The Origin of the Maltese Language

3 The origin of the Maltese language The origin of the Maltese language has for a long time baffled scholars and linguists. Now accepted as a branch of Arabic, it was thought to be an offshoot of Punic, mainly by scholars and dillettanti who wanted to deny the former and accept the latter as being more prestigious. In a seminal article Dr. Joseph Brincat of the University of Malta has detailed out the importance of Al- Himyari’s account on the Arabic Period in Maltese history, a text which has far-reaching implications for the origins of the Maltese language.1 The Proceedings of the Conference which was held in Malta between the 26th – 29th of September 1991 were published last year (1994) by the Institute of Linguistics, University of Malta. Starting with the statement that the current information on the Arab period in Malta (870 to 1090) is basically that of Michele Amari,2 a fact recognised by Godfrey Wettinger who judges it to be “still the standard work on its subject”,3 Brincat notes that the most informative primary texts are those of Ibn al-Atir, the anonymous Kitab al-cUyun, the Chronicle of Cambridge and al-Qazwini; Amari, writing in the nineteenth century, could not have known of al-Himyari who was not discovered before 1931 by E. Levi Provencal. Brincat refers to his own Malta 1870-1054: Al Himyari’s account (1991) for a discussion on the merits of al-Himyari’s text.4 These and other salient facts are recounted in detail by al-Himyari. Brincat maintains that “some scholars are convinced that al-Himyari may help to reconstruct the lost texts of al-Bakri.”5 Brincat even maintains that “al-Himyari reproduced faithfully the text concerning Malta written by al-Bakri in 1068, then this text is based on almost contemporary information regarding the Byzantine raid of 1053-54.”6 Then, if one takes into consideration that al-Bakri is indebted to al-Warraq (who wrote around 970) and al-cUdri (m. 1085) and the latter to al-Turtusi (at the beginning of the 10th Century), one can make out that even the events of 870 can be seen in a contemporary light.7 From a linguistic point-of-view the invasion of 870 A.D. is important for the fact that the island is described as “an abandoned ruin”. The destruction of the population explains the problem that many level-headed historians and archaelogists complain about, that is, the total absence of all building during the Arab period, 870-1090 A.D. It also explains the lack of a linguistic substratum much more cogent than the simple hypothesis which interprets the ease with which the inhabitants of Malta and Gozo learned Arabic because they already talked a Semitic language, namely Punic.8 Anthony Bonanno argues that “none of the ancient authors specifies that the population of the islands was indeed Punic or if the native community was subject to Carthaginian administration.”9 He cites Levy to the extent that Malta was held by the Carthaginians “a Carthaginiensis tenebatur" in 218 B.C. when the Romans took it. In 1 G. BRINCAT, Gli Albori della Lingua Maltese: Il Problema del Sostrato alla Luce delle Notizie Storiche di Al-Himyari sul Periodo Arabo a Malta (870-1054), in Languages of the Mediterranean, Msida 1994, 130-140. 2 “Una svolta nel modo di affrontare la storia del periodo arabo-islamico delle isole maltesi, viene nella seconda metà dell’Ottocento, in seguito alla pubblicazione della Storia dei Musulmai di Sicilia e dei due volumi della Biblioteca Arabo-Sicula di Michele Amari. Un tipo di approccio, più moderno e meno legato alle preoccupazioni delle istituzioni ecclesiastiche, viene inaugurato dagli studi del grande studioso siciliano. E gli storici maltesi, ovviamente, non poterono non tenerne conto.” (A. BARBATO, ibid, 172-173.) 3 G. BRINCAT, ibid, 130. 4 He states that it is “the longest text which has come down to us and gives information which was published, as for instance, the name of the last Byzantine governor of the island (Amros?) the names of the leaders of the Arab military expedition... and then the fierce Sawada Ibn Muhammad who was later appointed governor of Sicily”. (Ibid, 132.) 5 Ibid, 133. 6 Ibid, 133. 7 Ibid, 133. 8 Ibid, 133. 9 Ibid, 133. the Acts of the Apostles, St. Luke terms the Maltese as "barbaroi" but Bonanno observes that the Maltese who helped the shipwrecked “were probably farmers who spoke neither Punic nor any other language.”10 Still the Punic theory held sway among many scholars and amateurs who dabbled in it. The linguistic question became instrumentalised for imperialist political reasons with the hope that Maltese be given the prestige emanating from the mythical Phoenicio-punic origin, more than Arabic as the latter was deemed beyond the pale. This was considered an indispensable manoeuvre to help the teaching of English.11 The “punic” hypothesis is now fortunately discarded. The Arabo-Maghribite origin of Maltese as the ultimate source of the language is not subject to debate. One can now study Punic more scientifically and determine its consistency as regarding the origin of the Maltese language. One must not wholly deny that the inhabitants of the Maltese Islands still spoke the Punic language up to the time of the Arab invasion but one must concede that there is an immense gap of time from the last linguistic evidence (that of Luke 60 A.D.) and the archeological (1st century A.D.) to 870 A.D. It should be borne in mind that during the millennium which divides the two semitic cultures (218 B.C. - 870 A.D.) the islands were colonised by two Indo-European powers with great linguistic prestige. Even though, following Bonanno, one must conclude that latinization progressed at a very slow pace. It is hard to imagine that the Romans, who had changed the language of the majority of their territories, except where Greek, a language of greater prestige, was spoken, had not helped the linguistic latinization also in Malta and Gozo. Talking of Greek one must consider this language as another candidate for the solution of the language problem before the Arab invasion. In 535 A.D. the islands became part of the Byzantine Empire and the same deductions concerning Latin apply to this language as well: the isolated conservative environment permitted the continued use of Latin (or possibly Punic), while the length of time (350 years) and the proximity to Sicily convey one to a search for analogies with the linguistic milieu which existed in a zone only 93 km away.12 Lack of evidence for the language spoken before the acceptance of the new language could be a result of a violent and rapid imposition. Aquilina presumes “the preponderance of the Arabs (as a vital factor) because otherwise they would not have succeeded in influencing the language so much.”13 The utility of al-Himyari’s text lies precisely here: the description he gives of the ferocity of the Muslim attack of 870 A.D. explains the fact why it is so difficult to recognise the elements of the language spoken in Malta before the Arab invasion. If the island was ravaged and left uninhabited for 178 years there could not exist the continuity which was necessary for two languages to co-exist and the resultant fusion of the 14 elements of one into another could not take place. 10 Ibid, 133-134. 11 Ibid, 134. 12 Ibid, 136. 13 Ibid, 137. 14 Ibid, 137. .

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