Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts from April, 2012

the Syriac Serto Aramaic alphabet

Serto is one of the Syriac scripts for Aramaic used to write West Syriac.Its name comes from the word serta (ܣܪܛܐ) which means line. It was a cursive,easier to write evolution of the Estrangela script. The letters are simpler and go with the flow. The Serto script developed under Byzantine rule. This is also evident in its vowel diacritics which were adopted directly from Greek  writing. The letters are Α,Ο,Ε,Η,ΟΥ or a,o,e,i,u respectively. While the Eastern Madnkhaya developed under the Sassanids. Table of Serto letters Serṭā Transliteration IPA ʾ [ʔ] or silent hard: b soft: ḇ (also bh, v) hard: [b] soft: [v] or [w] hard: g soft: ḡ (also gh, ġ) hard: [ɡ] soft: [ɣ] hard: d soft: ḏ (also dh, ð) hard: [d] soft: [ð] h [h] consonant: w mater lectionis: ū or ō (also u or o) consonant: [w] mater lectionis: [u] or [o] z [z] ḥ [ħ], [x], or [χ] ṭ...

pronouns in Syriac Aramaic

aramaic demonstrarive pronouns

Square Aramaic alphabet (Hebrew)

The modern Hebrew alphabet is modeled upon the Imperial Aramaic alphabet  ,which was used for writing Aramaic by the Persian Empire.For this and practical reasons nowadays the Modern Hebrew alphabet is used for writing Aramaic literature. Texts in Jewish Neo-Aramaic,Biblical Aramaic and the Aramaic of the Talmud are written in the Hebrew script as well. Therefore it is important to learn the Hebrew scipt along with the Aramaic scripts.

the Aramaic script

Aramaic was a consonantal script mostly lacking vowels and was wriiten from right to left.It originally served Aramaic (west semitic languages. And letter became the official script for the assyrian and Old Persian (Achaemenid) empires from 6-4 BC It was the source of many alphabets of the world and the vast majority of Semitic scripts (Samaritan, Jewish, Palmyra, Nabataean, Syrian, Palestinian-Christian, Mandaean, Manichaean). The Aramaic writing had an impact even on Iranian writing systems (Parthian, middle Persian, Sogdian, and Khorezm).It was the basis (through the medium of Sogdian) for Uighur, Mongolian, and the Orkhon-Yenisei alphabets. There is a hypothesis about the Indian Brahmi scripts and Kharosthi originating from the Aramaic script. The center for the spread of Aramaic culture was the city of Damascus, and later - Palmyra and Edessa (modern Urfa in Turkey). Aramaeans mingled everywere with the local population and they assimilated it relatively eas...