Short Notices [pp. 580-590]

Short Notices.
The Pronunciation of Creek; Accent and Quantity. A Philological In quiry. By J. S. Blackie, Professor of Greek in the University of Edin burgh. Edinburgh, 1852, 8vo.
Studien ueber die 4Alt- und ANeugriec7ten und ueber die Lautgeschichte der
griechischen Buchstaben. Von Dr. Johann Telfy, K. K. Professor der
Klass. Philologie u. Lit. an der Pesth Un. Leipzig, 1853, 8vo.
Greek scholars are aware that the controversy concerning the
proper pronunciation of Greek, once rallying round the standards of Reuchlin and Erasmus, has been revived in our day.
Thus far, however, the firing has all been on one side. The
conservatives " of every land, however much they differ from
one another, have tacitly agreed, it seems, to let the storm pass,
to hide their heads, ostrich-like, in the sand, and, in the meantime, to remain in quiet possession and continued practice of
what their opponents call gross insults to the spirit of a noble
language, and arbitrary, ridiculous absurdities; whilst the
"reformers" have hitherto failed to make any decided impression for want of agreement among themselves, and on account
of a haste and rashness observable in most of them, which, as
is well known, are not the characteristics of a true reform.
The two treatises whose titles we have given, are some of the
grape shot fired into the obstinate enemy's castle. The one
comes from Hungary, the other from Scotland; both from Professors of the Greek language. The Hungarian is an enthusiast for Modern Greece, denies that the Slavonians left any
permanent traces in Greece, maintains that the Greeks of the
present day are the genuine, almost unmixed offspring of the
Pericles, the Demosthenes, the Thucydides; that their language
is a true counterpart of the classical Greek, and that everybody that does not pronounce Greek as modern Athens does,
commits sacrilege. Professor Blackie is more moderate. He
admits that the modern Greeks have widely departed from the
pronunciation of the language of their forefathers, as it may
be ascertained from other sources, that the Erasmians, on the
whole, come very near the ancient classical pronunciation; and
yet he demands that in deference to the present inhabitants of
Greece and Turkey, we should adopt the modern Greek pronunciation. T6lfy gives us the steps of his investigation, Blackie
nothing but results. The latter, however, claims an attentive
hearing, because, as he tells us, he has worked his way through
lIavercamp's great collection of older writers on this subject,
he has compared the arguments used in the old Cambridge
controversy with those advanced by "a well-informed modern
member of the same learned corporation;" he has consulted
the learned Germans; he has been in Greece, and continues to
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