7 Epigraphic Notes on the 'Amman Citadel Inscription [1969] In 1969 Professor Siegfried H. Hom published the tury BCE, in the inscription of King Yaril).<azar4 of Beth important Ammonite inscription from the citadel of an­ <Ammon, as well as sporadically in contemporary and cient Rabbath <Ammon, modem <Amman. 1 We wish to later Aramaic. However, the same simplified f:,,et is found comment (I) on the script of the inscription and its date, in the Mesha< Inscription regularly and appears not infre­ and (II) on certain of the readings in the text. quently in Hebrew scripts of the eighth (Samaria Ostraca) and seventh centuries BCE (the Yabneh-yam Inscrip­ I. tion). 5 $ade is unique. The long leg is characteristic of The script of the <Amman Citadel Inscription be­ ninth-century Aramaic, eighth-century Phoenician. 6 longs to the series of Aramaic lapidary scripts of the 1Alep in the <Ammonite script has most archaic traits. ninth century BCE. It shares with these scripts a number The downstroke breaks only a short distance through the of traits which differentiate them from contemporary lower horizontal. Elsewhere such forms are characteristic Phoenician (including the early Hebrew scripts of Gezer only of the tenth-century and earlier Phoenician texts, and the Moabite Stone). The tail (right down-stroke) of and in the ninth century, uniquely in the 1aleps of the dalet is already developed; it will develop more slowly in Honeyman and Nora Phoenician texts. The vertical Phoenician and Hebrew. The letter he in the <Amman in­ downstroke slants well to the right of the point of the hor­ scription tends to a rounded semicursive Aramaic form. izontal "v," an archaic trait of twelfth-century Phoeni­ Taw lengthens early, as does ~ade. Three letters of the cian, falling out in Phoenicia proper in the tenth century, <Amman inscription require special comment. The fet ap­ surviving in the early ninth-century texts of Cyprus and pears to have a single cross-stroke. This may be the case in the Bir Hadad Inscription, and is the normal lapidary form in Aramaic as early as the Nerab inscriptions,2 per­ Brill, 1991).] On the date of this beautiful cursive text, see J. Naveh, "The Date of the Deir 'Alla Inscription and the Aramaic Script;' IEJ 17 sisting into the fourth-century BCE lapidary hands (the (1967): 256f. I am inclined to believe that the script dates to about 700 theta-form fet). Ifet is made apparently with two cross­ BCE as does van der Kooij. N aveh places its script in the Aramaic typo­ strokes. This form appears already in the <Ammonite text logical sequence and dates it to the mid-eighth century. However, the of Deir 'Alla, 3 probably from the end of the eighth cen- script shares certain idiosyncrasies with the later 'Ammonite and Mo­ abite scripts on seals. I should argue, therefore, that it is diverging from the standard Aramaic cursive, and hence preserves archaic forms be­ I. "The Amman Citadel Inscription," BASOR 193 (1969): 1-13. yond their time. [For more recent bibliography, and other proposed readings, see Aufre­ 4. See R. D. Barnett, "Four Sculptures from Amman," ADAJ I cht: 154-63]. (1951): 34-36; Pis. XI, XIII. 2. See KAI No. 225-26. 5. For script charts of these texts, see F. M. Cross, "Epigraphic 3. See the preliminary publication by H. Franken, "Texts from the Notes on Hebrew Documents of the Eighth-Sixth Centuries B.c.: II," Persian Period [sic!] from Tell Deir 'Alla," VT 17 (1967): 480f. and PL BASOR 165 (1962): 37, Fig. 1 [p. 118 below]. [The editio princeps was published in 1976: J. Hoftijzer and G. van der 6. The form in Fig. 2 of Hom's article should show a short vertical Kooij, Aramaic Texts from Deir 'Alla (Leiden: Brill, 1976). For bibliog­ on the right between the horizontal strokes. The 'Amman form is best raphy, see Aufrecht, pp. xxvi-xxix, and J. Hoftijzer and G. van der Kooij, compared with the Bir Hadad ~ade, and the ~ade of the Phoenician Ba'! The Balaam Text from Deir 'Alla Re-evaluated: Proceedings of the Lebanon text (see Peckham: Pl. VII [pp. 104-5]). No doubt it is proto­ International Symposium held at Leiden 21-24 August 1989 (Leiden: cursive in origin like fet. 95 96 Transjordanian Epigraphy Sardinia. 7 The 'alep of other ninth-century Aramaic texts form is more elongated than the Nora and Archaic Cy­ is derived from the archaic Phoenician form. None, how­ prus kaps. On the other hand, it does not exhibit the curv­ ever, is typologically as early as the <Amman form. The ing downstroke of the Mesha< and later Hebrew hands. 