Ahmad Al-Jallad

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Ahmad Al-Jallad is a Jordanian-American philologist, epigraphist, and a historian of language. Some of the areas he has contributed to include Quranic studies and the history of Arabic, including recent work he has done on the Safaitic and Paleo-Arabic scripts. He is currently Professor in the Sofia Chair in Arabic Studies at Ohio State University at the Department of Near Eastern and South Asian Languages and Cultures. [1] He is the winner of the 2017 Dutch Gratama Science Prize. [2]

Contents

Biography

Al-Jallad was born in Salt Lake City. As an undergraduate, he attended the University of South Florida. He entered Harvard University for his doctoral program in Semitic philology and received his Ph.D. in 2012. One of his mentors during his studies was Michael C. A. Macdonald from the University of Oxford and John Huehnergard from Harvard University. One of his earliest achievements was reconstructing a previously unknown Arabian zodiac from pre-Islamic Arabia. He is presently considered one of the foremost authorities on the early history of the Arabic language and script and he helps direct archaeological expeditions across the Middle East. [3]

Al-Jallad has contributed to the decipherment and interpretation of the inscriptions of Ancient Arabia, especially Safaitic and Thamudic, and more broadly to the history of the Arabic language and its position within the Semitic language family. [4] He has discovered and studied a number of important texts for the history and culture of pre-Islamic Arabia, the Arabs, and the background of Islam. [5] [6] He is also a pioneer in the documentation and study of the Paleo-Arabic inscriptions. [7] [8] Al-Jallad directs epigraphic and archaeological expeditions across the Middle East. [9]

Notable publications

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Classical Arabic</span> Form of the Arabic language used in Umayyad and Abbasid literary texts

Classical Arabic or Quranic Arabic is the standardized literary form of Arabic used from the 7th century and throughout the Middle Ages, most notably in Umayyad and Abbasid literary texts such as poetry, elevated prose and oratory, and is also the liturgical language of Islam. Classical Arabic is, furthermore, the register of the Arabic language on which Modern Standard Arabic is based.

It is thought that the Arabic alphabet is a derivative of the Nabataean variation of the Aramaic alphabet, which descended from the Phoenician alphabet, which among others also gave rise to the Hebrew alphabet and the Greek alphabet, the latter one being in turn the base for the Latin and Cyrillic alphabets.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Safaitic</span> Script variant for Old Arabic

Safaitic is a variety of the South Semitic scripts used by the Arabs in southern Syria and northern Jordan in the Ḥarrah region, to carve rock inscriptions in various dialects of Old Arabic and Ancient North Arabian. The Safaitic script is a member of the Ancient North Arabian (ANA) sub-grouping of the South Semitic script family, the genetic unity of which has yet to be demonstrated.


Ancient North Arabian (ANA) is a collection of scripts and a language or family of languages under the North Arabian languages branch along with Old Arabic that were used in north and central Arabia and south Syria from the 8th century BCE to the 4th century CE. The term "Ancient North Arabian" is defined negatively. It refers to all of the South Semitic scripts except Ancient South Arabian (ASA) regardless of their genetic relationships.

Several calendars have been used in pre-Islamic Arabia. Inscriptions of the ancient South Arabian calendars reveal the use of a number of local calendars, as do Safaitic inscriptions from the Harran desert in Syria and Jordan. At least some of the South Arabian calendars followed the lunisolar system, while the Safaitic calendar had fixed months and seasons and, very importantly, a seasonal star calendar strongly connected to the Zodiac and the position of the ʔanwāʔ. The ʔanwāʔ, a series of asterisms on or near the zodiac belt were the most important element in pre-Islamic astronomy. These stars were connected to the season, and they were used to forecast various phenomena such as rain, temperature, wind. Before the rise of Islam, diviners invoked these stars in rainmaking rituals called istisqāʔ. Rituals took place during specific times, when the sun was in one or the other of these ʔanwāʔ, some Safaitic texts speak of ritual cleansing while the sun is in Virgo (ngm) or Sagittarius (ṯbr); another text mentions a libation during the full moon of Gemini (gml). It is thus obvious that Zodiac constellations, the position of stars and the mansion of the Sun were very important criteria and had an important impact on the pre-Islamic Arabian calendar and ritual life.

