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derunt , quia , dtiaims longis sequentibus primam bfevem acui noster sermo non patitur . " Lib . u cap . v . In Latin it was not allowed to pat the acute accent on the first syllables of such words as Olympus and tyraanus because their penultima is long : but ' it is implied that the Greek usage
did this ; that is , that they were accented as we now mark them , ' OAv / x ,-not , Tvpxvvo ; . I may observe , in passing that there is no instance in which oiTr written Greek accents are thought more objectionable than in such as these . In another passage , having
observed that his countrymen sometimes erred in substituting a circumflex accent for a grave , especially in Greek words , he instances the word ArpEvqf which the best Latin masters he says directed to be made acute on the first , and therefore grave on the second . Plutarch , in his Lives of the
Ten Orators , says that Demosthenes was censured for some peculiarities in his speech ; among other things , as 7 rpo < 7 r < xpoft ; va > y , the word AotcX ^ tt / ov , i . e . pronouncing it A < TKKy \ mov 9 as we do now . Servius , an ancient Roman writer , remarks on that line of the
iEneid , " Ubi tot Simois , " &c . " Hoc nomen , Siinois , jntegrum ad nos transiit , unde suo accentu profertux : narn si esset latinum in antepenultima haberet accentum quia secunda a fine brevis est " When therefore I find
the word in our Greek books accented 2 ^ o « f , my good opinion of our present system is confirmed . In ApoL , lonius Dyscolos , an old grammarian of the age of the Antonines , we find many notices of the accents : observing the custom of the iEolic dialect , he says , AlqXeT <; k ^ ti fictokcoq . Thi
confirms our common Greek , which makes it oxyton . Stephanos , another old writer , remarks , " AccvXlq' o ^ vysrczi to AocvXlq , to he AZXu ; AtoXiKaq papvve'v& . iJ Ammoniu s , a writer about two centuries after Christ , who was also the tutor of Origen , wrote a work entitled " Ue ^ I ouoiojv k < su hia . d } Qooov Xi ^ acovJ
in this book we have abundant evidence that in his day Greek was accented just as we now see it . He otten notices the distinction which accent makes in , words otherwise alike . For instance , he says that aypQiK oc , 7 Tj ) < wr& p 4 tf - , ^ | J , ^ means one who lives in the country , but that *< y-
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pQLK 0 <; , irg < yjrapol ; vTovci > Si signifies clownish in manners . This work is printed at the end of Scapula ' s Lexicon , and may therefore readily be examined .
If it would not transgress the limits which it is proper for me to assign to ^ his paper , I could multiply such quotations . I produce these merely as examples of the sort of evidence on which the credit of the Greek accents
rests . These ancient testimonies serve only to confirm what would without them be quite sufficient evidence , the authority of all our manuscript , and printed copies , and the actual usage of the living Greeks .
I consider it , therefore , as proved by the concurrence of all the evidence which antiquity furnishes on the point , that the ancient Greeks laid the accent where we now find it written , as well as that the accentual marks , though not so old as the usage which they
represent , lay claim to quite sufficient antiquity to preclude all just objection on that score . The only argument which has been really influential in causing the rejection of the accents , has been the apprehension that they are inconsistent with the just observance of quantity and the rhythm of
verse . I have already shewn , that the majority of those who prefer this charge are such as do not pay any real regard to quantity in any case , and that they mean something different by it from that which it properly expresses . It shall now be my business to shew that there is no real
ground for it in its true sense ; that there is no natural inconsistency in the Greek accents , and the proper observance of quantity . The point of difference between the Greek and Latin accentuation , which is the principal ground of objection against the former ,
is this : whereas the Latin rule is , that in polysyllables , if the penultima be long , the accent shall rest upon it ; the Greek rule , not turning on the quantity of the penultima , but on that of the last syllable , enacts , that if the
last be long , the accent shall rest on the penultima , but if the last be short , then it shall rest oh the antepenultima . Hence , in such a word as *>§* r < K , the Greek accent falls on the first syllable , while the usage of Latin would place it on the second . It is no wonder that we , who are eariy instructed in the
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Argument in favour of the Greek Accents . 44 /
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Aug. 2, 1823, page 447, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1787/page/15/
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