Semitic Inscriptions Research Articles

Record and Description of the Old Semitic Inscriptions from Southern Arabia. By DrKhalil Yahya Nami, of the Fuad I University, Cairo. Cairo, 1943.

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The Royal Inscriptions of Sumer and Akkad. By George A. Barton. (Library of Ancient Semitic Inscriptions, vol. i.) 8½ × 5½, pp. 406. New Haven: Yale University Press. London: Milford, 1929. 28s.

The Royal Inscriptions of Sumer and Akkad. By George A. Barton. (Library of Ancient Semitic Inscriptions, vol. i.) 8½ × 5½, pp. 406. New Haven: Yale University Press. London: Milford, 1929. 28s. - Volume 62 Issue 4

The Semitic Goddess of Fate, Fortuna-Tyche

Assyriologists have neglected the fundamental meaning of the common Semitic verb, to test, assign, allot. From this verb the name of the Arabic goddess of fate is derived. Curiously enough the earliest known Arabic name ofManâtis writtenin the Thamudic (Minæan) n. pr.Ta'bad- Manât. In Nabatæan the ordinary form is, which WellhausenReste des Arabischen Heidentums, p. 24, takes as a plural, defending this etymology by the Arabic derivativemaniyyat, fate, death, and broken pluralmanāya, in same sense. Goldziher,Archæologische epigraphische Mittheilungen aus Æsterreichvi (1882), 109, also takes the Nabatæan name as a plural, defending it from the Latin inscription from Aquileia, which hasManawat. Lidsbarski,Handbuch der Nordsemitischen Epigraphik, 313. readsManāwatu. G. A. Cooke,North Semitic Inscriptions, 79, 5et p.readsManūthu, as singular; the writing in the Coran isManātun. Arabic derivatives of this verb aremaniyyatun, fate,māni(n), one who determines, assigns,manā(n), death, fate, number, size. Hebrew derivatives are,mānā, portion,menāth, pi.mĕnayōth, portion, share. Aramaicmĕnāthā, portion, part. Syriacmĕnātha, part, portion;menyānā, number, andqalparticiplemāne kaukebe, one who determines by stars, astrologer.

The “Shalamians” of Arabia

Nabataean sepulchral inscriptions from El-Ḥejra in the El-Ḥejraejaz, 40 miles south of Teima and 300 miles S.S.E. of Petra, frequently mention the Nabateaans and Shalamians. The Aramaic-Nabataean inscriptions may be found in Professor Cooke's North Semitic Inscriptions, Nos. 78–109, and Professor Lidbarski's Nordsemitische Epigraphik, pp. 448–457. In them occur the names of the old Arabic deities, Dūsharā of Petra, Manūthu, a goddess of Qudaid in the southern Ḥejaz south of Medīna, Qaishā, Allat, principal goddess of the Arabians, and Hubalu of Mekka. According to Hommel, Grundriss, 715, n. 1, Allat may have been the principal deity of the Shalamians, but this is uncertain, and the exact location of this tribe is unknown. The “Shalamians” occur in three tomb inscriptions from El-Ḥejra, Cooke, ibid., 79 (1 b.c.), No. 81 (a.d. 4), No. 86 (a.d. 26).

Tsade and Sampi

In my contribution on the ‘Sematography of Greek Papyri’ (J.H.S. xxii, 1902) I included the Ptolemaic symbol Τ or = 900 among those of whose origin no satisfactory explanation could be offered (p. 138); although on p. 145 I identified the symbol with the later minuscule symbol ‘sampi’ or = 900, and pointed out the improbability of any association of the latter with either Pi or San-Sigma, whether in forms or arithmetical values. For the rest, as I said, ‘we must wait until we are in possession of ante-Ptolemaic documents, or of some facts yet to be supplied by epigraphy.’This paper is the report of a more thorough survey of the field of Greek and general archaeology on all the questions and problems involved in the explanation of the sign. These are in the best sense trivial, lying at the crossing of the ways of nob a few important theories, to which the foremost scholars have recently devoted much investigation—the composition and history of the Greek alphabet, particularly as regards its application for numeration, the enigmatical Tsade, the mutual relations of the ancient alphabets, the antiquity of S. Semitic (Arabian), Minaean, and Sabaean inscriptions, and the place of the Phoenician alphabet in the history of primitive Hellas.

Semitic Inscriptions. Enno Littmann

<i>Semitic Inscriptions</i>. Enno Littmann

Rev. G. A. Cooke, M.A. A Text-Book of North Semitic Inscriptions, Moabite, Hebrew, Phœnician, Aramaic, Nabatæan, Palmyrene, Jewish. pp. xxiv and 407, with fourteen plates. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1903. 16s. net.)

Rev. G. A. Cooke, M.A. A Text-Book of North Semitic Inscriptions, Moabite, Hebrew, Phœnician, Aramaic, Nabatæan, Palmyrene, Jewish. pp. xxiv and 407, with fourteen plates. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1903. 16s. net.) - Volume 35 Issue 4