Afro-Asiatic Research Articles

Semito-Hamitic or Afro-Asiatic consonantism and lexicon: Episodes of a comparative research I (Part 1: The long century of Semito-Hamitology until the middle of the 20th century)

A retrospective account on past comparative research on Afro-Asiatic (AA) or Semito-Hamitic / Hamito-Semitic (SH/HS, resp.) phonology (first of all consonantism, also root structure) and lexicon, segmented into episodes according to diverse trends (often overlapping in time) is now under way and will be presented part by part in a series of papers. The present paper contains the first ever direction of this research, labelled “Semito-Hamitology” covering studies seeking, in their conception, the “African”, i.e. “Hamitic” kinship of Semitic, without a permanent communis opinio over the whole century of this ‘trend’ (better: amalgamate era) regarding the limits of the family.

Phonology of Kafi Noonoo ideophones

This paper is the first and original work on the phonology of Kafi Noonoo ideophones. All of the data used in this study are collected through fieldwork. Ideophones are attested word classes with peculiar phonology in that they break some phonological rules of the prosaic language. Kafi Noonoo ideophones also undergo unique phonological features from the regular phonology of the language. Kafi Noonoo ideophones use all the phonemes of the regular language and additional five click-like sounds (ʘ, ǃ, ǁ, ʞ, and tchip). The click-like sounds do not found in the language and the regular phonology of Ethiopian Afro-Asiatic languages in general. Kafi Noonoo ideophones show different suprasegmental features from the regular phonology of the language. Another striking phonological feature in ideophones of the language is that ideophones break the phonotactics and suprasegmental features rules of the prosaic language. Moreover, Kafi Noonoo ideophones exhibit some syllable structures that are specific to ideophones. These are the (C1VC2C2), (CVVV…), (C1VVV…C2) and (C1VC2C2C2…). Furthermore, Kafi Noonoo is a tone language. The language has high and low tones. As the result of the study depicts ideophones of the language constitute both open and closed syllable shapes.

Mubi-Toram lexicon and Afro-Asiatic III: Lexemes with initial *ḅ-

The paper is another part of a planned longer series designed to step by step reveal the Chadic and wider Afro-Asiatic cognate heritage in the lexical stock of the Mubi-Toram languages which represent the easternmost (27th) group of the vast (6th) Chadic branch of the gigantic Afro-Asiatic family.

Omotic lexicon in its Afro-Asiatic setting VII: Further addenda to Omotic roots with *b-

The paper constitutes part of a long-range series aiming, step by step, to identify the inherited Afro-Asiatic stock in the etymologically little explored lexicon of the Omotic (West Ethiopia) branch of the Afro-Asiatic family displaying the least of shared traits among the six branches of this macrofamily, which suggests a most ancient Omotic desintegration reaching far back to the age of post-Natufian neolithic.

Noun Morphology of Kafi Noono

This paper aims at describing noun morphology in Kafi Noonoo (the Kafa language). Kafi Noonoo is an Afroasiatic language belonging to the Omotic family. The language is now been reduced to writing and is serving as a medium of instruction, administrative, media, and judiciary tool in the Kafa zone since 2008. The study is made to look into the noun morphology of the language. To achieve this, primary data has been collected from Kafa Zone and analyzed categorically. Nouns in the language generally end in -o/oo in their lexical entry (i.e. in isolation). Few nouns end in - e(e), and few place names that end in -ɑ, and a few in -i. Most proper nouns end in -i. The vowels attached also indicate the gender (-o/ -oo (masculine), -e/ -ee (feminine)) and number (e.g. ɡédʤò ‘lake(s)) of the head noun. Proper names usually end in -i; and morphologically, the prototypical Kafi Noonoo noun inflects for gender, number, and case. Under the noun morphology of Kafi Noonoo, the discussion of proper names, common nouns, derived nouns (of different forms of verbal nouns, abstract nouns, agentive nouns, and result nouns), compounds (resulting in euphemism, verb-manner compounds, language names and compounds with Ɂìndèé ‘mother’ and dòónò ‘lord’) has been discussed. Noun inflection of Kafi Noonoo nouns is also discussed. Thus, it is attested that the language inflects gender (usually masculine and feminine), number (singular and plural; the latter is formed by suffixing -nàʔó), and case. Concerning case, Kafi Noonoo has distinct case marking morphemes which are identified and discussed as follows. Thus, the nominative (appears unmarked), accusative (marked either by the morpheme -n, or by lengthening the final vowel, or it can be found unmarked), vocative (morphologically unmarked), allative (suffixes -wàán ‘to(wards)’ or -máɡ), ablative (expressed by -wàánè or -máɡè ‘from’), dative, locative, genitive (all these three are marked by the suffix -ttʃ), instrumental (expressed by the morpheme -nà), comitative (expressed by -nnà), similative(marked by -òóm), and comparative (marked by -jèè to the compared subject) cases have been identified in Kafi Noonoo.

