Proto-Arabic is the name given to the hypothetical reconstructed ancestor of all the varieties of

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

attested since the 9th century BC.

Evidence

There are two lines of evidence to reconstruct Proto-Arabic: *Evidence of Arabic becomes more frequent in the 2nd century BC, with the documentation of Arabic names in the Nabataean script as well as evidence of an Arabic substratum in the Nabataean language. *The Safaitic and

Hismaic 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 Safaiti ...

inscriptions were composed between the 1st century BC and the 4th century AD, in the basalt desert of the northwest

Arabian Peninsula The Arabian Peninsula (, , or , , ) or Arabia, is a peninsula in West Asia, situated north-east of Africa on the Arabian plate. At , comparable in size to India, the Arabian Peninsula is the largest peninsula in the world. Geographically, the ...

and the Southern Levant. They are also crucial to the reconstruction of Proto-Arabic, since they show many features that are shared by

epigraphic Epigraphy () is the study of inscriptions, or epigraphs, as writing; it is the science of identifying graphemes, clarifying their meanings, classifying their uses according to dates and cultural contexts, and drawing conclusions about the wr ...

Old South Arabian and

Classical Arabic 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 Caliphate, Umayyad and Abbasid Caliphate, Abbasid literary texts such as poetry, e ...

. The common features set them apart from languages that are documented further south, such as Dadanitic and Taymanitic (see Characteristics below).

Old Arabic 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, Nabataean alphabet, Nabatean, and even Greek alphabet, Greek. Alternatively, the term ha ...

in the Nabataean script is first attested in the Negev desert in the 1st century BC, but it becomes more frequent in the region after the decline of Safaitic and

. From the 4th century AD, Old Arabic inscriptions are attested from Northern Syria to the

Hejaz Hejaz is a Historical region, historical region of the Arabian Peninsula that includes the majority of the western region of Saudi Arabia, covering the cities of Mecca, Medina, Jeddah, Tabuk, Saudi Arabia, Tabuk, Yanbu, Taif and Al Bahah, Al-B ...

, in a script that is intermediate between

cursive Cursive (also known as joined-up writing) is any style of penmanship in which characters are written joined in a flowing manner, generally for the purpose of making writing faster, in contrast to block letters. It varies in functionality and m ...

Nabataean and the Kufic script of Islamic times.

Homeland

Based on documentary evidence, one scholar writes that the

urheimat In historical linguistics, the homeland or ( , from German 'original' and 'home') of a proto-language is the region in which it was spoken before splitting into different daughter languages. A proto-language is the reconstructed or historicall ...

of Proto-Arabic can be regarded as the frontier between northwest

Arabia The Arabian Peninsula (, , or , , ) or Arabia, is a peninsula in West Asia, situated north-east of Africa on the Arabian plate. At , comparable in size to India, the Arabian Peninsula is the largest peninsula in the world. Geographically, the ...

and the southern Levant.

Evolution

There is confusion with the application of the terms " pre-classical Arabic," "Proto-Arabic" and "

." This is sometimes the name given to ancient epigraphic North Arabian languages. Sabatino Moscati called them "pre-classical", Georgi Akhvlediani called them "proto-Arabic", Johann Fück, Haim Rabin, Ibrahim al-Samarrai and Karl Brockelmann called them "ancient Arabic". Brockelmann considered the epigraphic North Arabian languages to be among the ancient Arabic dialects that are not identical to Late Classical Arabic. Applying such a name to the North Arabian languages is an error. Ancient Arabic apparently coexisted with North Arabian but, unlike them, remained a purely spoken language. Dutch scholar Emery van Donzel considered "Old Arabic (Proto-Arabic) language" to be one of three stages in the development of Preclassic Arabic, following the Semitic Arabian languages and preceding Early Arabic of the 3rd to 6th centuries. There are also those who refer to the North Arabian languages as "Proto-Arabic" and distinguish between them and Preclassic Arabic. Agathangel of Crimea defined the period of existence of the Old Arabic (pre-classical) language as the V-VIII centuries (until 750), followed by the classical caliphate period (VIII-XI centuries), the post-classical period (XI-XV centuries), and then the period of decline (XVI-XVIII centuries). Late Preclassic dialects, both urban and Bedouin, are described to some extent by early Arab philologists. New Arabic or Middle Arabic, which became the urban language of the Arab Caliphate in the 8th century, emerged from pre-classical Arabic dialects, which continued to develop until modern Arabic dialects, showing tremendous changes.

Characteristics

There are several features shared by

, the varieties of Modern Arabic and the Safaitic and

inscriptions that are unattested in any other Semitic language variety, including the Dadanitic and Taymanitic languages of the northern

. They are evidence of common descent from a hypothetical ancestor, Proto-Arabic. The following features can be reconstructed with confidence for Proto-Arabic:Al-Jallad, A. (2015). ''An Outline of the Grammar of the Safaitic Inscriptions''. Brill. # negative particles ''m'' */mā/; ''lʾn'' */lā-ʾan/ > CAr ''lan'' # ''mafʿūl'' G-passive

participle In linguistics, a participle (; abbr. ) is a nonfinite verb form that has some of the characteristics and functions of both verbs and adjectives. More narrowly, ''participle'' has been defined as "a word derived from a verb and used as an adject ...

# prepositions and

adverb An adverb is a word or an expression that generally modifies a verb, an adjective, another adverb, a determiner, a clause, a preposition, or a sentence. Adverbs typically express manner, place, time, frequency, degree, or level of certainty by ...

s ''f'', ''ʿn'', ''ʿnd'', ''ḥt'', ''ʿkdy'' # a

subjunctive The subjunctive (also known as the conjunctive in some languages) is a grammatical mood, a feature of an utterance that indicates the speaker's attitude toward it. Subjunctive forms of verbs are typically used to express various states of unrealit ...

in -''a'' # ''t''-

demonstrative Demonstratives (list of glossing abbreviations, abbreviated ) are words, such as ''this'' and ''that'', used to indicate which entities are being referred to and to distinguish those entities from others. They are typically deictic, their meaning ...

s # leveling of the -''at''

allomorph In linguistics, an allomorph is a variant phonetic form of a morpheme, or in other words, a unit of meaning that varies in sound and spelling without changing the meaning. The term ''allomorph'' describes the realization of phonological variatio ...

of the feminine ending # ''ʾn''

complementizer In linguistics (especially generative grammar), a complementizer or complementiser (list of glossing abbreviations, glossing abbreviation: ) is a functional category (part of speech) that includes those words that can be used to turn a clause in ...

and subordinator # the use of ''f''- to introduce modal

clause In language, a clause is a Constituent (linguistics), constituent or Phrase (grammar), phrase that comprises a semantic predicand (expressed or not) and a semantic Predicate (grammar), predicate. A typical clause consists of a subject (grammar), ...

s # independent object pronoun in (''ʾ'')''y'' # vestiges of '' nunation''

Evidence

Homeland

Evolution

Characteristics

See also

References

Further reading