RYSWICK, PEACE OF. [TREATIES, CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE OF.] the chief sibilant of the English alphabet, and is employed to represent two different sounds, as in this and these. The word sugar would seem to justify the addition of a third sound, but in this word the vowel u, so often pronounced ye, has modified the pro nunciation of the preceding consonant. Syugur would easily glide into 'ingot.. In the Hebrew alphabet, whence those of Europe are derived, a common symbol is employed, with and without an affixed dot, to denote s and sit. The symbol referred to has for its name a word which also signifies tooth or teeth ; and if we call to mind that the so called Phcrnician and Samaritan alphabets give older forms of the Hebrew letters than those now used, it will be easily believed that the symbol in its original shape [AtruenEr] was the representation of two or three teeth : an origin which would agree with the fact that the sibilants are all formed by means of the upper teeth, and the sound sh by the upper and lower brought together. This explanation is con firmed by the consideration that in emitting the last-named sound the teeth are not only the sole organs employed, but more than usually exposed to view by the retraction of the lips. But for the strong evidence thus furnished by the Hebrew alphabet, the form and power of the letter might have been readily derived from an imitation of a hissing snake.
The letter s is subject to the following interchanges, many of which have been previously noted.
1,a with d. See D.
2, a with th and eh, as in the Laconian dialect of the Greek language, in which Oeor, TWOOEOS, AOnsauct, take the forms atop. Towaeop, Aactrota. llence too reirroneella, &c., readily glided into awrrope8a, &c. The English language formerly wrote lorrth, Aeteth, but now prefers lores, hates.
3, s with I. Thus again the Attic forms 07101, Inaroy, ilocetdess, au, were by the Dorian& written fan, eirerOv (regularly enough from the present wer(e)-res). rloctak.v, re. In like manner the German words dos, was, es, waster, hassen , awn, appear in English as that, what, it, water, hate, eat.
4, s with Thus the Creek island Zaxereot was the mother city of Saguntum in Spain, and no doubt gave its name to it. In fact the manuscripts of Livy (xxi. 7), with one exception, scarcely worth men tioning. appear to have all got Oellen& a Sagunto insula llieuntur, not Zaeyntho. But the most abundant evidence of the interchange is to be found in the Somersetahire dialect of our own tongue.
5, s with sh. Witness the Berlin pronunciation of all German words beginning with st. Moreover, the English words deep, slay, smear, anew, have for their German equivalents seldaf, arhlag-en, schm kr-en, sehnee.
6, s with e, y, and h. See those letters.
7, ks with g. See X.
8, a with n. See N.
9, a with r. See R.
10. S often appears before an iuitial consonant, where it is doubtful whether the older form be that with or that without the sibilant. Thus the Greek evere, aspevdoen, owl;, correspond to the Latin tego, fund( I, rape. So asoAot and would be found upon close examination to be the equivalents of the Latin cries and erns, and atctAeues to differ from scru-ta-ri only in the fact that the latter is a frequentative verb. Again the Greek possesses within itself the double forms epscpor and isexpos, orpeow and emu. The English language contains numerous examples of the tame variation, as in melt and smelt, tumble and stumble, pike And spike. The German as well as our own tongue not unfre quently prefixes an a when the Greek and often the Latin are without that letter. Thus the Greek KAfl-0/ (root NAM or rata), the Latin elated.o or rlud-o, and daris, the German sehliess-en, and the English shut are all of one kin. Compare too the various forma of the words signifying snow.
11. The sound sus at the beginning of word,' is often degraded by the loss of the sibilant or so, or both. Thus to the Latin auaria and suadee correspond the Greek &des, &c., the German 1114S, and the English street. Those who doubt the connection here assumed between snarl, and auadeo, may, as regards form, compare claris and dead°, or riginti with what must have been its older form, duiginti, while the connection in meaning will be readily established by the common comparison of adrice with medicine,. unpalatable but salutary, as in Lucretius (I. 935), Sal reluti absinthia, &c. Again, sop-or and satsuma (sep-nra) of the Latin correspond to the Greek GK-sos, to the Gothic verb in.eneepp-an, the German seldaf, and the English deep ; sorer and scenes in Latin, to the Greek inwpas and itcupa, and the German seltwieger as prefixed to John, rater, (tc.; the Latin sud-or, to the Greek s3ot, lapses, &c., to the German whweiss and English awed t ; the Latin sun, tried, se, to the Greek o6, oh, i, although the Greek has also allied words beginning with co. The Latin sorer, German schwester, English sister, have loot their correlative in Greek. Lastly this inter --..