ARAM, 7 (1995) 73-88 73
NOTES ON PALMYRENE ARAMAIC TEXTS
DELBERT R. HILLERS
A work entitled Palmyrene Aramaic Texts, by Eleonora Cussini and the present writer, is in press, scheduled to appear in fall, 1995. This contains an extensive bibliography, an edition of all the texts known to us, and a glossary.1 One of our purposes was to keep the work handy and affordable in price, so instead of giving translations of the texts, or providing each with extensive philological notes, we resorted to making the glossary fairly long, with citations to illustrate the contexts in which a word is used, transla- tions of those bits of text, and references to scholarly discussions of lexical items. Even so, in the course of working on the book, the present writer encoun- tered a few points where he wanted to write at somewhat greater length, per- haps to present an individual point of view, but felt this was at odds with the general proportion of the articles in the glossary or the collaborative nature of the work. Within Palmyrene Aramaic Texts, then, we have made occasional refer- ence to forthcoming fuller discussion with the phrase: “see Hillers, Notes,” and the present paper offers those notes. With grammatical topics first, then lexical topics, the following points will be discussed: 1) dissimilatory loss of the preposition beth; 2) a double abstract formation, involving the ending -ut; 3) a noun phrase that is inflected for gender, bnt X; 4) two items concerning the verb qwm: a) qwm in the peal (basic form) as derived from the causative (Afel), and b) qwm as marker of ingressive phasal aspect; 5) a textual conjecture that adds the word Ìpy<†>wtˆ, “zeal, energy” to the Palmyrene lexicon; and finally, 6) an attempt at defining the disputed term srgbˆ, as meaning “hinge, door fitting”, this being associated with the less problematic mlbn, “door-frame, doorway”.
1 Hillers, D. R., and Cussini, E., Palmyrene Aramaic Texts, (Baltimore). I am grateful to Dr. Cussini for bibliographic suggestions for the present paper, and for a critical reading of the manuscript. 74 NOTES ON PALMYRENE ARAMAIC TEXTS
1) Dissimilatory loss of the preposition beth. The loss of the monoconso- nantal preposition b before certain words with initial b or p is attested in an especially clear fashion in a recently published Palmyrene Aramaic text (BS III text number 45, of A.D. 132).2 This is a bilingual text, Greek and Aramaic, and the two versions combine to make the phonological point under discus- sion. The relevant part of the Greek text, from Dunant's edition, is: 17 … aûtoÕ 18 ândr[iántav téssarav ânéstjs]e, ∏n[a] 19 mè[nê]ntaÕq[a ên ïer¬ç Dióv], ∏na dè 20 [ê]n ïer¬ç †lsei, ∏na dè [ê]nïe[r¬ç] ‰Areov 21 kaì tòn tétarton ên ïer¬ç ˆAtargáteiov. Thus this part of the honorific inscription says that a caravan grateful to an effective leader: “… [set u]p [four] sta[tues] of him, one [h]er[e in the sanc- tuary of Zeus], one [i]n the sacred grove, one [i]n the sanc[tuary] of Ares and the fourth in the sanctuary of Atargatis ….” The corresponding Aramaic text is: 10 … ¨bdw lh 11 Òlm[yˆˆln ˆrb¨]ˆ lyqrh ˆÌd tnn bt 12 [b¨lsmn wˆÌd bt ˆr]Òw wˆÌd bgntˆˆlym 13 [wˆrb¨tˆ … bt ¨tr¨th …] This may be translated “… made for him [these fou]r statu[es], in his honor, one here in the house of [Baal]shamin, [and one in the house of Ars]u, and one in the garden of the gods (a phrase both intriguing and puzzling) and [the fourth … in the house of ¨Atar¨ate ….].” Note that the Greek text, as would be expected, repeats the preposition ên with each location. The Aramaic text is lacunose, but the extant parts do con- tain the evidence that concerns us at the moment, so that one may contrast bgntˆˆlym, where the b is written, and bt [b¨lsmn …], where it is not present before the initial labial of bt “house.”
