The Vocalization Systems of Arabic, Hebrew, and Aramaic: Their Phonetic and Phonemic Principles [2nd printing. Reprint 2019 ed.] 9783110812398, 9789027919656

Table of contents :
PREFACE
TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
1. ARABIC
2. HEBREW
3. ARAMAIC
4. MOTIVATION AND METHODOLOGY IN THE VOCALIZATION SYSTEMS: SOME REFLECTIONS
5. TABLES
6. BIBLIOGRAPHY

Citation preview

THE V O C A L I Z A T I O N S Y S T E M S O F ARABIC, HEBREW, A N D A R A M A I C

JANUA LINGUARUM STUDIA MEMORIAE NICOLAI VAN WIJK DEDICATA edenda curai

C O R N E L 1 S H. V A N STANFORD

SCHOONEVELD

UNIVERSITY

NR. XIII

1972

M O U T O N & CO • ' S - G R A V E N H A G E

THE VOCALIZATION SYSTEMS OF ARABIC, HEBREW, AND ARAMAIC THEIR P H O N E T I C A N D P H O N E M I C P R I N C I P L E S

by

SHELOMO

MORAG

THE H E B R E W U N I V E R S I T Y ,

JERUSALEM

Second Printing

1972 M O U T O N & CO • ' S - G R A V E N H A G E

© Copyright 1961 Mouton & Co., The Netherlands, Publishers, The Hague. No part of this book may be translated or reproduced in any from, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any other means, without written permission from the publishers.

First Printing 1962

Printed in The Netherlands by D. Reidel, Dordrecht.

PREFACE

This study is not a complete history of the vocalization systems of Arabic, Hebrew, and Aramaic, nor does it pretend to be one. The time for writing a full history of these vocalization systems has not yet come; much work remains to be done in the examination of mss. and printed texts before such a history can be written. My aim in this study was to trace the major lines of development in the history of the various systems of vocalization, pointing out the pertinent linguistic principles that underlay the work of the philological schools in which these systems were formulated. I am indebted to a number of my teachers and colleagues who offered advice on various problems, or who read proofs. I must especially mention Professors H. J. Polotsky, Z. Ben-Hayyim, and C. Rabin, all of the Hebrew University, and Dr. J. B. Segal, of the University of London. Mr. Harvey Sobelman, of Cambridge, Massachusetts, has also contributed some interesting remarks. My wife assisted in a number of ways, not the least of which has been constant encouragement. This monograph was written during my stay at Brandeis University. I wish to extend my thanks to my colleagues there for a pleasant and stimulating experience. Cambridge, Massachusetts, June 1959

S.M.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Preface

5

Introduction

9

1. Arabic

13

2.

17

Hebrew

3. Aramaic 4.

45

Motivation and Methodology in the Vocalization Systems: Some Reflections 61

5. Tables 77 I. Synopsis of Phonemic and Nonphonemic Notations. II. The Graphic Forms of the Vocalization Signs. 6.

Bibliography

79

INTRODUCTION

0.1. Arabic, Hebrew and Aramaic represent in their orthography only some of their vowels. To indicate the missing vowels, special systems of vowel notation were invented at a certain period in the history of each of these languages. In these systems, usually called vocalization systems, signs which represent the vowels and some other phonetic and phonemic entities, are placed above, below, or within the letters. Thus, for example, a dot, placed beneath any letter, informs the reader of a Hebrew or a Jewish Aramaic text which is vocalized in the Tiberian tradition (see § 2.2), that the consonant in question is followed by the vowel i. 0.1.1. The above systems of vocalization were gradually created in various schools which flourished in Palestine, Syria and Mesopotamia between the fourth and the tenth centuries A.D. These schools brought to an end a process, which, for Hebrew and Aramaic, began many centuries earlier. The proto-Canaanite alphabet, from which the alphabets used in these languages developed, originated as a system of writing in which only consonants were marked; the vowels were left undenoted. 1 In the course of time, there arose a need to indicate the missing vowels. In their search for a solution to this problem, North West Semitic scribes, particularly those writing Aramaic, began, as early as the ninth century B.C., to employ as vowel letters (i.e. letters which stand for vowels) 2 the letters which had originally 1 See Cross and Freedman, 7 if. The question whether in this alphabet a letter stands only for a consonant or for a consonant followed by any vowel - that is, whether the character of the alphabet is consonantal or syllabic - does not concern us here. The most convincing proponent of the syllabic interpretation of West Semitic writing in recent years has been I. J. Gelb (1952,166ff; 1958). 2 The traditional term for the vowel letters is matres lectionis.

