[AS 3.1 (2005) 83-107] DOI: 10.117/1477835105053516

Etymological Notes on North-Eastern Neo-Aramaic∗

Hezy Mutzafi

Tel Aviv University

The lexical stock of North-Eastern Neo-Aramaic (NENA)1 exhibits a large number of puzzling words of unknown or doubtful origin, and is fraught with tantalizing etymological conundrums awaiting solution. To select just a few examples from a small number of NENA dialects2— what might be the respective etyma of C.Urmi ˇslg ‘to pluck, extract, ∗Akkadian, Kurdish and Syriac words are usually given without reference when they can readily be tracked down in the following dictionaries: Akkadian: AHw, CAD; Kurdish: T. Wahby and C.J. Edmonds, A Kurdish–English Dictionary (Ox- ford: Clarendon Press, 1966), F.F. Omar, Kurdisch–Deutches W¨orterbuch (Kur- mancˆı). (Berlin: Kurdische Studien Berlin im Verlag f¨urWissenschaft und Bil- dung, 1992), B. Rizgar, Kurdish–English English-Kurdish Dictionary (Kurmancˆı), (London: Lithosphere Printing, 1993), M.L. Chyet, Kurdish–English Dictionary (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2003); Syriac: R. Payne Smith, Thesaurus Syriacum (2 vols., Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1879-1901; henceforth: Thesaurus), J. Payne Smith, A Compendious Syriac Dictionary (Oxford: Claren- don Press, 1903), C. Brockelmann, Lexicon Syriacum (Halle: Max Niemyer, 2nd edn, 1928). Notes on transcription: The vowels i, e, E and o are long; otherwise vowel length is marked only for long ¯a versus short a and long ¯u versus short u. Stress is penultimate unless otherwise indicated. Superscript + preceding a word indicates word-emphasis. Abbreviations: Akk. = Akkadian, Ar. = Arabic, Azer. = Azerbaijani, C. = Chris- tian dialect of . . . (e.g. C.Urmi), J. = Jewish dialect of . . . (e.g. J.Urmi), JBA = Jewish Babylonian Aramaic, JPA = Jewish Palestinian Aramaic, Kurd. = Kur- dish, Mand. = Mandaic, OA = Older Aramaic (vis-`a-vis Neo-Aramaic), Syr. = Syriac. See further under n. 2. 1NENA consists of dialects spoken (or originally spoken) east of the Tigris river in Kurdistan, the plain of Mos.ul and Iranian Azerbaijan. 2The lexical data offered in this paper refer to the following Neo-Aramaic dialects:

c 2005 SAGE Publications (London, Thousand Oaks CA, and New Delhi) 84 Aramaic Studies 3.1 (2005) uproot’, J.Urmi +znqr ’to pour, strew’, Hertevin qopina ‘forehead’,3 Betanure ˇswixa ‘fool’, A-T. iare hat@mta ’very wealthy (man)’,4 S-T. iare x¯uta ‘ford’, or Baz pode ‘snot’,˙ with˙ ˙ cognates such as C.Urmi p¯udı, ‘Aqra poze and J.Sanandaj bol´e? None of these lexemes can be deci- sively identified˙ as stemming from a foreign source, nor do they appear to have an ascertained Aramaic ancestry. At least some of them may well be genuine Aramaic words that have drifted so radically from their forbears during the long course of Aramaic history, having been reshaped by phonological, morphological, semantic, or accumulative, many-faceted processes, that their origins are no longer readily recog- nizable. Such radical changes have indeed occurred in many NENA words of Aramaic provenance. Compare, e.g., J.Koy Sanjaq nh¯al´a ‘ear’ with ˙ its precursor attested in Syriac as atu:h;n;d\aI a plural form of an;daI ‘ear’,5 K-T. iare p˘onqiˇsa ‘bubble’, a diminutive form (ending in -iˇsa < *-it¯a) of Syr. ‘ball’ and A-Tiare ’¯asa ‘cock’s upper claw, spur’, ¯ aq:dnwub .

Christian NENA dialects; in Turkey: Baz, Hertevin, Jilu, MarBishu, Marga, Sat; T. iare cluster: A-T. iare = Ashitha, K-T. iare = Ko, S-T. iare = Sarspidho; Tkhuma cluster: M-Tkhuma = Mazra; Iraq: Alqosh, ‘Ankawa, ‘Aqra, Aradhin, Barit.le, Isnakh, Koy Sanjaq, Nerwa, Qaraqosh, Telkepe; Iran: Salamas, Sanandaj, Urmi. Jewish NENA dialects; in Iraq: ‘Amadiyya, Aradhin, Arbel, Barzan, Betanure, Dobe, Koy Sanjaq, Nerwa, Rustaqa, Sulemaniyya, Zakho; Iran: Kerend, Naghada, Sanandaj, Saqqiz, Urmi. Additionally, there are references to Mlah. sˆoNeo-Mandaic, Neo-Western Aramaic and T. uroyo. Data on Neo-Aramaic dialects without a bibliographical reference are based on my informants. 3O. Jastrow, Der neuaram¨aische Dialekt von Hertevin (Provinz Siirt) (Semitica Viva 3, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1988), p. 197. 4According to an informant, the adjective hat.@m. .ta is after the name of ‘a cer- tain Arab king who was very rich’. Could this word stem from the name of the pre-Islamic poet ›D‹»hÌX©_Ìõ L‹Æh̹ (H. ¯atimof the tribe of T. ¯a’iyy), renowned for his gen- erosity (see C. Huart, A History of Arabic Literature (Beirut: Khayats 1966), pp. 23-24)? For Ar. h. > T. iare h cf. Ar. ðHÌmÌd̹ > Kurd. heywan > T. iare hEw@n ‘an- imal’. Cf. also J.Koy Sanjaq ’afl¯at¯un ‘very clever (person,¯ including woman)’ < Kurd., Ar. ‘Plato’ (and similarly in Y. Sabar, A Jewish Neo-Aramaic Dictionary. Dialects of Amidya, Dihok, Nerwa and Zakho, Northwestern Iraq (Semitica Viva 28, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2002; henceforth: JNAD), p. 99a, s.v. ÷wfalpa). 5The historical process is, briefly, *’˘edn¯ah¯at¯a > *’@nn¯ah¯at¯a > *nh¯ata > *nh¯al´a > *nh¯al´a > *nh¯al´a > *nh¯al´a; see the evidence¯ in¯ H. Mutzafi, ‘The¯ reflexes¯ of the word anda ˙(‘ear’)˙ in˙ Eastern˙ Neo-Aramaic: Etymology, Diversification and Innovation’, in M. Bar-Asher and M. Florentin (eds.), Samaritan, Hebrew and Aramaic Studies Presented to Professor Abraham Tal (in Hebrew), forthcoming.