A Grammar of the Homeric Dialect #271845

I will not attempt to enumerate the points on which new matter has been added, or former views recalled or modified. The increase in the size of the book is largely due to the fuller treatment of the morphology. Additions bearing on questions of syntax will be found in 238, 248, 267, 362, 365. On the whole I have become more sceptical about the theories which seek to explain the forms of the Subordinate Clause from parataxis, or the mere juxta-position of independent clauses. In general it may be admitted that the complex arose in the first instance by the amalgamation of simpler elements: but we must beware of leaving out of Sight the effect of 'contamination' in extending syntactical types once created. The neglect of this consideration is in reality another and more insidious form of the error from which recent writers on morphology have delivered us, viz. That of explaining grammatical forms as the result of direct amalgamation of a stem with a suffix or ending, without duly allowing for the working of analogy.