2 BS III text no. 45 (A.D. 132); see also Milik, J. T., Dédicaces faites par des dieux (Palmyre, Hatra, Tyr) et des thiases sémitiques à l'époque romaine, (Recherches d'épigraphie proche-orientale, I; Paris, 1972), 2-9; and Hillers, D. R., and Cussini, E., “Two Readings in the Caravan Inscription Dunant, Baalshamin, No. 45,” BASOR, No. 286 (May, 1992), 35-37, with further bibliography. Note also Drijvers, H., “Greek and Aramaic in Palmyrene Inscrip- tions,” in Geller, M., Greenfield, J., and Weitzman, M. (eds.), Studia Aramaica: New Sources and New Approaches, (Journal of Semitic Studies, Supplement 4, Oxford, 1995), 31-42. DELBERT R. HILLERS 75
Such a correspondence of Greek ên with Ø (zero; absence of b) in the Aramaic version is found also in another bilingual inscription, of A.D. 171 (Cantineau, J., “Tadmorea (suite),” Syria, 17 (1936), 280, text number 20): 7… aï dè t[±]vp[ó]le[w]v téssarev ƒulaì ëkás[tj] 8 ên î[díwç ïer¬ç ândrían]ta ânßgeiren …. This bit of Greek text may be translated: “… the four tribes of [t]he c[i]ty, each in its o[wn sanctuary,] erected [a statue …].” The Aramaic is approxi- mately the same, having the sense: “[The four] tribes made (statues), each tribe a bronze statue in the house of its god ….” In the Aramaic, as before, Greek ïer¬ç is matched by a phrase with bt “house of …”, and the bt “house” is without the preposition b. 8… ¨bd lh [ˆrb¨] 9pÌzyˆ pÌz pÌz bt ˆlhyh Òlm dy nÌs … Note also the bilingual text recently published by H. Drijvers (“Greek and Aramaic” 34, 36; see note 2 above), where Greek ïer¬ç (followed by noun) consistently corresponds to zero, that is, no explicit preposition, before Ara- maic bt “house”. Brockelmann discusses this phenomenon briefly, using the designation “haplology” (German: Haplologische Silbenelipse).3 It has long been a mat- ter of discussion within studies of biblical Hebrew, where besides bayit also petaÌ for b¢petaÌ (initial labial p) is attested, and noted as a phenomenon in Syriac, as e.g. by Nöldeke.4 I call attention to examples in Palmyrene Aramaic because here we have the advantage of a control from a contemporary Greek version, and because it is appropriate to confirm such an analysis of the Palmyrene texts in question, where uncertainty on this point was expressed in the past. Thus
3 Grundriss der vergleichenden Grammatik der semitischen Sprachen, Vol. I, (Berlin, 1908), §97 k (page 265); Brockelmann remarks “… bet findet sich ebenso im Aram.,” with- out giving examples, though he does cite comparable phenomena in Syriac and modern Ara- maic; Bauer-Leander, Historische Grammatik der hebräischen Sprache des Alten Testaments, (Hildesheim, 1991 [reprint of Halle, 1922]) §22 a Haplologie (page 217) gives no compara- tive evidence; KB3 page 101, second column, number 22, cites biblical evidence but for com- parison gives only “U(garitic) M(anual) §10,4.” 4 Joüon, P., Grammaire de l'hébreu biblique, (Rome, 1947) page 380, paragraph 126 h gives an extensive listing of occurrences in biblical Hebrew. For Nöldeke's laconic remark, see Nöldeke, T., Kurzgefasste Syrische Grammatik, (Darmstadt, 1966 reprint of Leipzig, 1898) §157 (page 99) footnote 2. 76 NOTES ON PALMYRENE ARAMAIC TEXTS
Cantineau, who does not discuss this detail in his Grammaire of 1935, declares, in his notes to the relevant texts, that these phrases are “a little sur- prising,” or “very odd.”5 Though the phonological point is minor, a fuller discussion is a desidera- tum. The same phenomenon is found in the Aramaic inscriptions of Hatra.6 It is possible that dissimilatory loss of b is attested also in Nabataean. Milik hesitates to admit this explanation of a problematic case, involving place- name beginning with b, perhaps with justification. Such an interpretive problem, I suggest, would be easier to resolve within the scope of a more conclusive general study of the situation in the Semitic languages as a group, taking into account the other occurrences, cited above, in Middle Aramaic.7 Akkadian might serve as a check on the theory that a phonetic feature, a dis- similatory loss, is really involved here, for the Akkadian semantic equivalent is unrelated phonetically, namely ina, whereas bîtu corresponds to the com- mon Semitic word for house, with initial b. As far as the present writer has been able to determine, from the silence of reference works consulted, and from consultation with specialists, “in the house” in Akkadian is ina bît, and simple bît with this sense does not occur. Since it is difficult to establish a negative proposition of this type (the detail X does not occur) it would be interesting to know from other specialists whether counter-examples are found in Akkadian. 2) My second topic, which is in the area of morphology, is a double abstract formation in Palmyrene Aramaic, that is, a kind of curiosity in the