О ПРОИСХОЖДЕНИИ ГЛАГОЛА «ПИСАТЬ» В ЧАДСКИХ ЯЗЫКАХ

Chadic, Semitic, Egyptian, Berber, Kushitic and Omotic languages comprise the Afroasiatic (Hamito-­Semitic) macro-family. The paper is aimed to clarify the origin of the verb ‘to write’ in different Chadic languages. Two main sources: semantic shifts and borrowings will be in the focus of the study. The phonological diversity of corresponding lexical forms is also of special interest. Numerous examples allow us to trace a long chain of semantic shifts ending in the verb ‘to write’. In almost all cases verbs ‘to cut’ or ‘to scratch’ have been identified as the first units of these semantic transformations. A ‘one-step’ semantic shift: ‘to put’ > ‘to write’ was active only in a few Central Chadic languages. Loans from Arabic and Fulfulde (Niger-Congo family) into different Chadic languages are listed. Of special interest is the derived noun ‘writing’, borrowed form from Kanuri (Nilo-Saharan family) into Chadic. J. Greenberg’s arguments, indicating Kanuri as the donor-language [Greenberg 1960, p. 209–210] and supporting evidence are under discussion. Typological parallels to the above-mentioned semantic shifts can be traced outside the Afroasiatic family, namely, in Indo-European and Nilo-Saharan languages. The whole amount of Chadic data and external parallels prove the independent origin of the verb ‘to write’ in different Chadic languages. Only in a few cases the verb ‘to write’ can be identified on a sub-group level.

Vladimir Golenischeff’s Vision of the Egyptian Language in the Light of His Archival Evidence

The article assesses the scholarly heritage of the founder of the Russian Egyptology Vladimir Golenischeff reflecting his views on the structure and the origin of the Egyptian language. It highlights a few of his archive documents: the structure of the fund in Centre Wladimir Golénischeff (Paris) containing the manuscripts of his treatise on the Egyptian syntax and a paper belonging to it; his letters to the French Egyptologists Étienne Drioton and Gustave Lefebvre of 17 June 1922 and 14 September 1936; fragments of other letters. The contents of these papers is compared to his publications. The points of Golenischeff’s polemics with the Berlin school of Egyptian philology were defined with his reluctance to accept the notion of Pseudopartizip as an analogy of the Semitic perfective and its anteriority to the suffix conjugation, the participial nature of the latter’s stem, the triliterality of Egyptian verbal roots. However, Golenischeff’s position was obviously backed by his own scholarly experience accumulated with years and not with an urge to oppose the Berlin school. This opposition came to be more active at the end of World War I, when the scholar laid the responsibility for the catastrophe in Russia on Germans. The scholar’s views largely depended on his vision of the origin of the Egyptian language: he declined his immediate connection to the Semitic languages and favoured their origin of a common ancestor tongue. A comparison of this vision to the concept of the Afroasiatic languages forwarded in 1960s by Igor Diakonoff shows that Golenischeff was well ahead of his time.

Semito-Hamitic or Afro-Asiatic consonantism and lexicon: Episodes of a comparative research II: The “old school” of Egypto-Semitic (Part 1: Pre-war phase)

A retrospective account on the past of the comparative research on Semito-Hamitic / Hamito-Semitic (SH / HS, resp.) or Afro-Asiatic (AA) phonology (first of all consonantism, also root structure) and lexicon, segmented into episodes according to diverse (often overlapping in time) trends is now under way and will be presented part by part in a series of papers. Episode II evaluates the so-called “old school”, a rather introverted special trend of this domain (arbitrarily focusing on a comparison of just these two branches: Semitic and Egyptian), which split off from mainstream Semito-Hamitic studies at the end of the 19th century, more than a whole century ago. The present paper surveys the pre-war share (encompassing some half of a century), a blooming and most fruitful phase in the history of Egypto-Semitic studies.

