Syriac language

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Syriac (/ˈsɪriæk/; ܠܫܢܐ ܣܘܪܝܝܐ Leššānā Suryāyā), also known as Syriac/Syrian Aramaic or Classical Syriac, is a dialect of Middle Aramaic. Having first appeared in the early first century CE in Edessa, classical Syriac became a major literary language throughout the Middle East from the 4th to the 8th centuries, preserved in a large body of Syriac literature. Indeed, Syriac literature comprises roughly 90% of the extant Aramaic literature. Syriac was once spoken across much of the Near East as well as Anatolia and Eastern Arabia.

The Old Aramaic language was adopted by the Neo-Assyrian Empire (911–609 BC) when the Assyrians conquered the various Syro-Hittite states to its west. The Achaemenid Empire (546-332 BC), which rose after the fall of the Assyrian Empire, also retained Old Aramaic as its official language, and Old Aramaic remained the lingua franca of the region. During the course of the third and fourth centuries AD, the inhabitants of the region began to embrace Christianity.

Along with Latin and Greek, Syriac became one of "the three most important Christian languages in the early centuries" of the Common Era. From the 1st century AD, Syriac became the vehicle of Syriac Christianity and culture, and the liturgical language of the Syriac Orthodox Church, the Maronite Church, and the Church of the East, along with its descendants: the Chaldean Catholic Church, the Assyrian Church of the East, the Ancient Church of the East, the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church, the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church, the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church, the Syriac Catholic Church, and the Assyrian Pentecostal Church.

Syriac Christianity and language spread throughout Asia as far as the Indian Malabar Coast and Eastern China, and was the medium of communication and cultural dissemination for the later Arabs and, to a lesser extent, the Parthian Empire and Sasanian Empire. Primarily a Christian medium of expression, Syriac had a fundamental cultural and literary influence on the development of Arabic, which largely replaced it towards the 14th century. Syriac remains the sacred language of Syriac Christianity to this day.

Syriac is a Middle Aramaic language and, as such, a language of the Northwest Semitic languages of the Afroasiatic family. It is written in the Syriac alphabet, a derivation of the Aramaic alphabet.

Geographic distribution

Although once a major language in the Fertile Crescent and Eastern Arabia, Syriac is now limited to the towns and villages in the Nineveh plains, Tur Abdin, the Khabur plains, in and around the cities of Mosul, Erbil and Kirkuk.

An 11th-century Syriac manuscript.

Syriac was the local accent of Aramaic in Edessa, and evolved under the influence of the Church of the East and the Syriac Orthodox Church into its current form. Before Arabic became the dominant language, Syriac was a major language among Christian communities in the Middle East, Central Asia and Kerala, and remains so among the Syriac Christians to this day. It has been found as far afield as Hadrian's Wall in Great Britain, with inscriptions written by Assyrian and Aramean soldiers of the Roman Empire.

History

Yeshuʿ, ישוע, the Hebrew and Aramaic name of Jesus

The history of Syriac can be divided into three distinct periods:

Old Aramaic, the language of the Syro-Hittite states of the Levant, was adopted as a lingua franca beside Akkadian in the Neo-Assyrian Empire
Middle Syriac/Middle Syriac Aramaic (ܟܬܒܢܝܐ Kṯāḇānāyā, "Literary Syriac"), which is divided into:
- Eastern Middle Syriac/Eastern Middle Syriac Aramaic (the literary and ecclesiastical language of the ethnic Syriac Christians of the Assyrian Church of the East, Chaldean Catholic Church, Syro-Malabar Catholic Church, Ancient Church of the East and Assyrian Pentecostal Church)
- Western Middle Syriac/Western Middle Syriac Aramaic (the literary and ecclesiastical language of the largely Syriac members of the Syriac Orthodox Church, Syriac Catholic Church and Maronite Church).
"Modern Syriac"/"Modern Syriac Aramaic" is a term occasionally used to refer to the modern Neo-Aramaic languages. Even if they cannot be positively identified as the direct descendants of attested Middle Syriac, they must have developed from closely related dialects belonging to the same branch of Aramaic, and the varieties spoken in Christian communities have long co-existed with and been influenced by Middle Syriac as a liturgical and literary language. In this terminology, Modern Syriac is divided into:
- Modern Western Syriac Aramaic (Turoyo and Mlahsô). Note however that these are sometimes excluded from the category of "Modern Syriac".
- Modern Eastern Syriac Aramaic (Northeastern Neo-Aramaic, including Assyrian Neo-Aramaic and Chaldean Neo-Aramaic but the term usually is not used in reference to Neo-Mandaic, another variety of Eastern Aramaic spoken by the Mandaeans).

The name "Syriac", when used with no qualification, generally refers to one specific dialect of Middle Aramaic but not to Old Aramaic or to the various present-day Eastern and Central Neo-Aramaic languages descended from it or from close relatives. The modern varieties are, therefore, not discussed in this article.

External Links

Wikipedia Article on the Syriac language

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