WOODARD, R.D. (Ed.) — the Cambridge Encyclopaedia of the World's Ancient Languages

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VARIA

WOODARD, R.D. (Ed.) — The Cambridge Encyclopaedia of the World's Ancient Languages. Cambridge Univer- sity Press, Cambridge 2004. (25 cm, XX, 1162). ISBN 0-521-56256-2. $160,-; £120,-. It is always difficult to review a book that is the result of a collective effort of so many people. The forty-five chapters of this encyclopaedic work are written by thiry-five different authors hence the quality of the chapters may differ accord- ingly. In the introduction, Woodard explains that in this encyclopaedia ‘ancient' means ‘attested in the fifth century AD or before', i.e. the end of the western Roman Empire in 476 traditionally marking the end of the period of Antiquity. At the same time, this ensures that the languages included are all attested before language documentation begins to become more profuse. The purpose of the book is to present a grammatical description of the languages treated, which means that languages of which only scant material is left, or undeciphered languages are not treated, although they are mentioned in the introduction (the undeciphered languages being 1. undeciphered Elamite, 2. the Indus Valley language, 3. from Crete: Cretan Pictographic, Linear A and the language inscribed on the Phaistos disk, 4. from Cyprus: Archaic Cypro-Minoan, Cypro-Minoan 1, 2 and 3, and Eteo-Cypriot, 5. Pseudo- Hieroglyphic from Byblos, 6. Meroitic in its two forms, 7. Libyan, 8. Proto-Sinaitic, 9. Iberian languages (apart from Celtiberian), 10. Some italic languages as North-Picene, 11. Pictish, which is styled not Celtic and probably not Indo- European1), and the insufficiently attested languages being, in Europe: 1. Siculan, 2. Raetic and Lemnian, 3. Ligurian, 4. Illyrian, 5. Thracian, 6. Macedonian, 7. Messapic, in Mesoamerica: 8. Zapotec (on which, however, a short remark is included on the pages 1109-1111). The descriptions of the other languages consist of a short overview of the historical context in which the respective language was used and an overview of the structure of the language along traditional lines, describing phonology, morphology, syntax and lexicon, concluded by short bibliography. The editor has not attempted to use one transcription method throughout the whole of the work, different transcription styles being current in the diverse disciplines, which ensures that the different chapters are easily studied by scholars in the particular field, although it may be a small set-back for someone who uses the book to get an impres- sion of the structure of languages unknown to him. It is interesting to see how in the main bulk of the work (as a result of the terminus ante quem?), some language fam- ilies are amply covered while others are not or only scantily present. The Afro-Asiatic language family is represented by eight languages (Akkadian, Ugaritic, Hebrew, Phoenician, Aramaic, Ge}ez, Ancient South Arabian, Ancient North Ara- bian, pp. 138-533), Indo-European by nineteen (Hittite, Luvian, Palaic, Lycian, Lydian, Carian, Greek, Sanskrit, Old Persian, Avestan, Pahlavi, Phrygian, Latin, Sabellian languages, Venetic, Continental Celtic, Gothic, Ancient Nordic, Classical Armenian, pp. 534-942). Other languages, of which the relation to other languages is still in doubt, are presented,

1) Cf. however Katherine Forsyth, Language in Pictland, Utrecht 1997, who maintains that all Pictish material is really Celtic after all. 8367_BIOR_05_5-6_01 30-01-2006 09:10 Pagina 508

