Everything about Assyrian Neo-aramaic totally explained
Assyrian Neo-Aramaic is a modern Eastern
Aramaic or
Syriac language. Assyrian Neo Aramaic is neither to be confused with
Assyrian Akkadian, nor the Old Aramaic dialect that was adopted as a
lingua franca in
Assyria in the
8th century BC. Although this latter Aramaic is also an Aramaic language, it's incomprehensible to speakers of the modern language. Originally, Assyrian Neo-Aramaic was spoken in the area between
Lake Urmia, north-western
Iran, and
Siirt, south-eastern
Turkey, but it's now the language of a worldwide
diaspora. Most speakers are members of the
Assyrian Church of the East.
Origin, history and use today
Assyrian Neo-Aramaic is one of a number of modern Eastern Aramaic languages spoken in the region between
Lake Urmia in
Iranian Azerbaijan and
Mosul in northern
Iraq.
Jews and
Christians speak different dialects of Aramaic that are often mutually unintelligible. The Christian dialects have been heavily influenced by the
Syriac language, a dialect of Eastern Middle Aramaic, that became the literary and liturgical language of many churches in the
Fertile Crescent. Therefore Christian Neo-Aramaic has a dual heritage: literary Syriac and colloquial Eastern Aramaic. The Christian dialects are often called
Sûret,
Syriac, or
Sûryāya Swādāya,
Colloquial Syriac. The name
Assyrian (
Ātûrāya or even
Āsûrāya) is adopted by many, but not all, Aramaic-speaking Christian communities as a socio-political definition of a nation (
umta) rather than a religious group (
millet). Russian linguists studied Assyrian Neo-Aramaic as spoken by immigrant speakers in
Georgia and
Armenia at the end of the
19th century. They called the language Айсорский,
Aysorskiy, from the
Armenian name Ասորի,
Asori. However, by the
1930s, the official name of the language in Russian had become Ассирийский,
Assiriyskiy, or Assyrian.
The
Assyrian Church of the East, of which most speakers of the varieties of Assyrian Neo-Aramaic are members, uses classical
Syriac in its liturgy. However, colloquial Assyrian often affects the pronunciation.
Assyrian Neo-Aramaic has numerous diverse dialects. In fact, on purely linguistic grounds,
Chaldean Neo-Aramaic could be considered the same language. However, the latter is based on the dialect of Alqosh in northern
Iraq, whereas the
Urmia dialect has become the prestige dialect of Assyrian Neo-Aramaic, and comprehension between the two is limited.
The Urmia dialect rose to prominence in
1836, when that dialect was chosen as the basis for publications in Assyrian.
Justin Perkins, an American
Presbyterian missionary, founded schools and printing presses, and was instrumental in the creation of a standard literary Assyrian. In
1852, his translation of the Bible into General Urmian was published by the American Bible Society with a parallel text of the classical Syriac
Peshitta. During the First World War, many Assyrians living in
Turkey were forced from their homes, and many of their descendants now live in
Iraq. Some of the rich texture of dialects remains, but the relocation has created a general dialect usually called
Iraqi Koine. Iraqi Koine is a mixture of various dialects with the influence of General Urmian.
The dialects of Assyrian Neo-Aramaic can be grouped thus:
- Urmian group:
- Northern group:
- Central group:
- Western group (western Hakkari Province):
- Upper Tiari
- Lower Tiari
- Tkhuma
- Lower Barwari
- Tal
- Lewin
The Central and Western groups are often grouped together as
Ashiret dialects. They, and especially the Western group, have more in common with
Chaldean Neo-Aramaic than with General Urmian. Ashiret dialects are often characterised by the presence of the fricatives
θ (
th) and
ð (
dh), where other dialects pronounce them either as stops (
t and
d) or, in the case of the Northern group, often eliding them. The so-called
Iraqi Koine is a mixture of Ashiret dialects with General Urmian. Iraqi Koine doesn't really constitute a new dialect, but an incomplete merger of dialects. Elements of original Ashiret dialects can still be observed in Iraqi Koine, especially in that of older speakers. Iranian Assyrians could be said to have developed an
Iranian Koine. However, their language is far more uniform, and much closer to General Urmian. In the Assyrian diaspora, especially in the
United States, those of Iranian extraction can be distinguished from those from Iraq by their more Urmian based language.
Assyrian is written in the
Madnhāyā version of the
Syriac alphabet, which is also used for classical Syriac.
Chaldean Neo-Aramaic was written in the
17th century, and developed a relatively phonetic spelling system. In the
1830s, Justin Perkins (
see above) used the Syriac script for writing Urmian Assyrian. However, his heavily etymological spelling system distinguishes it from the more natural Chaldean spelling. Other missionary agencies (
Roman Catholic,
Anglican and
Russian Orthodox) adapted Perkins's script for printing General Urmian. In the
1930s, following the state policy for minority languages of the
Soviet Union, a
Latin alphabet for Assyrian was developed and some material published. However, this innovation didn't displace the Syriac script.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Assyrian Neo-aramaic'.
|
External Link Exchanges
Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:
<a href="http://assyrian_neo-aramaic.totallyexplained.com">Assyrian Neo-Aramaic Totally Explained</a>
Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned. |
