Eteocyprian language

Eteocyprian
Period	1st millennium BC Chr.
Formerly spoken in	Cyprus
Language codes
ISO 639 -1	-
ISO 639 -2	-
ISO 639-3	ecy

Monolingual Eeteokyprian inscription from Amathous (Ashmolean Museum, Oxford).

As Eteokyprisch or Eteozyprisch is called an Aegean language , probably in the v first millennium. BC next to ancient Greek was spoken on Cyprus . It was supplanted by Greek and died until the end of the 1st millennium BC. Chr. From. The term 'Eteokyprisch' was created in 1932 by the ancient orientalist Johannes Friedrich , after Richard Meister had referred to non-Greek texts from Cyprus in 1911 .

In the 1st millennium BC Chr. Cyprus used its own syllabary ( Cypriot syllabary ), whereby most of the texts noted in this script represent the Arcadian-Cypriot dialect of ancient Greek (hence also "Cyprus-Greek script"). In addition, there are some texts (25–35) that cannot be interpreted in Greek and in which one therefore suspects evidence of an indigenous Eeteokyprian language. Most (about 20) of these texts come from Amathous . Since only a few and short bilinguals exist (the Eteokyprian-Greek bilingualism from Amathous is particularly important), deciphering Eteokyprian has been difficult so far. Overall, it remains unclear how many autochthonous languages (besides Greek and Phoenician as immigrant languages) were spoken in ancient Cyprus. It is possible that Eteokyprian and Kypro-Minoan represent different stages of development of the same language, especially since the Cypriot syllabary evidently developed from the Kypro-Minoan script . On the other hand, regionally different languages could have been spoken that were written with the same or a similar script. The classical philologist Markus Egetmeyer points out the possibility of a "Golgic language" in view of the traditional dominance of Amathous and clear differences in the character strings of the texts from A. and Golgoi .

Some research approaches attempt to combine the Eeteokyprian language and the Eeteocretic into an Aegean language family .

Classifications of the language

Cyrus H. Gordon interprets the language of the non-Greek texts as a Semitic language .
Thierry Petit assumes that the language could be related to Hurrian and Urartian , also both extinct.

Arnaud Fournet translates the non-Greek and non-Golgic texts as archaic Hurrian.

Aleksei Charsekin also tried to interpret the texts with the help of Etruscan and Lemnian :
- aisona : divine, from God [etr. <aisuna>: 'divine']
- ana : he (an-oti 'from him') [etr. <an>: 'he, she']
- eki : here [etr. <cei>]
- kail : land, earth (kail-i 'into the earth') [etr. <cel-i>: 'into the earth']
- kan : to give (kan-a, kan-io 'gift, present', kun-o 'given') [etr. <cen-u>: 'given']
- Lasana : Tyrrhenians / Etruscans [etr. <Rašna>: 'Tyrrhenians / Etruscans']
- man : lie (man-a 'he lies') [etr. <mene>]
- mun : land, parcel, burial place ( mun-oti : 'in the earth') [etr. <muni>, <munθ>]
- oite : mother [etr. <ati> 'mother']
- poti : leader / chief
- sot : crypt ( soti 'into the crypt') [etr. <suθ>: 'grave']
- ta : that (r / s) ( tan : 'that (r / s)', tan-oti : 'into that (r / s)') [etr. <ta>]
- taraw : give ( taraw-i : 'to be given', taraw- : 'given') [etr. <tur-u>: 'given']
- tu : here [etr. <θui> 'here']
- um : consecrate ( um-iesa-i : 'consecrated') [lemn. <aumai>: 'consecrated']

literature

Yves Duhoux : Eteocypriot and Cypro-Minoan 1-3. In: Kadmos , Volume 48, 2010, pp. 39-75.
Markus Egetmeyer: The recent debate on eteokypriote people and culture . In: Pasiphae. Rivista di Filologia e Antichità egee , III, Pisa / Rome 2009, pp. 69–90.
Markus Egetmeyer: “Do you speak Golgic?” Comments on an overlooked language . In: Études mycéniennes , 2010. Actes du XIII [e] colloque international sur les textes égéens (Sèvres, Paris, Nanterre, September 20–23, 2010), Pisa / Rome 2012, pp. 427–434.
Cyrus H. Gordon: Evidence for the Minoan Language. Ventnor Publishers, Ventnor NJ 1966.
Cyrus H. Gordon: Forgotten Scripts. Their Ongoing Discovery and Decipherment. Revised and enlaged edition. Basic Books, New York NY 1982, ISBN 0-465-02484-X .
Tom B. Jones: Notes on the Eteocypriot inscriptions. In: American Journal of Philology , 71, 1950, ISSN 0002-9475 , pp. 401-407.
Olivier Masson : Les inscriptions chypriotes syllabiques. Recueil critique et commenté (= Études chypriotes. 1, ISSN 0291-1655 ). De Boccard, Paris 1961 (Reimpression augmentee. Ibid 1983; also: Paris, Univ., Diss.).
Olivier Masson: “Les inscriptions étéochypriotes. i. - Les pierres d'Amathonte et leur situation actuelle ”, Syria30 (1953), p. 83-88 and “Les inscriptions étéochypriotes - ii. [-] iv [.]”, Syria 34 (1957), p. 61-80.
Thierry Petit: La langue étéochypriote ou l'amathousien . In: Archive for Orient Research. 44/45, 1997/1978, ISSN 0066-6440 , pp. 244-271.
Holger Pedersen : To the non-Greek inscriptions by Amathus . In: Orientalistische Literaturzeitung , 33, 1930, p. 963969.
Philippa M. Steele: Eteocypriot , In: A linguistic history of ancient Cyprus. The non-Greek languages and their relations with Greek, c. 1600-300 BC, Cambridge: University Press, 2013, ISBN 978-1-107-61741-4 , pp. 99-172

