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Art. XII.—Studies on the Comparative Grammar of the Semitic Languages, with Special Reference to Assyrian
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 March 2011
Extract
When we consider the progress made by comparative Indo-European philology, we can only wonder that even after the discovery of Assyrian, which undoubtedly represents the Sanskrit of the Semitic languages, no attempt has been made to form a comparative Semitic grammar. Assyrian has hitherto been regarded as at most useful for the explanation of certain questions of Hebrew lexicography; as for the morphology of the Semitic tongues, scholars have been content with simply stating the analogies which exist between Assyrian and the allied languages. The cause of this lies mainly in the fact that Assyrian is regarded as a corrupt branch of the Semitic family of speech; and much that is peculiar in its structure, the preservation of which really implies the highest antiquity, is treated as so many new formations, so that the possibility of properly utilizing Assyrian grammatical forms for the explanation of Semitic grammar is at the outset taken away. Hence, as long as such thoroughly perverse views are not given up, a scientific philology of the Semitic languages can never take its place by the side of that of the Indo-European languages.
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page 245 note 1 Passages like W. A. I. iv. 16, 67Google Scholarb, kima labiri-šu šû-ṭir ‘like its original written,’ may perhaps lead us to claim for Assyrian a passive participle of the form qatîl, closely corresponding to the Aramaic qĕtîl. With equal justice we could also claim the correspondence of a form qatûl with the Hebrew pass. part.
cf. W. A. I. iv. 31,Google ScholarObv. 11: “over door and bolts (of the underworld)
ša-pu-uḥ ip-ru, is spread the dust.” Both forms, however, are very uncertain, since the length of the vowel of the second syllable has not yet been proved by scriptio plena; at all events, I am unacquainted with any passage in which
is written. On the contrary, the reading
šâ-ṭir makes it more probable that we should transcribe, not qatîl and qâtul. but qâtil and qâtul. In dealing with the Assyrian conjugation in a future publication, I hope to point out that in Assyrian the participle passive and the participle active are not yet sharply distinguished from one another.
page 248 note 1 Yengeru, yengera, yengeri, would perhaps have become yengerû, yengera, yengerî, as labaska, labaski, labasku, have become labaska, labaskî, labaskû.
page 249 note 1 The only exception that could be quoted would be the older form êpašu, which once occurs in an inscription of Tiglath-Pileser, instead of the usual êpišu.
page 250 note 2 A fuller statement of the points briefly noted here in outline, which is quite sufficient for all who are acquainted with the questions discussed, will be given in three monographs, one on The Inner Flection, a second on The Growth of the Semitic Conjugations, and a third on The Assyrian Permansive.
page 250 note 1 Others have indeed maintained that this form, first established by E. Hincks and A. H. Sayce, has nothing to do with the Semitic Perfect. Fr. Lenormant, , in his E'tudes sur quelques parties des Syllabaires cunéiformes, p. 20, note 4, says: “Je reviendrai ailleurs sur le temps particulier du verbe assyrien, formé du participe, auquel Hincks a donné le nom de permansif; ce temps existe très-réellement, mais c'est à tort, que les savants de l'ecole anglaise out voulu le comparer au prétérit des autres langues sémitiques; il trouve son élement de comparaison et son explication dans certains emplois du participe à l'expression du présent dans les dialects araméens.” If Lenormant does not forsake this point of view, his work must be condemned beforehand as undertaken in vain. The Assyrian Permansive closely corresponds with the Ethiopic Perfect, especially with that of the intransitive verbs. Were Lenormant right, our argument would have been a mere waste of time: but a simple glance at the following paradigms is sufficient to show that he is not:—Google Scholar
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How Lenormant will explain šainâ from his Mishnite forms is to me incomprehensible. The “savants de l'école anglaise” are decidedly right.
page 252 1 Up to the time of Assur-bani-pal, Hebrew proper names are written on the Assyrian monuments with the final vowel attached. Thus, Hezekiah is Khazakiyāhu, Ahab is Akhabbu (i.e. Akhábu), Jerusalem is Ursalimma (i.e. Ursalíma), where the position of the accent must be noted. Conversely, Assyrian proper names, which have a final vowel in the inscriptions, are written defectively in our present Hebrew text. Thus Śinu-akhi-'erba appears as Babilu as
the Turtanu as
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