altra analisi, come funziona l'intelletto.

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Se ora anche noi vogliamo, per chiudere, concederci alia comparazione e confrontiamo fra !oro le varie fasi storiche del concetto stesso di compara­ zione, possiamo constatare che esso ha seguito uno sviluppo storico coeren­ te con Je idee-guida dei singoli momenti storici (come per esempio !'idea stessa di 'storia' - da universalis del genere umano in quanto tale, a parti­ colare e nazionale, a natura/is); e, viste Ia sua rilevanza e significativita, plaudire pertanto all'idea di farne il tema di un convegno a carattere stori­ co.

Gessinger, Joachim. 1985. "Sprachursprung und Sprachverfall bei Jacob Grimm" . ZPSK 38.654-71. Grimm, Jacob. 1848. Geschichte der deutschen Sprache. 2 vols. Gottingen: Dieterich. Hassler, Gerda. 1985. "Zur Auffassung der Sprache als eines organischen Ganzen bei Wilhelm von Humboldt und zu ihren Umdeutungen im 19. Jahrhundert". ZPSK 38.564-75. Humboldt, Wilhelm von. 1961-64. Werke in fUnf Biinde, a cura di Andreas Flitner & Karl Giel. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Leitzmann, Albert, a cura di. 1927. Briefwechsel der Bruder Jacob und Wil­ helm Grimm. Jena: Verlag der Frommanschen Buchhandlung (W. Biedermann). Paul, Hermann. 1891. "Geschichte der germanischen Philologie". Grund­ riss der germanischen Philologie a cura di H. Paul, vol. I. 9-51. Strass­ burg: Karl J. Triibner. Ramal, Paolo. 1974. "Das typologische Sprachproblem im 19. Jahrhun­ dert". ZPSK 29. 495-98. . 1983. Voce "grammatica storica". Dizionario Marx Engels, a cura di Fulvio Papi, 185-90. Bologna: Zanichelli. ---. 1984. Linguistica tipologica. Bologna: II Mulino. Schlerath, Bernfried. 1986. "Eine friihe Kontroverse urn die Natur des Ablauts". 0-o-pe-ro-si: Festschrift fur Ernst Risch zum 75. Geburtstag a cura di A. Etter, 3-18. Berlin & New York: Walter de Gruyter. Sonderegger, Stefan. 1985. " Die Briider Grimm - Philologie, histori­ sche Sprachwissenschaft und Literaturgeschichte". Die Bruder Grimm: Dokumente ihres Lebens und Wirkens a cura di D . Hennig & B . Lauer. Kassel: Weber & Weidemeyer. Swiggers, Pierre. 1985. "Categories grammaticales et categories culturelles dans Ia philosophie du langage de Humboldt: Les implications de Ia 'for­ me grammaticale'". ZPSK 38.559-63. Trabant, Jiirgen. 1985. "Humboldt zum Ursprung der Sprache" . ZPSK 38.676-89. Verlato, Micaela. 1983-84. "L'identita di pensiero e linguaggio secondo F. Schleiermacher: Sull'idea della relativita linguistica nel romanticismo tedesco". Quaderni patavini di linguistica 4.133-71. Wiesinger, Peter. 1985. "Jacob Grimm und Wilhelm Scherer als Sprachhis­ toriker" . ZPSK 38.519-32.

RIFERIMENTI BIBLIOGRAFICI

Bahner, Werner. 1985. "Jacob Grimm im wissenschaftsgeschichtlichen und internationalen Kontext der deutschen Sprachwissenschaft in der ersten Halfte des 19. Jahrhunderts" . ZPSK 38.426-80. & Werner Neumann, a cura di. 1985. Sprachwissenschaftliche Ger­ manistik: Ihre Herausbildung und Begrundung. Berlin: Akademie­ Verlag. Benfey, Theodor. 1869. Geschichte der Sprachwissenschdft und orientali­ schen Philologie in Deutschland seit dem Anfang des 19. Jahrhunderts mit einem Riickblick auf die fruhern Zeiten. Miinchen: Cotta. (Rist., London & New York: Johnson, 1965.) Bopp, Franz. 1827. "Uber J. Grimm's Deutsche Grammatik". JahrbuchfUr wissenschaftliche Kritik Febr. 1827, 251-303; Mai 1827, 737-59 (Rist., Vocalismus oder sprachvergleichende Kritiken uber J. Grimm's deutsche Grammatik und Grafts althochdeutschen Sprachschatz mit Begrundung einer neuen Theorie des Ablauts. Berlin: Nicolai, 1836). Cherubim, Dieter. 1985. "Hat Jacob Grimm die Historische Sprachwissen­ schaft begriindet?". ZPSK 38. 672-85. De Mauro, Tullio. 1965. Introduzione alta semantica. Bari: Laterza. Engels, Friedrich . 1878. Herrn Eugen Diihring's Umwiilzung der Wissen­ schaft. Philosophie. Politische Oekonomie. Leipzig. (Rist., Karl Marx & Friedrich Engels, Werke, voJ. 20. Berlin: Dietz, 1951-52.) Fleischer, Wolfgang. 1985. "Zur Geschichte der Grimm-Rezeption aus Jinguistischer Sicht" . ZPSK 38. 489-99. Fonnigari, Lia. 1977. La logica del pensiero vivente: Il linguaggio nella fifo­ sofia della Romantik. Bari: Laterza. ---

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210

PAOLO RAMAT SUMMARY

This paper examines the evolution of the concept of cross-linguistic comparison, from Humboldt to the Neogrammarians, and shows how the focus of comparison progressively shifted from an achronic, general ('philosophic' ) point of view to a diachronic, historically oriented one, quite in line with the developments of the comparative and reconstructive method in linguistics. The change in viewpoint is connected with the cul­ tural evolution from Enlightnement thinking to Romanticism and, sub­ sequently, to the Positivism of the neogrammarian period. It is shown that these changes must also be seen in the light of the socio-political evolution of Germany during the 19th century.

Part III: Comparative Linguistics before and after Humboldt

210

PAOLO RAMAT SUMMARY

This paper examines the evolution of the concept of cross-linguistic comparison, from Humboldt to the Neogrammarians, and shows how the focus of comparison progressively shifted from an achronic, general ('philosophic' ) point of view to a diachronic, historically oriented one, quite in line with the developments of the comparative and reconstructive method in linguistics. The change in viewpoint is connected with the cul­ tural evolution from Enlightnement thinking to Romanticism and, sub­ sequently, to the Positivism of the neogrammarian period. It is shown that these changes must also be seen in the light of the socio-political evolution of Germany during the 19th century.

Part III: Comparative Linguistics before and after Humboldt

Representation and the Place of Linguistic Change before Comparative Grammar* Sylvain Auroux

CNRS & Universite Paris VII

One may certainly characterize 19th-century linguistics (up to and including the Neogrammarians) as one whose orientation is essentially his­ torical. But in so doing, one has not really said very much. Grammarians obviously did not wait for the 19th century to notice that languages change. Still, everything depends on the way in which that change is represented. The 19th century did not become sensitive all of a sudden to an historical dimension which other periods had unjustly overlooked because they lacked a scientific linguistics. It provided itself with the theoretical means to represent linguistic change in another way. It changed the object's model and the model of scientific structure. If one wishes to reach an understanding of the way linguistic change may be otherwise represented and of the problems posed by its representa­ tion, it will be necessary to provide some very general means for visualizing that representation. In my opinion, the simplest means for visualizing is to start with the way Aristotle constructed the concept of movement in the Physics. Movement is the fact that a subject S moves from one property X to a Property Y (cfr. Fig. 1). This article is an abridged version - translated by Jay Tribby of The Johns Hopkins Uni� versity, Baltimore, Md. - of the third chapter of a forthcoming book to be entitled Le langage et Ia contrainte de Ia science. In the interest of presentation, the author has decided not to weigh the text down with notes and references. Indispensable bibliographi� cal references - and those only - have been integrated into the text.

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x -- - - - - - - Y

Saussure's comment that "etymology is neither a distinct discipline, nor a part of evolutionary linguistics. [I]t is only a special application of principles relative to synchronic and diachronic facts" (Cours . . . , Ap. Third part; n° 2834 in the Engler edition). One of the natural dimensions of movement is space. Nevertheless, one can easily make an abstraction of it, such as, for example, when one constructs a family genealogy. The tree that results from this has a temporal dimension only; whether or not the different members of the family were born and Jived in different places is not a pertinent question. Comparatists will have a tendency, until the appearance of linguistic geography and the resurgence of a diffusionist model (the so called 'wave theory'), to employ the genealogical model. Saussure will point out that

'

"

"

"

"

'S /

/

/ /

/

/

Fig. 1

X and Y may be words of the same language or each of a different lan­ guage, two states of the same language, two different languages, sounds, abstract structures such as phonemes or syntactical schemas; S may be a language, a people, a region, even an observer. The possibility of choice leads one a priori to assume that the study of linguistic mobility is a com­ plex question dependent upon delicate theoretical decisions. Difficulties also arise from the choice of the referentials with respect to which mobility may be identified. The point of departure, the initial measure of compari­ son is almost always the maternal language one speaks; the ability to move away from that central point of comparison, an ability which permits one to situate that language in its place among other languages, was only acquired at a late date, and at first through myth, in the sacred genealogy of the Renaissance, which made all languages descend from Hebrew. It appears natural to relate the movement to time, but the conception of the different elements of the movement differs according to the type of temporality under consideration. Consider the following etymological derivation which I borrow from the article "Etymologie" which Turgot wrote for the Encyc­ lopedie:

(1)

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SYLVAIN AUROUX

lat. /dies! > lat. ldiurnus/ > ital. lgiorno/ > fr. /jour/

The derivation Idies! > Idiurnus/ can be related to the temporality of the process of enunciation or to the logical time of the morphological deri­ vation. There is an after and a before, that which one signifies when one says that one form 'comes from' the other, when one considers the way in which, by speaking, I create this form by means of that form, or when one has in mind only the general types of these two forms. But one may also make use of temporality which is that of the time of the world considered as a form of universal chronology. In this case, without a doubt, there is a point of view from which /dies/ and !diurnus/ are seen as synchronous, because they have belonged to the 'same' language, which is not the case for !diurnus/ and /giorno/ or /jour/. ',1J.ese are difficulties which will elicit

language differentiates itself in time and, at the same time, in space [ . . . J. These two things (which one wants in order to have a precise view of the events) must always be considered at the same time and head on.

He added , "[B]ut we are obliged to separate them (in theory) so that we may proceed with orderliness" (Premiere Conference ii l'Universite de Geni!ve, 1891; Engler fasc.4, p.60.1). It was in this way that he pointed to the theoretical problem which studies on linguistic mobility have always found so intractable. The objectification of the dimensions of change and their separation are epistemological operations of great importance that should not be taken for granted. In the modern era, one has often begun by giving linguistic mobility a spatial referent, by first indicating the location of the new lan­ guage that one would encounter. It is in the Cosmographic of A. Thevet (1515) that the Our Father is used for the first time, in order to provide a sample of foreign languages (Thevet surveys twelve languages: Arabic, Turkish, Syrian, English, Scottish, Slavic, Polish, German, Swedish, Fin­ nish, Lapp, Latvian, and continental Caribbean). One has begun from the space occupied by the observer, as one can see in all kinds of reports, travel accounts, and other histoires naturelles et morales which seem to constitute the canonical form for the Renaissance to the 18th century. One presents the space of the world. The Westerner moves within that space, then he relates his voyage by describing what he sees and encounters; glossaries, linguistic remarks, observations on the history of peoples encoutered and their institutions all graft themselves onto the account. In 1795, in his lessons at the Ecole Normale, C. Volney (1757-1820) will maintain that 'Voyages [ . . . ] are the best historical materials that we could wish for'. The vast compilations

