PREFACE IT was originally intended that this Grammar should form one of the volumes of the Students' Series of Comparative and Historical Grammars, but some time ago I was informed by the Delegates of the Clarendon Press that a third edition of my Gothic Primer was required. It then became a question whether it would be better to issue the Primer in a revised form, or to set to work at once to write the present Grammar. I laid the two alternatives before the Delegates, and they preferred to accept the latter. As a knowledge of Gothic is indispensable to students of the oldest periods of the other Germanic languages, this book will, I trust, be found useful at any rate to students whose interests are mainly philological and linguistic. I have adopted as far as possible the same method of treating the subject as in my Old English and Historical German Grammars. Considerable care and trouble have been taken in the selection of the material contained in the chapters relating to the phonology and accidence, and I venture to say that the student, who thoroughly masters the book, will not only have gained a comprehensive knowledge of Gothic, but will also have acquired a considerable knowledge of Comparative Germanic Grammar. In selecting examples to illustrate the sound-laws I have tried as far as possible to give words which also occur in the other Germanic languages, especially in Old English and Old High German. The Old English and Old High German cognates have been added in the Glossary.