An Open Access Online Journal on Arabian Epigraphy.
This article studies two unique Greek inscriptions from Wadi Salma in north-eastern Jordan. The first contains seven lines of Old Arabic written in Greek letters, and is our first secure example of Arabic prose written in Greek in the pre-Islamic period. The inscription sheds light on several grammatical features otherwise obscured by the consonantal skeletons of the Semitic scripts, such as the presence of case inflection, the realization of III-w suffix-conjugated verbs, and the vowel pattern of the prefix conjugation. The second inscription is written entirely in the Greek language, but contains a long section of prose which is thematically similar to what is typically found in the Safaitic inscriptions.
Graeco-Arabica Greek inscriptions Old Arabic Safaitic
This paper publishes three new Safaitic-Greek bilingual inscriptions. One of them is the first to contain a translation of the Old Arabic prose into Greek. In addition to their decipherment and translation, the paper offers a few grammatical observations on the Arabic and Greek, and remarks on the growing evidence for Arabic-Greek bilingualism in the Harrah.
Bilingual inscriptions Graeco-Arabica Greek inscriptions Literacy Safaitic
This contribution provides a preliminary update to An Outline of the Grammar of the Safaitic Inscriptions (ssll 80; Leiden: Brill, 2015) based on new inscriptions and the re-interpretation of previously published texts. New data pertain to phonology, demonstratives, verbal morphology, and syntax. The supplement to the dictionary contains hundreds of new entries, mainly comprising rare words and hapax legomena.
Ancient North Arabian Arabic grammar Safaitic