Web links

Cypriot syllabary (English)

Remarks

^ Johannes Friedrich: Kleinasiatische Sprachdenkmäler . Walter de Gruyter, Berlin 1932, pp. 49–52, here: p. 49.
↑ R. Meister, “Cypriot Syllabary Writings in Non-Greek Language”, session reports of the Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences, phil.-hist. Classe, Berlin 1911, pp. 166-169., Reference from Markus Egetmeyer: The recent debate on eteokypriote people and culture . In: Pasiphae. Rivista di Filologia e Antichità egee , III, Pisa / Rome 2009, pp. 69–90, here p. 69
↑ Markus Egetmeyer: Eteokyprisch: Language of ancient Cyprus . In: Antike Welt , 6/16, pp. 6–7, here p. 7 and the same: The recent debate on eteokypriote people and culture . In: Pasiphae. Rivista di Filologia e Antichità egee , III, Pisa / Rome 2009, pp. 69–90, here pp. 71–72 with a listing of 27 surely non-Greek and non-Golgic texts according to where they were found: 20 from Amathous, 1 from Kourion, 3 from Paphos, 2 from Cyprus of unclear provenance, 1 from Egypt ( Abydos ) - E. 9, p. 74 mentions Golgic texts
↑ Markus Egetmeyer indicates Paphos as a possible place of change from "Kypro-Minoan" to "Kypro-Greek", because this is where the oldest texts can be found, cf. ders .: Eteokyprisch: language of ancient Cyprus . In: Antike Welt , 6/16, pp. 6–7, here 7
↑ Markus Egetmeyer: “Do you speak Golgic?” Comments on an overlooked language . In: Études mycéniennes , 2010. Actes du XIII [e] colloque international sur les textes égéens (Sèvres, Paris, Nanterre, September 20–23, 2010), Pisa / Rome 2012, pp. 427–434
↑ Arnaud Fournet: The Eteocypriot Languages and Hurrian. 2013

[1] Johannes Friedrich: Kleinasiatische Sprachdenkmäler . Walter de Gruyter, Berlin 1932, pp. 49–52, here: p. 49.

[2] R. Meister, “Cypriot Syllabary Writings in Non-Greek Language”, session reports of the Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences, phil.-hist. Classe, Berlin 1911, pp. 166-169., Reference from Markus Egetmeyer: The recent debate on eteokypriote people and culture . In: Pasiphae. Rivista di Filologia e Antichità egee , III, Pisa / Rome 2009, pp. 69–90, here p. 69

[3] Markus Egetmeyer: Eteokyprisch: Language of ancient Cyprus . In: Antike Welt , 6/16, pp. 6–7, here p. 7 and the same: The recent debate on eteokypriote people and culture . In: Pasiphae. Rivista di Filologia e Antichità egee , III, Pisa / Rome 2009, pp. 69–90, here pp. 71–72 with a listing of 27 surely non-Greek and non-Golgic texts according to where they were found: 20 from Amathous, 1 from Kourion, 3 from Paphos, 2 from Cyprus of unclear provenance, 1 from Egypt ( Abydos ) - E. 9, p. 74 mentions Golgic texts

[4] Markus Egetmeyer indicates Paphos as a possible place of change from "Kypro-Minoan" to "Kypro-Greek", because this is where the oldest texts can be found, cf. ders .: Eteokyprisch: language of ancient Cyprus . In: Antike Welt , 6/16, pp. 6–7, here 7

[5] Markus Egetmeyer: “Do you speak Golgic?” Comments on an overlooked language . In: Études mycéniennes , 2010. Actes du XIII [e] colloque international sur les textes égéens (Sèvres, Paris, Nanterre, September 20–23, 2010), Pisa / Rome 2012, pp. 427–434

[6] Arnaud Fournet: The Eteocypriot Languages and Hurrian. 2013