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The Semitic languages are a family of languages spoken by more than 370 million people across much of the Middle East, where they probably originated, and North and East Africa. They constitute the northeastern subfamily of the Afro-Asiatic languages, and the only branch of this group spoken in Asia.
The most widely spoken Semitic language today is Arabic (206 million speakers), followed by Amharic (27 million speakers), Hebrew (7.5 million speakers), and Tigrinya (6.75 million speakers). Semitic languages were among the earliest to attain a written form, with Akkadian writing beginning in the middle of the third millennium BC. The term "Semitic" for these languages, after Shem son of Noah, is etymologically a misnomer in some ways, but is nonetheless standard.
This is the first general survey of the Semitic languages, including the Arab and Aramaic dialects and various languages of Ethiopia.
The Semitic languages are a family of languages spoken by more than 370 million people across much of the Middle East, where they probably originated, and North and East Africa. They constitute the northeastern subfamily of the Afro-Asiatic languages, and the only branch of this group spoken in Asia.
The most widely spoken Semitic language today is Arabic (206 million speakers), followed by Amharic (27 million speakers), Hebrew (7.5 million speakers), and Tigrinya (6.75 million speakers). Semitic languages were among the earliest to attain a written form, with Akkadian writing beginning in the middle of the third millennium BC. The term "Semitic" for these languages, after Shem son of Noah, is etymologically a misnomer in some ways, but is nonetheless standard.
This is the first general survey of the Semitic languages, including the Arab and Aramaic dialects and various languages of Ethiopia.
Preface Part I. Generalities 1. Genetic subgrouping Alice Faber, Haskins Laboratories, USA 2. Writing systems Peter Daniels, USA 3. Arabic grammatical tradition Jonathan Owens, Germany 4. Hebrew grammatical tradition Arie Schippers, Netherlands Part II. Old Semitic 5. Akkadian Giorgo Buccellati, UCLA 6. Amorite and Eblaite Cyrus H Gordon, USA 7. Aramaic Stephen A Kaufman, Hebrew Union College, USA 8. Ugaritic Dennis Pardee, University of Chicago 9. Ancient Hebrew Richard Steiner, USA 10. Phoenician and Canaanite Stanislav Segert, UCLA 11. Classical Arabic Wolfdietrich Fischer, Germany 12. Sayhadic (Epigraphic South Arabian) L E Kogan, Russia and A V Korotayev, Oriental Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences 13. Ge'ez (Ethiopic) Gene Gragg, University of Chicago Part III. Modern Semitic 14. Arabic Dialects and Maltese Alan S Kaye, California State University at Fullerton and Judith Rosenhouse, The Technion, Haifa, Israel 15. Modern Hebrew Ruth A Berman, Tel Aviv University 16. Neo-Aramaic Otto Jastrow, University of Erlangen, Germany 17. Modern South Arabian Marie-Claude Simeone-Senelle, CNRS, France 18. Tigrinya L E Kogan, Russia 19. Tigre shlomo Raz, Tel Aviv University 20. Amharic and Argobba Grover Hudson, Michigan State University 21. Harari Ewald Wagner, Germany 22. East Gurage Ernst-August Gutt, Germany 23. Outer South Ethiopic Robert Hetzron Index
...this ambitious book is a welcome addition to the library of Semitic studies. It is replete with interesting material and will be of value to comparitive Semiticists and theoretical linguists for many years to come. - Journal of Linguistics
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