Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Ken Penner" <pennerkm AT mcmaster.ca>]

Jack wrote:
> ALL of the Semitic inscriptions on all of the catalogued 
> ossuaria are in Aramaic.  
> The language commonly spoken will be the language commonly
> misspelled or grammatically incorrect on ossuaria, ostraca, 
> graffiti, and that is nearly exclusively Aramaic.

I agree that Aramaic was the most commonly spoken language at that time and
place.
However (I expect you agree, Jack), this does not mean that Hebrew was not a
commonly spoken language as well. As Trevor notes, bilingualism is likely.
I'd be interested to know how much of the graffiti does not consist of
personal names. The Bar Kokhba documents abundantly attest Aramaic names
(Bar- rather than Ben-) within Hebrew documents.

Ken Penner, McMaster/DSS
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PennerThesis