Taymanitic was the language and script of the oasis of Taymāʾ in northwestern Arabia, dated to the second half of the 6th century BC.

Classification

Taymanitic does not participate in the key innovations of

Proto-Arabic Proto-Arabic is the name given to the hypothetical reconstructed ancestor of all the varieties of Arabic attested since the 9th century BC. Evidence There are two lines of evidence to reconstruct Proto-Arabic: *Evidence of Arabic becomes m ...

, precluding it from being considered a member of the Arabic language family. It shares one key isogloss with

Northwest Semitic Northwest Semitic is a division of the Semitic languages comprising the indigenous languages of the Levant. It emerged from Proto-Semitic language, Proto-Semitic in the Early Bronze Age. It is first attested in proper names identified as Amorite l ...

: the change ''w'' > ''y'' in word-initial position. Examples include ''yrḫ'' for *warḫum 'moon, month' and ''ydʿ'' for ''wadaʿa'' 'to know'. It is clear that Taymanitic script expressed a distinct linguistic variety that is not Arabic and not closely related to

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 ...

Safaitic Safaitic ( ''Al-Ṣafāʾiyyah'') is a variety of the South Semitic scripts used by the Arabs in southern Syria and northern Jordan in the Harrat al-Sham, Ḥarrah region, to carve rock inscriptions in various dialects of Old Arabic and Ancient N ...

, while it can tentatively be suggested that it was more closely related to Northwest Semitic.

Phonology

Consonants

Vowels

There were two diphthongs of a vowel and semivowel: and .

Characteristics

Taymanitic exhibits two major features which are innovative: # The change ''w'' > ''y'' in word-initial position: ''yrḫ'' for *warḫum 'moon, month' and ''ydʿ'' for ''wadaʿa'' 'to know'. # The mergers *''z'', *''ḏ'' > *''z''; *''s'', *''ṯ'' > *''s''; and *''ṣ'', *''ṯ̣'' > *''ṣ'' (loss of interdentals). Unlike Arabic, Taymanitic does not exhibit the merger of Proto-Semitic and s

References

{{Semitic languages Ancient North Arabian Northwest Semitic languages Extinct languages of Asia