Biblical Hebrew Forum

["J. Leake" <john.leake AT yahoo.co.uk>]

Yes, North Arabian. Look at Michael MacDonald's book Literacy and Identity in Pre-Islamic Arabia for more info. A major thesis of his is that written language in such an environment can have several purposes, but not necessarily the functions it might perform in a literate settled society. There are a number of languages in nomadic environments (and this appears to include some of the pre-Islamic Arabian dialects) that are used more for 'making one's mark'—recording one's name and reading others'—then for functional literacy. A very similar system is in use today among the Taureg, the Tifinagh: this alphabet is used as a game as for children and for grown-ups it is used for recording names, for graffiti, typically while one is whiling away the long days tending sheep or watching for enemies (I'm following MacDonald here), doetimes for short notes. Tellingly, when missionaries have attempted to use the system as a literary vehicle, it has proved inadequate as it leaves too great a uncertainty of vowelling etc. The Taureg, then, a a people with high literacy in this system, but who are entirely an oral culture, since it doesn't perform the role played by alphabets in settled societies.

The North Arabian desert is filled with such inscriptions - from about the eighth century BC, in Ancient North Arabian, particularly the Safaitic variety. Before that you have drawings and tribal marks, but those don't cease. I must admit the proto-Sinaiatic inscriptions came to mind when I re-read this earlier, though.

But Arabic itself, it seems, was even in use as a literary language in pre-Islamic Arabia (this is not certain but seems the current concensus, for which you can read, say, Gregor Schoeler's writings), not for prose but for verse 'daftars', notebooks used by poetic rawīs (reciters and repositories of oral poetry, usually attached to a poet, often in an apprenticeship relationship). Such books weren't 'published' but could act as an aide memoire and might be handed down.It wasn't, however, used as a graffiti language like Safaitic and Tifinagh in pre-Islamic times.

John Leake

The Open University

 

---

'inna SâHiba Hayâtin hanî'atin lâ yudawwinuhâ: 'innamâ, yaHyâhâ.
(He who lives a comfortable life doesn't write about it - he lives it.)
Tawfiq al-Hakim, Yawmiyyât Nâ'ib fil-'Aryâf.

---

---

From: R. Lehmann <lehmann AT uni-mainz.de>
To: George Athas <George.Athas AT moore.edu.au>
Cc: "b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org" <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Thursday, 11 April 2013, 16:07
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] akkadian bible?

George,

maybe we have, as for instance ancient North Arabian. But is is important to see what kind of "literature" this was, dealing with sheep and goats, but not with history and religion.

¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨

Dr. Reinhard G. Lehmann, Academic Director
Research Unit on Ancient Hebrew & Epigraphy
FB 01/ Faculty of Protestant Theology
Johannes Gutenberg-University of Mainz
D-55099 Mainz
Germany
lehmann AT uni-mainz.de
http://www.hebraistik.uni-mainz.de/eng
11th Mainz International Colloquium on Ancient Hebrew (MICAH) 2013:
http://www.micah.hebraistik.uni-mainz.de/204.php

Am 11.04.2013 um 14:19 schrieb George Athas:

Thanks for the input, Dr Lehmann. Oral tradition for nomadic cultures is, indeed, the norm. Writing is quite extraordinary. Do we have any examples of writing from ancient nomadic cultures?

GEORGE ATHAS

Dean of Research,

Moore Theological College (moore.edu.au)

Sydney, Australia

From: "Dr. Reinhard G. Lehmann" <lehmann AT uni-mainz.de>
Date: Thursday, 11 April 2013 1:26 AM
To: B-Hebrew <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] akkadian bible?

My goodness,

will anyone of you maybe take into consideration that early Hebrew tradition was oral, as is normal and most efficient in nomadic societies?

¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨

Dr. Reinhard G. Lehmann, Academic Director

Research Unit on Ancient Hebrew & Epigraphy

FB 01/ Faculty of Protestant Theology

Johannes Gutenberg-University of Mainz

D-55099 Mainz

Germany

lehmann AT uni-mainz.de

http://www.hebraistik.uni-mainz.de/eng

11th Mainz International Colloquium on Ancient Hebrew (MICAH) 2013:

http://www.micah.hebraistik.uni-mainz.de/204.php

_______________________________________________
b-hebrew mailing list
b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/b-hebrew