This article should specify the language of its non-English content, using {{lang}}, {{transliteration}} for transliterated languages, and {{IPA}} for phonetic transcriptions, with an appropriate ISO 639 code. Wikipedia's multilingual support templates may also be used - notably xdm for Edomite. (November 2024) |
Edomite | |
---|---|
Native to | Edom |
Region | Idumea (modern-day southwestern Jordan and southern Israel) |
Ethnicity | Edomites |
Era | early 1st millennium BCE[1] |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 | xdm |
xdm | |
Glottolog | edom1234 |
Edomite was a Northwest Semitic Canaanite language, very similar to Biblical Hebrew, Ekronite, Ammonite, Phoenician, Amorite and Sutean, spoken by the Edomites in Idumea (modern-day southwestern Jordan and parts of Israel) in the 2nd and 1st millennium BCE. It is extinct and known only from an extremely small corpus,[2] attested in a scant number of impression seals, ostraca, and a single late 7th or early 6th century BCE letter, discovered in Horvat Uza.[2][3][4][5]
Like Moabite, but unlike Hebrew, it retained the feminine ending -t in the singular absolute state. In early times, it seems to have been written with a Phoenician alphabet. However, by the 6th century BCE, it adopted the Aramaic alphabet. Meanwhile, Aramaic or Arabic features such as whb ("gave") and tgr/tcr ("merchant") entered the language, with whb becoming especially common in proper names.[citation needed] Like many other Canaanite languages, Edomite features a prefixed definite article derived from the presentative particle (for example as in h-ʔkl ‘the food’). The diphthong /aw/ contracted to /o/ between the 7th and 5th century BCE, as foreign transcriptions of the divine name "Qos" indicate a transition in pronunciation from Qāws to Qôs.[6]
While we were fortunate enough to have a major inscription, the Mesha Stone, for Moabite, we are much less fortunate as regards Edomite. Here we are reliant on a few short and fragmentary inscriptions and a number of seals.