ENCYCLOPEDIA of HEBREW LANGUAGE and LINGUISTICS Volume 1 A–F

ENCYCLOPEDIA OF HEBREW LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTICS Volume 1 A–F

General Editor Geoffrey Khan

Associate Editors Shmuel Bolokzy Steven E. Fassberg Gary A. Rendsburg Aaron D. Rubin Ora R. Schwarzwald Tamar Zewi

Volume One

Introduction ...... vii List of Contributors ...... ix Transcription Tables ...... xiii Articles A-F ...... 1

Volume Two

Transcription Tables ...... vii Articles G-O ...... 1

Volume Three

Transcription Tables ...... vii Articles P-Z ...... 1

Volume Four

Transcription Tables ...... vii Index ...... 1

© 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-17642-3 640 cultural words: biblical hebrew names, or sentences that form the core of References any esoteric formula employed for the fab- De Leeuw, Karl and Jan Bergstra (eds.). 2007. The rication of talismans show to this very day history of information security. A comprehensive handbook. Amsterdam: Elsevier. an easily detectable Hebrew patina, a very Glidden, Hope. 1987. “Polygraphia and the Renais- influential, and still reprinted manual for deci- sance sign: The case of Trithemius”. Neophilolo- phering cryptographies or slang in use among gus 71:183–195. Ofer, Yosef. 2008. “Methods of encoding in Sam- delinquents or members of marginal groups, uel de Archevolti’s Arugat ha-Bosem”. European illustrates this point. The author and Ger- Journal of Jewish Studies 2:45–63. man police officer Friedrich Christian Benedikt Schippers, Arie. 2000. “The work of Samuel Archi- Avé-Lallemant (1809–1892) published between volti (1515–1611) in the light of the classical traditions and cinquecento Italian literature”. Hel- 1858 and 1862 a groundbreaking book on mantica 51:121–138. the dialects of the underworld, under the title Das deutsche Gaunerthum in seiner social- Saverio Campanini politischen, literarischen und linguistischen (IRHT—CNRS, Paris) Ausbildung zu seinem heutigen Bestande ‘The German underworld in its social, political, lit- erary and linguistic formation to its contem- Cultural Words: Biblical Hebrew porary existence’. The definition of a specific language of the Gaunerthum ‘criminal under- The ancient Hebrew lexicon contains a con- world’, coinciding in large parts with Yiddish siderable number of Kulturwörter or Wan- (of which he provides a full-fledged grammati- derwörter, that is, lexical items whose origins cal description), is not a mere reflection of the cannot be identified with certainty, but which situation of impoverished Jews ensuring their are common to cultures throughout a particu- survival through illegal activities and of other lar region, as well as loanwords borrowed from delinquents finding it useful to communicate various languages used over a wide area (from by means of this ‘strange’ language to escape the Mediterranean to South Asia). No doubt the attention of the authorities (to no avail, so Israel’s geographical location—as the land it appears), it is far more a late manifestation bridge between the two great cultural centers of the perceived connection between Judaism of Egypt and Mesopotamia, along with access and ‘forbidden secrecy’, which celebrated its to the Mediterranean Sea to the west and the triumphs from the Renaissance onwards. Red Sea, and thence the Indian Ocean, to the The particular nature of Hebrew alphabetic south—was a major factor in the absorption of signs, always oscillating between normalcy numerous foreign words. and two extreme statuses—perfect language Among the most commonly recognized Kul- barzÆl ַבְּר ֶזל or perfect swindle—can be verified, even if, turwörter in Biblical Hebrew are tannùr ‘oven’, which rank among ַתּנּוּר a posteriori, from a completely different field ‘iron’ and of knowledge, absolutely extraneous, at least the most well-traveled words in recorded linguis- apparently, to esoterism and magic. In his tic history. The former word occurs seventy-six choice to name ±alef and to use the correspond- times in the Bible. The irregular correspondence to desig- of the phonemes in Akkadian parzillu (Mari (א) ing letter of the Hebrew alphabet nate the transfinite, to give expression to the dialect barzillu), Ugaritic br≈l, Hebrew barzÆl, fact that some infinities are larger than others, Aramaic-Syriac parzel, Sabaean frzn, Arabic to skim with the tools of quantity the unfath- firzil (specifically ‘iron fetter’) indicates that this omable realm of quality, mathematician Georg word is of non-Semitic origin (and underwent Cantor anticipated, as it were, avant la lettre, borrowing within Semitic from one language the further history of ±alef in literature, epito- to another). Forms without suffixed -l include mized by Jorge Luis Borges’s short story by the Ge≠ez bërat, Amharic-Tigrinya-Harari brät, with same title (published in 1947), which gave new the same or similar forms in other Ethiopian dimensions to the autonomous dynamics of languages, as well as forms in various Cushitic polysemy in language and to the unique blend languages, e.g., Saho-Afar birtà, Khamir birät. of secrecy and revelation that affects Hebrew, Further afield, other perhaps related words for language and script, especially from an exog- metal, without a dental or fricative conso- enous perspective. nant in third position, are Egyptian bi3 ‘metal’ © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-17642-3 cultural words: biblical hebrew 641