5 Cantineau, J., “Tadmorea (suite),” Syria, 17, (1936), 281 (the whole article = 267-355). “L'apposition Òlm bt bl “statue du temple de Bêl” ou “dans le temple de Bel (sic)” est un peu étonnante; il n'y a cependant pas moyen de lire autre chose". Later, Cantineau declares it “très curieux” that in the phrase bt ˆlhyh there should be no preposition. The point is not discussed in the fundamental grammatical studies of Rosenthal and Cantineau: Cantineau, J., Grammaire du palmyrénien épigraphique Cairo, 1935; Rosenthal, F., Die Sprache der palmyrenischen Inschriften und ihre Stellung innerhalb Aramäischen, Mitteilungen der Vor- derasiatisch-Aegyptischen Gesellschaft, 41. Band, 1. Heft, (Leipzig, 1936). 6 Aggoula, B., Inventaire des inscriptions hatréennes, (Institut français d’archéologie du proche-orient, Bibliothèque archéologique et historique tome CXXXIX, Paris, 1991), text no. 272, page 129, line 1 = Vattioni, F., Le iscrizioni di Îatra, Istituto orientale di Napoli, Supplemento n. 28 agli Annali, vol. 41, (Naples, 1981), fasc. 3, 88, inscription no. 272: … swrˆ wˆbwlˆ dy bnˆ byt ˆlhˆ nÒr[w] mryˆ … (the wall and gate which he built in the house of the god NÒrw, the lord). 7 Milik, J. T., “Nouvelles inscriptions nabatéennes,” Syria, 35, (1958), 247-48; discussing ˆln nÒbˆ dy bÒrˆ he considers and then rejects the idea that this might be explained as “in bÒrˆ” (< *bbÒrˆ, as in Hebrew): “Mais en nabatèen on n'en pas d'example ….” DELBERT R. HILLERS 77 way of forming certain abstract nouns. The same phenomenon is found in a few cases in Syriac, and is perhaps connected to a similar unusual pattern in formation of certain plurals. It is probable that relevant evidence on the subject treated here might be found elsewhere in Semitic, to say nothing of general linguistics, hence my observations are, as in the previous case, meant to describe phenomena in the Palmyrene corpus, suggesting that an improved description or explanation might be reached in an inquiry with a broader tex- tual and theoretical basis. As would be expected in an ancient Semitic language, we find in Pal- myrene Aramaic a suffix -ut (written -wt) used to form abstracts of nouns, The nouns meaning “head, chief” thus rbn and also the shorter rb frequently occur in construct before another noun in an expression: “head of X”, with X standing for some group or organization. Thus rb swq “head of the mar- ket”; rb mrz̈ “head of the symposium, symposiarch.” The plural rbny occurs in RTP 38 wrbny ¨wntˆ dy bl “the leaders of the priesthood of Bel.” That the meaning of ¨wntˆ is “priesthood” is uncertain, but the analysis of the construction is apparently unaffected by the uncertainty.8 Both rbn and rb yield abstracts: rbnw and rbw: “status of being chief” or “term as head”, e.g. CIS number 3928, line 4 rbnwt syrt[ˆ], “term as caravan leader” Greek sunodiárxou. A further unremarkable development is attested in the formation of abstracts from construct chains by attaching -ut at the end of either the regens or rectum, the “nominative” or “genitive” of the phrase, so either “(A + -ut) of B”, or “A of (B + -ut)”. For the former, note for example, rbnwt ¨ynˆ “term as (or: office of) supervisor of the spring.” For the alternative mode, note rbnsqw “term as head of the market.” What is less routine is to find rbnwt mrzÌwt PN “the term as head of the symposium of So-and-so” (Inv 9 28 line 1), where both members of the con- struct chain that lies behind this derivation are supplied with -ut. For Syriac, I note that Duval mentions this construction, giving one example: “rabbut kahnuta grande prêtrise, de rab kahne grande prêtre.”9 The same phrase is cited also in the Lexicon Syriacum of Brockelmann and the Lexicon of J. Payne Smith and the Thesaurus Syriacus of R. Payne Smith; from these works one may glean also other examples: for “high priesthood” there is attested rabbut kumruta; for “patriarchate” there is rabbut ˆabahuta; from
8 For discussion of ¨wntˆ see Milik, Dédicaces, 1-2; 92; 283-84; and Gawlikowski, M., “Liturges et custodes sur quelques inscriptions palmyréniennes,” Sem, 23, (1973), 118-19. 9 Duval, R., Traité de grammaire syriaque, (Paris, 1881), 244 §256 (b). 78 NOTES ON PALMYRENE ARAMAIC TEXTS rabbayta “steward” there are various abstract formations for the sense “stew- ardship, economy”, including rabbat baytuta, with one -ut, and also rabbut baytuta, with two. What seems to be a parallel phenomenon, making the double abstract formation seem less an isolated curiosity, occurs in pluralization of certain construct chains; this also may be more widespread in Semitic, so that the Palmyrene and Syriac examples cited here would only illustrate a more com- mon development in the treatment of somewhat complex nominal construc- tions. The last example cited above, rabbayta “steward,” has as plural rabbay batte – both elements of the construct chain are pluralized. Similarly rab Ìayla “commander” is pluralized rabbay Ìayle or rabbay Ìaylawwata; “centurion” is sg. rabba dma (spelled rbˆ dmˆˆ) with pl. rabbay mawwata. We seem to touch on the perplexities that speakers of English have with our “attorney generals” – or is it “attorneys general”? –, not to mention various “in-laws.” Italian pomodoro (singular) is variously pluralized pomidoro, pomodori, and pomidori. 