2: Lesson Vowels above as Vowelsareindicated throughcertainconsonants well as signsthat appear may someconsonants serveeitherasa true andbelowthe letters.

Therefore, are or consonant, asthe markerof a vowel.Usuallywhenconsonants usedto mark vowels, vowelstheyaremarkingare"long vowels."But, not every"long the that Consonants markvowelshelp with vowel" is represented sucha consonant. and makethe pronunciation a word moreobviousto a reader theseconsonants of lectionis, Latin for "mothers reading." of are,therefore, calledmatres it is from motres-consonants, helpfulto In orderto distinguish consonants true lettersin transcription. represent matres-consonantssuperscript the as Althoughthe vowelsarelabeled either"long" or "short,"this nomenclature does The in not describe length theirpronunciation. vowels BiblicalAramaic of are the not distinguished the lengthof time it takes pronounce to them,but rather by by Thus,we will speak a "shortla/" andthis describes sound theirdistinctsounds. of a quantity, lengthof i.e., distinctfrom "long la/",but bothwouldhavehadthe same pronunciation. into Like the Aramaicconsonants, vowelsmaybe transliterated theRoman the i.e., Long vowelsaredistinguished from shortvowelsby a macron, a line alphabet. : a;longlal : a). overthem(short lal Partl: Belowarethe vowelsignsandthe consonallts sometimes that accompany them.In this list, thevowel signsa"re represented or the beneath above letterbeth;their pronunciation follow. forms,andtheir approximate, transliterated conventional I a pronounced thea in the like marksshortlal, conventionally Englishword "mat." pronounced thea in the markslong lal, conventionally like word "pa," or "father."Sometimes, especially at Englishcolloquial theendof a word,it is alsorepresented i'Tl or Nl (ban ba ). as , Thesame svmbolalsomarksa short/o/: seebelow. pronounced thee marksthe short/e/ sound, like conventionally "Ed," or in theword"less." in theEnglish name

Introductory Lessonsin Aramaic by Eric D. Reymond

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-1

e, e

marks a shortor long /e/ sound.In either case,the vowel is pronounced like the ay in say, or like the ey in convey. conventionally it as'l eY, Nl e', e', andiJJ eh,eh. EY; Sometimes is alsorepresented Distinguishingbetweenthe shortand long e is often difficult. For the beginningstudent,it will be helpful to transliterate this symbolwith e universallyand subsequently learnthoseplaceswherethe symbol to represents e.

-l

pronounced the I in marksthe short/i/ sound, conventionally like "pit."

l'

r-l

pronounced thee in marksthe long/ii sound, conventionally like thename"Pete,"or like the i in theword "latrine"and"saline".Note theextrayodh.Thisconfirms thatthe i-vowelis long. marksthe short/o/ vowel,conventionally pronounced theaw like of theword "paw." Notethatthisvowel is very closeto the a. When these vowelsymbols wereinvented applied the consonantal and to text,theremightnot havebeena distinction between o anda the All sounds. the same, is conventional distinguish vowelsin it to two transliteration pronunciation. and Learning where , representsand a whereit represents is not easy. havetriedto disambiguate o I befween thetwo vowelsin transliteration.

-t J O

i'r

-w

marksthe long/o/ vowel,conventionally pronounced theoa like of "coat,"or like theo of "rote."It is sometimes written also : o. withoutthewawcomplement: I marksthe short/u/ vowel,conventionally pronounced theoo like of "cook."

ju

I -'l

-w

marksthe long/u/ vowel,conventionally pronounced theoo like of "noon,"or the u of "fune." Thisis the shewa symbolandmarksa mufinured vowel, pronounced thea in "above."Theshewa conventionally like symbol alsomarksthe absence a vowel.Determining of which of these two alternatives shewa the represents sometimes provedifficult. will

