Description
Book SynopsisCovers the major languages, language families, and writing systems attested in the Ancient Near East Filled with enlightening chapters by noted experts in the field, this book introduces Ancient Near Eastern (ANE) languages and language families used during the time period of roughly 3200 BCE to the second century CE in the areas of Egypt, the Levant, eastern Anatolia, Mesopotamia, and Iran. In addition to providing grammatical sketches of the respective languages, the book focuses on socio-linguistic questions such as language contact, diglossia, the development of literary standard languages, and the development of diplomatic languages or linguae francae. It also addresses the interaction of Ancient Near Eastern languages with each other and their roles within the political and cultural systems of ANE societies. Presented in five parts, The Companion to Ancient Near Eastern Languages provides readers with in-depth chapter coverage of the writing systems of ANE, starting with their
Trade Review"To sum up, A Companion to Ancient Near Eastern Languages deserves a place on every Hebrew Bible scholar's shelf (or device) alongside other standard resources on the ancient Near Eastern world of the OT." – Bulletin for Biblical Research, Vol. 31, No. 2, 2021
Table of ContentsList of Illustrations ix
List of Tables xi
Notes on Contributors xv
Preface xix
Part I Writing Systems 1
1 The Decipherment of Ancient Near Eastern Languages 3
Peter T. Daniels
2 The Emergence of Cuneiform Writing 27
Christopher Woods
3 The Development of Egyptian Writing in the Fourth and Early Third Millennium bce 47
Ludwig Morenz
4 The Emergence of Alphabetic Scripts 65
Christopher Rollston
Part II Ancient Near Eastern Languages 83
5 Sumerian 85
Piotr Michalowski
6 Egyptian 107
Matthias Muller
7 Akkadian 129
Rebecca Hasselbach‐Andee
8 Eblaite 149
Amalia Catagnoti
9 Elamite 163
Jan Tavernier
10 Amorite 185
Viktor Golinets
11 Hurrian 203
Dennis R.M. Campbell
12 Hittite 221
Ilya Yakubovich
13 Luwian 239
Craig Melchert
14 Ugaritic 257
Robert Hawley
15 Ancient Hebrew 279
Seth Sanders
16 Phoenician and Punic 297
Francoise Briquel Chatonnet and Robert Hawley
17 Old and Imperial Aramaic 319
Christian Stadel
18 Ancient South Arabian 337
Peter Stein
Part III Ancient Near Eastern Languages Used as Administrative Languages or Linguae Francae 355
19 Akkadian as a Lingua Franca 357
Juan Pablo Vita
20 Aramaic as Lingua Franca 373
Margaretha Folmer
Part IV Language Contact in the Ancient Near East 401
21 Sumerian and Akkadian Language Contact 403
C. Jay Crisostomo
22 Language Contact of Ancient Egyptian with Semitic and Other Near Eastern Languages 421
Thomas Schneider
23 Hebrew and Aramaic in Contact 439
Aaron Koller
24 Multilingualism and Diglossia in the Ancient Near East 457
Rebecca Hasselbach‐Andee
Part V The Development of Literary Languages and Literary Contact 471
25 Standard Babylonian 473
Christian W. Hess
26 Standardization in Egyptian 489
Antonio Loprieno
27 The “Influence” of Sumerian on Hittite Literature 505
Mark Weeden
28 Ancient Near Eastern Literary Influences on Hebrew Literature and the Hebrew Bible 521
Michael Wingert
Index 537
