פוסטר של ד"ר אוון כהן (שיתוף פעולה עם קרלו מלוני)

עבודה משותפת של קרלו מלוני מאוניברסיטת ציריך וד"ר אוון כהן:

The Resh Riddle – Identifying the Biblical Hebrew Rhotic

(הוצג ב-r-atics')

:תקציר

In our study, we propose a reconstruction the Biblical Hebrew rhotic, resh, based on an analysis of its phonological behaviour. We examine phonological phenomena related to resh on a quantitative basis, and argue that it is best identified as an alveolar tap – ɾ.

In light of the cross-linguistic diversity of rhotics, it can be challenging to identify a rhotic’s phonetic realisation in dead, unrecorded languages, such as Latin and Ancient Greek. The same holds for the Biblical Hebrew rhotic. According to some accounts (e.g. Gesenius and Kautzsch 1910; Blau 2010), the Biblical Hebrew rhotic, resh, should be categorised as some kind of back consonant, while other accounts (Luzzatto 1853; Harper 1912; Joüon and Muraoka 2006) classify resh as an alveolar or dental segment. Others still, such as Khan (2020), relying on Early Hebrew grammarians, reached the conclusion that resh had a twofold pronunciation depending on its phonological environment. These accounts were not based on a systematic examination of the phonological phenomena related to resh, which suggest that it should be grouped in the natural class of the coronals.

In order to reconcile our account with the grammarians’ accounts, we assume a diachronic transition, during which an original alveolar trill lenited to a transitional alveolar tap, which in turn changed into the back consonant described by the grammarians. This assumption is supported by a typological review of the rhotics’ diachronic changes. Moreover, we propose a possible timeline for this diachronic change, basing it on extra-Biblical sources, such as transcriptions of Hebrew words in cuneiform characters and in the Greek alphabet, and a comparative examination of the rhotics in the Semitic languages.

Selected References

Blau, Joshua (2010). Phonology and morphology of Biblical Hebrew. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns.
Gesenius, Wilhelm and Emil Friedrich Kautzsch (1910). Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Harper, William Rainey (1912). Elements of Hebrew by an Inductive Method. Charles Scribner's sons.
Joüon, Paul and Takamitsu Muraoka (2006). A grammar of Biblical Hebrew. Vol. 27. Gregorian Biblical BookShop. Khan, Geoffrey (2020). The Tiberian Pronunciation Tradition of Biblical Hebrew. Vol. 1. Open Book Publishers.
Luzzatto, Samuel David (1853). Grammatica della lingua ebraica. Vol. 1. Co' tipi di A. Bianchi.

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