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b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] Aramaic in Babylonia

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  • From: Peter Kirk <peterkirk AT qaya.org>
  • To: Karl Randolph <kwrandolph AT email.com>
  • Cc: b-hebrew <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Aramaic in Babylonia
  • Date: Thu, 07 Jul 2005 01:04:39 +0100

On 06/07/2005 21:59, Karl Randolph wrote:

...

As for when, others on this list indicate that it could have started already
during the Assyrian period, and like the German example above, starting with
the cities, merchants and intellectual classes, gradually spreading
throughout the whole society.


I am sure that no one has a problem accepting that Akkadian gradually lost ground and was replaced by a different but related language, Aramaic. This would be like the similar process of German immigrant communities in North America gradually changing to speaking English. But they do this not by some form of convergence between German and English, but by a change from one language to a distinct one. Similarly, Akkadian did not gradually change into Aramaic, but was replaced by it. At least that is what most scholars think, and a gradual merging between significantly different languages would be almost unprecedented.

As for when this happened, the best answer seems to be "we don't know". There are very few records of spoken languages, for obvious reasons.

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



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