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LINGUISTIC CHANGE BEFORE COMPARATIVE GRAMMAR

of the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century, which will aim to inventory the languages of the world, will begin most of the time for a starting point of a geographical nature, which determines, for exemple, the project of Mithridates oder allgemeine Sprachenkunde of J. C. Adelung and J. S. Vater (1806-1817), even if for Monboddo (On the Origin and Progress of Languages, 1773-92) , Lorenzo Hervas (1784, 1800-1805), or A. Court de Gebelin (1773-82) the ultimate aim is to reconstitute the evolution of man and of the faculty of language. The most important clas­ sification of languages in the period is that of the Venetian geographer A. Balbi (1781-1848), which is entitled Atlas Ethnographique du Globe, ou classification des peuples anciens et modemes d'apres leur langue (1826). Conrad Malte-Brun (1775-1826), founder of the Societe Geographique, considers limiting the classification, that is to say the similarities, using a spatial principle. The anthropologist Charles d'Orbigny (1806-1876) formu­ lates the principle, which he borrows from the geographer, in this way: 'In the philosophical study of the structure of languages, the analogy between a few roots only acquires value when one can link them together geographi­ cally' (L'homme Americain, 1839:147). It is obvious that for us a travel account, a monograph on an exotic lan­ guage, a classification according to geographical principles are not history of languages. What we think of as history supposes an essential, and above all linear, relation to temporality. But one must understand that this con­ ception is a result that was not provided beforehand. If we wished to scrutinize the works of the 16th or 17th centuries using such a conception we would not understand anything about the transformation that our mod­ ern concept of history has represented. This is why I propose to consider more generally the studies of linguistic mobility in the general sense that we have just defined, that is to say, before a certain choice of options with respect to the referentials and the objects studied has clearly delimited what one might possibly call 'history'. Thus restored to its most general sense, linguistic mobility, of which what we call linguistic change is only one part, concerns, above all, difference and distortion; linguistic mobility does not become an essential problem until the Renaissance, with the great dis­ coveries. In a real sense, a new world offers itself to the mind; one will make oneself a collector, one will take inventories, compare, classify, ask oneself what comes from what. Starting in 1555, the Swiss doctor Konrad Gesner (1516-1565) will publish his Mithridates sive de differentiis lin­ guarum tum veterum tum quae hodie; between 1613 and 1619 the Thresor de

l'histoire des langues de cet univers of Claude Duret (d.l621) will appear, in which history has its etymological meaning of 'recension'. It is without a doubt this movement born in Renaissance - that is, on this terrain and with the assistance of materials accumulated over many centuries - that will make possible the birth of modern comparatism. As a scientific structure, the study of linguistic mobility differs substan­ tially from the works of the grammatical tradition, so much so that contacts between the two have been quite rare. The theoretical goal of grammar is to determine the set of rules governing the construction of the speech chain. Grammar is not particularly separable from the didactic of languages. As for linguistic mobility, its study has had practical designs of the political and/or colonial sort (see, for exemple, Charles de Brasses's Voyages aux terres australes, 1757), to which religious propaganda will be attached. As concerns the European vernaculars, since the 16th century the constitution on Europe as a political entity has motivated nations to undertake research into their origin and their legitimacy. Because of this, historical hypotheses bring political returns. (In France, for example, it is obvious that the hypothesis of a Celtic origin would tend to remove the country from the domain of Roman law, in which the sovereign concedes the imperium to his vassals.) The practical interests to which studies of mobility remain subordi­ nated do not necessarily cause a distortion of analyses, nor do they consti­ tute insurmountable barriers. On the contrary, one can see that the growth of goal-oriented research engenders in the end, by its sheer mass, research whose most immediate interest is a pure interest in knowledge. The emer­ gence of this interest is evident, in many cases, by the end of the 18th and the beginning of the 19th century: The first volume (1800) of the famous Catalogo de las lenguas de las naciones conocidas of Lorenzo Hervas y Panduro (1735-1809) is thus the first complete treatise on Amerindian lan­ guages written by the Spanish Jesuit, a Vatican librarian, using the works of his missionary colleagues. It is clear, nevertheless, that the sociological component of these studies of mobility remains under the influence of prac­ tical interests. This will not concern pedagogues or men of letters, as is the case with the grammar of the classical languages and European vernaculars, but missionaries, explorers, administrators, collectors and erudites. It is perhaps in their theoretical component that the studies of mobility differ from grammatical studies in their most characteristic fashion. The most important difference, I would suggest, is the structure of the empirical

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LINGUISTIC CHANGE BEFORE COMPARATIVE GRAMMAR

element of this theoretical component. The grammar of tradition, that which studies the classical languages and vernaculars, always relies on the competence of native speakers, and virtually never on linguistic remnants. Philologists, who have rarely been good epistemologists, have accused gen­ eral grammar(ians) of lacking an empirical base. They have done so because they have not understood that general grammar uses other sets of data from those for studies of mobility. For the phenomena of mobility, competence is inoperative; taking inventory of data as a cognitive, autono­ mous practice, which explains why it could begin in the milieu of collectors and erudites, who often had no theoretical competence of any note. The first correlations could be made successfully for vocabularies of approxi­ mately fifteen words, assembled by people who knew nothing about lan­ guages, and which were subsequently compared by people who were even less knowledgeable. The empirical datum of the studies of mobility is not merged with the assertion of a fact by means of abstract terms which make a recognition of the fact dependent upon thet theory. The datum is first and foremost a thing, for exemple, the Eugubine tables discovered in 1444, the Codex Argenteus found in 1563, the Codex Mendoza, the texts of the Oaths of Strasbourg, the Gothic Bible of Ulfila, etc. This concrete existence at the foundation of knowledge has important consequences, which one can see clearly by following the history of Etruscology as described by B . Carra de Vaux (b.1867), for example, in his work dedicated to La langue Etrusque, sa place parmi les langues (Paris: Champion, 1911). From the Renaissance to the beginning of the 20th century the discipline progressed by bringing together a considerable mass of data, without in any way advancing the classification of the language or the description of its structure. The empir­ ical dimension of the studies of mobility suppose the accumulation of data which are relatively independent of any theoretical mutations. Their development is submitted to a social temporality measured in long cycles. It takes time to assemble the data, information is scarce, dispersed, and, admittedly, quite costly (voyages, collections of manuscripts and inscrip­ tions, studies of dialects) . This undoubtedly explains the very early appear­ ance of a project for a history of linguistics, a project of interest to those (such as Leibniz, J. B. Bullet [1699-1775], A. Court de Gebelin [1725-1784]) who were to study the mobility. For them, it was a question of taking an inventory of the relevant data; from catalogues which have reached us we know that they set up and used libraries with vast holdings.

But realistically, such a quantity of information can be assembled and manipulated only by the machinery of stable institutions (public libraries, universities, learned societies, specialized journals, etc.), which requires relatively heavy investments. Without a doubt, their products will constitue the most characteristic and the most successfull achievement of the new sci­ entific structure characterized by the organization of the German university. The results of research undertaken before 1800 are nonetheless far from negligible, as a quantitative study (the only meaningful study in this area) easily demonstrates this. The example of the Spanish production of the works of Amerindian languages is illuminating in this respect. At the beginning of the 19th century this production greatly surpasses sev�n hundred original titles, more than two hundred of which date from the 16th century alone, with almost three hundred for the 17th, and about two hundred from the 18th century. If one refers to the different languages studied, one can present the following estimation: At the end of the 16th century, the Spanish patrimony weighs on thirty-three languages; at the end of 17th, eighty-four languages; at the end of the 18th, one hundred fifty­ eight languages (cf. Auroux & F. Queixalos, Pour une histoire de Ia linguistique amerindienne en France [Paris: Societe d'Ethnolinguistique Amerindienne, 1984], p. 3). The production differs substantially according to the country: In the same period, the French production, for example, in all related subject areas, considered together barely attains a third of the Spanish production on the Amerindian topic. The study of the French tradition, because it will lag further and further behind from the start of the take-off of comparatist studies, provides a good example for studying the theoretical and practical obstacles to the development of the new science. Theoretical works on linguistic mobility are relatively rare and are con­ centrated in the second half of the 18th century. Other than Besnier's remarks in his Discours sur Ia science des etymologies, included in the 1694 edition of the Dictionnaire etymologiques by G. Menage (1613-1692), one can rely on only the Dissertation sur les principes de I'etymologie par rapport a la languefranqaise by C. Falcone! (1671-1762), which appeared in Tome XX of the Histoire de l'Academie des Incriptions et Belles Lettres, the famous Traite de Ia mecanique des langues ou des principes physiques de l'etymologie (1765) by the President Ch. de Brasses (1709-1777), the Histoire naturelle de Ia parole (1776) of Court de Gebelin, and the not less famous article "Etymologie" in the Encyclopedie (1752), from the pen of A.-R.

220

221

SYLVAIN AUROUX

LINGUISTIC CHANGE BEFORE COMPARATIVE GRAMMAR

Turgot (1727-1781), who collaborated on several studies on dialect while he was the intendant of the Limousin. This article played an important role due, without a doubt, to the exceptional means of diffusion provided by the Encyclopedie, but also to its intelligent, if not original, synthesis of the themes of the period. One should add to this the intervening changes which occurred between the publication of the Encyclopi!die (1751-72) and the Encyclopi!die Mi!thodique. The three tomes dedicated to grammar and bel­ les-lettres in the latter (1782-86), under the direction of N. Beauzee (17171789) and J. F. Marmontel (1723-1799), are not mere reiterations of most of the articles.written for the former. New articles concerning our topic have been added, certain of which bear the label 'history of languages'. As all of the articles are assigned a label, one can see that their way of viewing mobility is not exactly the one we would understand as history. A modern reader interested in surveying the ensemble of data concerning the history of lan­ guages would have to look for them among many fields within the outline of the system of knowledge which, at the end of the work, divides the different articles according to their subject matter (see Fig.2). This dispersion among five rubrics correspond to the fact that in the opening classification there is no history or comparaison of languages.

of the data assembled by the French demonstrates that in that country investigators never made much progress as far as European languages are concerned. In 1769, when J. Ihre (1707-1780) publishes his Glossarium Suigothicum, a synthesis of numerous earlier works, there is not one French work on the Germanic languages, not anything original on northern Europe, even if the resident consul for Copenhagen, E. Mallet (1713-1755) publishes a monograph in 1755. It is obvious that the French have an idea of European unity, an idea which comes quite naturally when the geographical boundary predominates, but they represent that unity by privileging Celtic as a common ancestor, a language brought to public attention through studies written by Celtic scholars and Celtic enthusiasts ('The Celtic language may be considered the primitive language of Europe since it was the stem of its ancient languages', Court de Gebelin, Le Monde Primitif, V, 1778, p. XCIIi) . It is undoubtedly because of an absence of data that one does not find in France works analogous to that of the Englishman J. Parsons, who publishes his Remains of Japhet, being Historical Inquiries into the Affinity and Origin af the European Languages in London in 1767. The development of comparatism is not, however, a simple question of data. The assertion of a link of parentage between two languages is not a datum, it is the referential sighting of a fact dependent upon the theoretical terms (for example, the notion of family relation) that make it possible. In scientific practice, the similarities, before being facts, are hypotheses which must be confirmed or shown to be false, and which provide a basis for dis­ cussion. In the face of an increase in data, proposed hypotheses have more often been a matter for the fantastic than for the accumulated experiences of the discipline. In 1606, Guichard postulates the Hebraic origin of all lan­ guages; in his well known work on Les moeurs des sauvages ami!riquains compari!es a celles du nouveau monde (1724), which is often considered the birth of comparative ethnology, J.-F. Lafitau (1681-1740) maintains that the Amerindian peoples are of Pelasgian origin; in 1757, Granval sees the origin of French in the Celtic tongue, an idea shared by several good minds and one to which we shall return, while Le Brigant (1720-1804) sees it as the primitive language of all mankind (1787 and passim); one of the official Orientalists of the Academie des Incriptions, J. De Guignes (1721-1800), argues in favour of an Egyptian origin for the Chinese, a thesis which is contested by the Arabic scholar le Rouix des Hauterais (1724-1795) in the course of a well-known polemic; as for the principal theorists of linguistic mobility, De Brosses and Court de Gebelin, they support the existence of

I. Division III. The written word IV. Division . Figurative Language. I. Figures of diction V. Division. Etymology VI. Division. Application of the principles to languages VI . I. Individual languages Fig. 2

The structure of the empirical element of the studies of mobility links their development to a particular linguistic training on the part of inves­ tigators, or, to be precise, to the availability of certain data. The location of a language within any classification depends, quite simply, upon the lan­ guages to which it is compared, just as the configuration of the general clas­ sification depends upon the ensemble of data used. Obviously, this consti­ tutes a developmental constraint for mobility studies. At first one began by comparing anything and everything, whether it was a question of 'confor­ mity', 'analogy', 'resemblance' or 'affinity'. This practice was a comfort to the idea of a universal harmony of languages, linked to the theme of a primitive language, which certain people still believed might be Hebrew (cf. the Harmonies Hi!brafques of E. Guichard, 1618). In any event, the state

rii

222

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SYLVAIN AUROUX

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an organic primitive language. If we think back to the above-mentioned example involving Etruscan, there is no room for thinking that the situation necessarily attests to an absence of seriousness. The study of languages has long be considered, notably by Leibniz, an indispensable aid to the study of peoples and migrations. This orientation supposes an empirically un­ acceptable axiom, one people, one tongue. One can also reverse this axiom. By using historical testimony on migrations, and with hardly any other linguistic argument than that of the names of the migrating people, C. Ch. de Peysonnel le fils (1727-1790), the resident consul of Smyrna, identifies the Slavic origin of Serbo-Croatian for the first time, in 1756. Only the linguistic thought processes, not the truth of the similarities, will be of interest to us. As far as a recognition of linguistic mobility is concerned, it is helpful to distinguish between genetic mobility and positive mobility. A genetic study organizes abstract states; for example, it claims that, in linguistic development, concrete terms come before abstract terms. This ordering structure does not necessarily correspond to a precise chronology and, in particular, the events which are examples of each state may be preceded by events which are examples of a later state. That is, here are many series of chronologically ordered events which can exemplify the stages of an unfold­ ing process. Positive or historical development may be defined by an axiom of historicity;

