Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Yigal Levin <Yigal-Levin AT utc.edu>]

Thank You.

Yigal

At 03:20 PM 7/10/2003 -0400, David Sheby wrote:
>
>>Message: 5
>>From: Peter Kirk <peter.r.kirk AT ntlworld.com>
>>To my untrained eye, the 1890 spelling does not look like it has any Aleph
>>at all, but rather a "defective" Samekh-Lamed... Is this possible, or was
>>Saloniki/o always spelled with an Aleph?
>>Yigal
>
>I can understand your confusion if not accustomed to Sephardic
>cursive script (solitreo). It is NOT samekh lamed as you suggest.
>It is alef-lamed. Another 2 examples  are uploaded to (same directory, 
>different file name):
>http://www.users.voicenet.com/~hosp/obstacle/aleflamed/AL_2and3.pdf
>
>which should eliminate the ambiguity.
>
>Item #1 written in 1892 from Jerusalem, is addressed to Israel Rozanes
>Note the following in this example:
>Line 1: The clear lamed (shown in red arrow)
>         in the word Y-R-U-SH-L-M (Yerushalim=Jerusalem)
>Then look at Line 2: Y-S-R-(ALEF-LAMED).
>
>(Note This is not the "best" example only because
>the writer doesn't clearly distinguish his "S" from "SH" but
>that's not for this discussion: only so I don't get a comment on it
>later)
>
>The second in this file (3rd total) shows , from another piece of 
>correspondence,
>that he signs his name Eliezer Papo (BEN (son of) PELE)
>(indicating that he's a descendent of the famous R' Papo from Sarajevo).
>Here to there is an A-L ligature to form the first two letters of EL-iezer
>Note that the AL-ligature never looks like a samekh: it is open on the
>right but the samkekh is closed on the right.
>
>I thought the one example would suffice. PLEASE understand
>that you will exhaust me if I'm challenged on every example.
>
>Now to the second question: As a rule, Ladino and many place
>names in PERSONAL correspondence (NOT Ketubot or RESPONSA)
>were written phonetically.
>How many variants one can quote is based on one's personal experience.
>So what a person says is a function of his/her personal experience with 
>such material.
>So with this said, two comments:
>1. Alef-lamed ligature is not always used in spelling "Saloniko" or any 
>variants as shown
>before: two distinct letters, alef and lamed are sometimes used. The same 
>is true of a word
>like "s-AL-u-d-o" and its variants. Also the name "SH-M-U- [ (alef-lamed)]
>
>I don't have all examples computerized, so it's difficult, without a time
>consuming manual search, to respond to every
>question with an example or counter-example. I hope
>that the 3 examples provided in the two PDF files demonstrate that 
>"alef-i-lamd"  (alef-lamed
>ligature) was used as a single character in handwritten correspondence, and 
>should
>QUESTION the notion that the ligature (i.e., two-letter combination 
>represented
>by a distinct new single character, rather than as an unbroken combination 
>of two letters)
>was used as a "space-saver".
>
>Dr. David Sheby
>VP, Foundation for the Advancement of Sephardic Studies and Culture 
>(www.sephardicstudies.org)
>Secretary, Ottoman and Near East Philatelic Society (www.oneps.org)
>
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>
Dr. Yigal Levin
Dept. of Philosophy and Religion
University of Tennessee at Chattanooga
615 McCallie Avenue
Chattanooga TN 37403-2598
U.S.A.