726 PART X: USE AND ADAPTATION OF SCRIPTS Series Minor 8) The Hague: Mouton SECTION 6I Ly&in, V. I t952. Drevnepermskij jazyk [The Old Pemic language] Moscow: Izdalel'slvo Aka- demii Nauk SSSR ry6r. Komi-russkij sLovar' [Komi-Russian diclionary] Moscow: Gosudarstvennoe Izda- tel'slvo Inostrannyx i Nacional'nyx Slovuej. Adaptations of Hebrew Script -MaLa Enciklopedija Prosvetq I978 [Small Prosveta encycloPedia]. Belgrade. Moll, T. A,, & P. I InEnlikdj t951. Cukotsko-russkij sLovaf [Chukchee-Russian dicrionary] Len- BENJAMIN HARY ingrad: Gosudtrstvemoe udebno-pedagogideskoe izdatel'stvo Ministerstva Prosveldenija RSFSR Poppe, Nicholas. 1963 Tatqr Manual (Indima Universily Publications, Uralic atrd Altaic Series 25) Mouton Bloomington: Indiana University; The Hague: "lagguages" rgjo. Mongolian lnnguage Handbook.Washington, D C.: Center for Applied Linguistics Jewish or ethnolects HerbertH Papet(Intema- Rastorgueva,V.S. 1963.A ShortSketchofTajikGrammar, fans anded It is probably impossible to offer a purely linguistic definition of a Jewish "language," tional Joumal ofAmerican Linguisticr 29, no part 2) Bloominglon: Indiana University; The - 4, as it is difficult to find many cornmon linguistic criteria that can apply to Judeo- Hague: Moulon. (Russiu orig 'Kratkij oderk grammatiki lad;ikskogo jzyka," in M. V. Rax- Arabic, Judeo-Spanish, and Yiddish, for example. Consequently, a sociolinguistic imi & L V Uspenskaja, eds,Tadiikskurusstj slovar' lTajik-Russian dictionary], Moscow: Gosudustvennoe Izdatel'stvo Inostrmyx i Nacional'tryx SIovarej, r954 ) definition with a more suitable term, such as ethnolect, is in order. An ethnolect is an Sjoberg, Andr€e P. t963. Uzbek StructuraL Grammar (Indiana University Publications, Uralic and independent linguistic entity with its own history and development that refers to a lan- Altaic Series r8). Bloomington: Indiana Universityi The Hague: Mouton. guage or a variety and is used by a distinct language community. A Jewish ethnolect, (Indiana Universily Publications, Uralic and Altaic Series Street, John C. rg6j. Khalkhn Stacrure then, is a spoken and/or written form serving for the most part the Jewish population 24.) Bloomitrgton: Indima University; The Hague: Mouton. of a specific area. Our knowledge of Jewish ethnolects is inadequate, as in many cases Vinogradov, V V., ed. tg6ffi8. Jazyki narodov SSSR [Languages of the peoples of the USSR] 5 vols Moscow & Leningrad: Nauka scholars began to investigate them when it was too late and only a handful of speakers were still using them; in worse cases, some of these ethnolects had already disap- peared. Jewish ethnolects share many characteristics: they incorporate Hebrew and Ara- maic elements, not restdcted to the sphere of cultural vocabulary but aiso found throughout the lexicon as well as in phonology, morphology, and syntax. They have developed distinct spoken forms as well as unique ways of translating sacred Hebrew texts verbatim (Hary IggS) into the various Jewish ethnolects. The most obvious ex- ternal characteristic ofJewish ethnolects, however, is the consistent use, in their writ- ten forms, of Hebrew characters (sncrror 46). Very frequently, Jews adopted the spelling conventions of Talmudic orthography, employing the final forms of Hebrew letters and sometimes adding vowel signs using existing consonants and/or symbols. Thus, the Hebrew script symbolizes the Jewish nature of the ethnolect. It is not un- common to use script as a religious identification for a language, as with the Ambic script of Persian and Urdu, for example, which symbolizes the Muslim nature of the languages. Jewish ethnolects developed in the diaspora from local languages and were used in both their written and spoken forms by Jews within the Jewish community. They developed as one result of a migration, the dispersion of the Jews throughoutAsia and Europe during the early centuries ofthe Common Era (Birnbaum r97r: 68) The cre- ation of these ethnolects began as a way of assimilation into the non-Jewish environ- mbnt but later came to be a hallmark of "continuing Jewish consciousness and identity" (Ben-Sasson rg7r:77t).That is, the initial adoption ofa local language was SECTION 6l: ADAPTATIONS OF IIEBREW SCRIPT 729 128 PART X: USE AND ADAPTATIO] an attempt to assimilate into the sunounding environment and to speak like the local inhabitants; but latet in order to become a symbol of Jewish identity and an aclual Arabic Judeo-Arabic Phonetic Ualue the language established itself as Jewish with its Hebrew obstacle to assimilation, I R l@. ?l Aramaic linguistic elements. script and Hebrew and l tbl Jewish languages are numerous, and the list reflects Jewish history and geogra- n,n lrl phy. Beside Hebrew, the primary Jewish language (althougb see Ornan r985), Jewish O n,n,n lr, 0l forms of Aramaic began to develop even before the beginning of