[Commonly recommended methods for learning a foreign language are inadequate because most people are not equipped to solve the problems that inevitably arise. The best results are obtained through imitation of a native speaker under the guidance of a trained linguist. Principles first used in recording American Indian languages have been applied to the teaching of oriental languages with unexpectedly good results.]

In Language 18.259–70 (1942) we began a discussion of the question whether Hittite of the time when our texts were written distinguished phonemically between syllabic and consonantal u and i. On account of lack of direct evidence concerning these sounds in anteconsonantal and final position we confined our attention to the antevocalic position, and considerations of space compelled us to postpone the presentation of evidence concerning Our present purpose is to discuss the evidence concerning the latter phoneme.

[Nom. Uvārazmīy (not -miya) as older form of Uvārazmiš; motivation of Arminiyaiy as loc. to Armina;būmiyā as loc. only; arašaniš and abiš instr. pl. Instr. sg. ending on dual stem in ušīyā, gaušāyā; ucašam ‘sight’ (not ucašma ‘eye‘); hazbanam (with Meillet) for KT's reading harbānam. Karšā instr. sg. (not nom. dual), karšayā loc. sg. (not nom. pl.), with remarks on syntax.]

[The paper assembles from the AIS the material in support of the thesis that southern Italy originally had a labial treatment of the group -gn- in the form of ṷn or mn, and that the forms in jn represent an attempt to reproduce the northern and central Italian forms in ñ. The labial development is connected with that of Rumania.]

In many branches of Ural-Altayic, investigations are far from being exhaustive. This is particularly true of the Tungus group, inasmuch as with the exception of one sub-division—Mandžu—little research has been done. So far even the classification of the Tungus languages and dialects remains a subject for controversy. In the standard work on Tungus ethnology, Social Organization of the Northern Tungus (Shanghai, 1929), by S. M. Širokogorov, the languages are divided, in accordance with the author's hypothesis concerning Tungus migrations, into a northern and a southern group. The southern group includes Mandžu, the historical language of the Ňu-Čžen (also: Jučen and Džürdžen), Goldi, and Olča (lower Amur). The remaining Tungus languages are placed in the northern group, which today is called Eveŋki (‘the people‘), a term used by the Tungus themselves. Širokogorov, as well as other scholars, disregards a third Tungus group, the Even or Lamut. These consist of hunters and reindeer-breeders who roam in scattered groups over the vast territory between the Khatanga river (100° E. long.) and the Anadyŕ (165° E. long), infringing on the territory of the Jakut in the lowlands of the Lena, Jana, and Indigirka rivers. They are thus separated from their southern kinsmen, the Eveŋki, by a distance of nearly 1300 miles. The geographic distribution of the Tungus cannot be here discussed in detail. Eastward of the ninetieth meridian almost two-thirds of the entire Siberian territory are inhabited by the Tungus.

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