PREFACE.

speaker, and this corresponds almost exactly to the sound of the German ch in such words as ach, nach, doch, etc. For those, therefore, who may have already acquired the elements of German pronunciation even this difficulty would be wholly removed. The names of Portugal or Portuguese America (Brazil) are scarcely more formidable than those of Italy. There is, indeed, only one sound (that of m or ão) unknown to our language, and this is by no means difficult to acquire. So that by learning two foreign sounds an Englishman or American will be enabled, if the pronunciation be properly marked, to pronounce, with tolerable correctness, all the myriads of names belonging to Italy, Portugal, Spain, Brazil, and Spanish America. With regard to French, the case is, we admit, very different; but, as an offset to the inherent difficulties of this language, we have the fact that it is more universally studied than any other; so that if one is really desirous of mastering its peculiar sounds he will at least be pretty sure to find near at hand every needful aid for doing so.

Persons who view the different European languages separately are apt to regard the mastering of the difficult sounds in all as a far more formidable task than it really is. They forget that a large proportion of the most difficult sounds are common to several different languages. For example, the French and Dutch u is equivalent to the German and Hungarian ü, and to the Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish y. Here it will be seen that the same sound (and that one of the most difficult for an Englishman to acquire) occurs in seven dif ferent languages. Again, the German ö or oe is found in Hungarian, Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish, and nearly corresponds to one of the most difficult of the French and Dutch sounds, that of cu in the Dutch words breuk, reuk, or in the French leur, peur, etc The German ch, as already remarked, corresponds almost exactly to the Spanish j or x, and is essentially the same as the modern Greek y, the Russian x, the Polish, Scottish, and Welsh ch, and the Dutch g.t

The acquisition of ten or twelve new sounds, which might be learned by persons of ordinary aptitude in a few hours, would enable any one who can read correctly the pronunciation of English words, as marked in Walker's, Webster's, or Worcester's Dictionary, to pronounce with tolerable correctness all the names of Portugal, Spain, Italy, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany, Denmark, Norway, and (we might perhaps add) of Sweden, Russia, and Hungary.

In another part of the work will be given a full and particular explanation of the system of orthoëpy which has been adopted, and of the method pursued in order to insure the greatest attainable accuracy. It may, however, be proper to say here, that the author, fully sensible that the value of this most important feature (the pronunciation of the names) must depend almost entirely on the thoroughness and accuracy with which it is carried out, has spared neither time, labour, nor expense in order to render it as perfect as possible. Particular attention has been given to what may be termed the five principal languages of Continental Europe-namely, the Italian, French, German, Spanish, and Russian. In regard to the French especially, this being by far the most important of all, both on account of its being so widely spoken, and on account of the inherent difficulty of the sounds to be represented, the utmost pains have been taken not only to ascertain the correct pronunciation, but to mark it so fully and clearly that any intelligent person who has once acquired the elementary sounds of the language, and made himself acquainted with our system of notation, may pronounce with facility and with tolerable accuracy whatever name he may have occasion to speak. As already observed, the Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese names are comparatively easy for the English or American learner. Those of Germany are not very formidable, for although the German vowel sounds are more difficult than the Italian, the similarity of accent that exists between the German and our own tongue is an important help to us in acquiring the correct German pronunciation. Of the five languages above named, the Russian is undoubtedly the most difficult; but in overcoming the essential diffi

There are one or two other sounds, such as the diphthongs ou and ei, (or ey,) which, though having no exact equivalent in English, yet differ so slightly from some of our sounds, and, we may add, are so easy to acquire that for practical purposes they may be said to form no exception to the above statement.

culties of the language, the author has had the assistance of some of the best Russian scholars in Europe; and he has reason to hope that the pronunciation of the Russian names contained in this work will be found not only generally correct in regard to the accent, (perhaps the most important point of all,) but sufficiently accurate in other respects for all practical purposes.