Omotic lexicon in its Afro-Asiatic setting VIII: Further addenda to the Omotic roots with *b- + dentals and sibilants (Part 1)

The paper constitutes part of a long-range series aiming, step by step, to identify the inherited Afro-Asiatic stock in the etymologically little explored lexicon of the Omotic (West Ethiopia) branch of the Afro-Asiatic family displaying the least of shared traits among the six branches of this macrofamily, which suggests a most ancient Omotic desintegration reaching far back to the age of post-Natufian neolithic.

Marginal notes on the project for an etymological dictionary of the Mubi-Toram languages

The paper accompanies the second part of a planned longer series “Mubi-Toram lexicon and Afro-Asiatic” as a kind of belated extended introduction surveying some new results in the grouping of these languages as well as into some principles guiding our research designed to step by step reveal the Chadic and wider Afro-Asiatic cognate heritage in the lexical stock of the Mubi-Toram languages which represent the easternmost (26th) and sprachgeschichtlich perhaps the most enigmatic group of the vaste Chadic (i.e., 6th) branch of the gigantic Afro-Asiatic family.

Case alignment in Kabyle Amazigh

Abstract This paper examines the state alternation in Kabyle, arguing that state is the morphological realization of Case. The free state is accusative case, and the construct state is nominative case. Taking morphological patterns and syntactic distribution into account, Kabyle is found to be a Type 2 marked nominative language. Both states, or cases, are morphologically marked. The free state is the default case. This analysis accounts for the bulk of the distribution of free state and construct state nouns, and situates Kabyle as belonging to a typologically rare alignment system that is concentrated in Afroasiatic and African languages.

The lexicon of an Old European Afro-Asiatic language. Evidence from early loanwords in Proto-Indo-European

The lexicon of an Old European Afro-Asiatic language. Evidence from early loanwords in Proto-Indo-European

Definiteness in second language acquisition: Preliminary results regarding Indo-European and Afroasiatic languages

This article describes and compares the way in which definiteness is expressed in Romance (Catalan and Spanish) and some Slavic and Afro-Asian languages. We present some difficulties concerning definite nominal expressions that speakers of Ukrainian, Egyptian Arabic and Amazigh as L1 face when learning Catalan or Spanish as a second language and we show that the acquisition of definite determiners is, in general, problematic regardless of the typological nature of the L1. We also indicate that these difficulties can be related to the emergence of different determiner layers in the higher functional field in the nominal domain during the acquisition process.

Origin and diffusion of human Y chromosome haplogroup J1-M267

Human Y chromosome haplogroup J1-M267 is a common male lineage in West Asia. One high-frequency region—encompassing the Arabian Peninsula, southern Mesopotamia, and the southern Levant—resides ~ 2000 km away from the other one found in the Caucasus. The region between them, although has a lower frequency, nevertheless demonstrates high genetic diversity. Studies associate this haplogroup with the spread of farming from the Fertile Crescent to Europe, the spread of mobile pastoralism in the desert regions of the Arabian Peninsula, the history of the Jews, and the spread of Islam. Here, we study past human male demography in West Asia with 172 high-coverage whole Y chromosome sequences and 889 genotyped samples of haplogroup J1-M267. We show that this haplogroup evolved ~ 20,000 years ago somewhere in northwestern Iran, the Caucasus, the Armenian Highland, and northern Mesopotamia. The major branch—J1a1a1-P58—evolved during the early Holocene ~ 9500 years ago somewhere in the Arabian Peninsula, the Levant, and southern Mesopotamia. Haplogroup J1-M267 expanded during the Chalcolithic, the Bronze Age, and the Iron Age. Most probably, the spread of Afro-Asiatic languages, the spread of mobile pastoralism in the arid zones, or both of these events together explain the distribution of haplogroup J1-M267 we see today in the southern regions of West Asia.