621 BIBLIOTHECA ORIENTALIS LXII N° 5-6, september-december 2005 622

four from the Ancient Near East (Sumerian, Elamite, Hur- explained solely by the above asssumptions, when we find that rian, Urartian, pp. 19-137) and two from Europe (Etruscan, ql, as object of the verb sm{, followed by the suffix of the third Georgian, pp. 943-987). The rest of the books contains the person sing., the form of the suffix is normally -}, but -m is description of two other languages from Asia (Ancient Chi- attested at least seven times, -y three times, -{ twice, -{}, -}{, - nese, Old Tamil, pp. 988-1040) and of two languages from h, and -n once.4) The situation seems to be, rather, that in the Mesoamerica (Mayan, Epi-Olmec, pp. 1041-1111). A chap- later Punic period a suffix -im for the third person sing. arises, ter on reconstructed ancient languages concludes the book in a period when the case endings are perhaps already lost. (pp. 1112-1128). The whole is made more accessible by four In the short bibliography one is surprised to find both indices (general subjects, grammar and linguistics, linguistic Krahmalkov's grammar and dictionary. These works are, laws, languages, 1129-1162). because of the many personal idiosyncrasies contained in In the case of languages that are near to each other from them, not really useful for the beginner or outsider in thed historical-linguistic point of view, there is some overlap in field of Phoenician an Punic.5) However, these few critical the descriptions. The remark on ‘word structure' in Phoeni- remarks do not diminish the worth of this chapter, which cian (11.4.1, p. 372), is parallelled by the description of the gives, as the other chapters on ancient Near Eastern languages ‘morphological-type and word structure' in Hebrew (10.4.1, do, a practical and useful overview of the grammar of Phoeni- pp. 335-6, and ‘noun formation' (10.4.2.5, pp. 339-41) and cian and Punic. by the note on ‘nominal formation' in Ugaritic (9.4.2.1, p. Joseph F. Eska saw no problem in the discussion in one 294). As Ugaritic, Hebrew and Phoenician are very nearly chapter of the several different languages normally described related, Hebrew being the better known of these languages, as Continental Celtic (chapter 35, pp. 857-880). Several lan- it would have been practical to limit the description of the guages are distinguished as Hispano-Celtic (Celt-Iberian, spo- Hebrew facts, indicating, as was done to some measure by ken in the northern part of the Iberian peninsula), Galatian Pardee for Ugaritic, where the information on Ugaritic and (Asia Minor), Lepontic (Northern Italy), Gaulish (Belgium Phoenician is (still) incomplete. The same subject is also and France). The relation of these languages with the prede- treated by Huehnergard in his description of Proto-Semitic in cessors of the Celtic languages attested on the British Isles the overview of the Afro-Asiatic languages, ‘morphological (Goidelic: Irish, Scots Gaelic, Manx and Brittonic: Welsh, type and word structure' (6.3.3.1, pp. 145-6).2) However, the Cornish, Breton) is still debated. The languages known from comparable sections may easily be found and the character inscriptions that are datable before the terminus ante quem of the book probably requires this approach. are Lepontic (600 BC to the beginning of the Christian era), As it is impossible to review all chapters of this ency- Gaulish (3d century BC to 2d century AD) and Celt-Iberian. clopaedia in a detailed way, we have limited ourselves to a The last mentioned one is attested from 200 BC to the 2d short discussion of only one chapter, choosing one from the century AD, but it is the most conservative type of Conti- Afro-Asiatic language family, viz. the one on Phoenician and nental Celtic. Eska discusses the writing systems used for a remark on the chapter on Continental