Guignes, which will also help us to bring to light one of the foundamental aspects separating the 18th century studies of mobility from the comparatism which follows. . . . This learned man takes note of a well known fact: 'An mflmty of travellers have already noticed that in the Indian languages and even in Sanskrit, the learned tongue of these peoples, there are many Latin and Greek words' (Histoire de l'Academie des Inscriptions [Paris 1770] p.327). He quickly invokes the axiom of historicity: "One must not los� oneself m conjectures, nor go all the way back to the time of the Flood, m order to _ explain why we find Latin and Greek words in Indian languages": m effect, everything is explained by the contacts and borrowings between languages (ibid.). About fifteen years later, William Jones (1746-1794), in the fre­ qutmtly cited passage of his famous 1786 address before the 'Asiatic Soci­ ety' of Calcutta, will note that the 'affinities' between Greek, Latm and Sanskrit are "so strong that no philologist could examine all three of them without believing that they came from a common source, which perhaps no longer exists". The 'discovery' of the relations between Sanskrit and the European languages is not, as Jones thought, a simple question of affirming the resemblance between them, as the myth will perpetuate after him. Cer­ tainly, these resemblances were quite obvious and had been noticed for a very long time, but to move from their observation to the assertion o a common origin is an intellectual operation presupposing a way of seemg things which was not that of De Guignes. A. Koyre showed years ago that the birth of Galileian physics was not due to the discovery of a new fact, but to the appearance of a new theoretical structure which permitted one to contemplate unknown facts, and above all, to interpret facts which were already known in another manner. This model may not be of universal application, but in any case it describes fairly well what occurred at the birth of modern comparatism. It is not a new fact that changed the course of science, as all the histories of linguistics claim, it is a theoretical mutation that will allow facts to be interpreted differently. A passage of one of the rare work of dialectology written by a French speaker, the Swiss E. Bertrand, concerning the canton of Vaud, sum­ marizes perfectly the functioning of the sociological model which dominates the conception of linguistic mobility in the Classical Age:

(2)

If a positive or historical state precedes another, then for each state there is one attested fact and one only, such that this order­ ing structure is maintained in a universal chronology.

A certain number of prudent authors adopted this axiom. 1t is clear that any assertion of the sort founded in physics or biology, just as with the 'laws' of general grammar, finds itself in the same situation as an assertion of origin and violates the axiom of historicity. By acknowledging (2), one is Jed to no longer concern oneself with the problem of the origin of lan­ guages, since one refuses to discuss states to which chronologically attested facts do not correspond. An attitude such as this is summarized perfectly by Turgot: 'The etymology is sound in the chain [ . . . ] [of] alterations as a suc­ cession of facts known directly or proved by reasonable inductions' (art. "Etymologie", Enc. Methodique, II:27). This axiom of historicity is not necessarily a felicitous one in all of its applications; to be sure, it blocks speculation, but it also blocks any reasoning which is the least bit general. One sees this ih a characteristic passage by the famous Orientalist De

�

�

Exchanging one language to adopt another is, for a people, not the work of one moment . To accomplish this, centuries are required. It is usage, it is commerce with neighbours, it is the mixing of nations, war and con�

224

SYLVAIN AUROUX

LINGUISTIC CHANGE BEFORE COMPARATIVE GRAMMAR

quests, revolutions and turmoil, transmigrations and colonies which give rise to the formation of new languages and to their introduction into a Country. Conquests in particular extend the tongue of the conquerors and corrupt or strengthen those of the vanquished. Sciences, in the shade of peace, embellish them and perfect them all. The less a people cultivates the sciences and the arts, the more difficultes it is for them to perfect their language: the more a people are free, the less easily they adopt that of other Nations. (Recherches sur les langues anciennes et modernes de Ia Suisse et principalement du canton de Vaud, Geneve 1758:1M2)

The subject of linguistic change - and this is obviously an option that may appear parodoxical - is thus a people situated in space. Its essential cause is the mixture of languages. In 1750, in a text which he never pub­ lished, Turgot advanced the idea that 'the progress of languages which were never mixed would be very slow, there would be more additions than changes in the words, which would be merely softened a bit' (cf. D .Droixhe "Un plan inedit de Turgot pour un discours sur l'origine, Ia formation et le melange des langues [vers 1750)", Marche Romane. 24:1-2 [1979) p.220). In the article langue anglaise in the Encyclopedie Methodique (II, p.45) Louis de Jaucourt (1704-1779) supports the same theses that one finds more or less everywere. In fact, if one considers the ensemble of texts one notice three principal causes of change. First, external causes such as climate, the prog­ ress of civilization, and linguistic politics; next, the mixing of languages; and finally, the wear of time. This last cause might de compared to an inter­ nal principle of change; nonetheless, it remains unessential. Through a reading of the Turgot text just cited one sees immediately the distance that separates this type of model of mobility from those which will come to light­ with comparatism, one of the principal hypotheses of which will consist of making change the natural state of language.

�' Fig. 3

T

, L, L, L,

L,

Fig. 4

L'

r L,

L,

L,

L 10 L 11 L 11 L 13

Fig. 5

225

Positioned in space, the model of the mixing of languages corresponds to Fig. 3, which is to a certain extent a theory of waves. If one changes the ref­ erential, and if one wishes to use time, which corresponds in a certain way to a retrospective sighting, one obtains Fig. 4. The diffusionist model of lin­ guistic change is generally incompatible with a tree structure, representad in Fig. 5. One can see this by following, for example, the treatement of Polynesian languages in a manuscript study (1772) by Court de Geoelm, dedicated to the language of Tahiti. This study is full of interesting views on the linguistic unity of the 'Southern seas'. In it, following the ideas pre­ sented by A. Reeland (1676-1718) back in 1708, the author interprets the resemblances between the languages as evidence of a common origin, a projection of Malay toward the East (cf. S. Auroux & A. Boes, "Court de Gebelin [1725-1784) et le comparatisme: Deux textes inectits", Histoire­ Epistemologie-Language, 3-2:45-48 [1982)). In a later version, he will be more precise: the analysis of the languages spoken in the Southern seas [ .. . J proves that these languages depend closely on the Malay tongue [ . . . ] such that the entire southern part of our globe appears united by a common language. (Monde PrimitifVII:538 [1781])

A projection of the movement onto Fig. 5 appears possible; the nodes the tree are as much dates as they are geographical locations of different of languages. This possibilty is purely accidental; it holds as long as the case being considered respects the double condition of having only one superior node and of not accounting for any possible ralations between lower notes (it is assumed that there is no communication between the Oceanic islands); if not, one falls back on the two preceding models. If one follows Court de Gebelin principal conclusion, it is difficult to say that it corresponds for­ mally to the identification, expected after the proposed linkages, of what we would call an Austronesian family. The author expresses it in this way: 'We see that the language of Thaiti is one link of a chain which, by mixing with the tropical, embraces all of the Southern islands of the Old and New World' (Auroux & Boes, Zoe. cit. , p.56). The diffusionist model assumes continuity of linguistic movement and thus renders problematic - when only one language is in question the resulting definition of different lan­ guages. In a certain way, as Court de Gebelin says explicitly, we are always faced with the same language. To arrive at the notion of the linguistic fam­ ily, one must constitute classes of equivalence among the ensemble of lan­ guages, starting from the predicate 'having language X as a common ances-

226

SYLVAIN AUROUX

tor'. Only the model of Fig. 5, in which every node of level n is dominated by a single node of level (n-1), assures the transitivity necessary to a rela­ tion of equivalence. One may interpret the arcs of Fig. 4 as signifying '"being a source of", or more precisely, "having words which come from". This relation is not itself transitive, and if one reasons as if it were, one can demonstrate any kind of relationship one pleases. The continuist conception of linguistic movement poses the fundamen­ tal problem of the criteria for linguistic identity, a problem which, in and of itself, precludes any solution. The method that consists of comparing voc­ abulary hardly provides any clarifications, as Beauzee's notes in the article "Langue" of the Encyclopedie demonstrates: The analogy of words cannot be a significant proof of the filiation of ian� guages, unless one wishes to say that all the modern languages of Europe are respectively the daughters and the mothers of each other. (Encyc­ lopedie, p.249)

This conclusion, to which Meyer's law will later return, is found in Lafitau, on the dialects of the Algonquin and the Huron (Moeurs des sauv­ ages ameriquains comparees aux moeurs de !'ancien terns [Paris, 1724], pp.476-77). It is a consequence of the diffusionist model. Beauzee tnes to avoid this inconvenience by basing linguistic identity on grammatical, and no longer lexical, criteria. This lead him to take up again the typology of abbe Girard (1677-1748), and to distinguish between analogous languages, which respect the analytic order of thought, and transpositive languages, which do not. A language corresponds to a certain genius, a grammatical schema which is all its own: 'Above all, the principal and indestructible genius of all idioms consists in syntax'. A language may be the source of another only under the condition that it belongs to the same typological class. We move away from a model by diffusion to approach what we might call a model by germination, according to the metaphors in use during the century that follows. Unfortunately, the position regarding an indestructi­ ble core of identity brings Beauzee to notice the profound differences between the syntactic structures of French and Latin (cases, articles, auxiliaries, personal pronouns, tenses) and to conclude that Latin cannot be the origin of French. His developmental model correspond to Fig. 6. In admitting a certain continuity in the typological variations, and in intimat­ ing that Italian might have changed class under the influence of Celtic, he does not apply the typological criterion with much coherence.

LINGUISTIC CHANGE BEFORE COMPARATIVE GRAMMAR Celtic

French

227 Latin

English

Spanish

I I

Italian l

- - - - - - - - - - - -- -

_ _ _____ _

analogous languages

transpositive languages Fig. 6

Beauzee will return to the history of French in the Encyclopedie Methodique, devoting a special article to it which did not exist in the Encyc­ lopedie. He will present an evolutionary schema that one may summarize by Fig. 7. Celtic Ninth c. Rustic Roman ------ Tudesque or Roman language (court) (people) Tenth c. French Twelfth c. ------- Greek Fourteenth c. ------- Italian 1535 French official language

j

Monuments:

Oaths of Strasbourg Philomene Norman laws

Fig. 7

French is definitively a Romance language, the Celtic contribution is limited to a few words: 'Although our language is a corruption of Latin, mixed with several Greek, Italian, and Spanish expressions, nevertheless we have retained many words whose origins appears to be Celtic' (Enc. Meth., II, p.125). Beauzee's fixed view prohibits him from privileging the mixture of languages: linguistic mobility is thought of as either an alteration in primitive identity or a spatial displacement. The opposite theme, the increase in the number of terms in a language as a function of the progress of civilisation, would not alone suffice to think of the change as a linguistic innovation. For that, it will be necessary to break with the idea that mobil­ ity is something continuous, indeed something imperceptible like that slight movement which, from generation to generation, distances the language of our ancestors from our own.

