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b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] Re: PS /g/

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  • From: Peter Kirk <peterkirk AT qaya.org>
  • To: Karl Randolph <kwrandolph AT email.com>
  • Cc: Hebrew <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Re: PS /g/
  • Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2004 00:41:59 +0000

On 17/11/2004 00:26, Karl Randolph wrote:

Yitzhak:

I originally noticed this pattern while reading through Ezra and Nehemiah. I
do not have access to later writings, so I don’t know how they treated the
pronunciations. But I can speculate (with the best of them :-( ).

I first noticed it with the transliteration of Artaxerxes: the first Xi in
the name corrosponds to the Hebrew and Aramaic X$, which to the Greek ear
probably sounded like an /x/, but the second one in Hebrew, such as all the
times in Nehemiah and in Ezra 7:7, 11 were written with a samekh, while Ezra
in his Aramaic portions, e.g. Ezra 4:4, 7:21 transliterated the /x/ with a
sin/shin.


The name is of course Persian. The Greek forms probably derive from the Persian, possibly through an Aramaic form as Aramaic was the court language of the time. It is very unlikely that the Greek spelling derives from the Hebrew.


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






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