Celtic. these Celtic languages, an important issue as Continental Chapter 11, on Phoenican and Punic (pp. 365-385), is writ- Celtic is only known represented in borrowed writing sys- ten by Jo Ann Hackett. The introductory remark provides prac- tems. Hispano-Celtic in at least two slightly different forms tical definitions of Phoenicia, Phoenician, Punic, Neopunic and of an adaptation of the Iberian script, early Gaulish text in Latino-Punic, although one might question whether the largest Greek, the later ones in Latin script, while Lepontic (and the corpus of votive texts really relate to child sacrifice (p. 366), few Cisalpine Gaulish texts) is written in variants of the north as many votive texts do not state the character of the vow of Etruscan script. Especially the Iberian script and its adapta- the supplicant. The note on dialectal variation is to the point tion for Hispano-Celtic poses problems.It is described as but very short, resulting in the incomplete statement: “The semi-moraic semi-segmental, i.e. partly syllabic (the stops p, third masculine possessive suffix on nouns that end in a vowel t, k whether voiced or not, followed by one of the vowels a, is -y in Standard Phoenician, but -m in late Punic texts” (p. e, i, o, u), partly phonemic (the vowels a, e, i, o, u and the 367), where it is unclear which nouns end in vowels. Later the other consonants, m, l, n, r, s, s, with alternatives m, n, r). statement is repeated (p. 375), but from table 11.3 it may be The writing of the stops, which in the language were not concluded that nouns ending in a consonant are nouns in the always followed by a vowel, may vary. The morphology of nominative/accusative case, while nouns ending in a vowel are these languages is typically Indo-European and although still nouns in the genitive case. However, the case endings were not entirely clear, because of the lack of texts, it seems rather probably dropped already in standard Phoenician, which makes straightforward. The most interesting part of Eska's paper is it difficult to explain the differentiation in late Punic. The same the one treating syntax (pp. 871-877), mainly because of the view is advocated by Amadasi,3) note, however, her remark on special place of the Celtic languages attested on the British the exceptions in late Punic (-m used following a noun in nom- Isles within the Indo-European family. The VSO-character of inative/accusative position, and -} and -y in the genetive posi- the Goidelic and Brittonic languages must be an innovation tion). It seems that the situation in late Punic cannot be in these languages when compared to Continental Celtic. His- pano-Celtic is a OSV-language, while in Gaulish verb-initial, verb-medial and verb-final are found. The idea that Gaulish 2) A chapter on Canaanite dialects might also have been used to bring together the comparable features in Ugaritic, Hebrew and Phoenician. Chap- ter 12, by Pardee, titled ‘Canaanite dialects' (pp. 386-90) is concerned with 4) K. Jongeling, ‘The concluding formulae in Punic votive inscriptions', the Northwest Semitic dialects of the second millennium BC, apart from DS-NELL iv, 1999, pp. 39-79, see p. 48. Ugaritic, known from Canaanite features in Akkadian documents, and from 5) On Krahmalkov's Phoenician-Punic Dictionary, Leuven 2000, cf. K. the Proto-Sinaitic and Proto-Canaanite inscriptions. Jongeling & R. M. Kerr, ‘A Personal, ‘Phoenico-Punic Dictionary' ‘, Ori- 3) Friedrich-Röllig, Phönizische-Punische Grammatik, 3. Auflage, neu entalia lxxi, 2002, pp. 173-181, and on his A Phoenician Grammar, Lei- bearbeitet von M. G. Amadasi Guzzo unter Mitarbeit von W. R. Mayer, den 2001, cf. id., ‘The Grammar of Krahmalkov's Phoenicians', Folia Ori- Roma 1999, §§112, 234, 237 entalia xxxix, 2004 [2005], pp. 197-205. 8367_BIOR_05_5-6_01 30-01-2006 09:10 Pagina 509