As the Russian Empire unites Asia with Europe, so the language of Russia may be said to form, in one sense, the connecting link between the Oriental and European tongues. The names belonging to the other languages of Europe are all written either with Roman letters, or in characters, like the German and modern Greek, which can readily be converted into corresponding Roman letters; and the mode of writing such names is, with very few excep tions, the same in all the various European languages; for example, MAZZINI, the name of the renowned Italian patriot, is not only the Italian, but the English, French, German, Dutch, Danish, Swedish, and Spanish name of the same person; in like manner, the name of the celebrated French philosopher, DESCARTES, will be found to be invariably written with the same letters in all the modern languages of Western and Southern Europe; so also the name of SCHILLER, the illustrious German poet, is spelled alike in Italian, French, Spanish, German, etc.; for though in the last-named language it is usually (but by no means univer. sally) written in German characters, (Schiller,) yet as these exactly correspond to the Roman letters usually employed in spelling the name, the difference is only apparent, not essential. Russian names, on the contrary-as they (like all Oriental names) are neither written in Roman letters nor in characters which can be converted into corresponding Roman letters— are spelled ACCORDING TO THE SOUND, the writers of the different nations seeking to indicate the pronunciation of the name in the manner which to them seems most proper. Thus the name of one of the most distinguished Russian poets is written in English DErzhavin, in French DERJAVINE, and in German DERSCHAWIN, each spelling being intended to represent the sound of the name according to the different languages; so likewise the name of another celebrated Russian poet is written in English PooSHKIN or PUSIIKIN, in French POUCHKINE or POUCHEKINE, and in German PUSCHKIN; each of these different modes being intended to represent exactly the same pronunciation. It is curious to observe that the Russians adopt precisely the same rule in writing foreign names; that is, they spell them (with a few exceptions) according to the sound, without attempting to follow the letters of the original spelling; thus, they would write Bordo for Bordeaux, Dzhonson* for Johnson, Davoo for DAVOUST, Roosso for ROUSSEAU, Chimarozat for CIMAROSA, Chartoriskeet for CZARTORYSKI, etc.; in the same manner as a Frenchman might write Ouachintonn for WASHINGTON, (as Volney§ actually does,) Chéquespir for SHAKESPEARE, and so on. (See "Reiff's Russian Grammar," pp. 167, 168.)

There is perhaps no branch of pronunciation attended with so many difficulties as that of Oriental names. One great source of perplexity arises from there being in our language no uniform and established system for writing such names. French and German writers, for the most part, adhere pretty strictly to the rule referred to above-that is, they try to represent as nearly as possible the sound of the name in their own language. The French write the name of the celebrated Mongol conqueror of the thirteenth century, DJENGUIS, or DJENGUYZ. The Germans write it DSCHENGIS; and both give the sound of the name, as nearly as it can be done, in their own tongue. The French have no other way of representing the sound of our j (a very common sound in the Oriental languages) than by Dj or Dg. The Germans represent the same sound in the best way they can, but very imperfectly, by Dsch. In the second syllable of the above name the French use u after g, to make this consonant hard before e, i, or y. If the u were omitted, the g (being before c) must necessarily, according to • They have no single letter to represent our j, but one which is exactly equivalent to our zh.

↑ They represent the sound of our ch by a single character, Y.

↑ As we are unable to give the Russian letters, we give the nearest equivalent.

§ See Volney's "Tableau du Climat et du Soldes États-Unis d'Amérique,” (2 vols., Paris, 1803,) where the reades will also find WAYNE spelled Ouayne; WILLIAMS written Ouilliams; RUSH, (Dr.,) Roche; GREEN BRIER, Grine braïar: WORCESTER, Ouorcester, etc.

PREFACE.

rules of the French tongue, have the sound of thei: j or our zk. But in German, as g is always hard, they need use only the simplest form, (gis.) The sound of the name, however. is represented much more simply and more perfectly in English by JENGIS or JENGIZ. Again: the name of a celebrated Sultan of Syria and Egypt is written in French, NOUR-ED-DIN MAHMOUD, in German, NUR-ED-DIN-MAHMUD, and would be written in English, NOORED-DEEN-MAHMOOD. It should be observed that the French make no attempt to conform to the German spelling, nor the Germans to the French; but both nations adhere very generally to the principles of their respective languages. Unfortunately, a large majority of English writers, instead of conforming to a rule which has the double merit of being (in most instances) simple and easy for the writer and perfectly intelligible to the reader, by sometimes writing in the French and sometimes in the German or Italian mode, and not very unfiequently combining the two in the same name, have involved the department of Oriental names in a confusion which is most perplexing to all, and is absolutely inextricable to those who have not made it the subject of long and laborious study.

Even if the mode of writing Oriental names according to the French and German letters were equally intelligible to ordinary readers as the English mode, there would still be one paramount argument in favour of the last-viz.: the letters of our language are capable of conveniently expressing or representing a greater variety of sounds than those of any other European tongue. There is no sound much used either in Oriental or Russian names which we cannot express as well as the French; while there are several which we can express much better than they; and there are sounds perfectly familiar to our tongue which they cannot express at all. Take, for example, the sound of our j, (which, as already intimated, is of very frequent occurrence in Asiatic names :) what we express by a single letter is indicated less perfectly in their language by two-dj. So also the sound of our ch, one of continual occurrence both in the names of Asia and of Eastern Europe, is indicated in French by three letters instead of our two, as Tchandra for CHANDRA, etc. It may be remarked that this sound, as well as that of j, is one of the most common and familiar to the English tongue, while both are foreign to the French language, since neither of them is to be found in any genuine French word. Again: our w expresses a sound (common in the Oriental languages) which is not nearly so neatly nor so well expressed by the French ou. This defect in their language is so obvious that some eminent French writers (Pauthier, for example, in his works on China) often make use of w when they wish to represent the sound of our w at the begin ning of a name; e.g., WEN WANG-not OUEN OUANG, as the strictly French mode of writing would require. Lastly, there are sounds expressed in our language with perfect ease which they cannot represent at all; among them are the sounds of the Greck (th) and 8, (th;) the first of these is of frequent occurrence, not only in modern Greek, but in Spanish