3) The third topic is at least loosely related to the previous, since it treats of a noun phrase; in this case the compound formation involves the words “son” and “daughter”. In Palmyrene Aramaic, not surprisingly, tribal names frequently have the form: “bny X,” where “X” stands for a personal name or other title. In at least one case in Palmyra, the tribal name, a kind of compound, may be described as inflected for gender. In BS III text 11, a dedication of a column is made by one Amatallat, daughter of so-and-so. Amatallat's patronymic is followed by a further indication of her relationship to the soci- ety: dy mn bnt mytˆ “who belongs to the tribe Mita.” Parallel to this dy mn bnt mytˆ is the masculine counterpart dy mn bny mytˆ, as in Inventaire 9 text 20, an inscription concerning a male who is a member of the Mita tribe.10 In the French translation of Dunant in her first edition of the text, Amatallat is “des Benê Mîta”, a rendering explained and justified in Dunant's com- ments. This seems to me fine, and in contrast the English of the phrase in the new lexicon of Hoftijzer and Jongeling might be thought overly word-for- word, both lengthy and somehow imprecise or unidiomatic: “… who belongs to the women of the M. tribe.”11
10 The tribal name bny (bnt) mytˆ is attested rather frequently; see Stark, J., Personal Names in Palmyrene Inscriptions, (Oxford, 1970), 57. 11 Hoftijzer, J. and Jongeling, K., Dictionary of the North-West Semitic Inscriptions, (Lei- den, 1995). DELBERT R. HILLERS 79
Though Dunant appropriately calls the phrase bnt mytˆ unusual (“insolite”) with respect to Palmyrene Aramaic, there are parallels, though in the nature of the case not a great many, in biblical Hebrew. Thus, the tribe of Dan sometimes is referred to as bnê dan, and in 2 Chronicles 2:13 we read of a man who is son “of a Danite woman” ˆissah min bnôt dan. It seems that one never says “a female of the bnê X;” admittedly, however, this judgment is based on only a somewhat perfunctory search. In the New Testament, note the description of Zachariah in Luke 1:5, where it is said: “and his wife was of the daughters of Aaron”, in the Authorized Version, which gives us the Greek word-by-word. The Revised English Bible has “… was of priestly descent.” (For biblical Hebrew, note also Genesis 24:3; 28:1, 6, 8; Deu- teronomy 23:18.) 4) Turning now to the verb qwm, the first topic is a pattern of derivation exemplified in the Palmyrene Aramaic corpus, where we may think of the basic form of the verb, the Peal, as derived from the Afel, the causative. Two Palmyrene inscriptions furnish evidence. The first is CIS 3921 (of A.D. 120), an honorific inscription on an element of a column. 1 Òlmˆ dnh dy mlkw br whblt br m¨ny dy 2 ¨b[d]w lh bwlˆ wdms lyqrh qm Òlmˆ dnh 3 b[yrÌ …..] snt 4.100+20+10+212 “This statue of So-and-so was made for him by the Senate and Council, in his honor. The statue was erected (“erecta est” Chabot in CIS; “a été érigée” Cantineau, Inv 9, number 31, page 44) in [the month …] of the year 432.” Not in this inscription (which seems to have ¨bdw “they made”), but in numerous other texts which speak of the making of honorary statues, we have the causative, Afel, in the sense “to erect, to set up.” The Peal qm of CIS 3921, line 2, therefore, may appropriately be described as a passive of the Afel. The second text, of A.D. 274, is inscribed on the entrance to the Tomb of Malku, a text of “concession” in Gawlikowski's classification.13 Here certain niches are transferred to a new owner. Lines 9-11 give the date of the trans- fer in an unusually explicit form: “Agreed on in the year 590, in the month
12 In line 2, read ¨b[d]w with Cantineau Inv 9 31. 13 First published by Ingholt, “Five Dated Tombs from Palmyra,” Berytus, 2, (1935), 57- 120 (107, number XIII); text of “concession” number 24 in Gawlikowski, M., Monuments funéraires de Palmyre, Travaux du Centre d’archéologie méditerranéenne de l’Academie Polonaise des Sciences, (Warsaw, 1970); cf. Milik, Dédicaces, 301. 80 NOTES ON PALMYRENE ARAMAIC TEXTS of Siwan.”14 The Aramaic verb form in question is qmt. Though Ingholt, in the first edition, terms it “quite a problem”, he gives a translation and expla- nation that has been followed by others, thus Gawlikowski's “fixé(?),” the recent Dictionary of Hoftijzer and Jongeling: “it is agreed”. Milik has con- jectured that the form qmt is textually dubious, lacking a letter – a possibility entertained and dismissed by Ingholt – and would conjecturally insert a y, yielding q[y]mt, which he parses as a passive of the Pael, a D passive. The form qmt is not as problematic as Ingholt thought, at least not as a Peal, basic form. Ingholt himself cited some parallels in other dialects; these can be amplified. Note that the causative, Afel, in Palmyrene is used of fixing an import duty on foodstuffs, in the Tariff (CIS 3913, lines 109-110): ˆqymt dy yhwˆ [mtgb]ˆ dnr “… I have established that it shall be charged one denarius a load.” This suggests, in my opinion, that within our severely limited corpus of Palmyrene Aramaic, we have evidence for thinking of Peal and Afel together in considering our problem. The situation in biblical Hebrew to which we will pass immediately, rounds out this picture in a satisfactory way, though our evidence is hardly complete. In several biblical