the Common Era' Jews began to employ the t, l ts, Before the end of the Second Temple period, Hellenistic e_ €l Greek Koind in its Jewish form which many centuries later became krown n thl -Yevanic, C Balkans as Judeo-Greek. After the seventh century, when Islam began to spread in the c )n,)h lxl Judeo-Arabic began to develop, and Jews across the Middle East and Nortb Africa, 'I tdl from Spain to kaq adopted forms of this ethnolect. In North Africa, Judeo-Berber r,i [d, 6] emerged; and in Iran, Judeo-Persian. on the other side of the Jewish world, Latin pro- 1 tr1 duced six different ethnolects: Judeo-Italian (Italkian) in Italy; Judeo-Provenqal ) I (Shuadit) in southern France, and Judeo-French (Zarphatic) more to the north; Judeo- ) [zl catalan in the eastern part of the Iberian Peninsula, and Judeo-Porhrguese in the west- o tsl em part; and Judeo-spanish (Ladino, Jidy6, Judezmo) in between After the expulsion u) U] century Judeo- of the Jews from the Iberian Peninsula toward t]le end of the fifteenth c/f, o lsl the Balkans, Turkey, and Palestine, and to the south Spanish spread to the east through \t'i,1 le, z) throughout North Africa. Yiddish originated in the tenth century among central Euro- L t [r] b u, y/r, 'r ld, zl v L ttl t, :1, 'l L tvl Asia Judeo-Tajik is employed, Judeo-Tat (of the Iranian family) is used by Jews in tfl Daghestan in the eastem caucasus, and Judeo-Georgian is used by Jews in Georgia 19 7'P tql in the southern Caucasus. Judeo-Crimchak (of the Turkic family) is employed by ,! )n tkl Crimean Jews, both Rabbanites and Karaites. J , 0l of these languages, Judeo-Arabic, Judeo-Spanish, and Yiddish have had the larg- DE est impact on Jewish culture and civilization since the dispersion of the Jews. Among Im] these, Judeo-Arabic holds a significant place: it has the longest recorded history of r4 lnl geo- the three, from pre-Islamic times to the presenu additionally, it spans the widest ;'1 thl the medium of expression graphical area, from Spain to Yemen and lraq, and "it was n, i'1,;'l lt, hl for one of the foremost periods ofJewish cultural and intellectual creativity" (Still- ) r1 I lwl man r988:3-4). Judeo-Arabic is thus here the primary example of the use of the He- til brew script; Yiddish and Judeo-Spanish are treated as well. ts rtnrn 6t.z: Vowel Representation ,ool-'0,. [i] O, sonetimes ' [i:] usually ' [u] O, frequently I [u:] usually I Judeo-Arabic is an ethnolect which has been spoken and written in various forms by [e] O, sometimes ! [e:] usually , [o] @, lrequently 1 [o:] usually I Jews throughout the Arabic-speaking world; its literature is concerned for the most lal @ lel usually N part with Jewish topics and is written by Jewish authors for Jewish readers. Judeo- 730 PART X: USE AND ADAPTATION oF SCRIPTS SECTION 6l: ADAPTATIONS OF HEBREw SCRIPT 13I Arabic has had a long history, with a dramatic change occurring around the fifteenth Phonetic orthography century c.E., when the Jewish world severed its contact with the Muslim world and Phonetic orthography, on the other hand, is used only during Early Judeo-Arabic. It its Arabic language and culture. This was especially true in NorthAfrica and less so is based on phonetic principles, free from the influence of Classical Arablc orthogra- in Yemen, where strong contact was maintained for some time. To refine and more phy. Moreover, Blau and Hopkins (1987: rz4) claim, "There is no orthographical fea- accurately describe the history ofJudeo-Arabic, I periodize ir as follows: Pre-Islamic, ture this tradition] which has to be explained as an imitation of literary Arabic Early (8th/9th-Ioth centuries), Classical (Ioth-r5th centuries), Later (I5th-I9th [in spelling habits." The main characteristic of (broad) Phonetic orthography are as fol- centuries), and Modern Judeo-Arabic (zoth century). This scheme, however, should Iows. not distract us frorn the major change that occurred in the fifteenth century: the first three periods constitute Medieval Judeo-Arabic; the latter two, Late. (i) Marking d and z with 'r d, as it represents the closest phoneme in Hebrew to Three script usages car be identified for Judeo-Arabic: "Phonetic," "Arabi- the pronunciation of ,; and t (e.g. 'llP qbd lqaba&al 'he received', cf. ,cp cized," and "Hebraized." Of the three, Arabicized orthography has had the greatest in- (tbd;11Dn llpdkfhafizaka] 'may He presewe you', cf. d&b hpzk, ibid rg:,). fluence In general terms, TABLE 6r r represents the transcription of Judeo-Arabic (ii) Marking the definite article phonetically, not morphophonemically as in traditions. The final varieties of He- consonants inespective of the three ortbographic Arabicized orthography (e.g. nnp)': bylqmh[bilqanh] 'with the grain', cf. brew letters (shown to the right of the slant) are used in word-final position. The vow- )rhm e,iJl b'lqml.t;o)n1\ [arrahi:m] 'the Merciful', cf.