The ‘Risala’ of Yehuda Ibn Quraysh and its Place in Hebrew Linguistics

1981 ◽  
Vol 8 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 307-327
Author(s):  
W. Jacques Van Bekkum
Keyword(s):  
Direct Influence ◽  
Comparative Linguistics ◽  
Semitic Languages ◽  
Interesting Connection ◽  
Comparative Aspect ◽  
Hebrew Language ◽  
History Of ◽  
Linguistic Approach ◽  
Lasting Influence ◽  
Hebrew Linguistics

Summary The Risāla of Yěhuda Ibn Quraysh (10th century) has evoked many suggestions and presuppositions among modern scholars with regard to its place within the development of Hebrew linguistics. This paper does not deal extensively with the Risāla on its own, but examines possible connections of the Risāla with contemporary and later linguistic works. In the first place, an article of Allony (1970) is discussed, in which the author states that the second chapter of the Risāla was influenced by a work of Sacadya Gaon, the Kitāb al-sab-cīn lafza al-mufrada. However, his arguments are not convincing, as already observed by Becker (1977) and Téné (1980). Ibn Quraysh was completely independent from the works of Sacadya Gaon and in fact stood outside the tradition in the study of the Hebrew language which Sacadya Gaon had established. Ibn Quraysh did not have a lasting influence on later grammarians because of his unusual linguistic approach. Direct influence is demonstrable in the Kitāb Jāmic al-’Alfāz of al-Fāsī. In this connection the problem is discussed, whether Ibn Quraysh was a Qaraite, like al-Fāsī, as some scholars have thought. Works of later grammarians like Ibn Tamīm, Ibn Janāh and Ibn Hayyūj are considered, but their alleged dependence upon the Risāla is disproved. The most interesting connection lies between the Risāla and the Kitāb al-Muwāzana by Ibn Bārūn. This book is clearly a comparative work like the Risāla. Ibn Bārūn, too, is aware of the kinship of certain Semitic languages and he shares particular views of Ibn Quraysh regarding lexical explanations and Hebrew grammar. But it is remarkable that the works of Ibn Quraysh and Ibn Bārūn did not make an impact on the later development of Hebrew linguistics and did not succeed in focusing attention on the comparative aspect in the study of Hebrew and Arabic. Reasons for this are given by Téné (1980). It is clear that both the Risāla and the Kitāb al-Muwāzana represent an episodic development within the history of Hebrew linguistics, which was not developed by later Hebrew linguists until modern scholars of comparative linguistics took it up again.

Comparative graphematics

2011 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 12-38 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rüdiger Weingarten
Keyword(s):  
Language Change ◽  
Writing System ◽  
Writing Systems ◽  
General Outline ◽  
Comparative Linguistics ◽  
Systems Research ◽  
History Of ◽  
Linguistic Approach

This paper seeks to outline comparative graphematics as a linguistic approach within writing systems research and typology. In addition to providing a general outline of the approach and its benefits, it is exemplified through a discussion of the relation between the gemination of consonant letters and the graphemic representation of long consonants. Two different approaches within comparative graphematics are applied, one that asks about the meaning or function of the units of writing systems and one that starts with linguistic (e.g. phonological or morphological) units or structures and looks at whether they are represented (and, if so, how) in various writing systems. Consequently, two different typological matrices are presented. Moreover, through a combination of historical and comparative perspectives, the paper investigates the diachronic transitions in the functions of a graphemic construction, as observed within the history of a single writing system or in its adoption within several systems. It is shown that an inherited construction, such as the germination of consonant letters, can be reanalysed; if it loses its former representational function during the course of language change, it may subsequently be utilized for different purposes. A construction may also remain as an ‘evolutionary vestige’ within a writing system, at least for some time. Similar forms of reanalysis can be found if a construction is applied to a new language. Keywords: graphematics; orthography; writing system; script; comparative linguistics; cross-linguistic studies; typology; germination

Ethio-Semitic

2020 ◽  
pp. 358-363
Author(s):  
Victor Porkhomovsky
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Linguistics ◽  
Semitic Languages ◽  
The World ◽  
Genetic Unit ◽  
History Of ◽  
Areal Linguistics

Ethio-Semitic languages form a group within the Semitic family of the Afro-Asiatic language phylum. In all the surveys of languages and language families of the world this group of languages in Ethiopia and Eritrea is always present and is by default treated as a genetic unit within Semitic. Its traditional status is supported by a long history of population medley, language contacts, and interference within the framework of areal linguistics, comparative linguistics, and sociocultural, geographical, and ecological paradigms. The internal classification of Ethio-Semitic provokes many controversies on all levels, including the language ~ dialect level. This chapter describes and explains this problematic nature, taking into account morphological isoglosses such as prefix conjugation and suffix conjugation.