228

SYLVAIN AUROUX

LINGUISTIC CHANGE BEFORE COMPARATIVE GRAMMAR

The French are hardly interested in the close similarities between the Indo-European languages. The first French work dedicated to these lan­ guages is the book by J. Pereire (1715-1780), Observations sur treize des principales langues de !'Europe (1799), of which only the first part of the first volume, which is not very historical, ever appeared. This deficiency corresponds to the basic reasons we have analyzed up to this point. They are summarized perfectly in the Arbre Genealogique des langues mortes et vivantes, which a certain Felix Gallet dedicated to the abbe Sicard (17421822), the famous teacher of deaf-mutes, head of the general grammar course at the Ecole Centrale. We can date this tree to about 1800: we reproduce it .in Fig. 8. If the idea of genealogical tree is tacitly understood in the metaphor of mother languages and daughter languages, Gallet's tree is the first systematic genealogical schema of which we are aware. It appears about fifty years before the trees of August Schleicher (1821-1868) and the Czech Ladislas Celakovsky (1799-1852). The weaknesses of the French school, however, are seen immediately. Like the Table of compared languages which figures in the first tome of Monde Primitif, from which Gallet drew his inspiration, the tree is of astonishingly poor quality given the period in which it is executed. It consists of about sixty languages; Hervas claimed that Court de Gebelin had knowledge of only one-fifth of the languages in the universe; Adelung and Vater will multiply by ten the number of languages surveyed; Balbi will succeed in presenting seven hundred, while predicting that the world's languages must number near two thousand. The similarities presented testify to both a clear perception of European unity and a state of knowledge that is already obsolete. Sanskrit - Indic - appears in a corner next to. Chinese and Tartar, far from the European languages attached to Celtic, whose close ties to the primitive language must lead one to view it as a sort of 'proto-European', not as one of the languages directly known. Hungarian remains attached to the Slavic family. Geek and Latin are still considered descendants of Hebrew. Even more-than the similarities, it is the form of the tree itself which is remarkable. As we saw above with reference to the Fig. 6, a genealogical tree theoretically makes an abstraction of the spatial dimension. The tree of Fig. 8 is in fact a transitional form in which one is still able to detect that dimension. The trunk of the tree in centered on Europe, and one still dis­ tinguishes the North, the East, and the West. 'Mexican' and the Slavic branch, however, are not where geography would place them. The location of the branches of the tree is thus no longer totally geographical, nor is it Fig. 8

229

230

LINGUISTIC CHANGE BEFORE COMPARATIVE GRAMMAR

SYLVAIN AUROUX

yet a pure depiction of chronology and the similarities among languages. The most astonishing aspect is undoubtedly the persistence of the dif­ fusionist model, which one recognizes by the fact that certain segments of the tree intertwine to form new branches with one another. If one takes the example of French, and if one is interested in what dominates it in the chronology, one sees that the schema of its ancestors corresponds to the structure of the temporal projection of the diffusionist model, such as it is presented in Fig. 4 above. Conceived in this way, the tree does not succeed in separating linguistic families; it permits every confusion, such as, for example, that of classifying Hebrew among the ancestors of French through the intermediary of Greek. Certainly, historical knowledge progressed during the 18th century. Besides the materials we have just analyzed, the constant additions to the dictionaries of Menage or Ducange (1610-1688) attest to this and, in a general way, so does the better utilization of documents (old translations, maps, treatises, place names, etc) . It is symptomatic not only to see an article "Romane (langue)" appear in the Encyclopedie Methodique, but even more so to find in this article the presentation of the text of the Oaths of Stras­ bourg. Still, the theoretical elements employed attest to the same ambiguities and the same hesitations as the global models analyzed above. In relation to what we know of later camparatism, certain of them should be considered impediments, in the same sense that the model of the dif­ fusionist position was an impediment. In that perspective, it seems to me that the three privileged points acting as impediments, and which remain for us to study, are the attachment of linguistic change to 'figure' , the role accorded to the word and to the concept of the root, and finally, the pre­ dominance of monogeneticism. Linguistic mobility is first conceived under the concept of figure. For semantics it is a question of the trope and for phonetics, one of metaplasm, which Beauzee definies in this way: General name which one gives in grammar to the figures of diction, that is, to different changes which take place in the material of words, for what­ ever cause and in any way whatsoever, but nevertheless in any way they please and with the authorization of usage. (Enc. Meth. , II, p.529; emphasis added: S.A.)

A 'figure' is a transformation which marks the passage from a sound X* to a sound Y*, or from a sound X* signifying idea X to another meaning of the same sound , which I summarize in the schemas (3c) and (3d) , derived from (3a) and (3b), which describe the relatin of meaning.

(3)

abcd-

231

f (X) = X* f-1 (X') = X F' (X') = Y* F (f-1 (X') ) = Y

The change of 'letter' is one of the oldest theoretical instruments of etymologists and comparatists. Metaplasm is thus the ancestor of the phonetic law. By this, I mean to say that it embraces the same domain, while representing it in a different manner, in the same way that , for exam­ ple, our concept of the complement has as its ancestor the notion of the 'syntax of regime'. It is obvious that 'figure' concerns mobility in general (discoursive variants, variants in dialect, the position of two languages in a relation of correspondence), and not simply 'historical mobility'. The clas­ sic use of the notion of figure is only governed by two principal hypotheses. On the one hand, one must always be able to define an ensemble located at the beginning and another at the end of the series, in the way that the ensemble of primitive meanings of words and the ensemble of the figurative meanings function, respectively, for tropes. On the other hand, one must be able to define the functions designated F and F' in (3). The classic works state that the sounds of a language constitute a definite ensemble: the metaplasm thus always unites two 'letters' belonging to one or several lan­ guages. Like the trope, it is the object of a classification whose headings are: prothesis, apharesis, syncope, epenthesis, apocope, paragogue, con­ traction, metathesis and commutation. Without a doubt, we have a theoretical material produced by a long tradition whose essential elements will cross over into historical linguistics. Thus, what is important is the way one applies it. The list of examples 4-11 has been selected, unless otherwise indicated, from articles in the Encyc­ /opedie Methodique (1782-86). (4)

humilis < humble; numerus < nombre; cineris < cendre; pul­ veris < poudre; mel < miel; fel < fie!; bene < bien; rem < rien; laterna < lanterne; thesaurus < tresor; funda < fronde.

(5)

gr. nessa < anas; gr. kreas < cara; gr. morphe < forma.

( 6)

'The Spanish have brought [ . . . ] a quantity of Latin words into their language by changing f to h; for example, hablar (to speak) from fabulari, hazer (to do) from facere, herir (to wound) from ferire, hado (fate) from fatum, hido (fig) from ficus, hogar (hearth) from focus, etc.' (art. "Commutation").

232

SYLVAIN AUROUX

(7)

amavisti < amasti; relligio < religio.

(8)

deluvium < deluvie < delu - ie (art. "Commutation").

(9)

platea < piazza; blanc < bianco (art. "Etymologie").

(10) Fr. nom ¢> Ger. name ¢> Eng. noun ¢> Finnish nime (Court de Gebelin, 1776) (11) pous, pes, piede, pie, pe, fuss, foot, foet, voet (C. Denina, La clef des langues, 1804, t. 3, p. XXIV). The diversity of these examples amply demonstrates the ambiguity of metaplasm as a representation of linguistic mobility: it is not bound a priori in a privileged fashion to the temporal dimension. The commutation of item (6) is an authentic phonetic law of Spanish; as is item (9) for Italian. But metaplasm can represent variants or poetic licenses (cf. example 7) just as well as it can represent simple, set correspondences between different lan­ guages. If one takes quotation (10), for example, Court de Gebelin merely states that where is an Iii in Finnish, there is an /o/ in French, an lou/ in English, an /a/ in German. It is a matter of noting a principle of variation; the sounds of each of the languages cited constitute, in turn, the beginning and ending ensembles of the 'figure'. No· temporal relation orients these ties; a temporal relation could exist only between each of the sounds and the sound of an original language which is not under consideration. There are numerous ways of presenting generalizations starting from observed metaplasm. The most simple involves the familiar classification of different items. This is what one finds in example (5); each French word is assigned a corresponding word in Latin, all instances are grouped together because each correspondence is an example of epenthesis. The figure type classifies the example in a manner which is of little interest to the history of languages; it assigns no necessity, no regularity which is unique to a given sound. One proceeds from one word to the other according to a principle which assumes that a sound disappears in the interior of the first word. Usage decides the disappearance (cf. the italicized passage in the definition of metaplasm), and depending upon the words; nothing prevents usage from deciding differently for the same letters. The second form of the general representation consists of asserting global correspondences between the different possible sounds. Court de Gebelin is undoubtedly one of the first to use the expression 'law' to designate this type of assertion. This is a question of correspondences of the type in sample (10), examples of which

LINGUISTIC CHANGE BEFORE COMPARATIVE GRAMMAR

233

are found in all the world's languages: 'These principles or laws occur in all languages, whatever they may be, anytime and anywhere'. From this 'the history of peoples becomes a matter of calculation' (Monde Primitif, vol I , p.83). One may represent Court de Gebelin's method by the series of axioms which he himself provides in his Histoire naturel/e de Ia parole (1776), and which we synthesize in (12). (12)

Chap. VII First Principle. Languages are merely the dialects of one single language. Second Principle. The differences which reign between languages do not prevent them from having the same origin. Third Principle. The first language is composed of monosyllables only, taken from nature, painting it with physical objects and the source of all words. Fourth Principle. Only the comparison of the greatest possible number of languages can lead to the primitive language and to the true etymology of each word. Fifth Principle . The more words are a part of common usage, the more they undergo change. Chap . VIII First Principle. Change or alterations in vowels do not prevent one from recognizing the origin of the words. Second Principle. Change or alteration of some of the consonants in a word do not prevent one from recognizing the origin of words.

Principles such as these permit one to demonstrate rigorously almost anything. It is a consequence that Turgot had brought to light in the article "Etymologie" in rejecting 'etymologies founded upon the possibility of any random change whatsoever' (Enc. Method. , t. 2, p.31): 'We will not listen to one who, to justify a change in Italian etymology from the Latin I pre­ ceded by a consonant in r, would put forward the example of Portugese and the affinity between the two sounds'. From this comes the fixation on a clear referential for linguistic mobility: As far as changes are concerned, it is necessary to 'study their succession just as one studies historical facts' , and to limit oneself to a variation 'fixed on certain languages, focusing on cer­ tain dates, according to the order of the places and the times' (ibid. ). In this way Turgot arrives at a viable conception of the phonetic law, although far from comparatism, since it concerns only one language. He gets rid of the contingency stubbornly attached to metaplasm so as to explain regularity by means of the compulsory equalization of pronunciations: 'In no languages is pronunciation arbitrary, because everywhere one speaks to be understood'. Whereas 'figure' remained attached to the unity of the word which gave it

234

its definition, 'phonetic law', on the contrary, expresses a regularity which depends only upon sounds which are present, a regularity which cannot be predicted by any definition of figure. Between figure and phonetic law there is a double relation. Both work on the same material, that which places sounds in corresponding relations with one another. This explains why, for example, one finds already in quotation (11) above elements con­ cerning the first consonantal change in the Germanic languages. It is obvi­ ous that phonetic laws are not born spontaneously in Rask's brain; they come from knowledge accumulated by way of the different figures he has inventoried. But the concepts of linguistic change which correspond respec­ tively to figures and to phonetic laws have incompatible theoretical struc­ tures; the passage from the one to the other is not a question of a better observation of phenomena, it is a theoretical mutation. Without a doubt, it is the system of De Brosses-Court de Gebelin that best demostrates that the role of the word in etymology might have been an important impediment to the development of comparatism. These two authors organize etymological derivations by word families. De Brasses employed the term universal archeologist to designate a table in which the words of all the world's languages would have a place according to the stage of derivation that they represent, under the word of the primitive language which constitutes its root. In the plans for Monde Primitif, Court de Gebe­ lin foresaw a 'Comparative Dictionary of Languages', which never appeared: In this dictionary words will be arranged individually under the primitive word from which they derive . It groups numerous word companies by genealogical trees whose root is the primitive word, just as a flag serves as a rallying point. (Auroux & Boes 1982:42)

Word families defined in this manner are necessarily independent of the languages to which each of their members can belong. A language is nothing other than a treasure of words. If one wishes to visualize different languages and, at the same time, different word families, one must undoubtedly resort to a schema such as the one in Fig. 9. One notices easily that the lines which link words of the same language allow room for all of the combinations of the diffusionist model. It is obvious that the comparison of different languages first took the word as its basic element. The resemblance between words of related lan­ guages is an intuitive fact, as least for those closest to one another. This undoubtedly accounts for the large number of exact etymologies (about 56

235

LINGUISTIC CHANGE BEFORE COMPARATIVE GRAMMAR

SYLVAIN AUROUX

Lt- - - - - M(O,t) - - - - - M(0,2) - - - - - M(0,3)- - - - -M(0,4) '

·

·

· ·

·

'

'

.

.

'

'

..

.

.

.

: : : :' : : : :. : : : : : : : : : :. : : : : :;:/: :�;/M
This last point permits me to conclude my remarks with a working proposal: that is, an encounter on the change in the notion of 'comparison' after Humboldt. Another possible theme for an encounter, if you prefer, could be the point brought home by Coseriu and Gensini, one that I am particularly fond of and which might help us bridge the gap between historians of lin­ guistic thought and historians of European culture and political life. I am speaking, in Kuhnian terms , of the Epicurean paradigm. Epicurean linguistics assigned to the physis the possibility of construct­ ing various languages and thus different scientific elaborations, the prole­ pseis and all intellectual endeavor. Materialist and naturalist, Epicurean lin­ guistics circulated widely throughout Europe - openly in England , a free country, and undercover in Italy and Germany, where there was much less freedom. (There was however still enough freedom for Giambattista Vico (1668-1744) to establish contact with Neapolitan epicureans in the 17th cen­ tury, to give but one example.) Now, the question is: What influence did the re-discovery of the fifth book of Lucretius have on the philosophy of language in the 17th and 18th 5.