Hebrew contexts dealing specifically with possession or transfer of real property, qm is used in the sense “be established, confirmed”, with a further semantic development to “be transferred to, become the property of;” the lexicon of Brown, Driver, and Briggs cites for this sense 1 Samuel 24:21; Leviticus 27:19; 25:30; and Genesis 23:17, 20. In the last two cases we have to do with tomb property specifically, a point the present writer has exploited in a paper on Genesis 23 (sale of the cave at Machpelah), read at the 1994 meeting of the Catholic Biblical Association. The rendering in the New Jewish Publication Society Version, which is frequently espe- cially sensitive to legal nuances, uses the English verb “to pass … to” that is, “to be transferred … to”, for the combination of qwm and the preposition l- designating the owner. Remaining within biblical Hebrew, we find uses of the causative, the Hifil, for the transitive, active senses “to establish, to make effective, to make binding, to fix.”15 We may describe the passive uses of the Qal, the basic form, in various ways; an older term is that this is a “back-formation” from the Hifil, and perhaps, in the absence of a fuller treatment of derivation,
14 Lines 9-11: … qmt snt 590 byrÌ sywn. 15 For basic stem and causative there is a parallel semantic development of ¨md “to stand”. DELBERT R. HILLERS 81 that will do.16 The possible scope of a full investigation is broad; one has a good idea of the study that might be necessary to speak only of the single verb qwm “to stand” in the article under that head-word in KB3, where the evidence begins, from a chronological point of view, with citation of a West- Semitic gloss qamat in a Mari text. In any case, whatever the form a more definitive grammatical description might take, the senses “to be erected” and “to be agreed on,” or “to be valid” seem to me confirmed to me as approx- imately correct for the relevant Palmyrene texts. As a second observation concerning the verb qwm, in several passages in Palmyrene it is best understood as a marker of phasal aspect, that is, as con- veying the idea of the onset of the continuum of action expressed by the verb that follows. Such a use of qwm, long recognized in one way or another by Semitic lexicographers and grammarians, is now described in a grammatically satisfactory way in the recent study of F. Dobbs-Allsopp.17 The present note is meant to add details to the examples he cites and to show the relevance of his analysis and corpus of examples for this particular body of Aramaic texts. The texts are CIS 3966, line 5 bdyl dy qm wbnˆ wqrb “because he built and offered” (that is “he went ahead and built” etc.) and Inv 10 111, line 4 bdyl dy qm w¨drnn bkl Òbw klh “because he helped them (he set about and helped them) in everything.” Note also CIS 3924, line 5, where qm wsms seems to have as equivalent in Greek (the text is damaged) the single verb (line 7 of the Greek text) [katespo]údasen “he was zealous for.” Chabot and Starcky miss this sense or unnecessarily adduce the different idiom, found in other Palmyrene texts, qm brs “stood at the head.” Chabot cites, and rejects, the approximately correct opinion of Clermont-Ganneau, who rendered qm wbnˆ (CIS 3966) “coepit aedificare,” conveying the ingressive sense.18 5) Turning now to a detail of a lexical sort, in one passage, instead of a difficult Ìpywtˆ, we should read instead Ìpy<†>wtˆ, “zeal, energy”; if this conjecture is apt, a new word is added to the attested lexicon of Palmyrene
16 Meehan, C., offers a welcome step toward such a full treatment in his article “Qal/Pe¨al as the Passive of Hif¨il/Af¨el in Mishnaic Hebrew and Middle Aramaic,” in Jongeling, K., Muure-Van den Berg, H.L., and Van Rompay, L. (eds.), Studies in Hebrew and Aramaic Syn- tax presented to Prof. J. Hoftijzer, (Leiden, 1991). The limitations Meehan set himself are partly indicated in the title. The present writer finds other limitations in the approach used, and is of the opinion that within Semitic linguistics our description of derivation is too much determined by an extraneous logic or by traditional pedagogical methods. 17 Dobbs-Allsopp, F.W., “Ingressive qwm in Biblical Hebrew,” ZAH, 8, (1995), 31-54. 18 Clermont-Ganneau, C., “Epigraphie palmyrénienne,” Recueil d'archéologie orientale, tome VII, (Paris, 1906), 18 (“se mettre à bâtir”) and 26-29. 82 NOTES ON PALMYRENE ARAMAIC TEXTS
Aramaic. Since Drijvers (“Greek and Aramaic,” 41; note 2 above) indepen- dently already proposed this reading – in his opinion † may actually be dis- cerned on the stone – the observations below are meant only to amplify his concise statement of the case. The bilingual Aramaic-Greek text Inv 10 127 records an honor granted by the Senate of Palmyra in A.D. 86 to an individual who had shown excep- tional favor toward the city's merchants. Line 2 contains a hapax legomenon whose sense is not satisfactorily explained by the editor of this fascicle of the Inventaire, J. Starcky, while the Dictionary of Hoftijzer and Jongeling, at the headword Ìpyw1 gives alternatives, either “effort” (noting the Greek equiva- lent) or also “protection?.” In view of the context lÌsbn Ìpywtˆ w Ìsˆ †b[ˆ] dy ˆst