scholarly journals Eating out of Calabashes.Was it Reality? Proto-Bantu and the domestication of Cucurbits

Afrika Focus ◽  
1998 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Annelies Bulckens
Keyword(s):  
Historical Linguistic ◽  
Key Words ◽  
Agricultural History ◽  
Comparative Linguistics ◽  
History Of ◽  
Tropical Areas ◽  
Eating Out ◽  
Linguistic Approach

This paper examines the history of calabashes in the Bantu-world. Due to con- servation problems of floral remains in tropical areas, no material traces of these fruits have been excavated untill now. The historical linguistic approach adopted in this paper, gives an overview of the evolution and history of different words signifying calabash and allows the formulation of some conclusions on agricultural history.  KEY WORDS : comparative linguistics, Bantu, calabash, Curubits 

Liepājai – veltījuma dzejas / dziesmu piemēri mūsdienās un 19. gadsimta baltvācu literārajā mantojumā

2020 ◽  
pp. 26-34
Author(s):  
Ivars Orehovs
Keyword(s):  
Travel Literature ◽  
Geographical Location ◽  
Geographical Environment ◽  
Comparative Aspect ◽  
Literary Heritage ◽  
History Of ◽  
Native Place ◽  
History Of Literature ◽  
The 19Th Century ◽  
The Town

In a literary heritage with a developed tradition of genres, works whose main purpose is to attract the attention of readers to a selected geographical location, are of particular culture-historical and culture-geographical interest. The most widespread in this respect is travel literature, which is usually written by travellers and consist of impressions portrayed in prose after visits to foreign lands. Another type of literary depiction with an expressed poetic orientation, but a similar goal, is characteristic of dedicatory poetry. The author’s position is usually saturated with emotional expressiveness as well as the artistry of symbols, encouraging the reader or listener to feel the formation of a spontaneous attitude. It is possible to gain confidence in the engagement of the author of the poetry as an individual in the depicted cultural-geographical environment, which can be conceptually expressed by words or pairs of words ‘resident’, ‘native place’, ‘patriot’. With regard to the devotional depictions on the Latvian urban environment, one of the earliest examples known in the history of literature is the dedicatory poem in German by Christian Bornmann to the town Jelgava with its ancient name (Mitau, 1686/1802). The name of Liepāja town in this tradition of the genre has become an embodiment later – in the poetry selection in German, also using the ancient name of the town (Libausche Dichtungen, 1853), but in terms of contemporary literary practice with Imants Kalniņš’ music, there is a convincing dominance of songs with words of poetry. The aim of the article is, looking at the poetry devoted to Liepāja in the 19th century and at the turn of the 20th/21st century in the comparative aspect, to present textually thematic peculiarities as well as to provide the analytical interpretative summary of those.

Economic thought in the 17th and 18th centuries: a linguistic approach

2015 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 260-270
Author(s):  
Iara Vigo de Lima
Keyword(s):  
Economic Thought ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Front Position ◽  
History Of ◽  
Epistemological Model ◽  
Theory Of Language ◽  
Theory Of Value ◽  
Linguistic Approach ◽  
Practical Implications

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyse Michel Foucault’s new epistemological model regarding an analogy between the theory of language and economic thought in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Design/methodology/approach – Through the scrutiny of language, Foucault intended to demonstrate that some analogies, among different branches of knowledge (interdiscursive practice), allow us to apprehend the underlying configuration of thought regarding ontological and epistemological conditions that have historically determined knowledge. He draws a parallel between four theoretical segments borrowed from general grammar (Attribution, Articulation, Designation and Derivation) and economic thought on wealth. Findings – One of the most remarkable propositions of this approach is that the theory of language and economic thought were epistemologically isomorphic in that context. What the theory of language stated in relation to “attribution” and “articulation” corresponded to the “theory of value” in economic thought. What grammar investigated regarding “designation” and “derivation” was analogous to the “theory of money and trade” in economic thought. The relationships that were – directly and diagonally – identified between and among them led to the conclusion that there was ‘a circular and surface causality’ in economic thought insofar as “circulation” preceded “production”. It was “superficial” because it could not find an explanation for the cause of “wealth”, which was only possible when “production” was placed in the front position of theories. Practical implications – Such an epistemological point of view can inspire other studies in the history of economic thought. Originality/value – This paper offers a perspective on how to think about the history of ontological and epistemological conditions of economic thought.

scholarly journals Swiss Architectural Origins, Le Corbusier, and the Pātaka of Lake Horowhenua (1845)

2014 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
pp. 72-81
Author(s):  
Peter Wood
Keyword(s):  
Le Corbusier ◽  
Direct Influence ◽  
The North ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
History Of ◽  
The One ◽  
Swiss Lake ◽  
Richard Taylor ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Town