310

TULLIO DE MAURO

centuries? I already mentioned the influence on Leibniz, and then on Hum­ boldt, of the rapid development of the sciences, among which the historical sciences. This new model of knowledge, joined to the discovery of what Vico called 'sterminate antichitil' (infinite regression of the past) created a shock, a feeling of alienation from the historical present which, in a uni­ verse considered to be only 5000 years old, had previously been thought to occupy a significant slice of cosmic time. The discovery of the endless reaches of what we know to be cosmic time certainly weighed on the cos­ mographies of that period, but also on such historical endeavors as the clas­ sification of languages. Perspectives changed. New models were needed to generate faits of interest to science and philosophy. It would therefore seem worthwhile to study the bestioni of Epicureans in relation to the rise of the linguistic sciences. There was a general move­ ment to desecrate all institutions - law, state, monarchies - which the French and Anglo-Saxons put into practice and which the Italians and Ger­ mans, not in a position to start revolutions, elaborated theoretically . . . and not too badly at times.

Index Nominum

A. Aarsleff, H. 5, 10-11, 57n, 77, 88, 90-91, 123, 149-150, 152n, 291n, 302 Adam 63-64, 66 Adelung, J.Chr. 10, 204, 216, 228 Aldrete, B. 288 Alembert, J. le Rond d' 93 Alighieri, D. 86 Ambrosio, T. 14 Antinucci, F. 201 Arens, H. 3, 120 Aristotle 190, 195, 213, 236, 304 Arlotto, A.T. 290n Arnauld, A. 39, 42 Arndt, H.W. 49 Ascoli, G.!. 253 Augustinus 103-104, 106 Auroux, S. 219, 225, 234, 236, 302-303, 308 B. Bacher, W. 283 Bahner, W. 200-202, 204-205 Balbi, A. 216, 228 Barba, M. 269 Barber, W.H. 123 Beatus Rhenanus: see Rhenanus, B. Beauzee, N. 220, 226-227, 230, 235 Becanus, G.: see Gorp, J. van Becker, K.F. 207 Bembo, P. 40 Benes, B. 161, 174n Benfey, Th. 87-88, 95, 120, 125, 150, 199, 204-205, 240-242, 290n Benveniste, E. 286 Benzel, E. 19

Beregszaszi, P. 124 Berezin, F.M. 17-18 Bernard, E. 14 Bernegger, M. 4 Bernhardi, A.F. 163, 242 Bernier, F. 18 Bertrand, E. 223 Besnier, P. 219, 288-289 Bickerton, D. 289 Biondelli, B. 302 Bittner, K. 14 Bloomfield, L. 94, 240 Boas, F. 287 Boehme, J. 63, 119, 121 Boes, A. 225, 234, 236 Bonfante, G. 5, 61, 86 Bopp, F. 15, 93-95, 147, 150, 174n, 185, 189, 199, 201-203, 207, 237, 240-241, 246, 255-257, 263-264, 283, 286, 290n, 302, 308-309 Boretzky, N. 289 Borrichius, 0. 291n Borsche, T. USn, 116n, 139, 142, 151n, 153n, 272 Borst, A. 6, 61, 86, 115n, 121 Bourdieu, P. 281 Boxhorn, M. 12-13, 23, 120 Braude!, F. 304 Breal, M. 150, 289, 302 Brenner, H. 19 Brerewood, E. 5 Brosses, Ch. de 21, 150, 217, 219, 221, 234, 236 Brugmann, K. 126, 205, 309 Bullet, J.-B. 218 Burkhardt, H. 43, 45, 54n, 56n Burnett, J. (Lord Monboddo) 216

312

INDEX NOMINUM

Bursill-Hall, G.L. 52n Busbecq, O.G. de 15 Bynon, Th. 85n, 239, 29Jn

li l ll

C. Callewaert, J. 17 Cannon, G .H. 290n Carra de Vaux, B. 218 Cartesius: see Descartes, R. Cassirer, E. 71, 83, 161-162, 270 Castets, J. C. 290n Catherine II 10 Cayet de Palma, P.V. 14 Celakovsky, L. 228 Celtis, C. 3 Chafe, W.L. 129 Champollion, J.F. 187 Cherubim, D. 206 Chevalier, J.-C. 54n, 281 Chomsky, N.A. 189, !95n, 240, 308-309 Christy, C. 268 Cicero 253 Clauberg, J. 68 Cluvier, J. 23 Coeurdoux, G.L. 282-283, 290n Cohen, M. 4 Collinder, B. 4 Collinge, N.E. 29Jn Comenius, J.A. 6-7, 9, 22, 28 Condillac, E. Bonnot de 143 Copernicus, N. 236 Cordemann, G.F. 11 Corvin, M. 16 Coseriu, E. 158-160, 167, 173, 173n, 174n, 266, 282, 288, 291n, 302, 305309 Cosimo III de' Medici 10 Court de Gebelin, A. 150, 216, 218-219, 221, 225, 228, 232-237 Couturat, L. 62, 74 Cruciger, G. 12-13 Cuvier, G. 244

lld

D. d'Alernbert: see Alemhert

I,

'

II� ',, i

1'\ :

-U

Dalgamo, G. 37, 40, 53n, 63, 67, 79, 152n Dante: see Alighieri, D. Darnell, R. 287 Dascal, M. 52n, 53n, 55n, 56n, 74, 306 Davanzati, B . 290n Davies, J. 23 De Guignes, J. 221-223 De Laet, J. 120 De Mauro, T. !50, 158, 206 Delbriick, B. 240, 257 Denina, C. 232 Derrida, J. 187, 192, 197 Descartes, R. (Cartesius) 64, 105-106, 206 Desirat, C. 97 Di Cesare, D. 306-308 Diderot, D. 93 Diez, F. !99 Diogenes Laertius 73 Dominicy, M. 53n Dressler, W.U. 291n· Droixhe, D . 61, 71, 120, 124, 224, 283, 290n, 29Jn Ducange, Ch. 230 Duponceau, P.S. 97 Duret, C. 217 Durrerus, A. 52n E. Eckhardt, J.G. von 6, 17, 80, 307 Egenolff, J.A. 23 Emeneau, M.B. 287 Encreve, P. 281 Engel, J.J. 135 Engels, F. 204 Engler, R. 215 Epicurus 71-73, 83, 309, 310 Erasmus of Rotterdam 22 Estienne, Ch. 89 Etter, E.-L. 3 Eyben, H. von 11 F. Fabricius, L. 19-20 Falcone!, C. 219

INDEX NOMINUM Fantoni, T. 15 Fazekas, T. 24n Fechner, Th. 270 Feller, J.F. 11, 89 Feugere, L. 89 Fichte, J.G. 181 Filastrio da Brescia 71 Finck, F.N. !60 Fischer, J.E. 124-125, 129 Fleischer, W. 205 Fogel, M. 5, 8, 9-10, 22, 28, !50 Formigari, L. 51n, 173n, 199-200, 203, 207, 301 Foucault, M. 282, 290n Francke, Th.A. 290n Frege, G. !94n Freinsheim, J. 4 Friedrich, P. 29Jn Fulda, F.K. 235 G. Gabelentz, H. C. von der 207 Galilei, G. 223, 236 Gallet, F. 228 Gamkrelidze, T. 288 Gaon, S. 291n Gassendi, P. 73 Gatterer, J.Ch. 124 Gauger, H.M. 288 Geiger, T. 92 Gensini, S. 78, 200, 29ln, 306, 309 Gerholm, L. 24n Gesner, K. 216 Gessinger, J. 203 Gipper, H. 158-159, 242 Girard, G., abbe 226 Giuliani, M.V. 54n Godfrey, J .J. 290n Goethe, J.W. 161-162, 165, 173, 174n, 307 Golius, J. 63, 67 Goropius Becanus: see Gorp, J. van Gorp, J. van 89 Granval 221 Grape, A. 12 Greenberg, J. 97

313

Grimaldi, le Pere 16 Grimm, J. 19, 93, 147, 185, 188, 199, 20!-207, 241, 245, 247, 255, 257, 263 Gronov, A. 4 Grote, T. 19 Grotius, H. 120 Guerrier, W. 10 Guichard, E. 220-221 Gulya, J. 24n, 125, !30n Gunther, H. 195n Gyarmathi, S. 8, 125, 127, 237, 241, 245 H. Haarmann, H. 150 Hagege, C. 285 Halhed, N.B. 93 Halogoland, 0. de 4 Hamann, J.G. 206 Hamilton, A. 242, 256-257 Hampshire, S. 89 Hand, F. 52n, 53n Hanzeli, V.E. 8 Hardt, H. von der 71 Hassler, G. 207 Haugen, E. 289 Hauteraies, M.A.A. le Rouix des 221 Heckewelder, J.G.E. 97 Hegel, G.W.F. 268 Heinekamp, A . 63-65, 115n, 145, 152n, !53n Hellen 85 Helmholtz, H. von 270 Herbart, J.F. 268, 270, 272-273 Herberstein, S. von 16 Herder, J.G. 88, 150, 151n, 181, 184, 186, J95n, 200, 204, 243, 252, 307 Herodotus !03 Herv;!s y Panduro, L. 150, 216-217, 228, 245, 303, 307 Heyse, W.L. 207, 267-268 Hirschfeld, H. 283 Hjelmslev, L. !67, 173 Hobbes, Th. Jl5n, 152n Hockett, Ch.F. 85 Hoenigswald, H.M. 97, 127, 290n Homer 174n

314

INDEX NOM!NUM

INDEX NOMINUM

Home, K.M. 288 Hotman de la Tour, F. 4 Humboldt, A. von 248 Humboldt, W. von 85, 92, 94-98, 102· 103, 109-115, 116n, 117, 125, 127-128, 135-150, 151n, 152n, 153n, 155-162, 164-173, 174n, 181· 192, 194, 196-197, 200-203, 206-207, 210, 240, 249, 256· 257, 263, 265, 266-269, 278, 280, 284· 286, 302-303, 306-310 Hunfalvy, P. 6, 8 Hymes, D.H. 281, 287 !. Ihre, J. 12, 221 lomandes 4-5 !valdo, M. 161 Ivanov, V.V. 288 J. Jacob, A. 3 Jager, A. 88 Jager, L. 307 Jakobson, Fl. 97, 149, 158, 173 Jaucourt, L. de 224 Jenisch, D. 241 Jolley, N. 75 Jones, W. 85, 93, 123, 126-128, 223, 242, 245-246, 252, 255, 282, 290n Julius Caesar 4 Jungius, J. 53n Justel, H. 20 K. Kangro, H. 9, 53 Kanne, J.A. 241 Kant, I. 111, 138, 142, 156, 163, 173n, 181, 183-184, 189, 197, 242, 267, 307 Katriel, T. 52n Kautsky, K. 199 Kirchmaier, G.G. 23 Klin, E. 257 Kneale, M. 52n Kneale, W. 52n Kochanski, A. 14-15, 18, 22, 28 Koerner, E.F.K. 239, 257

Korner. J. 244 Koyre, A. 130, 223, 281 Krahe, H. 92, 291n Kraus, Chr.J. 245 Kretzmann, N. 52n Kuhn, Th.S. 93, 125, 281, 309 Kukenheim, L. 57n Kurylowicz, J. 286 L. La Loubere, S. de 21 Lachmann, K.F. W. 201 Lafitau, J.F. 221, 226 Lako, G. 8 Lamarck, J.-B. 244, 251 Land, S.K. Sin Langlois, Ch.V. 281 Lanjuinais, J.D. de 236 Larucea de Tovar, C. 87 Lassen, C. 236 Le Brigant, J. 221 Lefmann, S. 94-95 Lehmann, W.P. 291n Leibniz, G.W. 3, 5, 28, 31·32, 34-57, 60· 69, 71-80, 83, 85, 87· 93, 95, 97-98, 102-114, 115n, 117, 119-125, 128, 135· 150, 151n, 152n, 153n, 156, 158, 163, 195n, 201 , 206, 218, 222, 239-240 , 245, 254, 263, 283-284, 289, 291n, 302-308, 310 Leitzmann, A. 201 Leroux, Fl. 161 Leroy, M. 70, 301 Liebrucks, B. 142 Linnaeus, C. 24.3-244 Lo Piparo, F. 301 Locke, J. 31·34, 36, 51n, 55n, 57n, 68· 69, 108, 139, 143, 152n, 206 Lohmann, J. 115 Lomonossov, M.V. 17 Lotze, H. 270 Lucretius 71· 72, 83, 309 Ludolf, H. !1, 14, 16, 20-21, 23, 61, 71, 91-92, 120·121, 123, 283 Lundkvist, S. 24n

M. Malebranche 106 Mallet, E. 221 Malte-Brun, C. 216 Marino, L. 161 Markey, T.L. 288 Marmontel, J.F. 220 Martinet, A. 24n Mayrhofer, M. 290n Mechovia, M. de 16 Mecho)V, W. 16 Meier, G. 14, 71 Meillet, A. 4, 282·283, 287, 291n Menze, C. 151n, 152n, 153n Merton, R.K. 281 Metcalf, G.J. 61, 71, 119·121 Menage, G. 73, 219, 230, 235 Michaelis, J.D. 11 Michel de Marbais 52 Michou: see Mechovia Miechow: see Mechovia Misteli, F. 26 Molnar, A. 8 Monboddo: see Burnett, J . Morhof, D.G. 11, 89, 121 Morpurgo Davies, A. 127, 159, 248, 251, 288 Moses ben Asher, A . 291n Mounin, G. 25n, 125 Mueller, H.J. 87-88 Mugnai, M. 74 Mukherjee, S.N. 290n Mullins, N.C. 281 Muller, J . c. 120, 130n, 283, 290n, 291n Murray, S.O. 281 .