- vl - r

Introductory Lessonsin Aramaic by Eric D. Reymond

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$Fr Nd Nd These represent like threesymbols ultra-short vowels,essentially the munnured vowelin nature, eachhavinga slightlydistinctquality. but (i.e., Typicallythese underguttural vowelsappear consonants N, lJ, JJ, andl'l; sometimes beforeor after) andp andsometimes also before ),), andl). Unliketheshewa, whichonly sometimes should be pronounced, these threesymbols always represent presence a the of pronounced vowel.
irt

:-

ay

Occasionally, findsa vowelandconsonant arepronounced one that The together. mostcommon BiblicalAramaicis the short/a/ + in yodh,whichis pronounced theEnglishword "eye."Notethatin like this case shewa the symbolmarks absence a vowel. the of

-l Notethatwhena kaphappears in a word it hasthis form: , it is conventional last to write this with a shewa symbol(l), though this shewa symboldoesnot represent vowelsound. a Also important understanding Armaicwordswerepronounced, how to is falls.Usually,it falls on the lastsyllable a word. understanding wherethe stress of Occasionally falls on the next-to-last it in syllable, which case stressed the syllable :lll-lf is indicated an accent mark(. ): by

Exercise 2a.
Now, try transliterating followingwordsincluding the theirvowelsandtranslating for thewordsnot translated you.Determining which letters trueconsonants are and which arematre,s-consonants become will muchclearer you beginto understand as the formsof nounsandverbs. -j?b --' melek("king") -'la: ("silver")(Because shewa the first vowelof theword,it is the is pronounced.)
ll-

Ftr-t

ttFt Ir

lrrJ

Introductory Lessonsin Aramaic by Eric D. Reymond

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-FJ I - I:J

1-j\ - rJ :

j'f n)ul:. )tJitn 'i'!'i?n )D n;il! :l! ):: 'i'E')u1

l't;]7 l;'T'nn 1?n]
I i " : : | -:-

''l7t;]'ln:l
: T '

Part2 As mentioned a above, distinguishing between shewa representsmurmured the that rather vowel,andthe shewa represents absence a vowel is sometimes that the of whena shortvowel(lal _ ,lel .. ,lil ., lol , , lul ...) comes difficult.In general, beforea shewa, shewa represents absence a vowel;whena longvowel the the of ' (/il , , l1l , hl . ,loll ,lil 1) comes represents before shewa, shewa a the a munnured vowel.For example, because denotes shortvowel,the shewa a _ followingit in N!?D (",tl. king") represents absence a vowel.Similarly the of with the shortlil in lt.-l:l ("he writes").On the otherhand,in lIJ"li;1 ("he let you know")thei representslongvowelandthusthe shewa followingit is a pronounced. (There exceptions, this holdstrue,by-andJarge most for are but words.)

Exercise 2b.
from Distinguish shewas represent the murmured-vowels those thatrepresent that the absence vowelsby transliterating of these words. N?Ol ("the silver") :l|]'f n ("he let you know" or "he caused to know") you pluralentities) lf n!|! ("you" for masculine (The , symbol j'-lnS ("those representshere.) who aresaying") d 'i]l! ("building")

n]l? ("The onewho is building")(The , symbol representshere,as a il,.) does

Introductory Lessonsin Aramaic by Eric D. Reymond 13

Remember: pronounced. vowels($ A,!f d, S d) arealways Theultra-short

2c. Exercise
in embedded thebiblicalbookof Ena (a:11). of Thisis thebeginning a letter, it: Transcribe

'ni)! rn?u "T Nf-t.i*jltD-lg ;T:"7 - N??D )! *nluurnr_i-l$ i1?iTl-11! :T'Ju tD;s '-'t N"ll;t] ":t R?)* N'lil) !'-1] nlJj:l
"This (is) a copyof the letterthattheysentto him: 'To: Artaxerxes, king -- (From:)your servants, people Avar-Naharah. the of the who Now, let it be knownto theking thatthe Jews/Judaeans . . ."'

