11-06-2013, 06:36 PM
Akhi Paul,
I'm glad you took my challenge in the playful spirit it was made in. :-)
The translation is, "Eliezar put blood upon his relatives, and immediately set sail upon the river that flows to the Island of Dreams. There, upon its shore, he remembered what he saw."
This was in Middle Galilean (circa 5th-6th century), and most of these features aren't particularly idioms, but split etymologies that Western Aramaic dialects share. I kinda put it together off the cuff, but each element of it I can provide examples of from the middle portions of the Palestinian Talmud and the Rabba series (Bereshit, Vayikra, etc.). A breakdown:
- YHB (L is used instead of SWM for (to put, place). As I've discussed elsewhere SWM simply doesn't occur in Western dialects at all.
- )DM is Galilean (and Samaritan) for DM "blood".
- QRYB in Western dialects means "relatives" rather than "neighbors" as it resolved in Eastern dialects.
- MN YD is specifically a Galilean idiom for "immediately."
- PR$, as I mentioned does mean "to separate" usually, but in the context of the next word it means "to go sailing," even often on its own.
- NHR is as you'd think it is, "river" but the emphatic in Galilean and Samaritan orthography uses terminal He rather than Alef.
- DNGYD is from NGD, in Eastern dialects predominantly "to draw out." In Western dialects in the past participle it means "flows."
- LNYS is from the word NYS which is more often found in the plural as NYSYN "islands" (it's a Greek loan word, common in Galilean).
- XLMYYH you pretty much nailed. "The dreams," in conjunction with NYS it's "The Island of Dreams."
- WTMN = "and there" (in other dialects it tends to be TMH)
- (L GYPYH - You nailed it. :-)
- )YNHR is in Eastern orthography )TNHR, and in Galilean and CPA NHR in Ethpeel is the common form for "remember."
- DXMY is from the verb XMY which is much more common in Syriac is XZY "to see". This is a feature that is found in most Middle Jewish dialects and all Western dialects, and where XZY does occur in Galilean it's very rare and believed to be a "correction" made by later Eastern-speaking scribes.
I do know a bit of Aeld Englisc vocab and grammar to begin with (as I go over Beowulf in some of my classes as an example of linguistic drift) but let me give it a try from memory, reading it *as* Old English. :-)
he = "He" in the nominative case.
aerist = I'd think "arising" or "resurrection" in; something to do with the verb arisan?
scop = "poet" in nominative singular, pronounced "shop" with sc = sh; gotta know that one if one has read any OE poetry. :-)
aelda = the plural nominative of aeld = "old (ones)?"
barnum = I'd guess the root is bairn in the plural dative, "for children" or "to children"
Putting it all together, though, I'm having difficulty as the declensions aren't matching as I'd expect them to. "He arose, the poet. Old ones to children." Something to do with new life? If it's poetry, the sentences are going to be really choppy to begin with with lots of alliteration; not at all conversational. :-)
How'd I do? :-) Terrible, I'm sure.
.
I'm glad you took my challenge in the playful spirit it was made in. :-)
Paul Younan Wrote:At a disadvantage, "Off the cuff", without reference to time and place (and, especially context) I would have read this phrase as:
"Gave Eliezar the man to his relatives, and at hand became separated in the river that streches/is elevated to "the point of dreams""?, and there upon the bank was revealed his anguish/warmth ?....." (not sure of these words without further context - the phrase "d'ngyd l'nys khlmayyeh" could very well also be an idiom meaning "to expound on the interpretation of dreams" - again, without context, it is hard to tell - and an unfair tactic to have employed by you!)
...
Also, the point about "men yad", or "set sail" being a localised idiom is important - not to the reading of the text, but to the interpretation. Local idioms exist in modern Aramaic, even from village to village within the same family of dialects. Having local idioms does not a new language make.
Finally, just throwing out consonants without reference to time and place puts me at the disadvantage of not knowing, for instance, whether or not the daleth or lamedh which preceeds a word can be understood as a proclitic. Or, how to properly decipher possession/gender/number suffixes. While I do appreciate your challenge, no one really can translate something like that, with 100% accuracy.
Inscriptions/manuscripts are found in a certain location and dated, then they are translated based in large part on those pesky little nuances. One can hardly base decisions of etymology on such scant information.
The translation is, "Eliezar put blood upon his relatives, and immediately set sail upon the river that flows to the Island of Dreams. There, upon its shore, he remembered what he saw."
This was in Middle Galilean (circa 5th-6th century), and most of these features aren't particularly idioms, but split etymologies that Western Aramaic dialects share. I kinda put it together off the cuff, but each element of it I can provide examples of from the middle portions of the Palestinian Talmud and the Rabba series (Bereshit, Vayikra, etc.). A breakdown:
- YHB (L is used instead of SWM for (to put, place). As I've discussed elsewhere SWM simply doesn't occur in Western dialects at all.
- )DM is Galilean (and Samaritan) for DM "blood".
- QRYB in Western dialects means "relatives" rather than "neighbors" as it resolved in Eastern dialects.
- MN YD is specifically a Galilean idiom for "immediately."
- PR$, as I mentioned does mean "to separate" usually, but in the context of the next word it means "to go sailing," even often on its own.
- NHR is as you'd think it is, "river" but the emphatic in Galilean and Samaritan orthography uses terminal He rather than Alef.
- DNGYD is from NGD, in Eastern dialects predominantly "to draw out." In Western dialects in the past participle it means "flows."
- LNYS is from the word NYS which is more often found in the plural as NYSYN "islands" (it's a Greek loan word, common in Galilean).
- XLMYYH you pretty much nailed. "The dreams," in conjunction with NYS it's "The Island of Dreams."
- WTMN = "and there" (in other dialects it tends to be TMH)
- (L GYPYH - You nailed it. :-)
- )YNHR is in Eastern orthography )TNHR, and in Galilean and CPA NHR in Ethpeel is the common form for "remember."
- DXMY is from the verb XMY which is much more common in Syriac is XZY "to see". This is a feature that is found in most Middle Jewish dialects and all Western dialects, and where XZY does occur in Galilean it's very rare and believed to be a "correction" made by later Eastern-speaking scribes.
Paul Younan Wrote:Now, for a little fun of my own, let's see how much better you do with an old English phrase (no peeking at dictionaries, not that I would be able to tell, but that I trust you!" (I'm not testing you in old English, merely pointing out how much more the English language has changed in a much shorter span of time.)
Here is the phrase:
he aerist scop aelda barnum
Can you make anything out of that .... "off the cuff?" Even one word ? And how much older is the text you gave me, than the one above? Well, probably at least 1,500 years. And I would wager that I read more than you did, off the cuff.
I do know a bit of Aeld Englisc vocab and grammar to begin with (as I go over Beowulf in some of my classes as an example of linguistic drift) but let me give it a try from memory, reading it *as* Old English. :-)
he = "He" in the nominative case.
aerist = I'd think "arising" or "resurrection" in; something to do with the verb arisan?
scop = "poet" in nominative singular, pronounced "shop" with sc = sh; gotta know that one if one has read any OE poetry. :-)
aelda = the plural nominative of aeld = "old (ones)?"
barnum = I'd guess the root is bairn in the plural dative, "for children" or "to children"
Putting it all together, though, I'm having difficulty as the declensions aren't matching as I'd expect them to. "He arose, the poet. Old ones to children." Something to do with new life? If it's poetry, the sentences are going to be really choppy to begin with with lots of alliteration; not at all conversational. :-)
How'd I do? :-) Terrible, I'm sure.
.