10

INTRODUCTION

represented only the semivocalic y and w. Later on in the gradual process of the introduction of vowel letters into a consonantal system of writing,3 the letters representing' (the glottal stop) and h were also adopted as vowel letters. Thus came into being the scriptio plena, the "full writing" of Aramaic and Hebrew, an orthography in which certain vowels are represented by letters,4 as against, for example, Greek and Roman alphabetic orthographies in which an attempt is made to represent all vowels. We should also bear in mind that in Semitic writing, in contrast with the Greek and Roman, each of the vowel letters has also a consonantal (or semivocalic) function. Compared with the scriptio defectiva, the orthography in which the vowels were completely or almost completely lacking, the scriptio plena was a significant step toward making the reading of any North West Semitic text less dependent on the reader's interpretation, which was sometimes necessarily subjective. Even the scriptio plena, however, constituted only a partial solution to the problem in question. 0.1.1.1. In order to get a more complete picture of the inadequacy of the vowel letters, the following facts should be considered: (a) The vowels of Aramaic and Hebrew can be roughly classified into three categories: the /a/ group, the /// group, and /w/ group.6 The introduction of the vowel letters provided a useful means for the indication of the long vowels of the /// and /«/ groups. Vowels of the \a\ group, on the other hand, were consistently denoted by the vowel letters only in final position;® 3

The history of this process has been admirably presented by Cross and Freedman. 4 See Gelb 1952, 166; Cross and Freedman, 1-7, where the pertinent literature is reviewed. 5 Cf. Segal, 20. A note on transcription: an unenclosed italics letter stands for a grapheme (i.e., any letter or vocalisation sign); between slant lines and square brackets, it denotes, as usual, phonemic and allophonic values, respectively. 6 Except when following in Hebrew Ik/ in the pronominal suffixes or /// in the perfect forms of the second person masc. sing.

INTRODUCTION

11

medially, they were represented only in certain verbal and nominal categories.7 (b) Short vowels of all three groups were not as a rule denoted by the vowel letters.8 (c) As a result of various processes of linguistic development, the vowel letters acquired, besides their consonantal functions, a multivalent character. Thus, in the orthography of Tiberian Hebrew (§ 2.2), the vowel letter y may appear not only when the vowel of the preceding consonant is ji/ but also when this vowel is /e/, /e/, and /a/. Similarly, w is written both for /«/ and /o/;' comes after /a/, /e/, /e/, /o/, and ///, and A in final position after ¡a/, ¡e/, ¡e/, and /o/.9 0.1.2. The invention of the vocalization signs (§0.1) proved to be almost as efficient as would have been the introduction of new vowel letters to represent the heretofore missing vowels (and the other phonetic and phonemic entities which were not denoted by the orthography). In fact, it was primarily because of tradition and the sacred nature of the texts that no additional vowel letters were introduced;10 instead, external signs - that is, signs placed above, below or within the letters - were adopted. The ingenious invention of the vocalization signs thus solved the problem of the necessary notation without involving any visual deformation of the traditional orthography. It may be of interest to add here that the use of the vocalization signs, which became a part of scribal practice, had also a significant effect on the traditional methods of language teaching,11 and played an important role in stabilizing the oral ' Medial a-vowels are regularly represented by a vowel letter in the orthography of Mandaean (which, however, employs all vowel letters to a greater extent than any other Aramaic dialect - see below, footnote 10). 8 Exceptions to this rule are not too rare. See, e.g. for Syriac, Brockelmann, 7; Noldeke, 1904, 5ff. 9 Some of these usages, for example' after an //'/ that is not represented by the vowel letter y, are rather rare (orthographical phenomena which are peculiar to specific texts, such as the Qumra :n texts, do not concern us here). 10 Orthographies which were not bound by tradition did introduce additional vowel letters. This has been the case in Neo-Punic and Mandaean. 11 For a description of certain traditional methods of teaching reading still extant in several Jewish ethnic groups, see Morag, 1957.

12

INTRODUCTION

transmission of some of the reading traditions of the texts (see § 2.2.2).

0.2. It seems worthwhile to examine the principles upon which the Arabic, Hebrew and Aramaic vocalization systems are based. The analysis of these principles may shed some light upon a hitherto relatively neglected chapter in the history of writing, and, therefore, may be of interest not only to the Semitist but to the student of general linguistics as well. 0.2.1. In this study, the term vocalization sign will apply to any external (§ 0.1.2.) mark which serves to denote the proper reading of a word or of a letter, and the use of which is not confined to one letter only. Signs which regularly appear with any one letter, and with it only (such as the point which differentiates Hebrew s from s, or Syriac d from r), will not be included in this term.

