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OT: Settling the issues on "Ethio-Sabean" connections, "Habashat", and the related
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[QUOTE]Originally posted by Yom: [QB] ^^Sundiata, I wrote most of that particular passage at Wikipedia, which answers.com mirrors for most of its content. [QUOTE]Originally posted by Zorn: [qb] BTW- I came across this link on Axum: http://endingstereotypesforamerica.org/ancient_aksum.html Though it obviously has old information, this caught my eye: "The Aksumite Kingdom enriched itself with the Greek culture, which it had much exposure. Tekle Tsadik Mekouria,11 wrote that, "There were considerable commercial and cultural exchanges between the two countries." The Greek and South Arabian scripts were used until Aksum developed its own written language, Ge'ez, in the 5th century. "The Alphabet," Kobishanov tells us, "is generally regarded as the outstanding achievement of the Aksumite civilization."12 New England historian, Graham Connah pointed out that the, "syllabry used for inscriptions grew less and less like the South Arabian form which it had originated, and more and more like Ge'ez, the ancestor of the Ethiopian languages…At first a consonantal syllabary, it was not until the fourth century AD that a system of vocalization was introduced and this was clearly an Ethiopian development."13" This is the first time I've heard of Greek influence on Axum- where does that fit in with what you've read? And did the fully developed Ge'ez alphabet really come in that late? [/qb][/QUOTE]No, Ge'ez didn't come that late. As I said above, it evolved from ESA around the 4/5th century BC (it was a gradual process; see "Akkele Guzay" by Rodolfo Fattovich in the Encyclopaedia Aethiopica) and was vocalized by the early 4th century AD. Ezana's inscriptions are the first with a fully vocalized Ge'ez alphabet, but we have traces of vocalization even earlier, such as a vocalized letter ([i]sadis[/i], i.e. a "sixth" order vowel) in a coin of Wazeba (who ruled before Ezana's father). See Grover Hudson, "Aspects of the history of Ethiopic writing" in [i]Bulletin of the Institute of Ethiopian Studies 25[/i], 2001, pp. 1-12.) Greek influence wasn't that substantial, however. There are a few loanwords, like the word for "table," which is T'erep'eza from Greek "Trapezius" and the word "debtera" for a biblical scholar from the Greek "diphthera" (prepared hide/parchment), which is pretty widespread (daftar in Arabic and Persian, defter in Turkish). I can't think of any other loanwords, but the Ethiopian numerals are derived from modified Greek letters. Any Greek influence that can be found outside of this is in regards to Christianity and not particularly significant when you look at the larger picture, though. [/QB][/QUOTE]
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