’qò∫a≠ ‘helmet ַקוֹבע / ≠kò∫a ַכּוֹבע most likely ‘[meteoric] iron’ in the Pyramid (d) Hebrew) Texts), Ugaritic brr ‘tin’, and Sumerian BAR (note that the word occurs with two different (not attested as an independent lexeme, but see velars, evidence of a non-native lexeme): Hittite AN.BAR ‘iron’, ZABAR ‘bronze’, KUG.BABBAR ‘silver’, kupa•i ‘helmet’, Greek κύμβαχος kumbachos qwb≠, Syriac קובע etc.). Berber azzal ‘iron’ is probably a loanword ‘crest of helmet’; cf. Aramaic from Phoenician/Punic, in which the initial b- qubbë≠à, Arabic qubba≠a, Ge≠ez qob≠, Cushitic was misinterpreted as a preposition and -rz- was (e.g., Oromo) qobi, all denoting various types assimilated to -zz-. of head covering (e.g., the Ge≠ez term means Moving to Europe, we note that Latin *bher- ‘monk’s hood’). -kinnòr ‘lyre’: Akkadian kin ִכּנּוֹר som (or *fersom—either proto-form is possible) (e) Hebrew knr, Arabic כנר ferrum is also related. The ancient ironworks nàrum, Ugaritic knr, Aramaic < discovered at Fursill, in the Italian Dolomites, kannàrat, Sanskrit kinara, Hittite kinirri, Greek indicate that this toponym derives from our κιννύρα kinnura. pìlÆ:gÆš ‘concubine’: Greek ִפּ ֶיל ֶגשׁ word as well. Barsel ‘iron’ also appears in Rot- (f) Hebrew welsch (borrowed from Hebrew). In English, παλλακίς pallakis, Latin paelex; the Hebrew brazil denotes coal with an abnormally high word clearly is borrowed from an Indo-Euro- admixture of iron pyrites. Other connected pean language, though the source cannot be words include Anglo-Saxon braes (> Modern either the Greek or Latin forms cited. English ‘brass’), Old Friesian bress ‘copper’, The origins of some Kulturwörter are known, and Middle Dutch bras ‘metal’. but since they were borrowed into Hebrew tannùr ‘oven’ occurs fifteen already at the earliest stages of the language ַתּנּוּר The word times in the Bible, including in early texts such they also deserve to be noted here. These as Gen. 15.7 and Exod. 7.28. It is attested include three loanwords from Greek attested in .mëúèrå< (Gen ְמ ֵכָרה (in Late Egyptian as trr, later Coptic trir, and early biblical texts, viz., (a ַל ִפּיד (in the following Semitic languages: Akkadian 49.5) < μάχαιρα makhaira ‘sword’; (b tinùru (attested first at Alalakh in the Middle lappì≈ (Gen. 15.7; Exod. 20.18; five times in Babylonian period), Aramaic-Syriac tannùrà, Judges, etc.) < λαμπάς lampas ‘torch, lightning’; ,liškå< (1 Sam. 9.22; otherwise late ִל ְשׁ ָכּה (Arabic tannùr, and Mehri tënnawr. Despite and (c the similarity, this word has no connection to in 2 Kgs 23.11; Jeremiah; Ezekiel; Ezra-Nehe- the Semitic root n-w-r ‘light’, but is a regional miah; Chronicles) < λέσχη leschè ‘(wine-)hall’. Kulturwort. Beyond Egypto-Semitic, the word Names of spices, as one might expect, travel entered Middle Persian and hence Modern with the products themselves, and thus Hebrew mòr, Ugaritic ֹמר ,.Persian tanùr, Turkish tandır, Azeri tëndir, is awash with such terms, e.g Armenian t‘onir and, still further to the east, mr, Arabic murr, Greek μύρρα murra, Latin qëßì≠å< , Greek κασία ְק ִצ ָיﬠה ;’Urdu-Hindi tandùr (those familiar with Indian murra ‘myrrh -karkòm, San ַכְּרכֹּם ;’cuisine will recognize the word tandoori used kasia, Latin casia ‘cassia to describe food cooked in a clay oven), and skrit kurkuma, Akkadian kurkanû, Greek Nepali tanùr. κρόκος krokos, Latin crocus, originally ‘tur- Other Kulturwörter in Biblical Hebrew meric’ apparently, and then also ‘saffron, cro- hål< òμ (both plural≤± ֲא ָהלוֹת / hål< ìm≤± ֲא ָה ִלים ;’include: cus forms are attested), Tamil (also Prakrit) aghil, këμònÆμ ‘tunic’: Ugaritic Greek ἀγάλοχον agalochon, ἀλόη aloè, Latin ְכּ ֹת ֶנת a) Hebrew) .ktn, Greek χιτών chitòn, Latin aloe ‘aloes’; etc כתן ktn, Aramaic tunica; cf. also Sumerian GADA, Akkadian kitû In addition, there are numerous loanwords ‘flax, linen’; and eventually English ‘cotton’. from Sumerian, Egyptian, Akkadian, Persian, aq ‘sack, sackcloth’: Akka- Indic, Hellenistic Greek, Latin, etc., all of» ַשׂק b) Hebrew) -q, Egyptian «g, Cop- which are treated in individual entries else» ַשׂק dian saqqu, Aramaic tic sok, Greek σάκκος sakkos, Latin saccus. where herein. ,yayin ‘wine’: Ugaritic yn ַי ִין c) Hebrew) ,.yn, Ge ez wayn, Cushitic (e.g ין Phoenician ≠ References Beja) wayni, Hittite wiyana, Greek οἶνος oinos, Brown, John Pairman. 1995–2001. Israel and Hellas. Latin vinum; cf. also Arabic wayn ‘grapes’. 3 vols. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.