'alep of the Mesha< Inscription is drawn more nearly on Lamed is a static letter. Curled and angular bases ap­ the vertical but otherwise is decisively more developed pear side by side in this era and are not of typological sig­ than the <Amman form. nificance. Bet requires little comment. It is a typical ninth­ The mem of the <Ammonite Inscription is most ex­ century form, little differentiated from the late tenth, or traordinary. It is a form intermediate between the vertical for that matter, early eighth-century styles. zigzag mem of the tenth century and the very beginning Dalet develops a tail in Aramaic at the beginning of of the ninth century in Phoenician, and the horizontal or the scripts we can identify as Aramaic; in this evolution it near-horizontal zigzag mems of the ninth century. The anticipates the Phoenician and Hebrew series. The Deir <Ammonite form is earlier typologically than the mems of <Ana cursive shows the extreme evolution of the tail of the Bir Hadad and Mesha< inscriptions. Its closest paral­ dalet, probably a local <Ammonite feature. In the Ara­ lels are certain of the mems of the Kilamuwa Inscription maic series, the <Amman dalet is typologically primitive, and of the Nora and archaic Cyprus texts. The length of less evolved than the forms of the Bir Hadad and Zakkur the tail of the mem is a developed trait but with close par­ inscriptions. The latter have longer legs and more allels in the earliest Aramaic inscriptions. rounded points on the left of the triangular head. Nun shows elongation, a ninth-century Aramaic As we have noted, the he of the <Ammonite text is hallmark. Samek too is chiefly differentiated from older "hump-shouldered," that is tending to curve with drooping forms by its long leg. horizontals. An archaic form of he appears side by side 'Ayin is inscribed high and is of fairly large size. One with the proto-cursive forms. Rounded forms also appear 'ayin is inscribed in normal, circular form. A second is in the Kilamuwa and (especially) Zakkur inscriptions. open at the top. The latter circumstance is probably with­ Waw stands outside the Aramaic and Phoenician out typological significance; however, we must note that series of the ninth century, both of which utilize a near­ circular and open 'ayins occur together in the <Ammonite vertical right downstroke. The cup-topped waw of the cursive from Deir <Alla by the end of the eighth century. tenth century survives in elongated form in the Mesha< The open form is regular in the cursive. Inscription. The 'Y' -shaped waw appears sporadically in The anomalous :;ade has been discussed above; it is the Gezer inscription and regularly in the <Amman text. It not significant for dating in the Aramaic series. Both :;ade then disappears forever. and res are long, graceful forms. Sin is still undifferenti­ We have remarked above that the <Amman text has a ated from Phoenician forms of the tenth century, and fits two-bar f:zet and we have noted parallels. It should be appropriately in the ninth-century Aramaic. added that of all such f:zets of the ninth and eighth centu­ The taw of the Aramaic script of the <Ammonite stele ries, the <Ammonite form is least elongated. The broad, is only slightly developed beyond the 'X' -forms of tenth­ short-armed style is archaic, surprising in a script marked century Phoenician. While in Hebrew and Moabite, the otherwise by free, long strokes (with he, kap, mem, nun, 'X' -form persists into the ninth century, in the Aramaic and samek and res). series, our earliest Aramaic texts, Bir Hadad, Kilamuwa The yod of the <Amman Citadel Inscription is long and the I:IazaJel Inscriptions, all use an evolved taw in and angular, closely related to the yods of Mesha< and Bir which the longer downstroke is greatly lengthened, and Hadad. often curves to the left at the bottom (Kilamuwa and Kap is a useful letter palaeographically. By the be­ I:IazaJel forms). The <Ammonite taw is thus the earliest in ginning of the eighth century in Aramaic and Phoenician the Aramaic series. scripts, it has lost its 'k' -form, the horizontal 'v' on the We may summarize our analysis as follows. The left of the leg evolving into a horizontal 'y' (cf. Zakkur <Amman Inscription is written in <Ammonite, but in a and later eighth-century Aramaic scripts), as well as characteristic Aramaic hand of the ninth century BCE. It other styles in Hebrew and Phoenician. The <Ammonite exhibits a number of letter forms which are earlier than our earliest extensive Aramaic inscription, the Bir Hadad text of the mid-ninth century, including: 'alep, waw, 7. See the discussion of the evolution of 'alep in the writer's dis­ cussion, "An Archaic Seal from the Valley of Aijalon [Soreq]," BASOR mem, and taw. The Kilamuwa Inscription of ca. 825 168 (1962): 14f.