1

ARABIC

1.1. The orthography of Classical Arabic represents by vowel letters all the long vowel phonemes of the language - /a:/, /«:/, /»':/ but none of the short vowel phonemes. The latter, /a/, /u/, /«'/, are denoted by vocalization signs. Quantity, which is phonemic in Arabic, is thus expressed simply by the presence or absence of the vowel letters: when the vocalization signs are not followed by the corresponding vowel letters (that is, when the sign for ¡i\ is not followed by the vowel letter y, etc.), they denote short vowels; long vowels, on the other hand, are represented by the vowel letters ' w y.1 In this case the vowel letters do not have any vocalization signs of their own (accompanied by vocalization signs of their own, the letters do not serve as vowel letters but stand for the phonemes /'/, /w/, and lyl, respectively - cf. § 1.1.1.);2 the letter which precedes the vowel letter usually has the vocalization sign for that short vowel which corresponds to the long vowel in question.3 In a few cases, Arabic does not denote long vowels by the vowel letters.4 Also, in a number of morphological categories, the vowel letter ' (in final position following w) is of purely orthographic 1

Final /a:/ may also be represented by the vowel letter y\ see Wright, I, 11. The letters w and y may also represent, when accompanied by a special sign (the hamza), the phoneme /'/. 3 As pointed out by Fleisch {1958, 97), it would be more in accordance with the phonetic concepts of certain Arab grammarians to have the preceding letter without any vocalization sign; cf. further his valuable observations regarding this problem. 4 For such cases see Wright, I, 9-10. As to the notation of final //:/ in the orthography of the Qur'a:n cf. the literature reviewed in Birkeland, 1940b, 20-21. It seems, however, that in many of the instances in which the orthography of the Qur'a:n does not use the vowel letter y to represent a historical //:/ in final position, the historically long phoneme in question has been shortened. In poetry - usually, although not exclusively, with pausal forms 2

14

ARABIC

significance, having neither a phonetic nor a phonemic value.5 All these cases constitute, however, clear exceptions to the general rules of the Arabic systems of orthography and vocalization. In addition to the three short vowel phonemes, the Arabic vocalization system indicates gemination, which is phonemic, and possesses a sign for zero. Also, Arabic represents by external signs, the so-called tanwi:n signs, the last components - / a n / , /un/, /in/ of the final syllable of an indefinite noun of the so-called "triptote" class. The notation of these syllables by external signs, and not by the orthography, results from morphophonemic and grammatical, as well as historical, considerations. In conclusion we see that the Arabic vocalization system is based on phonemic principles: it represents all the vowel phonemes, but none of the allophones.6 1.1.1. In the Arabic vocalization a suitable method has been found to solve the problems that may have originated in the bivalent nature of the letters \ w, and y: as noted above, these letters serve as vowel letters when not possessing any vocalization sign of their own; otherwise, they denote consonantal and semivocalic phonemes.7 See further § 2.2.3. 1.2. The Arabic use of the vowel letters is based upon an application of a principle employed in Aramaic. As the Arabic script developed from that of Nabatean in a gradual process stretching final /// and /«/ may be counted as long, even when they are not represented by the vowel letters y and w: Wright, II, 368ff., 390; cf., however, Birkeland's observations {1940b, 12ff.). 5 According to the Arab grammarians the function of the 'alif (the letter ') in these morphological categories is to safeguard the reader from taking the preceding w (which would otherwise be the last letter of the word) to be the first letter of the following word. This letter is, therefore, called by the grammarians the "guarding 'alif' or the "separating 'alif". See Wright, I, 11. ' Cf. Cantineau, 1941, 131. For the phonemic structure of Classical Arabic see Cantineau, 1946. 7 Initial ' may, in close juncture, also have the value of zero; in this case a special sign, the so-called hamzatulwafl, is supplied to the letter.

ARABIC

15

over several centuries,8 the Arabs took over from the Nabateans the practice of denoting //:/ and /«:/ by vowel letters; 9 to these two vowel letters, a third one, \ has been added in Arabic as a regular indicator of /a:/. To represent the short vowel phonemes, the vocalization signs were invented later - in the seventh and eighth centuries A.D.10 However, the course that Arabic vowel notation finally took differs considerably from that of both Aramaic (§ 3) and Hebrew (§ 2). Of the Semitic languages which make use of vocalization signs, Arabic is the only one to denote in its orthography all of the long vowel phonemes but none of the short ones. Thus Arabic establishes a consistent and clear-cut opposition between its internal and external vowel notation - that is, between the values of its vowel letters and those of the respective vocalization signs. As observed above, this opposition in marking is correlated with a structural feature of the language - the quantitative opposition of the vowel phonemes. 1.2.1. The introduction of the vocalization signs into the practice of the scribes was a gradual process. Early manuscripts of the Qur'a:n show a partial use of these signs, "the vowel sign for one or more of the letters of a given word being used only where it was essential for a correct reading." 11 8

See, e.g., Abbott, 5. In Nabatean, ¡a:/ is denoted - by the vowel letters ' and h - only in final position, but not medially. For the Nabatean use of the vowel letters see Cantineau, 1930, 46ff. 10 We are not concerned in this study with the development of the forms of the Arabic vocalization signs from points to marks which originally were minatures of the vowel letters. For this aspect of the problem see Moritz, 384; Bergstrasser-Pretzl, 261ff.; Abbott, 39. Cf. also Fleisch, 1958, 85. 11 Abbot, loc. cit. We have not included in the description of the Arabic vocalization the signs denoting the 'ima. la (that is, in some reading traditions of the Qur'a:n, the substitution of the phonemes I a: I and /a/ by /