Page:Palestine Exploration Fund - Quarterly Statement for 1894.djvu/81

Rh

These words are by themselves sufficient to show the age of the Mishnah and the communication between the Jews and the Greek and Roman population. It is clear that vessels and medicines, with various articles of food, were bought from Gentiles. The list is not perhaps exhaustive, and several doubtful words have been omitted; but out of about 70 words only about a fourth are Latin, and three fourths may be older than the Roman conquest. Some of the words are not Greek or Latin in origin, though received apparently from such sources. Among these are Cucuma, Oryza, and Angaros, with probably Calamaria, Dalmaticum, and Cannabis.

A good many of these words occur on the contemporary Greek texts of Syria, and some survive in the language of the peasantry, such as Funduk "inn"; Kumkum  "bottle"; Roz  "rice"; Kinnib  "hemp"; Asfinjah  "sponge"; Tawala  "table," with others of Greek and Latin origin noted in my former paper.

In addition to Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, and Latin, other dialects were spoken in Palestine, such as the Aramaic of the Palmyrene inscriptions and of Bashan, and the Sabean dialect of the Arab tribes from Yemen settling south of Damascus, and the Nabathean of Petra, of the Sinaitic Desert, and of Moab; to which Persian and Mongol dialects, and those of the Aryans of Asia Minor, might perhaps be added in Northern Syria. From the earliest historic age other dialects besides Hebrew have always been spoken in Palestine, but the traces of the Persian domination seem to have been very faint as compared with the Greek influence, and are mainly found, in 500 A.D., in the Hagadah or legendary lore of the Babylonian Talmud. The Phœnician dialect was no doubt still extant, and though we have no known Phœnician texts of the age, Phœnician personal names occur in Greek texts near Beirut. The Samaritan dialect was also distinct, and that of Galilee differed from the Hebrew of Jerusalem. In the Galilean Synagogue texts, and the tomb texts of Jerusalem, Jaffa, and Galilee, dating from the Christian era to the third century A.D., we find evidence both of the language, and of the characters used in writing by the Jews.