names.

With respect to the German language, there is, if we mistake not, but one frequentlyoccurring sound in Oriental names (that of kh, indicated in German by ch) which can be better represented in German than in English, while there are many which can not only be more conveniently expressed in English, but much more correctly than in German. Thus, the Germans employ four letters (dsch) to indicate the sound of our j, and after all represent it most imperfectly, as in the example of DSCHENGIS, (JENGIS,) noticed above. Their four letters, tsch, do not represent correctly the sound of our ch, nor does their sch convey even a tolerable idea of our zh, (the sound of s in pleasure or occasion.) Like the French, they have no letter or combination of letters equivalent to our w, nor can they in any manner represent the sound of the modern Greek or d.

One mode of writing Oriental names, which has been recommended by several eminent scholars, is to employ English consonants in conjunction with German or 'Italian vowels, marked with certain accents in order to show their quantity or quality. Thus, a without the accent represents the Italian a either short or obscure, á or d denotes the long Italian a, as in

One great cause of this confusion undoubtedly arises from the fact that many English writers, in attempting to translate works from the German and French, fail to translate the names. But such an omission could scarcely occur if there was any generally-recognized system of writing such names.

father, often approaching the sound of a in fall; e as in met or her, c or ê as in fête or there, i as in pin; t or i as in marine; o nearly as in opinion; ó or ó as in hope; u as in push or pull; ú or a like oo in moon. This method has the merit of combining brevity with precision, and is well adapted to publications designed chiefly for the use of scholars; but there are serious, if not insuperable, objections to its general employment in English works intended for popular perusal. While such works are printed under the immediate superintendence of some competent linguist, they may, perhaps, answer every needful purpose; but as soon as they get into general and popular use, and require to be reprinted, the accents. as all experience proves, will be dropped either through carelessness on the part of the printer, or, what is more likely to occur, from a want of the proper kind of type. And let it be remembered that the omission of the proper accent in such a case is equivalent to the omission of a letter, with this great disadvantage, that the former error would be much less likely to attract attention, and would therefore be less readily corrected.

Those accustomed to the study of languages can scarcely conceive the difficulty which the unlearned experience in attempting to pronounce for the first time the letters of a foreign tongue. Readers of this class would be almost sure to miscall such names as NUREDDIN or NOUREDDIN, ABDUL MEJID or ABDOUL MEDJID, and a multitude of others, while they could pronounce them without the slightest difficulty if written according to the English sounds of the letters-NOOR-ed-Deen, AbdOOL MEJEED, etc. We admit that there are many names which, in order to give a correct idea of their pronunciation, would require some additional explanation besides merely writing them with English letters. But in a realm where the intricacies are so perplexing and the obstacles so formidable as often to bewilder and discourage the most intelligent, it is certainly no unworthy or useless task to attempt to do all that can be done to smooth and straighten the paths and to remove every unnecessary obstruction.

The rule adopted in the present work has been to give various spellings of every celebrated Oriental name, whenever these spellings appeared to be sanctioned by any good authority; the biographical notice being given under the English spelling, which is placed first in order.* Thus, in the name above cited, the English NOOR-ED-DEEN Mahmood is given, first, to which are added the French NOUREDDIN (or NOUR-ED-DYN) MAHMOUD, and the German NUREDDIN MAHMUD. So, also, the notice of the great Mongol conqueror, referred to above, is given under the English spelling JENGIS, this being followed not only by the French and German forms, (DJENGUIZ and DSCHENGIS,) but by many others, it being the rare fortune of this famous name to be written by respectable authorities in no fewer than TWENTY different modes. In the proper alphabetical place of each of these different spellings will be found a reference to that form of the name under which the biographical notice is given. The only exceptions to the rule above indicated are those very few names which appear to have acquired by universal (or almost universal) usage an established form common to the different European languages; as AVICENNA, (changed from Ibn-Seend,) AVENZOAR, (Ibn-Zohr,) AVERROES, (Ibn-Roshd,) ELMACIN, (El Makeen or El-Makin,) SALADIN, (Sala-ed-Deen or Sala-eddin,) SOLYMAN, (of Turkey, Soolcymán,) etc.

