The Hurrian Language - Isolate, Northeast Caucasian, or Distant Indo-European Connections?
🌐 Embark on a captivating journey into the mysterious realm of the Hurrian language with Learn Hittite! Join us as we unravel the enigma of Hurrian origins, delve into the fascinating Mitanni state, and explore the textual treasures that unveil the secrets of Hurrian.
🕵️♂️ This introductory video promises an epic exploration. Here's what's in store:
Background: Uncover theories about Hurrian origins and the intriguing Mitanni state.
Linguistic Connections: Discover Hurrian's relationship with Urartian and the attempts to link it with other language families - including, surprisingly, the Indo-European family.
Phonology and Morphology: Dive into the intricacies of Hurrian language structure, exploring noun and verb formation. Witness Hurrian cuneiform in action as we examine texts and sentences from authentic materials.
By the end, you'll grasp the agglutinating and ergative nature of Hurrian.
🎓 Gain insights into the groundbreaking work of scholars like Ephraim Speiser, Ilse Wegner, and Roger D. Woodard. Plus, discover three recommended resources for further exploration into the ancient languages of the Near East.
🔗 Have questions or insights? Share them in the comments below!
📌 Note: Delve into the exploration of fragmentary languages with an understanding that some aspects are debated, and definitive answers may be elusive. 🌍🔠
Sources: (approximately, they are in the order they first appear in the video)
⭐Woodard, R. (Ed.). (2008). The Ancient Languages of Asia Minor. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511486845
There are two German versions of Wegner’s Hurrian Grammar, the first has been translated into English.
⭐Wegner, I. (2000). Einführung in die hurritische Sprache. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.
Wegner, I. (2007). Einführung in die hurritsche Sprache (2nd rev. ed.). Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz
Wegner, I. (1995). Suffixaufnahme in Hurrian: Normal Cases and Special Cases. In F. Plank (Ed.), Double Case: Agreement by Suffixaufnahme. New York, NY. Oxford Academic.
⭐Speiser, E. A. (1940). Introduction to Hurrian. The Annual of the American Schools of Oriental Research, 20, xi-230. doi.org/10.2307/3768466
Fournet, A., & Bomhard, A. R. (2010). The Indo-European Elements in Hurrian. La Garenne Colombes / Charleston. (166 pages).
Laroche, E. (1980). Glossaire de la langue houritte. Editions Klincksieck. Paris.
Hrozny, B. (1915). Die Lösung des hethitischen Problems. Mitteilungen der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft, 56, 17-50.
Michalowski, P. (1986). The Earliest Hurrian Toponymy: A New Sargonic Inscription. Zeitschrift für Assyriologie, 76, 4-11
Moran, W. (1992). The Amarna letters. Johns Hopkins University Press
Diakonoff, I. M., & Starostin, S. A. (1986). Huro-Urartian as an Eastern Caucasian Language. Münchener Studien zur Sprachwissenschaft, Beiheft, N.F., 12, München.
Kassian, A. (2010). [Review of the book The Indo-European Elements in Hurrian by A. Fournet and A. R. Bomhard (2010)]. The Journal of Language Relationship, issue 4, pp. 199-206.
Farber, W. (1971). Zu einigen Enklitika im Hurrischen (Pronomen, Kopula, syntaktische Partikeln). Orientalia, 40(1)
Wilhelm, G. (1991). A Hurrian Letter from Tell Brak. Iraq, 53, 159-168
Wilhelm, G. (1998). Die Inschrift des Tisatal von Urkes. in G. Buccellati and M. Kelly-Buccellati (eds.) : 117-143.
#hurrian
#neareast
#languageisolate
#protoindoeuropean
#historicallinguistics
#bronzeage
#mesopotamia
#anatolia
#urartian
#northeastcaucasianlanguages
#ancientlanguages
#learnhittite
Пікірлер: 34
I think most of your viewers would totally dig a video on the Khoi San languages, which if I remember correctly you mentioned to be your primary linguistic field of study. Of course there are the phonologies, but I would love an examination of some grammatical features. Shared in the Sprachbund or just an examination of one or two example languages
@LearnHittite
3 ай бұрын
Good call, I'll look into it. Next will probably be Thracian because people asked for it but I wouldn't mind covering KKG for example.
What I really like about your videos is that you references for where we can find good information. As to affiliated languages, in my opinion we should accept that most of language history is lost. On evolutionary grounds I would argue that fully developed language has been around as long as our species has existed. It follows that language families have come and gone and very ancient relationships, given that there has to be continuity of speech, cannot be established. There is simply no evidence. Proto Urartian-Hurrian has to come from somewhere but it could derive from a family of languages that don’t now exist. Or it may be related to an extant language. Sometimes we can’t connect the dots
@LearnHittite
3 ай бұрын
I agree competely, but I think it is human nature, or at least the nature of many linguists, to try a find those deep connections. As futile as it may be.
I cannot imagine an ergative language requiring the accusative. The " and" reminds ne of the noun phrase marker in Basque (-a)
Excellent presentation.
