Biblical Hebrew Forum

[JimStinehart AT aol.com]

Peter Bekins and Yitzhak Sapir:
 
1.  Thanks, Peter Bekins, for the additional information as what types of 
Aramaic had )QR), and what types of Aramaic had XQR).  My point remains, 
however, 
that the root of both types of Aramaic words for “citadel” is QR, with 
neither the initial aleph/), nor the initial heth/X, being a part of the 
root.  
Once the aleph/) and the heth/X in initial position are viewed in this 
particular 
case as being in effect prosthetic, the essential linguistic identity of )QR) 
and XQR) in various forms of Aramaic becomes obvious.
 
2.  I see the above analysis as being supported by Yitzhak Sapir’s comment:
 
“Moshe Held's article in Erets Israel 16, p. 78-79 with notes (Hebrew), to 
which Victor Hurowitz referred me, makes the conclusion that xbr derives from 
the semitic root of x.br "to bind by magical force" and which appears in 
Akkadian as ubburu, rather than x_br "to make a lot of noise" which appears 
in 
Akkadian as xabaru.”
 
Note that presence or absence of an initial heth/X is not considered critical 
here.  The XBR in Hebrew that means “to bind by magical force”, which starts 
with heth/X, is linked to ubburu in Akkadian, which starts with a mere vowel, 
not a heth/X.  Meanwhile, a possible Akkadian link that starts with heth/X, 
namely xabaru, is rejected in analyzing the XBR in Hebrew that means “to bind 
by magical force”.  The point is that an initial heth/X may in some cases be 
a 
much less significant letter than is generally realized.  Thus the initial 
heth/X in Aramaic XQR) is a mere prefix, not part of the root.  The root, 
meaning 
“citadel”, is QR.  
  
3.  Peter Bekins wrote:  “There is no attestation of QR for citadel….”
 
I did not say that QR, standing alone, is a word for “citadel”.  What I said 
was that QR is an old 2-consonant Semitic root meaning “citadel”.  In fact, 
it seems that  a-l-l  of the ancient Semitic languages have a word for 
“citadel
” that uses either QR, or a linguistic equivalent of QR, as its root.  
Consider:
 
(a)  Ugaritic/Akkadian:  GR  
 
The word “ugaru” [U + G-R] in Akkadian, featuring G-R, often means “citadel”
.  This Akkadian word, with the meaning of “citadel”, may be the basis for 
the name “Ugarit”/U + G-R + T.  “Ugarit name is written Ugrt in the 
Phoenician 
language.  It is similar to the Akkadian word Ugaru;  it means the wall, the 
walled city, or the walled citadel.”  
_http://syriantrip.com/sites/sites.aspx?id=43_ 
(http://syriantrip.com/sites/sites.aspx?id=43)   In a Bronze Age 
context, Q-R and G-R may be linguistic equivalents.  As shown by the mid-15th 
century BCE Thutmosis III list, the Egyptians sometimes used Egyptian Q to 
represent 
west Semitic gimel/G, while at other times using Egyptian Q to represent 
qof/Q.  Accordingly, the G-R in “ugaru”, meaning “citadel”, may in a Late 
Bronze 
Age context be the linguistic equivalent of Q-R.  The Akkadian vowel U is a 
mere initial letter here, like the initial aleph and heth in )QR) and XQR) in 
Aramaic.  As to the final T suffix, see #i below re Biblical Hebrew.  The 
root 
is simply GR, being the Bronze Age linguistic equivalent (at least as to 
sound) of QR.  
 
(b)  Hittite:  GR
 
“Gurta” in Hittite means “citadel”.  Though Hittite is not a Semitic 
language, that looks like a Semitic loanword.  It’s G-R + T suffix, just like 
#a.
 
(c)  Akkadian:  KR  
 
The specific word for “citadel” (or “a fortified area within a city”) in 
Akkadian is “kirhu”.  Ellis Easterly, “Is Mesha's "qrhh" Mentioned in Isaiah 
XV 
2?”, in “Vetus Testamentum”, Vol. 41, Fasc. 2 (Apr., 1991), pp. 215-219.  
The key consonants there appear to be K-R.  As to whether K-R in the east 
Semitic language of Akkadian might be the linguistic equivalent of Q-R in a 
west 
Semitic language (such as Hebrew), we should consider that there was only a 
slight differentiation between kaf/K and qof/Q in sound.  Although it is true 
that 
west Semitic speakers consistently distinguished between these two sounds in 
the Bronze Age (including on the Thutmosis III list), that was not always the 
case in the east Semitic language of Akkadian.  “The sound sequence k-q for 
q-q 
is attested in South Babylonian of the Larsa area, in North Babylonian of the 
Sippar area, and in the Diyala region….”  “Cases of Free Variants in the 
Akkadian q Phoneme”, by E. E. Knudsen, in “Journal of Cuneiform Studies”, 
Vol. 
15, No. 3 (1961), pp. 84-90.  It is thus possible that a kaf/K in the east 
Semitic language of Akkadian in far-off Mesopotamia could have as its 
linguistic 
equivalent, in distant Canaan, a qof/Q.  In that extremely limited, specific 
context (though likely not otherwise), K-R and Q-R could be linguistic 
equivalents.  The sounds are very similar in any event.
 