Hismaic is a variety of the Ancient North Arabian script and the language most commonly expressed in it. The Hismaic script may have been used to write Safaitic dialects of Old Arabic, but the language of most inscriptions differs from Safaitic in a few important respects, meriting its classification as a separate dialect or language. Hismaic inscriptions are attested in the Ḥismā region of Northwest Arabia, dating to the centuries around and immediately following the start of the Common Era.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Old Arabic</span> Earliest attested stage of the Arabic language

Old Arabic is the name for any Arabic language or dialect continuum before Islam. Various forms of Old Arabic are attested in scripts like Safaitic, Hismaic, Nabatean, and even Greek.

Proto-Arabic is the name given to the hypothetical reconstructed ancestor of all the varieties of Arabic attested since the 9th century BC. There are two lines of evidence to reconstruct Proto-Arabic:

Taymanitic was the language and script of the oasis of Taymāʾ in northwestern Arabia, dated to the second half of the 6th century BC.

Nabataean Arabic was the dialect of Arabic spoken by the Nabataeans in antiquity. It was succeeded by Paleo-Arabic.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Old Hijazi Arabic</span> 1-700 CE language variety or dialect

Old Hijazi, is a variety of Old Arabic attested in Hejaz from about the 1st century to the 7th century. It is the variety thought to underlie the Quranic Consonantal Text (QCT) and in its later iteration was the prestige spoken and written register of Arabic in the Umayyad Caliphate.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Quranic studies</span> Academic discipline

Quranic studies is the academic application of a diverse set of disciplines to study the Quran, drawing on methods including but not limited to ancient history, philology, textual criticism, lexicography, codicology, literary criticism, comparative religion, and historical criticism.

The Jabal Ḏabūbinscription is a South Arabian graffito inscription composed in a minuscule variant of the late Sabaic language and dates to the 6th century, notable for the appearance of a pre-Islamic variant of the Basmala. It was found on a rocky facade at the top of the eastern topside of mount Thaboob in the Dhale region of Yemen and first published in 2018 by M.A. Al-Hajj and A.A. Faqʿas.

The Rīʿ al-Zallālah inscription is a pre-Islamic Paleo-Arabic inscription, likely dating to the 6th century, located near Taif, in a narrow pass that connects this city to the al-Sayl al- Kabīr wadi.

Paleo-Arabic is a script that represents a pre-Islamic phase in the evolution of the Arabic script at which point it becomes recognizably similar to the Islamic Arabic script. It comes prior to Classical Arabic, but it is also a recognizable form of the Arabic script, emerging after a transitional phase of Nabataean Arabic as the Nabataean script slowly evolved into the modern Arabic script. It appears in the late fifth and sixth centuries and, though was originally only known from Syria and Jordan, is now also attested in several extant inscriptions from the Arabian Peninsula, such as in the Christian texts at the site of Hima in South Arabia. More recently, additional examples of Paleo-Arabic have been discovered near Taif in the Hejaz and in the Tabuk region of northwestern Saudi Arabia.

The Jebel Usays inscription is a small rock graffito dating to 528 AD, located at the site of Jabal Says, an ancient volcano in the basaltic steppe lands of southern Syria. It is written in the Paleo-Arabic script. Only two other inscriptions written in the Paleo-Arabic scripts are known from Syria: the Zabad inscription, dating to 512, and the Harran inscription dating to 567–568. All three are connected to the Jafnids.

The Dūmat al-Jandal inscription is an Arabic Christian graffito written in the Paleo-Arabic script, and discovered at the Arabian site of Dumat al-Jandal. It was carved into the middle-left of a sandstone bolder, above a Nabataean Arabic inscription found a little lower. The rock also contains drawings of four female camels, one male camel, and an ibex.