N. Nansen-Diaz, E. 174n Neumann, G. 247 Neumann, W. 200-201 , 204·205, 255 Nicole, P. 39, 42 Nietzsche, F. 281, 309 Nizolio, M. 79, 303 Noah 90 Noreen, A. 19 Niisse, H. 243-244

315

o.

Ockham: see William of Ockham Olesch, R. 14 Oliveira, F. de 288, 291n Orbigny, Ch. d' 216 Orlandi, T. 290 Orosz, R. 16 Ostergren, S. 24n Osthoff, H. 205, 309 P. Padley, G.A. 87 Pagliaro, A. 302 Pallas, P.S. 150 Papay, J. 5, 16 Parsons, J. 221 Passmore, J. 281 Paul, H. 205-206, 247, 270 Paulinus a S. Bartholomaeo 282, 290n Paulus Diaconus 6 Pedersen, H. 240 Peirce, Ch.S. 186, 195n, 281 Pereire, J. 228 P6rion, J. 89 Perret, J. 4 Peter the Great 21 Petraeus, E. 5 Peysonnel , C.Ch. de 222 Pezron, P. 20 Philo Alexandrinus 104 Piccolomini, E.S. 3, 16 Pickering, J. 87 Pius II: see Piccolomini, E.S. Plutarch 85 Poggi, S. 267 Poliakov, L. 23 Poser, H. 115n Pott, A.F. 92, 125, 159, 264, 302, 308· 309 Prasch, J.L. 89 Preti, G. 74 Priscian 36, 38 Ptolemaeus, C. 236 Puglielli, A. 54n Pyramus de Candolle , A. 244

316

INDEX NOMINUM

Q. Queixalos, F. 219 R. Ramal, P. 158-159, 167, 173n, l,74n, 199-200, 204, 207, 288, 303, 307-308 Ramus, P. ( P. de Ia Ramee) 53n Rask, D.R.K. 93, 125, 207, 234, 241, 255-256, 263 Reeland, A. 225 Renzi, L. 158, 173n, 174n, 288 Reuchlin, J. 53n Rhenanus, B. 6, :is Richer, A. 6 Richter, L. 21 Robins, R.H. 3, 38, 40, 52n, 53n, 86, 158, 173n Rocher, L. 290n Rocher, R. 290n Rossi, P. 61, 71 Rousseau, J. 290n Rubruquis: see Ruysbroek Rudbeck, 0. the younger 22 Rudbeck, the older 23 Ruscelli, G. 40 Russell, B. 89 Ruysbroeck, G. de ( Rubruquis) 17 =

=

s.

Sajnovics, J. 124-125, 127 Salmon, P.B. 252; 254 Salmon, V. 53n Sanchez de las Brozas, F.: see Sanctius, F. Sanctius, F. 40, 53n, 54n, 57n Sapir, E. 97, 287 Sassetti, F. 283 Saumaise, C. 120, 283, 289 Saussure, F. de 215, 242, 257, 306-307 Savigny, F.C. de 206 Scaliger, J.C. 53n Scaliger, J.J. 5-7, 28, 86, 123 Schaeve, H . 13 Scharf, H.W. 142, 195n Scheffer, J. 5. 8-9

Schellhase, K.C. 6 Schelling, F.W.J. 174n, 203-204, 206, 243, 307 Scherer, W. 205 Schiller, F. 164, 181 Schlegel, A.W. von 96, 159, 173n, 188, 200, 250, 252, 256-257, 264 Schlegel, F. von 97, 128, 147-148, 159, 164, 173n, 174n, 200, 239, 243-251, 253-257, 264, 287 Schleicher, A. 90, 127, 228, 239, 257, 263, 283, 286, 291n Schlozer, A.L. 123-125, 130 Schmalstieg, W.R. 291n Schmidt, F. 49 Schmitt, R. 282 Schmitter, P. 158-159, 242 Schoppe, K. 40, 53n, 57n Schottel, J.G. 23, 63 Schrieckius, A. 283, 289 SchrOder, E. 5 Schuchardt, H. 253, 287 Schulenburg, S . von der 10, 22, 61, 7071, 80, 87-90, 92, 121, 130n, 150, 291n Schulze, B. 283, 290n Schurharnrner, G. 291n Seignobos, Ch. 281 Setala, E.N. 6-8, 10, 19 Sgall, P. 173n Shevoroshkin , V.V. 288 Sicard, R.A.C., abbe 228 Siger de Courtrai 52n Skalicka, V. 160, 166-167, 173, 173n, 174n Skytte, B . 10-13, 28 Smith, A. 158-159 Sonderegger, S. 202, 207 Sorlin, P. 24 Sparwenfeld, J.G. 12, 18, 20, 22, 28 Spinoza, B. 53n Stehr, A. 5-6, 20-21 Steinthal, H. 96, 160, 174n, 207, 263265, 268-269, 280 Stephens, R. 283 Stephens, T. 283, 291n

317

INDEX NOMINUM Stetter, Chr. 181, 185, 307 Stewechius, G. 52n Stiernhielm, G. 7-8, 10-12, 28, 71, 88, 289 Stipa, G.J. 7, 28 Strahlenberg, P.J. von 18 Strattrnann, Th.A.H. von 73 Struc-Oppenberg, U. 240, 244, 256 Sweet, P.R. 95, 97, 239, 242 Swiggers, P. 53n, 167, 202, 281-285, 287, 291n, 308 Sydow, C.-0. von 24n

Vater, J.S. 200, 216, 228, 242 Veenker, W. 8�9 Venantius Fortunatus 24n Vendryes, J. 129 Verburg, P.A. 115n, 302 Verlato, M. 204 Vertes, A.O. 7 Veyssiere de La Croze, N .M. 14 Vico, G.B. 68, 71, 73, 83, 124, 309-310 Volney, C.F.C. de 215 Vossius, G. J. 53n Vrieze, F.S. de 10

T. Tacitus 3-4, 6, 23, 28 Tatiscev, V.N. 17 Telegdi, Z. 159-160 Tentzel, W.H. 11, 16 Tene, D. 283 Thevet, A. 215 Thomassin, L. 22 Timpanaro, S. 240-246, 251-255 Tischler, J.T. 15 Tornaeus, J. 5 Trabant, J. 116n, 142-143, 146, 149, 151n, 152n, 162, 164, 204, 207, 284, 306, 308 Tr6ster, J. 10 Trubetzkoy, N.S. 286 Turgot, A.R.J. 125, 127, 214, 219, 222, 224, 233 Tursellinus, H. 37, 52n, 53n Twaddell, W.F. 257

w.

u.

Uhlig, G. 85-86 Ulphilas 8, 218 v.

Vailati, G. 74 Varro, M. T. 92

Wachter, J.G. 14 Walton, I. 14 Waterman, J.T. 11, 14-15, 19, 291n Watkins, C. 291n Weinreich, U. 289 Welcker, F.G. 157 Wells, R.S. 290n Wierzbicka, A. 32, 52n Wieselgren, H. 6, 90 Wiesinger, P. 202, 207 Wilkins, J . 37-39, 41, 54n, 63, 67, 79, 152n William of Ockham 52n William of Sherwood 52n Windischrnann, K.J.H. 150, 201, 255 Witsen, N. 18 Wittgenstein, L. 183, 194n, 195n Wolff, Chr.F. von 125 Wotton, W. 254-255 Wouters, A. 282 Wundt, W. 270 ·

Y. Young, G. 187 Z. Zsirai, M. 4, 8, 125

Index Rerum

A. Adjective 43, 51n Adverb 36, 38-39, 41-44, 47-48, 52n Affect 107 Affinity 223, 233 Affix 42, 249 affictional 251 affixation 250 Agglutinative (agglutinierende) 159, 171 Algebra 46 Alphabet of human thoughts 35 Amazons 18 Ambiguity 33-34, 36-37, 40 Ana/ogia: see Analogy Analogie: see Analogy Analogy 121, 124, 127, 129, 161, 166168, 182, 184, 186, 289 gemeischaftliche Analogie 172 network of analogies 165, 168 analogical 64, 165 analysis logica 53n Analytic 250 Ancestor 231 common � 250 Anthropology 111, 162 philosophical - 162-163 anthropological 170 Apperception 272 Arabs 22 arbitraire du signe 136, 143-144 Arbitrariness 51n, 57n, 83 arbitrary 66-68 arbre geneatogique 228 Article 38 Articulation 182, 184, 186 Aspect 56 Astrakans 16

Ausbi/dungsperiode 141 Autonomy 138 Axiom of historicity 222 B. Babel 61, 121, 144, 254 Basic vocabulary 119-121, 127 Bastarnae 4 Bau, organischer 147-148, 165, 167, 182, 184 innerer 248 Berliner Akademie 137, 151n, 152n, 155-156 Bilingualism 289 Biology 243 Biscayans 21 Borrowings 223, 253 Botanic 243 Bretons 4 but 34 -

c.

caractere des langues 138 Case 39, 43 case inflections 37�38, 40 cases of nouns 41 Categoremata 37 categorematic 36, 51n Celts 4 Change(s) 224, 289 systematic - 282 dimension of - 215 internal principle of - 224 Characteristica universalis 47, 49, 78, 107, 145 Cheremiss 16 Chronology 307

320

INDEX RERUM

Circassians 16 Class 160, 170, 172 Classification 35, 172, 173n1 220, 264266, 269, 276 - of languages 160, 172, 244 typological - 127, 251 Cognitio obscura 74 intuitiva 74 - clara confusa 74, 78 - dara distincta 74, 78 - adaequata 74 Cogitatio caeca vel etiam symbolica 14 Comparatism: see Comparativism Comparative 308 - anatomy 243 - anthropology 161 - grammar 129, 257, 282 - linguistics 85, 303 (see also: Linguistics) - method 126, 128, 200 - morphology 161 --historical linguistics 199, 257 Comparativism 6, 31, 49, 51, 60, 129, 159, 161, 163, 167-168, 185, 237, 241242, 282, 307-309 Comparison: see Comparativism Compilations 215 Compounds 253 Concept 111, 113-114 Conjunction 32, 35-36, 38-44, 47 coordinative - 41 subordinative - 41 Connection 121, 161 Consignifications 37 Contacts 223 Continuist conception of linguistic movement 226 Convention 72, 79 Conventionalism 63 Copula 38, 41-43, 46-48 Correspondence(s) 129 Persian-Germanic -- 15 systematic -- 309 corruptio 149, 303, 308 �

�

Creativity human - 161-163 linguistic - 168 D. Data 221 (see also: donnees) Decay 128 .Declinable 36 de/initio nomina/is 78 Definition 34-35 densite de villes 304 Derivation 121, 214 Derived 253 Descendants 128 Descent 126-127 Dictionary 44, 50 mental - 206 Diffusionist model 215, 225, 230 Discourse 112-115, 151n formal - 306 formalized - 306 mental - 31-33 verbal - 32 Diversity 161-162 - of languages 68, 77, 136, 157, 162, 169, 173, 265, 267 - of people 72, 83 donnees 302 (see also: Data) E. Einbildungskraft: see Imagination einverleibende: see Incorporating Empirical - base 218 - datum 218 Encyclopedia 79 Encyc/opi!die 220 energeia 267 English 21 Epicurean(s) 309-310 - linguistics 309 - paradigm 309 Epistemic - turn 37 - viewpoint 32

