Benjamin Suchard
LightNews LightNews
banner
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
Benjamin Suchard
@bnuyaminim.bsky.social
1.5K followers 470 following 3.3K posts
Hebrew Bible, Biblical Hebrew, Aramaic, Comparative Semitics. Blog: bnuyaminim.wordpress.com
Posts Replies Media Videos
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
Some cool additional data on names in Aramaic ostraca from 4th/3rd-c. Idumaea, from Giulia Francesca Grassi's review of Porten & Yardeni (2023). www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...
With regard to anthroponymy, all the proper names contained in Volumes 1–5 are conveniently listed in Table 2, “Names in TAO (TAO A–J)” (…). Recorded names number 567, although the authors rightly stress that some of them are uncertain or difficult to explain. They write that 65 names are composed with the theonym Qos, the Idumaean god, whereas only five names begin with the theonym Baʿal. However, the reviewer could count 74 Qos-names, as well as 14 names beginning with Baʿal; moreover, Baʿal names increase to 27 if the second element of composite names is taken into account. Additionally, frequent theonyms in proper names are El/Il (74 occurrences; the word ʾl may be either the theonym El/Il or the term for “god”) and Yahweh, recorded in 20 names. Other names which are frequently attested among Judaeans, such as Menaḥem, Mešullem, or Baruk, are also recorded. Other deities, such as Šamaš, Nabu, Nanai, and Egyptian Isis and Osiris (see below), are rarely present. Not surprisingly, many names are Arabic, and some of them have the desinence -w that was frequent in Nabataean names: examples are the frequent anthroponyms mlkw and ʿbydw (the latter being a qutayl diminutive form). Other names are Aramaic, for example zbynʾ or nṭyrʾ, qatīl-forms from the Aramaic elements zbn and nṭr. Two of them belong to the early stage of Aramaic anthroponymy, for they are borne by two kings of the 9th and 8th century b.c., although their distribution is different. ḥzʾl, “El has seen,” is common in the corpus, and is relatively well known in both Aramaic and Akkadian (…), besides the famous king of Damascus. In contrast, mtyʿʾl, “Benefited/Saved by El,”2 occurs just once in the Idumaean corpus and in Neo-Assyrian besides the king of Arpad, in Old Aramaic the similar form mtʿʾl is borne only by the king of Arpad, whereas mtyʿʾl is recorded in Nabataean and mtʿʾl in North Arabian and even in Minaean (…).
November 25, 2025 at 11:02 AM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
I thought it was su- but this logo is making me question that.
Stylized purple logo: "Saudi. Welcome to Arabia". The word Saudi has Arabic vowel markers for a-u-i.
November 21, 2025 at 11:11 AM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
Edge offering to translate a page in the Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon from Welsh to English
November 20, 2025 at 3:09 PM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
Marvel: 'Infinity War is the most ambitious crossover event in history' Me:
November 19, 2025 at 8:20 AM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
The debuccalization of *q and its consequences have been a disaster for the Levantine dialects.
November 17, 2025 at 2:52 PM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
Second, there's the name 𐢃𐢗𐢑𐢕𐢞𐢔 bʿlntn itself. Nehmé doesn't comment on it, probably because it's attested a few more times in graffiti. But what's cool about this name is that it's clearly Northwest Semitic, not Arabic like most Nabataean names.
3/6
Detail of bʿlntn in the photograph by H. Raguet Detail of bʿlntn in the tracing by L. Nehmé Search results for bʿlntn from DiCoNab, https://diconab.huma-num.fr/
November 14, 2025 at 11:05 AM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
🗿NABATAEAN NEWS🗿

Recently (2024), Laïla Nehmé published four #Nabataean texts from a burial site in north-western Saudi Arabia. Three are very fragmentary, but the fourth is the longest Nabataean text on stone found so far! Two things that stood out to me:
1/6
Photograph of a light grey rock fragment inscribed with 22 lines of Nabataean script.
November 14, 2025 at 11:05 AM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
Someone should inform the Syriacs! (Kiraz et al. 2015)
Vocalized Peshitta text of Leviticus 19:26–27, with a hard k in the -kun suffixes.
November 13, 2025 at 7:32 PM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
anyway here's the Hortus botanicus Leiden in November 2018
View of a park with big trees by a canal flanked by a road with bike path. The sky is mottled with small white clouds. In the park, there is a very big tree with mostly bare branches and a carpet of red leaves underneath it, a tree with bright bright yellow leaves, and some other trees with fall colours and grass.
November 10, 2025 at 1:02 PM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
November 7, 2025 at 3:47 PM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
It's happening
November 7, 2025 at 9:20 AM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
This quote I found on Wikipedia seems important too:
November 6, 2025 at 2:28 PM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
me trying to find a Levantine word with [z] on Wiktionary
Meme of four hands holding four pills (red, blue, yellow, green) labeled with the Arabic letters zay, dhal, dha' and dad.