19 Du Mesnil du Buisson, R., “Première campagne de fouilles à Palmyre,” CRAIBL, (1966), 158–90; Inv 12 48 = du Mesnil's “Inscription M 1” of page 170 (text and translation) DELBERT R. HILLERS 83
4 [… hyklˆ dnh w]ˆs[†wˆ] 5 dy qdymwhy wˆs†wˆ dy l¨lmnh w[t]†l[ylˆ] 6 klh wmlbnh w srgbˆ dy nÌs[ˆ…] Translation: “(PN and PN made) [… this temple and the] s[toa] which is in front of it and the stoa that is above it and the whole [c]eil[ing] and the doorframe and the srgbˆ of bronze .….” This text is in most respects a duplicate of Inv 12 48, but for the word mlbn of Inv 12 49 the counterpart is: wtr¨why wsrgbˆ dy nÌsˆ “… and its doorway and the srgbˆ of bronze ….” In the first publication of this text (1966), Du Mesnil (CRAIBL, 1966, 174) noted that both mlbn and srgbˆ were new words to the Palmyrene Aramaic vocabulary, and cited an implausible suggestion of J. Starcky for the latter term. A. Dupont-Sommer, in a note following the communication of du Mes- nil,20 offered a complicated suggestion for srgbˆ; this also was implausible. But while Dupont-Sommer seems off the mark on this term,21 he did propose for mlbn the sense postis portae, “door-post,” “door-frame,” citing Brockel- mann's Lexicon Syriacum for this sense of the term in Syriac, and offered an interesting proposal for the sense of the difficult Biblical Hebrew hapax legomenon malben, Jer 43:9. Teixidor and Bounni, in the notes to Inv 12 49, translate mlbnˆ with the general term “entré”; Aggoula, in his notes to Inven- taire 12,22 confirms the definition of Dupont-Sommer, adding convincing citations for use in Syriac and modern Arabic of Lebanon and Iraq. The Northwest-Semitic evidence already cited for this sense may be amplified, and cognate terms in Akkadian help to clarify the semantic devel- opment. Biblical Hebrew malben occurs in Nah 3:14 in the sense “brick
with photograph Plate III (page 171); Inv 12 49 = du Mesnil's “Inscription M 2”, page 172 (text and translation) with photograph Plate V. Gawlikowski, M., Le temple palmyrénien, Étude d'épigraphie et de topographie historique, (Palmyre VI, Warsaw, 1973), 83 gives the Aramaic text and a translation of “inscription M 1” following du Mesnil's edition. 20 Dupont-Sommer, A., “Remarques sur la première campagne de fouilles à Palmyre,” CRAIBL, (1966), 188- 90. 21 His proposal, which involves imagining a wall or basin of bronze is rightly repudiated by Gawlikowski, M., Temple palmyrénien, 84, who finds the notion archaeologically “assez surprenante”. 22 Aggoula, B., “Remarques sur l’inventaire des inscriptions de Palmyre, Fasc XI et XII,” Sem, 29, (1979), 109-18 (117). In discussion following reading of this paper, Kh. Assad sup- plied valuable confirmation, from his native knowledge of Arabic of the region, of the cur- rency of this sense. 84 NOTES ON PALMYRENE ARAMAIC TEXTS mold.” The same term is found in 2 Sam 12:31 (Qere), but the reading and the sense of the context are less clear. Dalman, in his Aramäisch-Neuhe- bräisches Handwörterbuch, and Jastrow, in A Dictionary of the Targumim … and the Midrashic Literature, note the use of this word in late Hebrew, and Aramaic, in the sense “frame”, or “quadrangular object.” An informative older discussion with abundant citation of passages is that of J. Levy in his Wörterbuch über die Talmudim und Midraschim.23 Levy cites Talmudic pas- sages (Hebrew) for the sense “Gestell” (“frame”), also of a windowframe or doorframe, as well as for the sense “Beet,” (“bed, plot of ground”) explained by Levy as a raised rectangular plot of ground with some kind of border. According to Levy, the original sense is “brick-mold,” from which it comes to be extended to any rectangular object made up of four sides (but not square). Brockelmann's Lexicon Syriacum, cited by Dupont – Sommer, gives con- cordant evidence for Syriac malbana, as does the Thesaurus Syriacus of R. Payne Smith – both the presumably original sense “brick mold” and the derived sense “frame” (of a door, etc.) are attested. This accords reasonably well with the various senses of the cognate terms in Akkadian, whether these are in some way the source of the West-Semitic words in question, or not: nalbanu, nalbantu or nalbattu.24 Biblical Hebrew malben stands in a context not free of difficulties, Jer 43:9; the sense of the associated term mele† is not well understood, and commentators express doubt that the text is entirely in order.25 In such cir- cumstances, evidence from Palmyrene usage, or other cognates, can hardly be expected to resolve all problems, but may be of help. It may be suggested that the sense of malben here is not to be sought by starting from the obscure mele† to then arrive at “Ziegelterrasse, Lehmboden” (KB3), for malben, or by treating malben as a doublet or gloss on mele† (so Holladay in his detailed commentary). Instead, bam-malben (without vowels bmlbn) seems closer in
