Concept
Semitic languages
Related concepts (49)
Ugaritic
Ugaritic (ˌjuːgəˈrɪtɪk,_ˌuː-) is an extinct Northwest Semitic language, classified by some as a dialect of the Amorite language. It is known through the Ugaritic texts discovered by French archaeologists in 1929 at Ugarit, including several major literary texts, notably the Baal cycle. It has been used by scholars of the Hebrew Bible to clarify Biblical Hebrew texts and has revealed ways in which the cultures of ancient Israel and Judah found parallels in the neighboring cultures.
Semitic root
The roots of verbs and most nouns in the Semitic languages are characterized as a sequence of consonants or "radicals" (hence the term consonantal root). Such abstract consonantal roots are used in the formation of actual words by adding the vowels and non-root consonants (or "transfixes") which go with a particular morphological category around the root consonants, in an appropriate way, generally following specific patterns.
Abugida
An abugida (ɑːbᵿˈɡiːdə,_ˈæb-, from Ge'ez: አቡጊዳ), sometimes known as alphasyllabary, neosyllabary or pseudo-alphabet, is a segmental writing system in which consonant–vowel sequences are written as units; each unit is based on a consonant letter, and vowel notation is secondary, like a diacritical mark. This contrasts with a full alphabet, in which vowels have status equal to consonants, and with an abjad, in which vowel marking is absent, partial, or optional – in less formal contexts, all three types of script may be termed "alphabets".
Proto-Semitic language
Proto-Semitic is the hypothetical reconstructed proto-language ancestral to the Semitic languages. There is no consensus regarding the location of the Proto-Semitic Urheimat: scholars hypothesize that it may have originated in the Levant, the Sahara, the Horn of Africa, the Arabian Peninsula, or northern Africa. Nowadays the likeliest place of origin is North Africa. The Semitic language family is considered part of the broader macro-family of Afroasiatic languages.
Eblaite language
Eblaite (ˈɛblə.aɪt,_ˈiːblə-, also known as Eblan ISO 639-3), or Palaeo-Syrian, is an extinct East Semitic language used during the 3rd millennium BC by the populations of Northern Syria. It was named after the ancient city of Ebla, in modern western Syria. Variants of the language were also spoken in Mari and Nagar. According to Cyrus H. Gordon, although scribes might have spoken it sometimes, Eblaite was probably not spoken much, being rather a written lingua franca with East and West Semitic features.
Amorite language
Amorite is an extinct early Semitic language, formerly spoken during the Bronze Age by the Amorite tribes prominent in ancient Near Eastern history. It is known from Ugaritic, which is classed by some as its westernmost dialect, and from non-Akkadian proper names recorded by Akkadian scribes during periods of Amorite rule in Babylonia (the end of the 3rd and the beginning of the 2nd millennium BC), notably from Mari and to a lesser extent Alalakh, Tell Harmal and Khafajah.
Mehri language
Mehri or Mahri ( مهريّت ) is the most spoken of the Modern South Arabian languages (MSALs), a subgroup of the Semitic branch of the Afroasiatic family. It is spoken by the Mehri tribes, who inhabit isolated areas of the eastern part of Yemen, western Oman, particularly the Al Mahrah Governorate, with a small number in Saudi Arabia near the Yemeni and Omani borders. Up to the 19th century, speakers lived as far north as the central part of Oman.
Emphatic consonant
In Semitic linguistics, an emphatic consonant is an obstruent consonant which originally contrasted with series of both voiced and voiceless obstruents. In specific Semitic languages, the members of this series may be realized as uvularized or pharyngealized, velarized, ejective, or plain voiced or voiceless consonants. It is also used, to a lesser extent, to describe cognate series in other Afro-Asiatic languages, where they are typically realized as ejective, implosive, or pharyngealized consonants.
Sheba
Sheba (ˈʃiːbə; Šəḇāʾ; سبأ Sabaʾ; Ge'ez: ሳባ Saba) is a kingdom mentioned in the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) and the Quran. Sheba features in Jewish, Muslim, and Christian traditions, particularly the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo tradition. It was the home of the biblical "Queen of Sheba", who is left unnamed in the Bible, but receives the names Makeda in Ethiopian and Bilqīs in Arabic tradition. According to Josephus it was also the home of the biblical "Princess Tharbis" said to have been the first wife of Moses when he was still a prince of Egypt.
Broken plural
In linguistics, a broken plural (or internal plural) is an irregular plural form of a noun or adjective found in the Semitic languages and other Afroasiatic languages such as the Berber languages. Broken plurals are formed by changing the pattern of consonants and vowels inside the singular form. They contrast with sound plurals (or external plurals), which are formed by adding a suffix, but are also formally distinct from phenomena like the Germanic umlaut, a form of vowel mutation used in plural forms in Germanic languages.