Arabic and Semitic Linguistics Contextualized: A Festschrift for Jan Retso

577 Pages·2015·19.092 MB·English, Arabic, German

by  Lutz Edzard

Arabic and Semitic Linguistics Contextualized

Arabic and Semitic Linguistics
Contextualized
A Festschrift for Jan Retsö
Edited by Lutz Edzard
2015
Harrassowitz Verlag · Wiesbaden
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Table of Contents

LUTZ EDZARD
Dedication………………………………………………………………………………… 9

SVEN-OLOF DAHLGREN, ROSMARI LILLAS-SCHUIL, HELENE KAMMENSJÖ,
PERNILLA MYRNE, LINA PETERSSON, ANTONIUS VAN REISEN, SINA TEZEL
A tribute to Professor Jan Retsö by his pupils………………………………………… 11

LUTZ EDZARD
Bibliography of Jan Retsö… ……………………………………………………………… 13

1. Slavic linguistics
SILJE SUSANNE ALVESTAD, Oslo
Canonical and non-canonical uses of the imperative in Slavic……………………… 19

ANTOANETA GRANBERG, Göteborg
New manuscript fragment of a Prolog,
discovered in the University Library in Uppsala……………………………………… 40

2. Arabic linguistics and philology
WERNER ARNOLD, Heidelberg
Living together with the Jews: A Palestinian Arabic text from Jaffa… ……………… 54

RUDOLF DE JONG, Cairo
Texts in the Bedouin dialects of the Awlād Saʿīd and the Tayāha of Sinai… ……… 61

WERNER DIEM, Köln
Ein Begleitbrief von 904 H zu Erlassen aus dem mamlūkischen Ägypten ………… 84

MELANIE HANITSCH, Erlangen
”Doppelte“ Tempus- und Aspektmarkierung im Neuarabischen.
Versuch einer Typisierung ……………………………………………………………… 102

BARRY HESELWOOD and JANET WATSON, Leeds
The Arabic definite article: A synchronic and historical perspective ……………… 157
6 Table of Contents
OTTO JASTROW, Tallinn
The position of Mardin Arabic
in the Mesopotamian-Levantine dialect continuum ………………………………… 177

ABLAHAD LAHDO, Uppsala
Tillo. Two texts reflecting daily life and cultural aspects of the Arabs of Tillo,
South-eastern Turkey …………………………………………………………………… 190

PIERRE LARCHER, Aix-Marseille
Une occurrence ancienne de la structure kāna sa-yafʿalu en arabe écrit …………… 198

GUNVOR MEJDELL, Oslo
Luġat al-ʾumm and al-luġa al-ʾumm – the ’mother tongue’
in the Arabic context ……………………………………………………………………… 214

MARIA PERSSON, Lund
Verb form switch as a marker of clausal hierarchies in urban Gulf Arabic………… 227

ORI SHACHMON, Jerusalem
Agglutinated verb forms in the Northern province of Yemen ……………………… 260

3. Arabic literature, science, and history of ideas
LENA AMBJÖRN, Lund
Qusṭā b. Lūqā. On protection against rheum and catarrhs that occur in the winter.
English translation of the Arabic text preserved in the manuscript
Ayasofya 372……………………………………………………………………………… 274

STEPHAN GUTH, Oslo
Aesthetics of generosity – generous aesthetics.
On the cultural encoding of an Arab ‘national virtue’ ……………………………… 299

PERNILLA MYRNE, Göteborg
Who was Ḥubbā al-Madīniyya?………………………………………………………… 328

GEORGES TAMER, Erlangen
Überlegungen zur Erinnerung und Identitätsbildung im Koran…………………… 345

4. Hebrew linguistics
SILJE SUSANNE ALVESTAD, Oslo, and LUTZ EDZARD, Erlangen/Oslo
Aspect in the Slavic and the Biblical Hebrew imperative …………………………… 361
Table of Contents 7
MATS ESKHULT, Uppsala
Thoughts on Biblical Hebrew ʾašær …………………………………………………… 391
STEVEN E. FASSBERG, Jerusalem
Linguistic variation and textual emendation: The case of Judges 4:20……………… 397
BO ISAKSSON, Uppsala
‘Subordination’: Some reflections on Matthiessen and Thompson’s article
“The structure of discourse and ‘subordination’” and its bearing
on the idea of circumstantial clause in Arabic and Hebrew………………………… 405
NAʿAMA PAT-EL, Austin, Texas
A note on segholate adjectives in Biblical Hebrew…………………………………… 426
OFRA TIROSH-BECKER, Jerusalem
Eliʿezer Ben-Yehuda and Algerian Jews: Relationship and language……………… 430
5.Aramaic, Ethiopic and comparative Semitic linguistics
REBECCA HASSELBACH-ANDEE, Chicago
Explicit performative utterances in Semitic…………………………………………… 448
JANNE BONDI JOHANNESSEN, Oslo, and LUTZ EDZARD, Erlangen/Oslo
Coordinated clause structures in Scandinavian and Semitic
involving a finite verb form and an infinitive …………………………………………………………………………………… 486
GEOFFREY KHAN, Cambridge
Causative constructions in Neo-Aramaic (Christian Urmi dialect) …………………………………… 506
FEKEDE MENUTA, Hawassa, and RONNY MEYER, Addis Ababa
Sonorant alternations in Muher… ……………………………………………………… 531
SINA TEZEL, Uppsala
Arabic or Ṣūrayt/Ṭūrōyo ………………………………………………………………… 554
KJELL MAGNE YRI, Oslo
Amharic and NSM (Natural Semantic Metalanguage)……………………………… 569

Dedication

Lutz Edzard

When Rosmari Lillas-Schuil, senior lecturer at Gothenburg University and one
of the former doctoral students of Jan Retsö, asked me on behalf of those in late
2013 to edit a Festschrift for the latter I considered this proposal to be a great
privilege and honor, but also a considerable challenge. Indeed, ever since, and
even before I came to Norway in 2002 to take on a professorship in Semitic lin-
guistics, this great Norwegian scholar has been an awe-inspiring role model for
me.
Jan Retsö has an impeccable active command of the ancient and modern
Semitic and other languages (especially Slavic and Germanic) he deals with. He
also has a virtually unique capacity to understand that certain linguistic pheno-
mena allow, and indeed call for, a multifaceted variety of analyses, as opposed
to a stifling monocausal approach so often found in (Middle Eastern) linguistic
scholarship. Few scholars have the ability or inclination to communicate in an
academic and private context auf Augenhöhe in the way that Jan Retsö has done
and continues to do. Jan Retsö has enabled many of us to appreciate the benefits
of a fresh scholarly approach that does not automatically take ”Altehrwürdi-
ges” in the discipline(s) for granted. His rich bibliography, encompassing lingu-
istic and philological studies, as well as studies grounded in the history of reli-
gion and culture, bears ample testimony of this circumstance.
The title of this Festschrift was inspired by Jan Retsö’s equally unique abi-
lity to contextualize his scholarship. As a scholar with additional in-depth train-
ing in history, he has always preferred to embed linguistic and philological
analysis in a historical and realienkundlich framework, be it in the Arab world, in
Israel, or in Ethiopia. On the occasion of several visits in Jerusalem, I had the
good luck to meet Jan Retsö in the Swedish Theological Institute and to profit
from his vast knowledge of languages, religion(s), history, and archeology. His
ability to lead historic and archeological tours at places like Jerusalem is unsur-
passed, as many colleagues in the field can confirm. Beyond his broad subject-
related knowledge, Jan Retsö is a humanist in every sense of the word. As much