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b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] Ayin and Ghayin

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  • From: Peter Kirk <peter AT qaya.org>
  • To: Kevin Riley <klriley AT alphalink.com.au>
  • Cc: B Hebrew <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Ayin and Ghayin
  • Date: Thu, 03 Nov 2005 12:47:33 +0000

On 03/11/2005 01:42, Kevin Riley wrote:

... The fact that the Phoenician letters
seem to fit so well the consonantal structure of the Phoenician language
makes it one of the wonders of the history of languages. ...


Well, surely there are some assumptions here. The Phoenician language has been reconstructed almost entirely from the rather few surviving texts in the Phoenician alphabet. So of course the reconstructed language corresponds well with the alphabet. But it is only an assumption that the actual spoken language corresponded well with written form.

For other ancient languages like early Greek the only reason that we know that the pronunciation differed from the alphabet was because in the large corpus of surviving texts there are tell-tale variations, and also meta-texts describing the language. In the much smaller Phoenician corpus there is much less variation and probably no meta-texts. So scholars were forced to assume that the alphabet is more-or-less phonetic. Of course if this is assumed at the start, it remains in the conclusions.

For example, we know that the Phoenicians did not distinguish ayin and ghayin, sin and shin etc in their writing. But is it therefore safe to conclude that they did not distinguish them in speech? Only if we presuppose that the script was phonetic - which is a very dangerous assumption if no other scripts in the ancient world were phonetic.

... As the witness of
history is unanimous in ascribing this script to the Phoenicians ...


I'm not sure what you mean by "the witness of history", but i understand that the story as reconstructed by modern scholarship is by no means so clear cut that this script originates with the Phoenicians. The Phoenician script is derived from earlier proto-Canaanite scripts, with certain modifications. The specific form of it known as "Phoenician" may have been used first by the Phoenicians and then borrowed by Hebrews, Moabites etc. But I wonder if there is any real evidence for this, rather than assumptions based on uncertain sources, like the old story that the Greeks borrowed their script from the Phoenicians, and the supposed conclusion that the script is perfectly fitted to the Phoenician language.

... I see no
reason to doubt that, especially when it does not fit the Hebrew or Aramaic
languages as well.


We know that the script does not fit Hebrew and Aramaic well because we know more about subsequent forms of these languages. We know little about later forms of Phoenician, and so we don't know that the script fitted Phoenician any better.

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





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