In April, 1845, the Rev. Richard Taylor passed through the area of the North Island now marked by the town of Levin. At this time, he described Lake Horowhenua as being of singular appearance for the small storehouses built over the water on poles. As was his predilection, Taylor made a drawing of the lake huts, a version of which was belatedly included in the second edition of his most important literary contribution, Te Ika-a-Māui (1870). This image would have remained as little more than a questionable curiosity was it not for Messrs Black Bros who, in the course of exploring the lake bed for Māori artefacts in 1932, legitimised Taylor's observation with their discovery of the submerged architectural remains of an aquatic hut. Nonetheless, almost a century after Taylor's original diary entry, GL Adkin, writing for The Journal of the Polynesian Society, lamented the neglect shown toward these remarkable structures, and which he cited as just one example of the "tantalising gaps" in the recorded history of Māori custom and culture. Sadly, it is well beyond the scope of this research to properly redress the historical neglect shown toward lake pātaka. What I do wish to do is to link these structures to an event on the shores of the Lake of Zurich, Switzerland, when Dr Ferdinand Keller noticed some half-submerged piles in 1854. Upon these remains Keller made a great, if erroneous, case for primitive "pile-work habitations" in the Swiss lakes. The impact of this argument cannot be understated. It became the privileged model for architectural origins in the German and French parts of Switzerland, and by the 1890s it was a part of standard teaching texts in Swiss schools, where it was firmly inculcated into the curriculum at the time that Charles Edouard Jeanneret was a child. This in turn has led Vogt to suggest that, in Keller's "dwellings on the water," Le Corbusier found a Primitive Hut typology that underpinned all his architectural thinking, and which is made most explicit in his principled use of piloti. What makes this all the more involved is that Keller, in searching for examples to visualise the construction of the Swiss lake dwellings, turned to the Pacific (which he categorised as at a developmental stage of architectural evolution akin to early Europe). In this paper I identify the exact etching by Louis Auguste de Sainson that Keller took for direct influence. The problem, however, is that de Sainson depicted a conventional whare built on land, and Keller transposed it to the water. So we have on the one side of this paper an authentic lake whare that is all but forgotten, and a famed European lake-hut that is all but Māori, and between the two is the figure of Le Corbusier who may or may not have unknowingly based one on his major innovations on influences found in the pātaka of Lake Horowhenua.

scholarly journals From devotion to commitment: Towards a critical ontology of engagement

2021 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 261-281
Author(s):  
Andrea Perunovic
Keyword(s):  
History Of Philosophy ◽  
Semantic Field ◽  
Comparative Linguistics ◽  
Conceptual Apparatus ◽  
Critical Ontology ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Binary Oppositions ◽  
Light Darkness ◽  
History Of

This article approaches the notion of engagement from the perspective of critical ontology. With language as the starting point of its hermeneutic task, it commences with an etymological analyses of diverse Indo-European words gravitating around the semantic field of the notion of engagement. From these introductory insights obtained by an exercise in comparative linguistics, devotion and commitment are mapped as two opposite, yet inseparable, modes of being of engagement. Both of these modes seem to condition engagement in an ontologically disparate manner. While examining their fundamental structures, some of the canonical concepts of history of philosophy such as being, existence, subjectivity, or world - and also some of its constitutive binary oppositions such as body/mind, individual/collective, transcendence/immanence, light/darkness and sacred/secular - will be reconsidered through the prism of different ontological dispositions that devotion and commitment impose respectively on engagement. The overall aim of this investigation is to bring forth the main existential characteristics of being-engaged, by interpreting the roles of who, where, and what of engagement, and in order to provide a fundamental conceptual apparatus for a critical ontology of engagement.

scholarly journals Alternative Modernity of the Princely states- Evaluating the Architecture of Sayajirao Gaekwad of Baroda

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 59-70
Author(s):  
Niyati Jigyasu
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Urban Form ◽  
Turn Of The Century ◽  
Positive Contribution ◽  
Urban Planner ◽  
Built Form ◽  
History Of ◽  
Princely State ◽  
The City ◽  
Lasting Influence

The first half of the 20th century was a turning point in the history of India with provincial rulers making significant development that had positive contribution and lasting influence on India’s growth. They served as architects, influencing not only the socio-cultural and economic growth but also the development of urban built form. Sayajirao Gaekwad III was the Maharaja of Baroda State from 1875 to 1939, and is notably remembered for his reforms. His pursuit for education led to establishment of Maharaja Sayajirao University and the Central Library that are unique examples of Architecture and structural systems. He brought many known architects from around the world to Baroda including Major Charles Mant, Robert Chrisholm and Charles Frederick Stevens. The proposals of the urban planner Patrick Geddes led to vital changes in the urban form of the core city area. New materials and technology introduced by these architects such as use of Belgium glass in the flooring of the central library for introducing natural light were revolutionary for that period. Sayajirao’s vision for water works, legal systems, market enterprises have all been translated into unique architectural heritage of the 20th century which signifies innovations that had a lasting influence on the city’s social, economic, administrative structure as well as built form of the city and its architecture. This paper demonstrates how the reformist ideas and vision of an erstwhile provincial ruler lead to significant architecture at the turn of the century in Princely state of Vadodara.