@LearnHittite
3 ай бұрын
Thanks very much for the kind words!
Also, it seems that Bomhard does no longer consider Hurro-Urartian to be related to Indo-European, instead arguing the similarities are due to early contact. Wegner, I., Bomhard, A. R. (2020). An Introduction to the Hurrian Language. p. 15. "In 2010, Arnaud Fournet and Allan R. Bomhard prepared a study in which they tried to demonstrate that there were non-Indo-Aryan Indo-European (grammatical and lexical) elements in Hurrian. Bomhard now (2020) takes these to be the result of prehistoric language contact."
This is a good presentation. I’ve been studying Hurrian for several years. I haven’t read Woodard but have the others. I’m always interested in gaining new knowledge.
@LearnHittite
3 ай бұрын
Yeah I really recommend Woodard's work. Very knowledgeable
Your explanations are always great and very interesting, thank you for your work
@LearnHittite
2 ай бұрын
Glad you like them!
One of modt interesting point is the Hurrian word (" Hil " ) means (to say, to speak). In Kurdish we have word ( Hewal-deh ) a compound verb, by: ▪Hewal-: to say, to speak, to tell ▪-deh: is the root of verb to Do, to done, to make So we say it quotidia in Kurdish: - ji me ra hewal-da (for us tell-did ... told us) - Ka ez ji we ra çîroka Memê Alan hewal-dim (Give me for you count-of Mem-the Alan I do telling ... Let me tell you the count of Mamê Alan). And I see the word ( Hewal-deh, hewl-deh ), as a very obvious an agglutination between Hurrian's root (hewal, hewl) with Indo-European root suffix (-deh). And it's make to remember the historic fact about Hurro-Mittanian Kingdom, where two languages emerged in mixing. To create base foundation to new language later.
@horoefrin4776
2 ай бұрын
Till to day as Kurdish peoples we use Horo name in Kurdistan north Syria and in Afrin north Syria we still have ancient town and citadel in the name of King Hori, Hor Khor(means Sun☀️ ,solar Disc) in our native oldest langauges and also in Kurdistan west Iran and North Iraq means Sun . also Hori Khori passed into Christian religion
@horoefrin4776
2 ай бұрын
En , Eni till today as Kurdish we use this word which it is Friday's name in our week days name , and as a verb En , Enan means belive , thought
I believe in Russia academics determined it to be a relative of Vainakh (Checheno-Ingush).
18:45 would it be thinkable to interpret hill as “tell" like in talk,say and speak. It’s kind a funny because in Turkish ”til/dil” means 👅tongue or language. In German we have a crazy word what is "Dolmetscher” dol/dil+match and means simply who matches tounghes (translator). Hope didn’t get to abstract and you get the idea. Thx and regards 😊
@LearnHittite
3 ай бұрын
That interpretation is certainly possible yes. We are quite certain of the meaning of the sign because according to Laroche it occured in an Hurro-Akkadian bilingual text. Til/Dil is also attested in some names and verb forms but its meaning is not fully understood.
@danielbriggs991
3 ай бұрын
I'm pretty sure it's the other way around: Tell means hill. Sorry, I had to 😆
Kassian has suggested a connection between Hurro-Urartian, Hattic, Burushaski and Yeniseian Source: Kassian, A. (2009-2010). Hattic as a Sino-Caucasian language
@LearnHittite
3 ай бұрын
Very interesting, I'll give the text you cited a read
Has anyone found a Hurrian or Urartian word for "hundred"? Does it sound anything like "haryoor"?
@anahit6645
Ай бұрын
In Armenian Haryur is 100 . Used today. Հարյուր
@pierreabbat6157
Ай бұрын
@@anahit6645 Yes, but is it from Urartian?
@mareksagrak9527
15 сағат бұрын
@@pierreabbat6157 No, it's not. But there are certainly some words in Armenian borrowed from Urartian, even though they are much less numerous than Parthian loanwords for example.
I vote for an urartian video. the next natural stop after the hurrian..
En , Eni till today as Kurdish we use this word which it is Friday's name in our week days name , and as a verb En , Enan means belive , thought
Till to day as Kurdish peoples we use Horo name in Kurdistan north Syria and in Afrin north Syria we still have ancient town and citadel in the name of King Hori, Hor Khor(means Sun☀️ ,solar Disc) in our native oldest langauges and also in Kurdistan west Iran and North Iraq means Sun . also Hori Khori passed into Christian religion
I truly believe that Hurro-Uratian languages have big time connections to some IE-languages like Hittite. It maybe even some kind of para- IE-language branch itself!! Armenian seem to have big time connections to Hurro-Urartian languages which have to be look in to more. Armenian has words common with especially Urartian language.
I wonder if this language has enough corpus so that it could be revived some day again...
@LearnHittite
3 ай бұрын
You never know, there could be a huge corpus of Hurrian waiting to be unearthed somewhere....
Genetically Uraratians are definitely armenians but Hurrians are in between Armenians and Kurmanji kurds
Proto asiatik is old Armenian
So the Hurrians were the Kurds of antiquity