23 2nd ed. by Goldschmidt L., Vol. 3, (Berlin and Vienna, 1924), 122. 24 Cited as cognates to biblical Hebrew malben in KB3, with reference to von Soden, AHW, 724a. 25 See the works of Rudolph, W., Jeremia, Handbuch zum Alten Testament, Erste Reihe 12 (3rd ed., Tübingen, 1968); and of Holladay, W., Jeremiah 2; A Commentary on the Book of Jeremiah, Chapters 26-52, Hanson, P., (ed.), (Minneapolis, 1989). Rudolph rejects malben as a dittography [of what? DRH]; and Holladay regards it as “evidently a doublet or gloss of bammele†.” His translation, with its question-marks, reveals the uncertainties involved: “… and hide them in the clay pavement (?) [in the brick-terrace(?)] which is in the entrance of the house of Pharaoh in Tahpanhes.” DELBERT R. HILLERS 85 sense to b¢petaÌ (bptÌ); as noted above, mlbn and the equivalent of ptÌ, namely tr¨, substitute for each other in two very similar Palmyrene inscrip- tions. If the text of Jeremiah contains a doublet, it is perhaps to be found in these two terms, unless, of course, a solution for the problems of the verse is to be sought in a different direction. With this on mlbn in mind, we may turn to srgbˆ, which, it is proposed, means “hinge, door-pivot”: a door-fitting made of metal. In several Palmyrene Aramaic dedicatory inscriptions, now accessible as numbers 48 and 49 in Inv 12,26 srgbˆ is found in a list of architectural com- ponents contributed to the temple of Bel Hammon on Jebel Muntar, by cer- tain donors, in Iyyar 400 (May, A.D. 89). The relevant lines of the inscription on the lintel of the main entrance to the temple, Inv 12 48, are as follows: 1 lbl Ìmwn ¨bdw mn kyshwn PN wPN hyklˆ dnh wˆs†wˆ 2 dy sysˆ dy qdmwhy wˆs†wˆ dy l¨lmnh wt†lylˆ klh wtr¨why wsrgbˆ dy nÌsˆ Translation: For Bel Hammon, PN and PN had this temple made, and the stoa of marble in front of it, and the stoa above it, and the whole ceiling, and its doors, and the srgbˆ of bronze … The second inscription, Inv 12 49, is mostly a duplicate of the first cited, but is an honorific inscription on a fragment of the support for a bust or statue. It substitutes mlbn for tr¨ in the list. 4 [… hyklˆ dnh w]ˆs[†wˆ] 5 dy qdymwhy wˆs†wˆ dy l¨lmnh w[t]†l[ylˆ] 6 klh wmlbnh w srgbˆ dy nÌs[ˆ…] Translation: (PN and PN had made) [… this temple and the] s[toa] which is in front of it and the stoa that is above it and the whole [c]eil[ing] and the doorframe and the srgbˆ of bronze ….27 As far as I have been able to determine, the term srgbˆ has remained unexplained. As noted, Du Mesnil, Starcky, and Dupont-Sommer offered
26 Bounni, A., and Teixidor, J., Inventaire des inscriptions de Palmyre, (Publications de la Direction Générale des Antiquités et des Musées de la République Arabe Syrienne, Damas- cus, 1975), numbers 48, 49 on pages 44-47 and Pl. XI. 27 The reading qdymwhy (line 5) is perhaps wrong; the published photographs in Inv 12 seems to permit reading (more normal) qdmwhy. 86 NOTES ON PALMYRENE ARAMAIC TEXTS complicated suggestions for the sense of srgbˆ which have not been generally accepted by later writers. Teixidor (in Inv 12) says that it remains unex- plained, having abandoned, as it seems, his previous adherence to the opinion of Dupont-Sommer, which he had expressed in 1968.28 Aggoula's revised reading and redivision of the word, in his comments on Inventaire 12,29 seem not to have won acceptance. Degen (1987) refers to srgbˆ as an unidentified object; as does the dictionary of Hoftijzer and Jongeling.30 An instructive starting-point for explanation of the term is a famous Ara- maic inscription from Elephantine (Cowley 30 = Porten and Yardeni TAD A4.7).31 Describing the damage to the Jewish temple, the writer of the letter lists the “… stone gateways, built of hewn stone, …, and their standing doors, and the bronze hinges of those doors, and the cedarwood roof …” (translation of Porten and Yardeni). Part of the corresponding Aramaic text may be quoted to illustrate the close correspondence to the Palmyrene listing of architectural elements with which we are concerned: the roof (a term cog- nate to the Palmyrene term used in this context), the doors, and the hinges of bronze. 10 … wdsyhm qymn wÒyryhm 11 zy dssyˆˆlk nÌs wm†ll ¨qhn zy ˆrz klˆ The term Òyr “hinge” is a well-attested Aramaic word, occurring in this sense in the Targumim, in Jewish Palestinian Aramaic, and in Syriac. The Akkadian cognate is Òerru, with the sense “door-pivot”, or “pivot-cap”.32 On this basis, one may conclude that, on present evidence, the term srgbˆ – which could be singular or plural – refers to bronze hinges (or: pivots) or door-fittings in general. Such objects are archaeologically well-attested, for ancient Mesopotamia and for the Roman world; and, if it is needed, there is