scholarly journals Simono Daukanto BUDĄ Senowęs-Letuwiu Kalnienu ĩr Ƶamajtiu (1845) šaltiniai

2020 ◽  
pp. 217-248
Author(s):  
Roma Bončkutė
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Cultural History ◽  
Comparative Linguistics ◽  
Language And Culture ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Future ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Regional Historiography

SOURCES OF SIMONAS DAUKANTAS’S BUDĄ SENOWĘS-LËTUWIÛ KALNIENÛ ĨR ƵÁMAJTIÛ (1845) The article investigates Simonas Daukantas’s (1793–1864) BUDĄ Senowęs-Lëtuwiû Kalnienû ĩr Ƶámajtiû (The Character of the Lithuanian Highlanders and Samogitians of the Old Times, 1845; hereafter Bd) with regards to genre, origin of the title, and the dominant German sources of the work. It claims that Daukantas conceived Bd because he understood that the future of Lithuania is closely related to its past. A single, united version of Lithuanian history, accepted by the whole nation, was necessary for the development of Lithuanian national identity and collective feeling. The history, which up until then had not been published in Lithuanian, could have helped to create the contours of a new society by presenting the paradigmatic events of the past. The collective awareness of the difference between the present and the past (and future) should have given the Lithuanian community an incentive to move forward. Daukantas wrote Bd quickly, between 1842 and May 28, 1844, because he drew on his previous work ISTORYJE ƵEMAYTYSZKA (History of the Lithuanian Lowlands, ~1831–1834; IƵ). Based on the findings of previous researchers of Daukantas’s works, after studying the dominant sources of Bd and examining their nature, this article comes to the conclusion that the work has features of both cultural history and regional historiography. The graphically highlighted form of the word “BUDĄ” used in the work’s title should be considered the author’s code. Daukantas, influenced by the newest culturological research and comparative linguistics of the 18th–19th centuries, propagated that Lithuanians originate from India and, like many others, found evidence of this in the Lithuanian language and culture. He considered the Budini (Greek Βουδίνοι), who are associated with the followers of Buddha, to be Lithuanian ancestors. He found proof of this claim in the language and chose the word “būdas” (character), which evokes aforementioned associations, to express the idea of the work.

scholarly journals Joseph Volotsky and Gennady of Novgorod: the Borrowing of Ideas in the Context on anti-“Judaizers” Polemics

Slovene ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 71-92
Author(s):  
Alexander A. Kazakov
Keyword(s):  
Decisive Factor ◽  
Direct Influence ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject

Hegumen Joseph of Volokolamsk’s writings and Archbishop Gennady of Novgorod’s epistles are the bulk of sources for the history of the heresy movement known as the “Judaizers”. However, the subject of relationship between these two accusers of heresy is still not sufficiently studied, and we have no proof of direct contacts between the Volotsk monastery and the Archbishop’s throne. At the same time, using the hagiographical sources about Joseph Volotsky allows us to suggest that these contacts did exist in the form of exchanging letters, and some books at the Volotsk Monastery library, judging by the scribes’ additions, were made at the scriptorium of the Novgorodian throne. The transfer of several works from Novgorod to Volok probably was a decisive factor for hegumen Joseph’s notions of the heresy, and some of the works received had direct influence on his polemic essays against the heretics. The author proposes a hypothesis that the notions of Judaic origins of the heresy were formed as a result of Archbishop Gennady comparing iconolatry practices occurring in Novgorod with the description of iconoclasm from The Epistle of Photios, the Patriarch of Constantinople, to Mikhail, the Prince of Bulgaria. Thus, iconoclasm became one of the main features of the “Judaizers”. But the “Judaizers” themselves did not view their common worshipping practices as heretical. This attitude towards the accusations allowed Archbishop Gennady to also accuse them of involvement with the Messalian heresy. Gennady based his charges on The Old Slavonic Nomocanon paragraphs on Messalians. Probably, the manuscript of this Nomocanon was delivered from Novgorod Archiepiscopal Court to Volokolamsk monastery along with the copies of other “Judaizers”’ writings, found by the archbishop. Some paragraphs on Messalians from the The Old Slavonic Nomocanon brought us to conclusion that they were used by Joseph Volotsky as the main source for his theory of “wise guiles”, which were supposed to reveal heretics.

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