321

INDEX RERUM Epistemology 307 Equivalence 226 Erkenntnis: see Knowledge ergon 267 Erscheinung: see Phenomenon Essences real - 32-33, 51n Etymology 34, 49, 57n, 77, 86, 90-91, 93, 97, 102, 119-120, 219 etymological 92, 214 Europeans 303 Evolution 244 biological - 207 evolutive 253 Externalism 303 external history 253 external stimuli 303 F. figure 230, 234 Finns 4-6, 20-21, 23 Fixity of species 244 Flectional 251 (see also: Inflectional) Form!Form 161, 165-168, 170, 264-265, 267, 269, 271, 273, 277 formal - 274 grammatical ....,. : see Grammatical linguistic - 31, 45-47, 60 logical - 45-46 material - 274 - of a sentence 37 - of discourse 44 Lautfonn 269, 274 Sprachform: see Sprachfonn Formal - discourse: see Discourse - languages: see Languages Formalization 80 Formalized - discourse: see Discourse - language: see Language Formation 161, 165, 167 principle of - 165-168 Formung: see Formation Freedom 170, 309 Freiheit: see Freedom

G. Gebiet 173 Gelegenheit 108-110 Genealogical - tree 252 - relations 146-147 Genetic affiliation 251, 255, 288 Genitive 45, 54n Genius of the language 254 Geology 243 Germanic Philology 307 Germans 4, 15, 310 Germination 226 Geschichte: see History Geschichtlichkeit: see Historicity Gesetzmiifligkeit (see also: Regularity) 170 Glottogeny 252 God 104, 108, 113-114 Goths 4 Government 41, 47 Grammaire generale et raisonnee 37�38, 42, 242 Grammar 44, 49-50, 119, 127, 148, 163, 167-168, 174n, 217 comparative - 147, 242, 282-283, 288-289' 302 general - 218, 222, 245, 307 historical - 200 philosophical - 38, 50, 57 rational - 35, 49-50 (see also: Grammaire generate et raisonnee) speculative 36 Grammatical differences 163 - form 168, 284, 286 - function 275 - structure 120, 168, 283 - subject 275 Greeks 21, 126, 158, 162 Grimm's law 91 Growth 128 Grundrichtigkeit 63 �

�

H. harmonia 77

322

INDEX RERUM

History (Geschichte) 106, 108-109 - of ideas 301 - of languages 216, 263 ,....., of linguistic ideas 302 - of linguistic research(es) 301-303 - of linguistic thought 301 historical 75, 246-247, 253 Historicity (Geschichtlichkeit) 77, 83 105 Historiography 307 Hungarians 5, 15, 20-22 Huns 22 L

Idee 106, 109, 111-112 idee de langue 307 Illocutionary force 31 Imagination (Einbildungskraft) !82-183 Incorporating (einverleibende) 159, 171 Indeclinable 36-37, 52n Indetermination 78, 80 Individual 171-172 - speech 170 Individuality 76, 109, 112, 114-115, 161, 165, 169-172 Individuum 76, 169 Inflection (inflexion) 37, 42, 49, 52n, 249-250 inflectional (flexierende) 159, 171, 174n (see also: Flectional) Innatism 76 Innovation(s) 127, 130, 227 inopia 69 Institutions 219 Interjection 36, 38-39 Internal - development 303 Interpretation 106, 113-114 Isolating (isolierende) 159 Italians 310 ],

Junggrammatiker: see Neogrammarians K. Kalmuks 16

Karelians 4 Kazans 16 Knowledge (Erkenntnis) 104-108, 111, 113 ordinary - 305 L. Language Adamic - (lingua Adamica) 120121, 141, 145 ancient - (lingua antiqua) 141 animal - 72 artificial - 40 common - 75 formalized - 306 human - 72, 83 mother - 23, 61, 71 ordinary - 305 organic-primitive - 221 (see also: primitive -) origin of - 63-64, 67, 142, 206 original - 142· philosophical - 40, 50, 79 primitive ...... 72 scientific - 79 universal - 105-106, 114, 135, 145, 206 Language affiliation 245 Language contact 253 Language kinship 146, 148, 203 Language policy 304 Languages analogous - 226 artificial - 37, 63, 67 foreign - 303 formal - 304 hegemonic - 303 historical-natural - (lingue storiconaturali) 62, 69, 74, 78-79 local - 304 national -- 304 new - 149 plurality of - 61-62 transpositive - 226 Lapps 3, 5-6, 18, 22 Latins 21

INDEX RERUM Law 232, 289 Lexicon 52n, 148 lingua A'damica: see Language, Adamic lingua antiqua: see Language, ancient lingue storico�naturali: see Languages, historical�natural Linguistic - families 230 - identity 226 - type 282, 286 (see also: Type) - typology 288 (see also: Typology) Linguistics historical - 231, 257 historical-comparative - 158, 255 (see also: Comparative) Uvs 20-21 Logic 49 M. Materialism 73 Matter --- of a sentence 37 --- of discourse 44 Meaning 69-70, 72, 75, 306, 309 Mechanical (mechanisch) 243, 250-251 Merkma/swort 275 Metaplasm 230 Method 171-172, 282, 305 Methode: see Method methode: see Method mixtura: see Mixture Mixture 149, 224, 253, 308 Mobility 214 genetic - 222 positive - 222 Modality 48, 114 possible worlds/real world 114 modele d'objet 302 modus significandi 36 Monad 75-77 Monadology 144 Monogeneticism 7, 61, 64, 146, 236, 255 Mood moods of verbs 45, 56n

323

imperative - 48 Morphology 162, 174n, 309 morphological 277 -- structure 247 --- markers 247 N. Name 38-39, 103-104, 110-111 Natur-Sprache 63 Natural 66-69, 75, 83 linguistic naturalism 203 natura/is origo 70 Need 72 Neogrammarians 204-206, 210, 213, 308 Noun 32, 37, 43-44, Sin 0. Obliquity 45 obliquely linked 39 Onomatopoeia 121, 271 onomatopeic - origin 141 - root 141, 144 Operations of the mind I mental opera­ tions 32-35, 39, 42, 55n Organ 181 Organic 174n, 243, 249, 250-251 organic whole 165-166 Organism (Organismus) 148, 152n, 161, 172, 174n, 242-244, 269 Organisationsperiode 141-149 origines gentium 138-140, 146 P. Paradigm 125, 309 Parsimony, principle of 34-35 partes orationis: see Parts of speeCh Participle 38 Particles 37, 60 Parts of speech, parts of discourse (partes orationis) 31, 35, 38, 42, 52n, 53n, 57n (see also under individual parts of speech) Perfection 128 Periphrase 35, 37 Permians 20

324

INDEX RERUM

Peucini: see Bastarnae Phenomenon (Erscheinung) 110, 113114 Philosophy of language 203, 282 Phoenicians 237 Phonetic law(s) 200, 231, 245 Phonetics 309 physis 309 Point of view 76 Polygeneticism 145, 252 Positivism 210 Predication 274-275 Preposition 35-36, 38-39, 41-44, 47, 53n spatial - 38 Procedure (Sprachverfahren) 169, 171 Pronoun 38, 41., 44-46, 52n interrogative 48 Propositional attitudes 32 Psychology - of language 207 psychological 267-268, 276-277 ......

Q. Quantifiers 36, 46, 48 R. Realism 63 Reconstruction 122-123, 126, 128-129, 141 internal - 129 Rede: see Speech, Discourse Reductive analysis 35 Referential 225, 233 Regularity 170 Relations 42-44, 47 Relativism linguistic - 206 Resemblances 245 Retention(s) 126, 128, 130 Romans 158, 303 Romanticism 158, 210 Root 235, 248 s.

Samoyeds 16, 20 Samiatians 5. 15

Scandinavians 18 Schematisierung 186 Schrift: see Writing Semantic onnifonnativity 79, 80, 83 Semantics 62, 78, 269, 305 Semiotics 57n Sensibility 76, 83 Sentences 306 Siberians 19 Siculi 14 Sign 104-107, 113, 136, 306 Singularity 161 Slavs 5, 22 Societates doctorum 306 Societe de Linguistique de Paris 206 Species species civiles 306 possible - 306 universal - 306 Speech 112-115, 168-171, 174n, 182, 186, 191 Speech act 32, 169, 267 Sprachbau 160 Sprachfahigkeit 267 Sprachform 160, 165, 269 Sprachidee 268, 307 Sprachkunde 135-136, 138-140, 151n, 181 Sprachsinn 185, 188, 191 Sprachverfahren: see Procedure Stamm 173 Stammbaum 252 sterminate antichitil 310 Stufengang der Sprachen 249 Structuralism 162 Structure (Struktur) 148, 161, 163, 165, 243, 245, 249-250 grammatical -: see Grammatical logical - 31 tree - 225 Struktur: see Structure Substratum theory 253 Sueves 4 Syncategoremata 37, 48, 52n syncategorematic 36

INDEX RERUM Syntax 37, 53n, 174n, 309 syntactic connection 168-169, 173, 174n Synthesis 142 Synthetic 250 System 243, 269 symbolic - 80 semantic 273 �

T. Tartars 19 (see also: Uzbeks�Tartars) Taxonomy plant - 244 Term 78, 221 termine: see Term Thought 163, 166, 173 Time 104, 112 Totality 161 trope 230 Type/Typus 160-161, 165-166, 171, 174n allgemeiner Redetypus 169 allgemeiner Typus 170 Constructionstypus 168 language - 161, 167, 173, 243, 248, 252 linguistic - 168, 172, 282, 286 morphological - 264 syntactic - 168-170 Typology 93, 129, 157-159, 167, 172173, 173n, 174n, 226, 257 typological 96-97, 102, 251 ...... comparison 172 - linguistics 161, 174n, 288 Typus: see Type u.

Uniformitarianism 128, 130 Unity 267 Universal 171 --- archeologist 234 ...... Characteristics: see Characteri� stica universalis harmony of languages 220 ..._

325

Universality 161, 170-172 Urtypus der Sprache 185 usus vulgaris 306 utilitas 72 Uzbeks-Tartars 16 (see also: Tartars) v.

Variability - of language 75, 80 - of meaning 70 Variety 83 --- of sensations 72 - of sounds 72 diathopic - 72 Veneti 4 Verb 37-39, 44 auxiliary - 36, 39, 41-42, 44 Verfahren: see Procedure Verschiedenheit 185, 306 (see also: Diversity) Verschiedenheiten 139, 306 Volkerpsychologie 268 Vo/kssprachen 267-268, 277 Vorstellung 270 Vorstellungswelt 273

w.

Wave theory 215 Weltansicht 143-144, 152n Wend 14 Word 183, 186, 288 Writing (Schrift) 190-193 z.

Ziculi: see Siculi Zusammenhang 164, 166

Index Linguarum

A. Altaic 90, 264, 277, 286 American Indian languages 124, 135, 163, 166, 217, 219, 247, 249, 264, 266, 277 Amerindian languages: see American Indian languages Anglo-Saxon 126, 310 Arabic 89, 215, 249-251 Aramaic 89, 146 Aranda 289 Armenian 14, 253 Austronesian languages 225 B. Basque 89-90, 95, 162-163, 249 Birman 264, 266 Breton 4, 12-13 Britannic 4 C. Caribbean 188, 215 Celtic 6, 15, 90, 92-93, 221; 226-227, 246-247 Chaldean 9 Cheremiss 16�17 Chinese 14, 128, 163, 172, 188, 192, 194, 221 , 228, 248 , 251, 255, 264, 266, 277, 285 Coptic 14, 249, 264, 277 Courlandais: see Latvian E. Egyptian 221, 255, 264, 277 English 12-13, 34, 53n, 126, 215, 227, 230, 251, 306, 308

Middle - 127 Modern - 127, 251 Estonian 4, 14, 19-20, 28 Et�iopic 255 Etruscan 222 European languages 89, 215, 223, 228, 237, 245-246, 255, 289 F. Finnish 3-6, 8, 10, 12-14, 20 , 22, 28, 215, 230, 245 Finno�Ugrian languages: see Finno­ Ugric languages Finno-Ugric languages 10, 12, 15, 19, 28-29, 90, 123-125, 289 Flemish Dutch 89 French 12, 34, 89, 93, 122,221, 226-227, 230, 302 Old - 122 Modern - 122 Norman -... 127 G. Georgian 56n German 12-13, 20, 28, 34, 50, 86-88, 9092,215, 230, 247, 253 Old High - 247, 264, 310 Low - 247 Germanic 15, 86, 92, 124-125, 221, 234, 246-248, 254 Gothic 7-8, 15, 246-247, 256 Greek 12-13, 85-86, 89-90, 92, 94, 127129, 173n, 223, 227-228, 230, 245, 247-249, 253-254, 264, 290, 303 Groenlandese 264

328

INDEX LINGUARUM

H. Hebrew 7, 9, 12-13, 22-23, 37, 53n, 61, 71, 86, 89-90, 121, 123, 228, 250-251, 254 Hindi 93 Hindustani 93 Hungarian 3, 6, 8, 12, 14, 20, 22, 28, 124, 145 I. Icelandic 247 lndic 223, 228, 246-249 (see also: Sanskrit) Indo-Aryan 126 Indo-European 90, 94-96, 98, 127-128, 228, 246, 251, 253, 255, 257, 264,266, 277' 285-286 Indo-Iranian 286 Indochinese 277 Indonesian 264 Italian 227, 230, 301, 306 J. Japanese 255 Japhetic 15, 89, 146 K. Kawi 94, 149 L. Lapp 4, 8, 215 Latin 5, 12-13, 34, 36, 50, 56n, 85-86, 89, 91-94, 124, 126, 128, 223, 226-228, 230-231, 246-248, 253-254, 256, 290 Latvian 8, 12, 215 Lettish: see Latvian Lithuanian 14 Livonian 19-20 M. Malay 225, 236, 266 Mexican language 167, 170, 172, 228, 264 (see also: Nahuatl) Mongolic 276 Mordvin 20

INDEX LINGUARUM

w.

