Siculo-Arabic
Siculo-Arabic | |
---|---|
Sicilian Arabic | |
العربية الصقلية | |
Native to | Emirate of Sicily |
Era | 9th–13th centuries |
Afro-Asiatic
| |
Arabic alphabet | |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 | sqr |
Glottolog | None |
This article is part of the series on the |
Sicilian language |
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|
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Siculo-Arabic or Sicilian Arabic (
Siculo-Arabic is extinct and is designated as a historical language that is attested only in writings from the 9th–13th centuries in Sicily.
History
Introduction to Sicily
During the 7th and 8th centuries, Sicily was raided from
Norman kingdom of Sicily
When the Normans entered Sicily, the island was divided into two main non-Latin linguistic groups:
- Arabic speakers, mostly in Palermo, Agrigento, Butera, Enna and Noto
- Greek speakers, mostly in Messina, Taormina, Cefalù, Catania and Syracuse
In 1086, the Normans managed to secure the conversion of the last important
The Nuzhat al-mushtāq fi'khtirāq al-āfāq (
Decline after 1200
In the post-conquest period, both Arabic and Greek were sometimes used by the new rulers and subsequently used in the king's fiscal administration, which managed royal lands and men in Sicily and Calabria.[14] The many documents that it issued are among the main and most important sources for Arabic in Sicily. However, when the Hohenstaufen replaced the Normans, Arabic was dropped as a language of government in 1194[15] and the Hohenstaufen expelled the remaining Muslims to Lucera and North Africa in the 13th century. Due to the expulsions, the only remaining Siculo-Arabic speakers were Christians.[16]
When the Aragonese took Sicily, they introduced Catalan nobility, made Latin the only official language; Greek and Arabic official records in Sicily ceased to exist by the 14th century.[17]
Arabic influence continued in a number of Sicilian words. Most of these terms relate to agriculture and related activities.
Maltese language
The modern language derived from the Siculo-Arabic spoken in Malta is known as Maltese. While "Siculo-Arabic" refers to the language spoken before 1300, hardly any records exist from the 14th century, and the earliest record in the Maltese language is Il-Kantilena (Xidew il-Qada) by Pietru Caxaro (late 15th century), which is written in the Latin script.
Maltese evolved from Siculo-Arabic through a gradual process of Latinisation following the re-Christianisation of Malta (which was complete by 1250).[18] Some items of Siculo-Arabic vocabulary are comparable with later items found in Maltese. Although Siculo-Arabic has had a relatively minor influence on modern-day Sicilian, this language shares many words of Arabic etymology, which may originate either in Spanish or Siculo-Arabic itself. Some examples are shown in the table a small sample:
Maltese | Sicilian (Arabic etymology) |
Spanish (Arabic etymology) |
Arabic (Modern Standard) |
English |
---|---|---|---|---|
ġiebja | gebbia | aljibe | جَابِيَة (jābiya) | reservoir |
ġulġlien | ciciulena | ajonjolí | جُلْجُلَان (juljulān) | sesame seed |
sieqja | saia | acequia | سَاقِيَة (sāqiya) | canal |
żagħfran | zaffarana | azafrán | زَعْفَرَان (zaʿfarān) | saffron |
żahra | zàgara | azahar | زَهْرَة (zahra) | blossom |
żbib | zibbibbu | acebibe | زَبِيب (zabīb) | raisins |
See also
- Varieties of Arabic
- Maghrebi Arabic
- Pantesco dialect, a dialect of Sicilian with unusually high levels of Arabic influence
References
- ^ "ISO 639-3 Registration Authority Request for Change to ISO 639-3 Language Code" (PDF).
- ^ "639 Identifier Documentation: sqr".
- ^ "ISO 639-3 Registration Authority Request for New Language Code Element in ISO 639-3" (PDF).
- ^ "ISO 639-3 Registration Authority Request for New Language Code Element in ISO 639-3" (PDF).
- ^ So who are the 'real' Maltese. 14 September 2014. Archived from the original on 2016-03-12.
The kind of Arabic used in the Maltese language is most likely derived from the language spoken by those that repopulated the island from Sicily in the early second millennium; it is known as Siculo-Arab. The Maltese are mostly descendants of these people.
- ^ Brincat, 2005. Maltese – an unusual formula.
Originally Maltese was an Arabic dialect but it was immediately exposed to Latinisation because the Normans conquered the islands in 1090, while Christianisation, which was complete by 1250, cut off the dialect from contact with Classical Arabic. Consequently Maltese developed on its own, slowly but steadily absorbing new words from Sicilian and Italian according to the needs of the developing community.
{{cite book}}
: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link) - ^ Ruffino, Giovanni (2001). Sicilia. Editori Laterza, Bari. pp. 18–20.
- ISBN 978-3-11-021844-2.
- ^ Nicklies, Charles Edward (1992). The architecture of the church of SS. Pietro e Paolo d'Agro, Sicily. Illinois Digital Environment for Access to Learning and Scholarship (Thesis). University of Illinois. Retrieved 7 February 2017.
- ^ The Age of Robert Guiscard, 2000, Page 171
- ^ Siculo Arabic, Dionisius Agius, 1996, pp. 79–88.
- ^ Houben, 2002, pp. 102–104.
- ^ Harley & Woodward, 1992, pp. 156–161.
- ^ Paolo Collura, Le Più antiche carte dell'Archivio capitolare di Agrigento (1092–1282), 1961, pp. 120–126
- S2CID 198864444.
- ^ S. Gleixner, Sprachrohr kaiserlichen Willens, 2006, pp. 412–413
- ^ "Kingdoms of Italy – Sicily".
- ^ Brincat, 2005. Maltese – an unusual formula. Archived from the original on 2015-12-08.
Originally Maltese was an Arabic dialect but it was immediately exposed to Latinisation because the Normans conquered the islands in 1090, while Christianisation, which was complete by 1250, cut off the dialect from contact with Classical Arabic. Consequently Maltese developed on its own, slowly but steadily absorbing new words from Sicilian and Italian according to the needs of the developing community.
{{cite book}}
: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
Sources
- Agius, D. A. (1996). Siculo Arabic. London: Kegan Paul International. ISBN 0-7103-0497-8.
- Johns, Jeremy (2002). Arabic Administration in Norman Sicily. The Royal Diwan. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-81692-0.
- Metcalfe, Alex (2003). Muslims and Christian in Norman Sicily: Arabic-speakers and the end of Islam. London and New York: Routledge. ISBN 0-7007-1685-8.
External links
- Agius, Dionisius A. "Who Spoke Siculo Arabic?", XII Incontro Italiano di Linguistica Camitio-semitica (Afroasiatica), ATTI a cura di Marco Moriggi, Rubbettino 2007. 25–33.