Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XVI.djvu/454

434 WALLACHIAN LANGUAGE, &c. WALLA WALLA Wdhch, designating the Romanic languages in general. The Wallachs call themselves Ro- mans (Romeni, Somunf), and their language Roman (Romenie, Romunie). The grammati- cal construction and material composition of the language still testify to its Latin extrac- tion; but it is only recently that the major- ity of scholars have agreed upon classing it with the Romance languages, by the side of French, Provencal, Portuguese, Spanish, Ro- mansh, and Italian. In Adelung's Mithridates it was still made to occupy a place of its own, with tho name of Romano- Slavic, and Vater and Raynouard were the first to place it in the list of Romance languages. The objection to this classification is mainly on the ground that Romance tongues are understood to be lan- guages derived from the Latin and mixed with Germanic as well as Celtic elements, while Wallachian has embodied hardly any German. It is supposed that the early population of Dacia were of Thracian descent, and spoke a language closely allied to tho ancient Illyrian, which was probably related to Greek, and is now represented by the Albanese. The influx of Jazyges and other barbarians, and of Ro- man emigrants in the 2d century of our era, when Dacia became a Roman province, totally changed the original character of the language. About the 6th century there was a largo influx of Slavs, remodelling the language anew, and pushing the population further north and south. Thus hardly half of the language, in its pres- ent form, is of Latin derivation, and the roots of the other words are to be found in Slavic, Albanese, Greek, Turkish, Hungarian, German, and other languages. The German element is quite insignificant, and is due in part to the vicinity of the ancient Goths. The Danube now divides the language into the northern or Daco-Romanic and the southern or Macodo- Romanic, which has remained a mere popular dialect, and taken up a large amount of Alba- nese and Greek, and proportionally little of Slavic elements. The Wallachs, or Roumans, as they are now more properly designated, use the Latin as well as the Cyrillic alphabet, which they obtained. from the Bulgarians. Among the principal features of the language are the following : The substantives, as in Italian, are indeclinable excepting a change of termina- tions which forms the plural : domnu, master, domni, masters. The article, which is ap- pended to tho substantive, forms the cases, thus: dommi'l, the master, a domnu'lui^ the master's, domntflui, to the master, &c. There are two genders, masculine and feminine. The declension of the pronouns is very irregular. The conjugation is similar to the Italian, as (eu) cuntu, I sing, (tv) cuntzi, (el) ciinte, (not) cuntem, (roi) cuntdtzi, (ei) ci'mte. The earliest literary monnment so far discovered, is a large historical fragment of the year 1495. The lit- erature of the following century is principally theological, but the Bible was not translated before 1643, when it was ordered to be done by the Transylvanian prince George Rak6czy. In recent times quite an array of learned and poetical works has been produced, and the lute political movements have led to the establish- ment of several newspapers. Minor works, mostly political, are rapidly increasing in num- ber, but nothing noteworthy from a purely literary point of view has appeared, though Assaky, Rosetti, Bolintineano, Alexandresco, Negri, Sion, Negrutzi, Alexandri, and others have recently published some very promising poems and romances. See Kornbach, Studien fiber dako-romdnische Sprache und Literatur (Vienna, 1850) ; Miklosich, Die glavischen Ele- ments im Rumunischen (Vienna, 1861); Ros- ier, Dacier und Romanen (Vienna, 1866) ; and Diez, Grammatik der romanischen Sprachen (3d ed., Bonn, 1870-72). WALLACE. I. Janes William, an American actor, born in London, Aug. 24, 1795, died in New York, Dec. 25, 1864. Sheridan early en- gaged him for Drury Lane theatre. At 18 he played Laertes to Elliston's Hamlet, and at 22 was the lago to Edmund Kean's Othello. He sailed for the United States in 1818, and on Sept. 7 made his first appearance in New York in the Park theatre, as Macbeth. He became stage manager of Drury Lane theatre in 1820, several times revisited the United States, and in 1837 opened the National theatre in New York, and managed it till it was destroyed by fire in 1839. In 1852 he opened "Wallace's lyceum " (afterward Wallack's theatre), in Broadway and Broome street, and in tho au- tumn of 1861 " Wallack's theatre," which he built in Thirteenth street and Broadway. He was a superior comedian, and excelled in such parts as Benedick, Mercutio, Rob Roy, Charles Surface, Martin Heywood, and Master Walter. II. John Lester, an American actor, son of the preceding, born in New York, Jan. 1, 1819. He made his first appearance on the stage in tho Broadway theatre, New York, at its open- ing, Sept. 27, 1847, as Sir Charles Coldstream in the farce of " Used Up." For several sea- sons ho was known as " J. W. Lester." He was a prominent member of Burton's company in tho Chambers street theatre from 1850 to 1852, when he became stage manager in his father's theatre, at the same time playing the leading parts. On the death of his father he became proprietor of the theatre, which he still manages (1876). He has written " Rose- dale" and other popular plays, and has trans- lated several French comedies. WALLA WALLA, the S. E. county of Washing- ton territory, bounded N. by the Snake river, E. by Idaho, from which it is separated by the Snake, S. by Oregon, and W. by the Columbia river; area, 8,500 sq. m. ; pop. in 1870, 5,300. There are many broad valleys and fertile plains, with abundant timber. The valley of Walla Walla river covers a considerable area, and is very fertile. The Blue mountains cross the E. end. The chief productions in 1870 were 110,- 905 bushels of wheat, 19,658 of Indian corn,