Part3: Syllabification Vowels and with a vowel.There A neverbegins Eachsyllable begins with a consonant. syllable * a vowel(called thathaveonly a consonant those aretwo kindsof syllables, * "open"syllables) thosesyllables havea consonant a vowel+ a and that (called"closed"syllables). consonant ("he let you know") the first syllable is In theword:j{l'f n (h6*-de-'ak) "open"because begins not it with a consonant, does havea but considered is syllable with the longd vowel.Thesecond at consonant its end,ratherit ends it is syllable because However, lastsyllable a closed the alsoan opensyllable. begins endswith a consonant. and in ( it o]) occur only Short vowels _, .., ., ., and, [when represents typically within a word: two places 1) In a closed syllable, (eitherthelastsyllable a word or in a syllable of syllable ar 2) in an accented ' mark( ): lfi!) with an accent ( i , ' ' 1 , a n d , [ w h e nt r e p r e s e n t]sm o s t f t e n c c u irn i o o a ) L o n gv o w e l s' . . , ' , no the of syllables, matter position the but opensyllables, canalsooccurin closed in (This,incidentally, distinguishes vowelpatterns Aramaicfrom those the stress. only in opensyllables in stressed or in BiblicalHebrew, wherelongvowelsappear
Introductory Lessonsin Aramaic by Eric D. Reymond
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longvowelsdo NOT occurin closed, unstressed i.e., closed syllables; in Hebrew, syllables, theyDO in Aramaic.) but for Givena form like :l{'1li'.T,it is impossible a beginning student know whether to is it or whether should pronounced a be as or not the first syllable closed open, word l*hod-'-ak/. correct The three-syllable word /hd-de-'ak/ asa two syllable or pronunciation in fact,difficult to know with certainty. is easiest beginning is, It if students unless simplyassume all longvowelsarein opensyllables, that otherwise This assumption results thetransliteration in ho*de'ak. indicated. 'ilt'i!13, Thewords tt??B ,N??:, above, and'i]!1,each begin with a closed Eachof these syllable. closed syllables contains short a vowel. Thewords:JfTli1, T"''lF$,andN')l begin with anopensyllable. Eachof these opensyllables contains longvowel.Thismeans the followingshewa each in a that wordrepresentsmurmured a vowel.
mr r ltqi

Anothercharacteristic Aramaicsyllabification thatwhentwo shewas of is occur such side-by-side, asin theword jlln:l the of , thefirst represents absence a vowelwhilethe second representsmurmured a vowel. Remember manyAramaic that wordshavea shewa theirfirst syllable. almost in In in everycase, shewa appears the first syllable a wordrepresents the that of a murmured vowelandshould pronounced. be

Exercise 2d.
Transliterate following passage the basedonEzra (5:4):

r:F$ NFi:'il'tlr lin) N:':l ;111 $illl nirFu jD jrftr "l T:l?
Then,thus,theyasked them: "What arethenames themenwho arebuildingthis building(lit., who this of buildingarebuilding)."
Introductorv Lessonsin Aramaic bv Eric D. Revmond t5

2e. Exercise
Transcribe following(from Ena 5.5) into Aramaicscript: the 'dldhdhdn yehu*dayc' hdwdt'al SdbEv wo'eYn wela'baltilu* himm6* "The eyeof their Godwasoverthe elders the Judaeans of did andthey(i.e.,theelders) not stopthem(i.e.,thebuilders)."

Vocabulary: Prepositions: 2 :"to" or "for"

: TD "from"
I -.

)9_: "to" or "against" "over" or "according or to" Adverbs: N, : thisparticle negates verbs trllt : "also" Short words: : "then" ]]llt tit$ : "thereis" Nl;'l : "he" : Nti.T "she" 'l : "and" "but" or !t'l] : "known" N]il? : "let it be" Qrlote the first syllable that contains shortlel vowelin an open a syllable. This is the exception therule pointed above. ultra-short to The out vowel beneath hehis secondarv: olderform of thewordwouldhavebeenllehthe the
we't.l

Introductory Lessonsin Aramaic by Eric D. Reymond

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