Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- List of contributors
- Preface
- List of abbreviations
- Introduction: documentary evidence, social realities and the history of language
- Part I THE LANGUAGE OF POWER: LATIN IN THE ROMAN NEAR EAST
- Part II SOCIAL AND LEGAL INSTITUTIONS AS REFLECTED IN THE DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE
- Part III THE EPIGRAPHIC LANGUAGE OF RELIGION
- Part IV LINGUISTIC METAMORPHOSES AND CONTINUITY OF CULTURES
- 10 On the margins of culture: the practice of transcription in the ancient world
- 11 Edessene Syriac inscriptions in late antique Syria
- 12 Samaritan writing and writings
- 13 The Jewish magical tradition from late antique Palestine to the Cairo Genizah
- Part V GREEK INTO ARABIC
- Index
12 - Samaritan writing and writings
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 March 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- List of contributors
- Preface
- List of abbreviations
- Introduction: documentary evidence, social realities and the history of language
- Part I THE LANGUAGE OF POWER: LATIN IN THE ROMAN NEAR EAST
- Part II SOCIAL AND LEGAL INSTITUTIONS AS REFLECTED IN THE DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE
- Part III THE EPIGRAPHIC LANGUAGE OF RELIGION
- Part IV LINGUISTIC METAMORPHOSES AND CONTINUITY OF CULTURES
- 10 On the margins of culture: the practice of transcription in the ancient world
- 11 Edessene Syriac inscriptions in late antique Syria
- 12 Samaritan writing and writings
- 13 The Jewish magical tradition from late antique Palestine to the Cairo Genizah
- Part V GREEK INTO ARABIC
- Index
Summary
The interest of modern scholarship in the history of the Samaritan people, their literature and the material remains of their past is a continuous trend started in 1907 by James Allen Montgomery. The script on the early silver coins of Samaria from the fourth century BCE is palaeo Aramaic, however, using in some cases palaeo-Hebrew letter forms. Meshorer and Qedar referred to the script of the legends on these coins as revealing a ‘mixed nature’. The early history of the Samaritan alphabet and in particular the period of its inception have remained an enigma. Montgomery refrained from suggesting a precise date for its beginning, whilst Purvis concluded ‘that the Samaritan script branched off from the paleo-Hebrew in the late Hasmonaean period’. Other scholars have suggested the first century CE. The present discussion aims to establish at what time the Samaritan alphabet was introduced, or rather created, and what its uses were.
THE MOUNT GERIZIM INSCRIPTIONS
The publication in 2004 of the Aramaic, Hebrew and Samaritan inscriptions excavated on Mt Gerizim in 1982–2004 presents a very important corpus of epigraphic material. The 395 inscriptions (almost all fragmentary) include 380 in Aramaic and ‘square’ Jewish script (nos. 1–380: ‘Lapidary Aramaic and Proto-Jewish’) and 9 in palaeo-Hebrew (nos. 382–90: ‘New-Hebrew’ script) ascribed to the third and second centuries BCE, antedating the ruthless destruction of the Samaritan temple by John Hyrcanus I in contributor. 113/112 BCE. The excavations revealed only four Samaritan inscriptions (nos. 392–5) attributed to medieval times. Only ten of several dozens of Greek inscriptions from the excavations were published and attributed to Samaritans during the fourth and fifth centuries CE.
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- From Hellenism to IslamCultural and Linguistic Change in the Roman Near East, pp. 303 - 323Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2009
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