November 1, 2025 at 2:55 PM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
Love the morphological integration on this Levantine #Arabic borrowing from #French garçon. 🐦🐦
Wiktionary entry: جرسون • (garsōn) m (plural جراسين (garāsīn), feminine جرسونة (garsōne)). 1. waiter
October 31, 2025 at 12:57 PM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
Not a great illustration but hopefully you get the drift.
October 28, 2025 at 8:02 AM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
Unintentional #Ge'ez on this shoebox (ሶ)
A shoebox from the brand Ayacucho. Upside down, the stylized Y on the front looks like a Ge'ez so sign.
October 24, 2025 at 1:11 PM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
Not the "e macron letter" I was looking for, thanks though
Feminine hands hold a white paper in a light blue envelope in front of some kind of artwork of Emmanuel Macron in front of the French flag.
October 24, 2025 at 7:41 AM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
Nice numerical parallelism there
6.2 Composition of Written Hebrew Three teachers reported using some composition of Biblical Hebrew in class. Four students remembered using it.
October 20, 2025 at 1:18 PM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
Notes from the Jewish cemetery in Vught 🇳🇱:
1) Very stylish 1930s monument for one Karel Azijnman. Interesting reference to his family as "the House of Azijnman" in the inscription. The rolling stone door reminds me of the Susya synagogue but is more common in ancient Christian architecture, I think.
An elaborate funerary monument in what I think is pink granite stands in a field of grass between more ordinary grey headstones with black Hebrew and Dutch lettering. The monument includes a round grey granite slab with a star of David and the inscription הכל הבל, "all is futility". An oil lamp has been carved into a niche in the top left.
October 20, 2025 at 9:03 AM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
In awe at the size of this lad.
A tome of about 850 pages, Stefan Bruweleit's "The Verbal Systems of Aramaic", lies on a table. The cover is in Brill's HdO series's signature style, with green and white elements on a black background, as well as "in Aramaic" in the middle of the cover in yellow Estrangela Syriac script.
October 15, 2025 at 6:00 PM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
Linguists: nooo you can't just keep an expression unchanged for 5500 years 😭
Levantine Arabic speakers:
Flash card from an app. It reads "sma`ni!", basically unchanged from Proto-Semitic*smaʕ-nī 'listen to me'
October 15, 2025 at 6:05 AM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
"We look forward to living and labouring side by side with you for many years to come in what is now your home as well as ours," I concluded my welcoming speech.

"... *kʷid?" the young man at the head of the armed band replied.
Tweet: Write a prehistoric-related two sentence horror story Reply: "Boy I'm glad to go to sleep" I said happily Little did I know... the evil kill dino was under my bed😱
October 11, 2025 at 8:35 AM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
Moabite Arabic, I love it
The Mujib, a steep river canyon, marks the beginning of a second dialect continuum, which we shall call Muʔābi, also classified as Southern Levantine. Muʔābi is represented by the dialects of the southern cities of Kerak, Tafila, Shawbak and Ma’an and the surrounding villages. This group has several distinctive features, e.g., the feminine suffix -ki instead of Ḥōrāni -ik, as in ʔamm-ki ‘your (f) mother’. At the same time, the Muʔābi group shares numerous features with the central and northern Ḥōrāni continuum of dialects.
October 10, 2025 at 3:00 PM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
Attended today's @nino-leiden.bsky.social lecture on Iron Age I Moab by Diederik Halbertsma. One of the many takeaways for me: Wadi Mujib, the biblical Arnon, looks *really* dramatic!
A bearded, white man in a black hat, black shirt, and khaki pants holds a rod with a photogrammetry device at the end, standing in front of a rocky desert landscape. The hills stretch to the horizon and are bisected by a deep, deep gorge, with water and some plant life visible at the bottom.
October 9, 2025 at 6:58 PM
bnuyaminim.bsky.social
These guys (Khirbet Kerak Ware people, Early Bronze III) = Cainite sons of Lamech
Various attempts have been made to account for the movement of Kura– Araxes communities – or parts of them – into the Levant. Long thought to be pastoral nomads or itinerant potters, new studies on the economy of the homeland sites has established the sedentary, agricultural base of most Kura–Araxes communities. Current studies therefore focus on the ability of Kura–Araxes networks to transmit technological innovations or precious metals from the northern peripheries toward urbanized centers, while maintaining an alternate way of life in autonomous communities. A promising angle seems to be the inverse relation between KKW-related settlement and strong urbanizing paradigms: Kura–Araxes commu- nities appear in, or move into, southeast Anatolia and the Amuq region in the wake of Uruk withdrawal, while in the Levant they avoid the flourishing Byblos enclave while exploiting weakened Jordan Valley sites. And although the northern connection with metalliferous and vine-growing regions has attracted explanations related to metal- and wine-making, the principal technological advantage that can be identified on the ground relates to ceramic crafts and to the traction complex: oxen, carts and probably plows. In other words, mobile communities with a Kura–Araxes cultural orientation moved in where opportunity arose, and survived as autonomous communities by fulfilling important functions, for example, as cattle drivers, and by showcasing an exotic cultural assemblage in an age when social articulation began to reassert itself following the decline of EB II uniformitarian propensities.
October 7, 2025 at 1:18 AM