© 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-17642-3 642 culture and nature Ellenbogen, Maximilian. 1962. Foreign words in the ent speakers of the same language or speakers Old Testament. London: Luzac. of different languages are exposed to very dif- Greppin, John A. C. 1991. “The survival of ancient Anatolian and Mesopotamian vocabulary until ferent kinds of experiences. Chomsky argues the present”. Journal of Near Eastern Studies that this “remarkable phenomenon” (Foucault 50:203–207. and Chomsky 1997:108) can have only one Kutscher, Eduard Yechezkel. 1961. Words and their explanation—that the system of grammatical history (in Hebrew). Jerusalem: Kiryat Sepher. Levin, Saul. 1983. “Hebrew {pi(y)lÆ. g: Æš}, Greek rules or “schematism” is innate. These innate παλλακή, Latin paelex: The origin of intermarriage principles also account for the gap between the among the early Indo-Europeans and Semites”. scarce, “scattered and degenerate” data avail- General Linguistics 23:191–197. able to children and “the very highly articu- ——. 1995. Semitic and Indo-European: The princi- pal etymologies. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. lated, highly systematic, profoundly organized Rabin, Chaim. 1974. “The origin of the Hebrew word resulting knowledge” that they manage to pilegeš”. Journal of Semitic Studies 25:353–364. derive from these data (108–109). According Rendsburg, Gary A. 1982. “Semitic PRZL/BRZL/ to Chomsky, when speaking of the notion of BR˛L ‘iron’”. Scripta Mediterranea 3:54–71. human nature, he is referring to those prin- Gary A. Rendsburg ciples that guide “our social and intellectual (Rutgers University) and individual behavior” (109). As for Foucault, he “mistrust[s] the notion of human nature a little”. While he accepts Culture and Nature the idea that human creativity is possible only within a system of rules, he does not think, as The question whether the rules of grammar Chomsky does, that it is necessary to assume are objective natural entities or a cultural and a nature of man or of consciousness as the historical creation can also take the form of a condition of existence of such rules or regulari- philosophical problem. Thus it can be related ties. According to Foucault, before one adopts to the metaphysical question whether man pos- this view, one should consider the possibil- sesses an essence or a nature or whether human ity that the rules, which are the condition of qualities are a cultural product and therefore the possibility of human creation, originate in dependent on time and place. These issues were social practices, such as economics, technology, at the center of a famous debate which took politics, and sociology. Thus he “would like to place in 1971 on Dutch television between know whether one cannot discover the system Michel Foucault and Noam Chomsky. It was of regularity, of constraint, which makes sci- later published under the title “Human Nature: ence possible, somewhere else, even outside the Justice versus Power” (Foucault and Chomsky human mind, in social forms, in the relations of 1997) and it is considered a fundamental text in production, in the class struggles, etc.” (123). matters of political philosophy as well. Since the source of regularities studied by sci- In this debate, Chomsky presents the notion ence—at least those sciences that deal with man of human nature underlying his theory of gen- and society—is society along with its history, it erative grammar. This nature or essence is follows that there is not one fixed schematism, primarily evident in the human capacity to but different kinds of schematisms, each con- create original sentences (108–109) free from stituting, according to Foucault, “a new grille, the control of stimuli (Chomsky 2006:11). In with its choices and exclusions; a new play with fact, “much of what a person says in his nor- its own rules, decisions and limitations, with mal intercourse with others is novel, much of its own inner logic, its parameters and its blind what you hear is new” (Foucault and Chom- alleys, all of which lead to the modification sky 1997:108). This free creation in language of the point of origin. And it is in this func- is, however, subject to rules, an idea formu- tioning that the understanding itself exists” lated, according to Chomsky, by Wilhelm von (117). These grilles, which are the condition Humboldt in the 1830s (113). This means of possibility of knowledge, change over time that “the speaker makes infinite use of finite in revolutionary leaps; thus they logically serve means” (Chomsky 2006:15). Furthermore, all as an “epistemological indicator” (110) or a languages that have been studied in depth “historical a priori,” which Foucault also terms reveal the same set of rules, even though differ- épistémè (1972:191; 1991:xxii). © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-17642-3