The confusion which prevails in regard to the spelling of Oriental names is not, however. the only cause of the difficulties with which this subject is surrounded. The character of the Oriental languages, so different in many respects from those with which we are most familiar, renders it often exceedingly difficult to indicate the pronunciation in a manner satisfactory to the English reader. In order that he might, as far as possible, enjoy every needful facility and aid in encountering the difficulties in question, the author deemed it necessary that he

The only exception to this rule of any importance will be found in Mythological and other names from the Sanscrit, which, like the Greek and Latin, may be regarded as a dead language; the names occurring in it, written according to the system established by Sir William Jones, (see page vii., near the bottom,) are pronounced according to the spelling rather than the (modern) sound of the letters. At the same time, the modern Ilindoo pronunciation, when this appears to differ essentially from the pronunciation first given, has usually been added For illustration, see the articles on AGNI, BRAHMA, GARUDA, etc.

PREFACE.

should have some knowledge of those tongues besides what books alone could furnish. He accordingly spent nearly two years in the East in studying the rudiments of several Asiatic languages, (with particular reference to their pronunciation,) including the Arabic, Persian, Sanscrit, and Hindostanee. The time and labour thus bestowed, he feels persuaded, have not been spent in vain. He has, in consequence of this preparation, not only been enabled to proceed with a surer step in representing the pronunciation of Asiatic and African names, but he has also in many instances, by referring to the name as written in Arabic or Sanscrit, been enabled to correct errors of greater or less importance in the prevalent European spellings of Oriental names.

Respecting the bibliographical references, it may be proper to remark that they are intended not so much to indicate the materials from which the preceding notice has been prepared, as to point out to the reader the sources whence he can obtain fuller information. The works referred to will be found generally, but not always, to contain all the materials used in the composition of the article to which the references are appended. Occasionally an isolated fact or circumstance of minor importance, but yet of sufficient interest to make it worth stating, may have been obtained from some source deemed good authority, to which, nevertheless, our plan, requiring the utmost condensation, would not admit of a special reference. Many of our facts, moreover, have been taken from the "Biographie Universelle," the "Nouvelle Biographie Générale," BROCKHAUS's "Conversations-Lexikon," or other similar works, when the article from which it is taken was too brief to make it worth while to refer to it particularly. As a general rule, it has not been deemed expedient to make a special reference to works like the above, unless the notice referred to extended to a page or more. This rule would, of course, preclude a reference in nearly all cases in which the subject of our notice is of minor importance. It would, however, be an error to infer that the omission of all references is intended as any indication of mediocrity in the subjects of our articles, more especially in regard to living characters, since, as has been already inti mated, the materials for the biographies of living persons, however distinguished, are often extremely meagre and defective. Nor would it be just to conclude that in all cases the length of the different notices is designed to be a measure of the relative importance of the individuals noticed, since he who has written many passable works may perhaps require a longer notice than he who has produced a single work of superior merit. Other things being equal, the man of action will almost of necessity occupy much more space than the man of thought, although the latter may have perhaps far juster claims upon the esteem and gratitude of mankind, and his glory may be as much more permanent as it is less daz zling, and less fitted to win the admiration of the unthinking and fickle multitude.

It may be observed also that considerably less space, relatively speaking, has generally been allotted to living persons than to those who are deceased; not merely because it is often much more difficult to obtain the necessary information in regard to the living, but more especially because it behooves us to speak with great circumspection, whether in the way of praise or censure, of those whose earthly career is still unfinished, and whose future conduct may possibly redeem the errors or throw discredit on the virtues of their past life." The subjects of the Hindoo and Norse Mythologies have been treated somewhat more fully in proportion to their relative importance than those of Classic Mythology, for the simple. reason that while one can find almost everywhere excellent works relating to the last, there exists scarcely any book of convenient reference to which the ordinary reader can have re course in order to satisfy his curiosity respecting the two former.

With respect to the relative length of the various articles there will of course be considerable diversity of opinion among different readers, according to their respective pursuits. and habits of thought. We are not, however, without hopes that the majority of candid

• Voltaire has well remarked: "On doit des égards aux vivants; on ne doit aux morts que la vérité”—(“ We owe consideration to the living; to the dead we owe only truth.") This consideration for the living was, indeed, formerly deemed so important that, until the last half century, all works of reference of this kind systematically excluded the biographies of living persons, however illustrious; thus rejecting the very class in which perhaps a large majority of readers feel the deepest interest.