The Umm al-Jimāl inscription is an undated Paleo-Arabic inscription from Umm al-Jimal in the Hauran region of Jordan. It is located on the pillars base of a basalt slab in the northern part of the "Double Church" at the site of Umm al-Jimal and was partly covered with plaster on discovery.

The Umm Burayrah inscription is a Paleo-Arabic inscription discovered in the Tabuk Province of northwestern Saudi Arabia. Among Paleo-Arabic inscriptions it contains a unique invocation formula, a prayer for forgiveness, and the personal name ʿAbd Shams. It was originally photographed and published by Muhammed Abdul Nayeem in 2000, and was recently redocumented by the amateur archaeologist Saleh al‐Hwaiti.

The practice of polytheistic religion dominated in pre-Islamic Arabia until the fourth century. Inscriptions in various scripts used in the Arabian Peninsula including the Nabataean script, Safaitic, and Sabaic attest to the practice of polytheistic cults and idols until the fourth century, whereas material evidence from the fifth century onwards is almost categorically monotheistic. It is in this era that Christianity, Judaism, and other generic forms of monotheism become salient among Arab populations. In South Arabia, the ruling class of the Himyarite Kingdom would convert to Judaism and a cessation of polytheistic inscriptions is witnessed. Monotheistic religion would continue as power in this region transitioned to Christian rulers, principally Abraha, in the early sixth century.

References

  1. ↑ "Ahmad Al-Jallad | Department of Near Eastern and South Asian Languages and Cultures" . Retrieved 2024-04-17.
  2. ↑ "Ahmad Al-Jallad wint Gratama Wetenschapsprijs". Universiteit Leiden. September 4, 2017.
  3. ↑ Muhanna, Elias (2018-05-23). "A New History of Arabia, Written in Stone". The New Yorker. ISSN   0028-792X . Retrieved 2024-04-17.
  4. ↑ Al-Jallad, Ahmad. "Al-Jallad. 2018. The earliest stages of Arabic and its linguistic classification" – via www.academia.edu.
  5. ↑ Al-Jallad, Ahmad. "Al-Jallad. 2020. The Linguistic Landscape of pre-Islamic Arabia -- Context for the Qur'an". OHoQuran– via www.academia.edu.Al-Jallad, Ahmad (June 14, 2015). "Echoes of the Baal Cycle in a Safaito-Hismaic Inscription". Journal of Ancient Near Eastern Religions. 15 (1): 5–19. doi:10.1163/15692124-12341267 – via www.academia.edu.
  6. ↑ Al-Jallad, Ahmad. "Al-Jallad. 2020. ʿArab, ʾAʿrāb, and Arabic in Ancient North Arabia: the first attestation of (ʾ)ʿrb as a group name in Safaitic" – via www.academia.edu.Al-Jallad, Ahmad. "Al-Jallad. 2022. The pre-Islamic basmala: Reflections on its first epigraphic attestation and its original significance" – via www.academia.edu.Al-Jallad, Ahmad (January 1, 2021). "Al-Jallad. 2021. The Pre-Islamic Divine Name ʿsy and the Background of the Qurʾānic Jesus, with Ali al-Manaser". JIQSA– via www.academia.edu.
  7. ↑ Sidky, Hythem; Al-Jallad, Ahmad. "Al-Jallad and Sidky. 2021. A Paleo-Arabic inscription on a route north of Ṭāʾif" – via www.academia.edu.
  8. ↑ Al-Jallad, Ahmad; Sidky, Hythem (April 1, 2024). "A Paleo-Arabic Inscription of a Companion of Muhammad?". Journal of Near Eastern Studies. 83 (1): 1–14. doi:10.1086/729531 – via CrossRef.
  9. ↑ Muhann, Elias (2018-05-23). "A New History of Arabia, Written in Stone". The New Yorker.
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