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b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] Re: variant pronunciation

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  • From: Peter Kirk <peterkirk AT qaya.org>
  • To: Joel Nothman <jnothman AT student.usyd.edu.au>
  • Cc: "b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org" <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Re: variant pronunciation
  • Date: Sun, 18 Apr 2004 13:48:42 -0700

On 17/04/2004 18:56, Joel Nothman wrote:


...
Regarding this, although the Yemenites have been very much isolated from many of the influences of other dialects, they still may have some influence from Yemenite Arabic. Particularly with reference to the "jimel" (gimel-dagesh)- this sound is the odd one out with respect to the 6 letters mentioned above, since all others both the variations with and without dagesh are pronounced in the same place. In Yemenite hebrew, gimel-with-dagesh is pronounced at the front of the mouth (on the alveolar palate) as "j", and gimel-without-dagesh is pronounced at the back of the mouth as "gh". Now, this could be the influence of Yemenite Arabic which has no hard "g" sound, but does have a "j"; it could also be a regional Ancient Hebrew dialect adopted by the Yemenites, and it is unlilely that we will ever know.

The case for Arabic influence is strengthened when you realise that Arabic jim corresponds to Hebrew gimel, in many words e.g. Hebrew hag (festival) = Arabic hajj (pilgrimage to Mecca), Hebrew regel (foot) = Arabic rijl. In most Arabic dialects jim is pronounced like English J, but in Egyptian Arabic it is pronounced like G, which is probably the more original Arabic version and certainly the proto-Semitic one. So it may well be that in Yemen the shift from G to J took place in parallel in both Hebrew and Arabic. But the Hebrew ghimel (i.e. gimel without dagesh) would have sounded like Arabic gheyn and would have retained the original sound (whereas the original Hebrew equivalent of gheyn had already merged with ayin).

one example: Qamatz gadol they pronounced O similarly to the Ashkenazi way.


You can see this from the masoretic transcription, in fact. In academic Hebrew, Qamats itself is considered a "long a", whose short equivalent is Patah, and shorter is Patah Hatuf (patah with a sheva next to it). But the Qamats is also used to transcribe two different vowels - the Qamats Qaton (short qamats) and Qamats Hatuf (qamats with sheva next to it). Both of these are in fact classified as "o" sounds, and are pronounced such by most Modern Hebrew accents. Nonetheless, the Masoretes gave them the same symbol, which tells us that the Masoretes too, like the Ashkenazim, pronounced all three as the same or similar sound, that is, "o".


As I learned the names, qamats hatuf is your qamats qatan, and qamats with sheva next to it is called hataf qamats. Hataf qamats is also the official Unicode name.

If the Masoretes considered qamats to be an O vowel as you say, how come furtive patah is never written after qamats, or patah, although it is written after every other vowel including holam? I am not really questioning what you say, merely asking for qualification. More like qamats was a back open vowel, perhaps rounded, a bit like the Scandinavian a with ring, or Persian long a - something between "ah" and "aw" in my English.


--
Peter Kirk
peter AT qaya.org (personal)
peterkirk AT qaya.org (work)
http://www.qaya.org/





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