28 In his series of contributions (under the same title) to Syria, gathered as Bulletin d'épigraphie sémitique (1964-1980), Institut Français d'Archéologie du Proche-Orient, Biblio- thèque archéologique et historique, Tome 127 (Paris, 1986), 380-81, where he had adopted, and elaborated, the proposal of Dupont-Sommer. 29 Aggoula, B., Sem, 29 (1979) 109-18 (117). 30 “Schrift und Sprache Palmyras,” in Ruprechtsberger, E., (ed.), Palmyra: Geschichte, Kunst und Kultur der syrischen Oasenstadt, (Linz, 1987), 27-31; srgbˆ discussed 29; Hoftijzer, J. and Jongeling, K., Dictionary of the North-West Semitic Inscriptions, (Leiden, 1995). 31 Cowley, A., Aramaic Papyri of the Fifth Century B.C., (Oxford, 1923); Porten, B., and Yardeni, A., Textbook of Aramaic Documents from Ancient Egypt, 1: Letters (Jerusalem, c. 1986). 32 See von Soden, AHW, 1093 s.v. Òerru; CAD (∑) 137 “door-pivot, pivot cap.” DELBERT R. HILLERS 87 evidence in the archeological record specifically from Palmyra of the use of bronze door-pivots – apparently even a piece of one has survived.33 As a general parallel, a passage similar to the Palmyrene inscription in question, note the Akkadian text “Agum-Kakrime and the Return of Mar- duk,” which treats of the construction of a new cella for the statue of Marduk recovered by the king, and especially of the splendid new doors; the text is quoted here in the version of B. Foster: “… great matching doors of cedar did I have fashioned …. The … with … of bronze did I …. Their doorposts with bands of refined copper did I hold fast.”34 (The description of the pre- cious inlays for the doors continues.) Other texts which make evident the architectural and religious prominence of temple doors may conveniently be consulted in the translation of Foster; thus in speech directed by king Nabonidus to the god Shamash: “O Shamash, sublime lord, as you enter Ebabbar, seat of your repose, may the gates, entrances, chapels, and court- yards rejoice before you like flowers(?).”35 Note also the text in which Nebuchadnezzar implores Shamash: “May doorsill, doorbolt, locks, and door leaves of Ebabbar ceaselessly voice words in my favor before you.”36 In various Old Testament texts there is an association of doors and gates with bronze, thus 1 Kg 4:13 (prose); Ps 107:16 and the very similar Isaiah 45:2. The etymology of the Aramaic word srgbˆ remains unclear, but some evidence may be adduced as possibly relevant. Another West-Semitic term for “hinge” is sgm (late Heb. segem, Aramaic sigmaˆ). This is related to Akkadian (middle and late Babylonian) sagammu (so von Soden, HWB, who gives the sense as “obere Türangel?”37 Von Soden cites the passage
33 On doors, hinges, and sockets of doors at Palmyra, see Ingholt, H., “Five Dated Tombs from Palmyra,” Berytus, 2, (1935), 57–120; 59 and Plates XXII and XXIII; As'ad, K., and Schmidt-Colinet, A., “Das Tempelgrab Nr. 36 in der Westnekropole von Palmyra. Ein Vor- bericht,” Damaszener Mitteilungen, 2, (1985), 17-35, p. 29; Sadurska, A., Le tombeau de famille de ¨Alainê, (Palmyra VII, Warsaw, 1977) 25; Michalowski, K., Palmyre: Fouilles Polonaises 1959, (Palmyra 2, Warsaw, 1960), 141-47, with numerous drawings and pho- tographs, and 201, Figure 225, Cat. number T 43 (bronze door-piece). 34 Benjamin R. Foster, Before the Muses: An Anthology of Akkadian Literature, (Bethesda, Maryland, 1993), Vol. I, 275. Foster's text number is III.9 (iv 9 ff). Manuscripts of this text are from the mid-first millennium, but it may have been composed earlier; see Foster, 273. 35 Before the Muses, 753, Foster's text IV.10. 36 Before the Muses, Vol. II, 746, Foster's text IV.8 (j). 37 This is apparently not regarded by S. Kaufman as a loanword in Aramaic, since the term is not discussed in his The Akkadian Influences on Aramaic, Assyriological Studies No. 19, (Chicago, 1974). 88 NOTES ON PALMYRENE ARAMAIC TEXTS
“sa-gam-mi-si-na (befestigte ich mit Kupferbändern).” The Akkadian term is discussed at length, with many citations, by A. Salonen.38 An attempt to relate srgbˆ to sagammu and West-Semitic sgm “hinge” would involve obvi- ous problems, but the possibility of an unusual development is perhaps not to be ruled out.39
ABBREVIATIONS USED Abbreviations used are: AHW = von Soden, W., Akkadisches Handwörterbuch; BASOR = Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research; BS III = Dunant, C., Le Sanctuaire de Baalshamin à Palmyre, Vol. III, Les inscriptions, (Rome, 1971); CAD = Chicago Assyrian Dictionary; CIS = Corpus Inscriptionum Semiticarum, Pars secunda, Tomus III; CRAIBL = Comptes rendus de l'Académie des inscrip- tions et belles-lettres; Inv = Inventaire des inscriptions de Palmyre, (with number of fascicle, and text number); KB3 = Koehler-Baumgartner, Hebräisches und Aramäi- sches Lexikon zum Alten Testament, Dritte Auflage; RSP = Gawlikowski, M., Recueil d'inscriptions palmyréniennes provenant de fouilles syriennes et polonaises récentes à Palmyre, (Paris, 1974); RTP = Ingholt, H., Seyrig, H., and Starcky, J., Recueil des tessères de Palmyre, (Institut Français d'Archéologie de Beyrouth, Bibliothèque archéologique et historique; Paris, 1955); Sem = Semitica; ZAH = Zeitschrift für Althebraistik.
38 Die Türen des alten Mesopotamien: Eine lexikalische und kulturgeschichtliche Unter- suchung, Annales academiae scientiarum Fennicae, Ser. B, Tom. 124, (Helsinki, 1961), 66. Salonen cites the rendering of Oppenheim: “upper hinge of the door.” Note, for our pur- poses, that one passage cited contains references to copper as the material of which the door- fittings are made. 39 See Kaufman, Akkadian Influences, 50 (note 89) and 28-29 for discussion of Aramaic words derived from Akkadian which show a somewhat unexpected r that is, in Kaufman's phrase, “disturbing but not impossible to account for.'