(d)  Assyrian:  KL?
 
One capital city of Assyria was “Kalkhu”.  With L and R sometimes being 
interchangeable, that looks a lot like “kirhu” in Akkadian above.  So perhaps 
K-L 
was used in this case by the Assyrians to mean K-R/Q-R/“citadel”.  The 
Assyrian capital of Kalkhu definitely was a “citadel”, although I have not 
been 
able to confirm that “Kalkhu” means “citadel”. 
 
(e)  Ugaritic:  QR
 
Ugaritic has qryt like Hebrew (see #i below), and also simply qrt, dropping 
the yod/Y.  These words probably mean “city” or “granary” in Ugaritic, but 
are related to the concept of a “citadel”.  As discussed in #i below, the 
root 
in all cases is QR.
 

(f)  Phoenician:  QR
 
QRT in Phoenician is the same as qrt in Ugaritic in #d above.  It primarily 
means “city”, but is related in concept to “citadel”.
 
(g)  Moabite:  QR  
 
In Moabite, qorhh or qrhh (where the first H is a heth) means “citadel”.  
Ellis Easterly’s above-cited article.  Although the suffix varies greatly 
(and 
the interior heth here might even be part of the root), the key elements in 
the 
root once again seem to be Q-R.
 
(h)  Aramaic:  QR  
 
As noted previously, the root of several Aramaic words for “citadel” is Q-R. 
 )QR) or XQR or XQR) mean “citadel” in Aramaic.  
 
(i)  Biblical Hebrew:  QR  
 
Last, but certainly not least, is QRYT in Biblical Hebrew. The final T 
indicates construct state in Biblical Hebrew, and is a mere suffix.  The 
Egyptian 
QRT at the beginning of item #11 on the Thutmosis III list of places in 
Canaan 
probably refers to a QRYT/“Kiriath”, and is one reason to think that in a 
Late 
Bronze Age historical context, the yod/Y was not part of this word’s root.  
As noted in #e above, Ugaritic has two versions of this word, one of which is 
qryt like Hebrew, but the other of which is simply qrt, dropping the yod/Y 
altogether.  With yod/Y thus not being part of the root, and with the tav/T 
being 
a mere suffix, the key consonants in QRYT/Kiriath are simply:  Q-R.
 
QRYT is sometimes said to be a poetic word for “city” in Biblical Hebrew.  
But in the Hebrew Bible, QRYT is often used in the sense of “fortified city” 
or “citadel”, rather than as a mere synonym for “city”.
 
*       *       *
 
Those are all the ancient Semitic languages I know.  They  a-l-l  seem to 
have some form of Q-R (Q-R or G-R or K-R or K-L) as an old 2-consonant 
Semitic 
root meaning “citadel”.
 
4.  Historians have been unable to figure out the Bronze Age name of the 
grand “citadel” in hill country in southern Canaan that in the Iron Age came 
to 
be called “Hebron” [XBRN or XBRWN].  But if we take a new, more literal, look 
at Joshua 14: 15, in light of the two spellings of “citadel” in Aramaic [)QR) 
vs. XQR)], we can solve that important Bible mystery.  (We’ll be able to 
confirm that our linguistic analysis is right by a quick glance at the Amarna 
Letters afterwards.)  From those two spellings of that Aramaic word, we learn 
that 
(i) QR means “citadel” [as in QR + T/QRYT, or possibly QL + T, but  
n-e-v-e-r  Q(YL, which is not QR or QL], and (ii) an initial heth/X may be 
far less 
important than is usually supposed [such as in XBRN:  X + BR + N, where BR in 
Aramaic and Biblical Hebrew can mean “field” or “what is produced from fields”
, with the mountainous city of Hebron in the Northern Negev Desert, though 
being an ideal fortress/“citadel”/QRYT, having precious little of either 
“fields”
 or “what is produced from fields”].  The city names QRYT and XBRN [QR + T, 
with the accent on QR/“citadel”;  and X + BR + N, with the accent on BR/“field
”/“what is produced from fields”] themselves are telling us the Bronze Age 
history of these places (as confirmed in secular history by the Thutmosis III 
list and the Amarna Letters).  We simply need to pay close attention to those 
city names, and do a basic linguistic analysis of those city names in light 
of 
the above huge hints from Aramaic.
 
Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois

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