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have dixti for dic-si-s-ti, extinxem for exting-sis-sem, vixet for vic-sis-set, &c., why should not dire = dic-se for dic-sis-se be an analogous abbreviation? Not to speak of the tendency to shorten the forms of words, which generally characterizes the Latin language, the omission of the syllable es or is is invariable in the passive infinitive of all consonant-verbs; for as amari or amarier is formed from amare = amase, we ought to have diceri or diceri-er = dic-es-ier from dicere = dicese, but, in point of fact, we always find dicier or dici, which is related to dic-es-ier very much as dic-se is to dic-sis-se.

CHAPTER XII.

THE LATIN CONJUGATIONS.

§ 1. The conjugations are regulated by the same principle as the declensions, § 2. The first or -a conjugation. § 3. The second or -e conjugation. § 4. The third or i conjugation. § 5. The fourth or consonant conjugation. A. Mute verbs. § 6. B. Liquid verbs. § 7. C. Semi-consonantal verbs. § 8. Irregular verbs. A. Additions to the present tense. § 9. B. Abbreviated forms. § 10. Defective verbs.

§ 1. The Conjugations are regulated by the same principle as the Declensions.

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HERE is not much difficulty in seeing that the Latin conjugations ought to be arranged on the same principle as the declensions—namely, according to the characteristic letters of the different verbs. This mode of classification will give us three conjugations of verbs in a, e, i, which are regularly contracted; and one conjugation of consonant verbs, which retain their inflexions uncontracted, whether the characteristic is mute, liquid, or semi-consonant. In the first three conjugations, which contain none but derivative verbs, the crude form of a noun is made the vehicle of verbal inflexions by means of the formative affix ya, which belongs to the second pronominal element. We shall see that, while the a and i conjugations append this formative syllable to crude forms terminating in these vowels respectively, the e conjugation represents the pronominal affix by this vowel alone, because it generally consists of verbs formed from consonantal nouns. In the semi-consonantal forms, there is no difficulty in seeing that the u verbs belong to the fourth and not to the vowel conjugations; but in order to know when a verb in i is to be considered as belonging to the vowel conjugation, and when, on the other hand, it is to be counted as a semi-consonantal verb, we must observe the evidences of contraction which are furnished in the former case by the second person singular of the present indicative, and by the present infinitive. Thus, while audi-o gives us audis audi-is, audi-re audi-ere, and audi-ri = audi-eri, cap-i-o gives us cap-is, cap-ère, and capi. Besides this, as we have already seen (above, Ch. XI. § 8), the vowelverb is generally confined to an agglutinate perfect in -vi. There are indeed irregularities, which must be learned by expe

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rience, and which generally flow from the copartnership in different tenses of two distinct verbs, as when peto, pětere have a perfect and participle petīvi and petitus, from a lost verb in -io, or when cupio, cupivi, cupītus, have an infinitive cupère, as though the i were a semi-consonantal adjunct. But the general distinctions of conjugations are those which discriminate the declensions of nouns.

§ 2. The first or -a Conjugation.

In laying down the general rules for the conjugation of a Latin verb, the grammarian has to consider, in the first instance, whether the perfect indicative (A. III.), or the passive participle (E. III.), present any deviation from the form of the verb; and he must then inquire what is the cause of this irregularity. Now, as we have seen in the previous chapter, the Latin verb has three forms of A. III.: (a) the proper or reduplicated perfect; (B) the aorist perfect in -si; (y) the composite, or agglutinate, perfect in -vi or -ui, from fui. According to the general rule already given, the vowel-verb is properly limited to the third form of the perfect active. In point of fact, there are only two exceptions to this rule in the case of the -a verb, and these two exceptions give us the regular or reduplicated perfect. But the two verbs, in which this form is found, are both of them irregular. For do, which makes A. III. dedi, D. I. dăre, and E. III. dătus, does not fully and properly belong to the vowelverbs, but partly also to the same class as its compounds con-do, con-dis, con-didi, con-dère, con-ditus. It is true that we have dás for the second person singular of A. I., and that the common form of C. I. is dem, des, det, &c.; but duim is the old form of the latter; and the quantity of a in dăbam, dărem, shows that we have not to do with a verb of which the characteristic is a, but with one which preserves this form of its root or articulation vowel. The old du-im, compared with the Umbrian, Oscan, and Tuscan tu- (above, pp. 125, 129, 184), the German thun, &c., would lead us to the conclusion that u was the most ancient articulation-vowel of this root. In its primitive meaning, do reverts to the same sense as our "do," and the German thun. Like the Old Norse and Etruscan lata, and like sino in Latin, and sri in Etruscan, do is used not only with prepositions, but with other verbal roots, signifying "doing," or "causing," as

opposed to eo, which denotes the passive result of the action: thus we have per-do, or pessum-do, opposed to per-eo, inter-do to inter-eo, ven-do to ven-eo, &c. As we have a 0 in the corresponding Greek forms Tép-Ow, &c., we may be led to conclude that the Latin do furnishes the link of connexion between didwu, Sanscrit dadâmi and Tienu, Sanscrit dadhâmi; which are therefore only different forms of the same root. The idea