Formation of theatrical sculptural costumes inspired by Arabic letters

The Arabic language has a great place in the world's languages. Because of its great advantages as a language for a large number of speakers, as it reaches 200 million people in more than 20 countries, in addition to the fact that the Arabic language is a Semitic language. This refers to a group of languages ​​that belong to the Afro-Asiatic language family. There are many forms of writing each letter of Arabic writing, depending on its position in the beginning, middle, or end of the word.There are many scripts in Arabic Calligraphy, Which are Naskh, Nasta'liq, Diwani, Thuluth, Reqa, and Kufic. The Kufic and Naskh scripts were the two main scripts developed for Arabic writing. Arabic letters are distinguished by their acceptance to be formed in any geometric shape compatible with any shape, and its essence is not subject to any change, and Arabic letters have a special aesthetic characteristic. The artist's awareness of and development of it, and given the ability of letters to form, designers used them in their designs. Clothing designers around the world are increasingly taking inspiration from Arabic calligraphy in their designs, such as Ezzedine Alia and Karl Lagerfeld from Chanel Couture, and recently, it is widely used in textiles, clothing, accessories, and even shoe designs, and there are many different studies on how to benefit from The Arabic letter, whether single or with Arabic motifs, is used in designing different fabrics and costumes. The researcher chose two types of Arabic calligraphy, one of them is geometric with sharp right angles, which is the Kufic type, and the other is the thuluth font, which is characterized by the abundance of curves and streamlined design. The purpose of choosing the two different types of fonts is to prove the validity of the hypothesis of benefiting from the aesthetics of Arabic letters in the design of sculptural costumes suitable for theatrical, lyrical, and cinematic performances, as well as for various celebrations and occasions because of their flexibility and flow. At the end of the research, the researcher concluded that it is possible to benefit from the aesthetics of Arabic letters in Creating and designing innovative costumes suitable for different theatrical productions, and final results and recommendations.

ФИКСАЦИЯ СТЕПЕНИ РОДСТВА НОСТРАТИЧЕСКОГО ЭТИМОНА *HuḲa В ЯЗЫКАХ ИНДОЕВРОПЕЙСКОЙ, АЛТАЙСКОЙ И АФРАЗИЙСКОЙ ЯЗЫКОВЫХ СЕМЬЯХ (по версии В. М. Иллич-Свитыча)

The article deals with the diachronic interpretation of material from the Indo-European, Altaic and Afro-Asiatic language families, reaching, on one hand, the etymons of the first level (Ancient Greek *okṷịe-, Albanian *okṷi-, Turkic *uk(ā)-, Mongolian *ukа-) and the second level (Indo-European *hṷekṷ- / *heuk-, Altaic *uka-, Afro-Asiatic *Hwq-), and on the other hand, the third level (Nostratic *HuḲa), and allows us to fix both a divergent and convergent relationship of correspondences, taking into account the established laws.

La posición del verbo en la frase y el ritmo en el sistema de Alviero Niccacci

A partir de la interpretación dada al onomástico divino veterotestamentario y la partícula waw en las formas verbales reconocemos, dentro del sistema desarrollado por Alviero Niccacci para el análisis del verbo hebreo, el criterio de la posición del verbo en la frase como responsable de la generación del ritmo en los textos bíblicos, tanto narrativos (transiciones temporales) como poéticos (merismos). Criterio que pensamos capaz de alcanzar la ondulación vibrante del origen, ritmo original (Yhwh) y originante (waw/ἰw-hwh), propio de las lenguas primitivas, abriéndose en dos direcciones: con la waw y el Tetragrama, en el contacto con el egipcio, en cuanto lengua afroasiática; y con la categoría de actualidad en el mensaje, hasta nuestra existencia (verbo ser) contemporánea. De este modo, en la posición del verbo, se reconoce una teología implícita en la sintaxis; el ritmo primitivo, original y originante.From the interpretation given to the divine veterotestamentary onomastic and the waw particle in verbal forms we recognize within the system developed by Alviero Niccacci for the analysis of the Hebrew verb, the criterion of the position of the verb in the phrase as responsible for the generation of rhythm in biblical texts, both narrative (temporal transitions) and poetic (merismus). Criterion that we think is able to achieve the vibrant ripple of the origin, original rhythm (Yhwh) and originant (waw/ἰw-hwh), typical of primitive languages opening in two directions: with waw and Tetragram in contact with the Egyptian as an Afroasiatic language, and with the category of actuality in the message until our contemporary existence (verb to be). Thus, at the position of the verb an implicit theology is recognized in the syntax, the primitive original and originant rhythm.

Parataxe après négation et interrogation

In this article, I will study parataxis after a negation or a question. Parataxis is well described in the grammars of ancient Greek and Latin. It occurs in modern Greek, ancient French, and in Hamito-Semitic languages such as Arabic, Berber or Biblical Hebrew. I would like to underline here the specificity of negation and question (yes-no question or wh- question). In these examples, negation or question always heads a complex sentence consisting of two coordinated and most often antithetical clauses. These structures do not belong exclusively to a particular language : they are universal as they reflect emotions or movements of thought (astonishment, reasoning, argumentation). It would be interesting to find out whether they occur in languages other than the ones I have mentioned.