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might be a verb-second language which has been maintained, the topic and a Forschungsgeschichte of each work. It is laud- is dismissed by Eska, and it seems that verb-medial as basic ably thorough and detailed. word order has a good chance to be the correct description In section 4 of this first part of the book he describes in of Gaulish, with the first moves towards a VSO-order already some detail the Armenian manuscripts that contain the trans- coming to the surface. We are still convinced that a substra- lated Byzantine law-codes. Again, Kaufhold's careful work tum on the British Isles was mainly responsible for the VSO- is to be praised as exhibited in this thorough presentation of order in Island Celtic, but perhaps some possibilities of the the manuscripts in all their detail. It is a pity that he did not Gaulish word order facilitated the change. Whether the dif- use the system of sigla endorsed by the Association interna- ferent basic orders in Continental Celtic should be ascribed tionale des études arméniennes but, fortunately, for the main to different substrata in e.g. Gallia and Hispania is an inter- libraries his system is not very different. He describes 74 esting topic not discussed in this volume, that is mainly of a manuscripts and deals, on pages 45 ff., with the difficult task descriptive nature. The subject could have been included, of of grouping the manuscripts, and their characterization. In his course, in the chapter by Don Ringe on “Reconstructed description of the groups he gives many details of orthogra- Ancient languages”6) (pp. 1112-1128), but unfortunately only phy and word usage. the historical method is briefly discussed concentrating on In the second part of the book, devoted to the Short Col- proto-languages, while the problems of “languages in con- lection, he has an interesting introduction in which he dis- tact” are not mentioned (note also that “substratum” nor cusses various aspects of the Sententiae Syriacae. This intro- “adstratum” are to be found in the subject index). duction is another example of thoroughness. First, the author Notwithstanding some small critical remarks, we may well introduces the Syriac version from which the Armenian was congratulate the editor with a really encyclopaedic work that translated (the oldest manuscript is dated about 800 CE). Next gives in many instances much more information than he discusses various aspects of the translation: how the trans- expected. lator handled words he did not know, how he translated ad sensum foreign terms (mainly Greek, or Latin through Greek) Leiden University, April 2005 K. JONGELING that he did not understand precisely, as well as quite precise translations of many Greek terms that were transliterated into Syriac (pp. 80-82), and others. He maintains against Karst, that ** the legal texts were translated from Greek and Syriac into * Classical Armenian and not into the Cilician dialect. This is particularly clear from manuscript V1223 (Venice, Mekhitarist KAUFHOLD, H. — Die armenischen Übersetzungen byzan- Library) while later copies that were known to Karst have tinischer Rechtsbücher. Erster Teil: Allgemeines. many “popular” or medieval forms, but these are secondary. Zweiter Teil: Die “Kurze Sammlung” (“Sententiae Syr- Kaufhold deals in some particular detail with orthographic iacae”). Forschungen zur Byzantinischen Rechts- peculiarities, and in this section it seems to us, that he could geschichte, Band 21. Löwenklau Gesellschaft, Frankfurt have presented them not just by categories “vowels”, “diph- am Main, 1997. (24 cm, XVI, 223). ISBN 3-923615-17- thongs”, etc. but have differentiated them by date and loca- 5. DM 60,-. tion in a systematic way. Such orthographic variants are com- Hubert Kaufhold has presented scholars interested in monplace in medieval Armenian manuscripts, while the Armenian Studies, as well as legal historians, with a funda- “correct” orthography of the grammars of Meillet, Jensen, etc. mental and thorough work on a most interesting collection of is rarely found in a pure form in actual manuscripts. Nonethe- Byzantine legal material, the “Short Collection”, also known less, in this section of the book, pp. 86-97 he has assembled a as “Sententiae Syriacae”. His book is composed of two parts. great deal of information about spelling and morphology of The first part is a general introduction and the second part is his manuscripts, which seem to show many medieval forms. a careful edition of the relevant texts, with introduction, crit- The text is clearly presented and the apparatus criticus is ical apparatus, translation and commentary. Two word lists well and clearly edited. The translation is aligned opposite conclude the whole: one is tri-lingual Armenian-Syriac-Ger- the text, while notes, mainly technical in character, are oppo- man and the other is bi-lingual Armenian-Syriac. site the apparatus criticus, In this work, Kaufhold presents two different but allied Hubert Kaufhold is to be congratulated for an accom- studies, one introductory and the other a text edition. He has plished piece of scholarship, which makes a major contribu- chosen as his field of study the examination of legal codes tion to the knowledge of the Armenian legal tradition and not composed in Armenian. He numbers six of these, of medieval Armenian learning. which two were otherwise preserved in Syriac alone and the other four in Greek (pp. 5-6). The second item in his list of Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Michael E. STONE these law codes is entitled, “Erneute kurze Sammlung der September 2005 Gesetze” (“Sententiae Syriacae”) and it is this work that he edits and translates in the second part of the book. In the first part we are presented with a painstaking study of the translated Byzantine law-codes, each dealt with sepa- rately (5-19). The bibliography concerning, and the textual situation and status of each of the codes is dealt with indepen- dently. This section provides both a technical introduction to

6) In his bibliography we missed R.S.P. Beekes, Comparative Indo- European Linguistics, Amsterdam-Philadelphia 1995.