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of "giving" is partly represented by that of "putting," or placing," for acceptance. In regard to the offering of prizes, or the placing of meat on the table, the ideas of placing and giving run into one another, and it is well known that pono and Tienu are regularly used in this sense (see my note on Pindar, O. XI. 63, and the commentators on Horace, I. Serm. 2, 106; II. 3, 23). But we may also represent the act of giving with reference to the donor as a liberal pouring forth of that which he has, and this is the primary sense of gef-an, gib-an, "give," xéF-w, &c., as Grimm has shown in a recent paper on the subject (Abh. Ak. Berl. 1848: "über schenken und geben "). The other verb, which appears to belong to the -a conjugation, but has a reduplicated perfect, is sto, which makes A. III. stěti. This verb does not give the same indications as do of a mere articulation-vowel; for even the compounds retain the long a, which appears in stābat, &c. But we have a by-form, si-sto, to which steti may be referred, just as our transitive "stay," intransitive "stand," are represented by the German present stehe, perf. stand, both of which are intransitive. And I am inclined to explain the long a in sto, as resulting from a contraction of staho= steyo, Germ. stehen, which is still found in the Umbrian stahito stato (above, p. 82). So that sto cannot be considered as a verb, of which the characteristic or formative adjunct is -a, but, like do, owes its contraction to the contact of the root-syllable with the termination. With these two exceptions, all a verbs form their perfect in -ui or -vi. Although the Greek vowel-verbs particularly affect the aorist in -σa, and indeed have no other, we find that no vowel-verb in Latin has the aorist perfect in -si, unless it has dropt in this tense its characteristic vowel in other words, we have no Latin perfect in -a-si, -e-si, or -i-si. We shall see that there are verbs in -eo and -io, which drop their characteristic, and have perfects in -si immediately attached to the root; but though the characteristic is sometimes dropt in -a

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verbs, as in domo, A. III. dom-ui, E. III. dom-itus, and though, when the root ends in v, the u of the perfect is absorbed and represented only by a lengthening of the verb-syllable, as in juv-o, A. III. jūv-i, E. III. jū-tus, we never find an -a verb which exhibits the aorist-perfect in -si. Why this tense has vanished in the first Latin conjugation it is difficult to say, unless we must conclude that it was not euphonious or convenient in the eleven short words, which elide the characteristic -a, and in which alone it was possible. These are crěpo, cubo, domo, frico, mico, něco, plico, sěco, sono, tono, věto. If we compare these words with the Greek verbs in -aw, which have a short ă before the -σ of the future, we may be led to conclude that in these instances also the a was originally followed by some consonant which has been absorbed, and the short vowel in the penultima favours the supposition that we have here the remnants of longer forms. Thus cubui belongs to cumbo, which is strengthened by anusvára, as well as to cuba-o, which, like KúπTw, may have had some consonantal formative: crěpa-o, crěpui, may be compared with strepo, strepui, which has altogether lost the pronominal adjunct of its present tense: doma-o stands by the side of daμνη-μι as well as δαμάζω. Whether veto is to be derived from vetus (cf. for the form vetulus, and for the sense antiquo), or should be compared with vitium, it obviously involves some semi-consonantal strengthening of the present tense. Of the regular verbs of the first conjugation, the most troublesome in its etymology is ploro, which Döderlein once (Lat. Syn. u. Et. III. 155) considered as an intensive form of plico, and which he now (ibid, VI. p. 273) connects with pluo, fluo and fleo. I cannot accept either of these etymologies. As far as the signification is concerned there is no reason to suppose that ploro ever meant "to shed tears," and such a meaning would be quite inconsistent with the ordinary use of the compound exploro. Festus tells us (p. 230, Müller, quoted above, p. 200), that the original meaning of ploro was inclamo or invoco; and with regard to ploro he says (p. 79): "explorare antiquos pro exclamare usos, sed postea prospicere et certum cognoscere cœpit significare. Itaque speculator ab exploratore hoc distat, quod speculator hostilia silentio perspicit, explorator pacata clamore cognoscit;" and the Glossar. Labb. explains endoplorato by éπIKáλeσov, which is more accurate than the account given by Festus (s. v. p. 77). In a frag

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