Diachronic Interpretation of Phonomorphological and Semantic Regularities of Nostratic (Based on *HuḲa “eye”)

The diachronic interpretation of Indo-European *hṷekṷ- / *heuk- “eye, to see”, Altaic *uka- “to notice, to understand” and Afro-Asiatic *Hwq- “to know”, originating from Nostratic *HuḲa “eye, to see”, allowed to establish both divergent and convergent types of linguistic relationship among them, for which the close (Indo-European, Altaic, Afro-Asiatic) and remote / distant (Indo-European / Afro-Asiatic and Altaic) types of language relationship have been established, depending on the action of the main phonomorphological and semantic regularities.The degree of manifestation of phonomorphological laws indicates a close type of language relationship among Indo-European, Altaic and Afro-Asiatic language families. They are: 1) the law on the three-letter / three-phonemic root structure of an archetype (according to E. Benvenist), which corresponds to the law on the consonant root (according to A G. Belova): it helped to fix three phonemes in Indo-European *hṷekṷ- / *heuk-, Altaic *uka- and Afro-Asiatic *Hwq-, as well as to trace the reflexes of this structure in the genetic data material of these language families; 2) the law of the mora is fixed in the Indo-European *hṷekṷ- / *heuk-, Altaic *uka- and Afro-Asiatic *Hwq-, the forms of which correspond to a monosyllable structure, and mono- and multisyllable structures have been observed in the genetic data material; 3) the process of spirantisation consists in weakening the consonant phoneme /q/, i.e. the reflection /q/ into /k/ and /x/; 4) the process of “pharyngisation” can be traced at the end of monosyllabic words, where it could occur by analogy with those forms of the word where the consonant was intervocal; 5) the law on the pronunciation of short vowel phonemes /a/ and /u/, where such features are represented: 1) the degree of solution of the oral cavity; 2) hardness / softness (low tonality / high tonality); 3) absence or presence of labilisation; 6) the law of prosody, which consists in the realisation of stress in accordance with various languages; 7) the law of an open syllable.The degree of phonomorphological manifestations indicates a remote / distant form of language relationship between Indo-European / Afro-Asiatic and Altaic language families, where one of the provisions of the phonetic prohibitions of Jucquо, i.e. when the initial and final laryngals are not allowed, is traced in the Indo-European *hṷekṷ- / *heuk- and Afro-Asiatic *Hwq-.The degree of manifestation of semantic laws indicates a close type of language relationship among Indo-European, Altaic and Afro-Asiatic language families, where 2 lexico-semantic variants (LSV) were fixed: 1) somatism; 2) action. If in the Indo-European *hṷekṷ- / *heuk- “eye, to see” 2 LSVs are fixed: 1) somatism; 2) action, but in the Altaic *uka- “to notice, to understand”, including Turkic *uk(ā)- “to raise, to listen” and Mongolian *uk- “to notice”, as well as the Afro-Asiatic *Hwq- “to know” – only 1 LSV – 2) action.

К РЕКОНСТРУКЦИИ ПОКАЗАТЕЛЯ ЕДИНИЧНОСТИ n- В ЧАДСКИХ ЯЗЫКАХ

The Afro-asiatic macro family includes Chadic, Semitic, Egyptian, Cushitic, Omotic, and Berber languages. The Chadic branch consists of about 170 languages spoken in Nigeria, Niger, Cameroon and Chad. The present paper continues a series of publications on Chadic diachronic morphology, focusing on prefixal derivation morphology. (For the velar prefix k- in different noun groups of Chadic languages and the verbalizing prefix ˀa-, see: [Stolbova 2015; 2018]. We propose a reconstruction of the singulative marker n- in Chadic nouns. As follows from our previous studies, lexicalized (or “frozen”) affixes are typical of unwritten Chadic languages; they can be uncovered only on the basis of lexical comparison. A careful analysis of singular forms derived from collective nouns denoting people, hoofed animals or insects suggests that the initial nasal in singular forms should be identified as a derivational prefix. We argue that in Chadic languages, n-forms precipitated the tendency to prenasalize primary singular nouns with the abovementioned semantics (people, animal, insect names). We also discuss external cognates pointing to the proto-Chadic origin of this prefix. Further research, on other Chadic noun groups (wild animals, birds, snakes) and especially on Semitic and Cushitic could clarify whether this morphological innovation was exclusive to Chadic or was shared by other Afro-asiatic languages.