N. Nahuatl 172 (see also: Mexican Ian� guage)

Tatar 15, 228 Teutonic, Old 34 Turkish 29, 215

Walachian 13 Welsh 23, 29

0. Oriental languages 254 Ostiak 16

u.

Uralo-Altaic languages 21, 227

z.

P. Permian 20, 28 Persian 9, 246-247 Polish 12-13 Polynesian languages 163, 225, 236, 264, 266, 277 Portuguese 231 Q. Quechua 250 R. Romance languages 86, 89, 92, 126, 227 s.

Samoyed 3, 8, 18, 22 Sanskrit 90, 93-95, 98, 126, 128, 172, 173n, 223, 245-246, 249, 253, 255-256, 285, 290 (see also: lndic) Saxon 247 Scottish 215 Scythian 15, 23-24, 89-90, 120, 130n Semitic languages 14, 89, 247, 250, 266, 277, 283, 286 Southern - 15 Serbo-Croatian 222 Siamese 21, 264 Siberian 124-125 Slavic 13-15, 18, 20, 23, 86, 215, 228, 246-247 Slavonic: see Slavic Spanish 227, 230 Swedish 5 , 12-13, 215 Syrian 215 T. Tahiti, language of 225 Tartar: see Tatar

v.

Vogul 16 Votyak 20

Zyryan 20

329

In the STUDIES IN THE HISTORY OF THE LANGUAGE SCIENCES (SiHoLS) series (Series Editor: E.F. Konrad Koerner) the following volumes have been published thus far, and will be published during 1990: 1. KOERNER, E.F. Konrad: The Importance of Techmer's "lnternationale Zeitschrift fUr Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft" in the Development of General Linguistics. Amsterdam, 1973. 2. TAYLOR, Daniel J.: Declinatio: A Study of the Linguistic Theory of Marcus Teren­ tius Varro. Amsterdam, 1974. 2nd pr. 1989. 3. BENWARE, Wilbur A.: The Study of Indo-European Vocalism; from the beginnings to Whitney and Scherer: A critical-historical account. Amsterdam, 1974. t.o.p. 2nd pr. 1990. 4. BACHER, Wilhelm: Die Anfiinge der hebriiischen Grammatik (1895), together with Die hebriiische Sprachwissenschaft vom 10. his zum 16. Jahrhundert (1892). Amster­ dam, 1974. 5. HUNT, R.W. (1908-1979): The History of Grammar in the Middle Ages. Collected Papers. Edited with an introduction, a select bibliography, and indices by G.L. Bur­ sill-Hall. Amsterdam, 1980. 6. MILLER, Roy Andrew: Studies in the Grammatical Tradition in Tibet. Amsterdam, 1976. 7. PEDERSEN, Holger (1867-1953): A Glance at the History of Linguistics, with par­ ticular regard to the historical study ofphonology. Amsterdam, 1983. 8. STENGEL, Edmund (1845-1935), (ed.): Chronologisches Verzeichnis franz6sischer Grammatiken vom Ende des 14. bis zum Ausgange des 18. Jahrhunderts, nebst Angabe der bisher ermittelten Fundorte derselben. Amsterdam, 1976. 9. NIEDEREHE, Hans-Josef & Harald HAARMANN (with the assistance of Liliane Rouday), (eds): In Memoriam Friedrich Diez: Akten des Kolloquiums zur Wis­ senschaftsgeschichte der Romanistik/Actes du Colloque sur l'Histoire des Etudes Romanes!Proceedings of the Colloquium for the History of Romance Studies, Trier, 2. -4. Okt. 1975). Amsterdam, 1976. 10. KILBURY, James: The Development of Morphophonemic Theory. Amsterdam, 1976. 11. KOERNER, E.F. Konrad: Western Histories of Linguistic Thought. An annotated chronological bibliography, 1822-1976. Amsterdam, 1978. 12. PAULINUS a S. BARTHOLOMAEO (1749-1806): Dissertation on the Sanskrit Lan­ guage. Transl., edited and introduced by Ludo Rocher. Amsterdam, 1977. 13. DRAKE, Glendon F.: The Role of Presc.riptivism in American Linguistics 1820-1970. Amsterdam, 1977. 14. SIGERUS DE CORTRACO: Summa modorum significandi; Sophismata. New edi­ tion, on the basis of G. Wallerand's editio prima, with additions, critical notes, an index of terms, and an introd. by Jan Pinborg. Amsterdam, 1977. 15. PSEUDO-ALBERTUS MAGNUS: Quaestiones Alberti de Modis significandi. A critical edition, translation and commentary of the British Museum Inc. C.2LC.52 and the Cambridge Inc.5.J.3.7, by L.G. Kelly. Amsterdam, 1977. 16. PANCONCELLI-CALZ!A, Giulio (1878-1966): Geschichtszahlen der Phonetik (1941), together with Quellenatlas der Phonetik (1940). New ed., with an introd. arti­ cle and a bio-bibliographical account of Panconcelli-Calzia by Jens-Peter KOster. Amsterdam, n.y.p. 17. SALMON, Vivian: The Study of Language in 17th-Century England. Amsterdam, 1979. Second edition 1988.

18. HAYASHI, Tetsuro: The Theory of English Lexicography 1530-1791. Amsterdam ' 1978. 19. KOERNER, E.F. Konrad: Toward a Historiography of Linguistics. Selected Essays. Foreword by R.H. Robins. Amsterdam, 1978. 20. KOERNE� , E.F. Konrad (ed.): Progress in Linguistic Historiography: Papers from the Internatwnal Conference on the History of the Language Sciences, Ottawa, 28-31 August 1978. Amsterdam, 1980. 21. DAVIS, Boyd H. & Raymond K. O'CAIN (eds): First Person Singular. Papers from the Conference on an Oral Archive for the History ofAmerican Linguistics. (Charlotte, N. C. , 9-10 March 1979). Amsterdam, 1980. 22. McDERMOTT, A. Charlene Senape: Godfrey of Fontaine's Abridgement of Boethius the Dane's 'Modi Significandi sive Quaestiones super Priscianum Maiorem. A text edi� tion with English trans!. and introd. Amsterdam, 1980. 23. APOLLONIUS DYSCOLUS: The Syntax of Apol/onius Dyscolus. Translated, and with commentary by Fred W. Householder. Amsterdam , 1981. 24. CARTER, M .. (ed.): Arab Linguistics, an introductory classical text with translation and notes. Amsterdam, 1981. 25. HYMES, Dell H.: Essays in the History of Linguistic Anthropology. Amsterdam ' 1983. 26. KOERNER, Konrad, Hans-J. NIEDEREHE & R.H. ROBINS (eds): Studies in Medzeval Lmguzstlc Thought, dedicated to Geoffrey L. Bursill-Hall on the occasion of his 60th birthday on 15 May 1980. Amsterdam, 1980. 27. BRE:VA-CLARAMONTE, Manuel: Sanctius' Theory of Language: A contribution to the hzstory of Renaissance linguistics. Amsterdam, 1983. 28. VERSTEEGH, Kees, Konrad KOERNER & Hans-J. NIEDEREHE (eds): The History of Linguistics in the Near East. Amsterdam, 1983. 29. ARENS, Hans: Aristotle's Theory of Language and its Tradition. Amsterdam, 1984. 30. GORDON, W. Terrence: A History of Semantics. Amsterdam, 1982. 31. CHRISTY, Craig: Uniformitarianism in Linguistics. Amsterdam 1983. 32. MANCHESTER, M.L.: The Philosophical Foundations of Humboldt's Linguistic Doctrines. Amsterdam 1985. 33. RAMAT, Paola, Hans-Josef NIEDEREHE & E.F. Konrad KOERNER (eds): The History of Linguistics in Italy. Amsterdam , 1986. 34. QUILlS, Antonio & Hans J. NIEDEREHE (eds): The History of Linguistics in Spain. Amsterdam, 1986. 35. SALMON, Vivian & Edwina BURNESS (comps): A Reader in the Language of Shakespearean Drama. Amsterdam, 1987. 36. SAPIR, Edward: Appraisals of his Life and Work. Edited by Konrad Koerner. Amsterdam, 1984. 37. 6 MATHUNA , Sean P.: William Bathe, S.J., 1564-1614: a pioneer in linguistics. Amsterdam, 1986. 38. AARSLEFF, Hans, Louis G. KELLY & Hans-Josef NIEDEREHE (eds): Papers in the Hlstory of Lmgutstzcs. Proceedmgs of ICHoLS Ill, Princeton I984. Amsterdam ' 1987. 39. PETRUS HISPANUS: Summulae Logicales. Translated and with an introduction by Francis P. Dinneen, S.J. Amsterdam, 1990. 40. HARTMANN, R.R.K. (ed.): The History of Lexicography. Papers from the Dictio­ nary Research Centre Seminar at Exeter, March 1986. Amsterdam, 1986.

41. COWAN, William, Michael K. FOSTER & Konrad KOERNER (eds): New Perspec­ tivess in Language, Culture, and Personality. Proceedings of the Edward Sapir Cente� nary Conference (Ottawa, 1-3 October 1984). Amsterdam, 1986. 42. BUZZETIJ, Dino & Maurizio FERRJANI (eds): Speculative Grammar, Universal Grammar, and Philosophical Analysis of Language. Amsterdam, 1987. 43. BURSILL-HALL, G. L., Sten EBBESEN & E.F. Konrad KOERNER (eds): De Ortu Grammaticae. Studies in Medieval Grammar and Linguistic Theory in Memory of Jan Pinborg. Amsterdam/Philadelphia, 1990. n.y.p. 44. AMSLER, Mark: Etymology and Discourse in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages. Amsterdam/Philadelphia, 1989. 45. OWENS, Jonathan: The Foundations of Grammar. Amsterdam, 1987. 46. TAYLOR, Daniel (ed.): The History of Linguistics in the Classical Period. Amster­ dam, 1987. 47. HALL, Robert A. jr. (ed.): Leonard Bloomfield, Essays on his Life and Work. Amsterdam, 1987. 48. FORMIGARI, Lia: Language and Experience in 17th-century British Philosophy. Amsterdam/Philadelphia, 1989. 49. DE MAURO, Tullio & Lia FORMIGARI (eds): Leibniz, Humboldt, and the Origins of Comparativism. Proceedings of the international conference, Rome, 25-28 Sep­ tember 1986. Amsterdam/Philadelphia, 1990. 50. KOERNER, Konrad: Practicing Linguistic Historiography. Selected Essays. Amster­ dam/Philadelphia, 1989. 51. KOERNER, Konrad & Hans-Josef NJEDEREHE (eds): History and Historiography of Linguistics. Amsterdam/Philadelphia, 1990. n.y.p. 52. JUUL, Arne & Hans F. NIELSEN (eds): Otto Jespersen.' Facets of his Life and Work. Amsterdam/Philadelphia, 1989. 53. OWENS, Jonathan: Early Arabic Grammatical Theory. Heterogeneity and Standardi� zation. Amsterdam/Philadelphia, 1990. n.y.p. 54. ANTONSEN, Elmer H. (ed.) with James W. Marchand and Ladislav Zgusta: The Grimm Brothers and the Germanic Past. Amsterdarn!Philadelphia, 1990. n.y.p.