The Diction viewed as a whole is made up of the following
parts: the Letter (or ultimate element), the Syllable, the
Conjunction, the Article, the Noun, the Verb, the Case, and
the Speech.
The Letter is an indivisible sound of a par-
ticular kind, one that may become a factor in an intelligible
sound. Indivisible sounds are uttered by the brutes also,
but no one of these is a Letter in our sense of the term.
These elementary sounds are either vowels, semivowels, or
mutes. A vowel is a Letter having an audible sound without
the addition of another Letter. A semivowel, one having
an audible sound by the addition of another Letter; e. g.
S and R. A mute, one having no sound at all by itself,
but becoming audible by an addition, that of one of the
Letters which have a sound of some sort of their own;
e.g. D and G.
The Letters differ in various ways: as
produced by different conformations or in different regions
of the mouth; as aspirated, not aspirated, or sometimes one
and sometimes the other; as long, short, or of variable
quantity; and further as having an acute, grave, or inter-
mediate accent. The details of these matters we must leave
to the metricians.
(2) A Syllable is a non-significant composite
sound, made up of a mute and a Letter having a sound
(a vowel or semivowel); for GR, without an A, is just as
much a Syllable as GRA, with an A. The various forms
of the Syllable also belong to the theory of metre.
(3) A Conjunction is (a) a non-significant sound which,
when one significant sound is formable out of several, neither
hinders nor aids the union, and which, if the Speech thus
formed stands by itself (apart from other Speeches) must
not be inserted at the beginning of it; e. g. μέν,
δή, τοί, δέ. Or (b) a non-significant sound capable of
combining two or more significant sounds into one; e. g.
ἀμφί, περί, etc.
(4) An Article is a non-significant sound marking the
beginning, end, or dividing-point of a Speech, its natural
place being either at the extremities or in the middle.
(5) A Noun or name is a composite significant sound not
involving the idea of time, with parts which have no signi-
ficance by themselves in it. It is to be remembered that in
a compound we do not think of the parts as having a signifi-
cance also by themselves; in the name 'Theodorus,' for
instance, the δῶρον means nothing to us.
(6) A Verb is a composite significant sound involving the
idea of time, with parts which (just as in the Noun) have
no significance by themselves in it. Whereas the word
'man' or 'white' does not imply when, 'walks' and 'has
walked' involve in addition to the idea of walking that
of time present or time past.
(7) A Case of a Noun or Verb is when the word means
'of' or 'to' a thing, and so forth, or for one or many
(e.g. 'man' and 'men'); or it may consist merely in the
mode of utterance, e.g. in question, command, etc.
'Walked?' and 'Walk!' are Cases of the verb 'to walk'
of this last kind.
(8) A Speech is a composite significant sound, some of
the parts of which have a certain significance by themselves.
It may be observed that a Speech is not always made up of
Noun and Verb; it may be without a Verb, like the
definition of man; but it will always have some part with
a certain significance by itself. In the Speech 'Cleon
walks,' 'Cleon' is an instance of such a part.
A Speech is
said to be one in two ways, either as signifying one thing,
or as a union of several Speeches made into one by
conjunction. Thus the Iliad is one Speech by conjunction
of several; and the definition of man is one through its
signifying one thing.
Poetics. Aristotle. Ingram Bywater (Translator), ed. Gilbert Murray. Oxford. 1909.