ANELC eLecture Series 2020: Eblaite As An East Semitic Language

The Ancient Near Eastern Languages in Contact eLecture Series ends this week with a presentation on Eblaite by Dr. Rebecca Hasselbach-Andee, Associate Professor of Comparative Semitics at the University of Chicago. Dr. Hasselbach-Andee’s work includes a broad range of Semitic languages, and she has edited a volume recently published, called A Companion to Ancient Near…

ANELC eLecture Series 2020: Culture and Context of Jewish Greek Writings in the Second Temple Period

Dr. Marieke Dhont presented the ANELC eLecture this week, demonstrating linguistic connections between Greek and Jewish culture. In addition, her study provides evidence for a bilingual community of Jews in the Second Temple Period. This time period followed the introduction of Hellenism from the west into the whole of the ancient Near East. Hellenistic Greek…

ANELC eLecture Series 2020: The Heritage of Samaritan Hebrew in the Second Temple Period

This week’s ANELC eLecture was presented by Dr. Stefan Schorch, who is working on a collaborative project to develop a lexicon of Samaritan Hebrew. Samaritans separated from the main Jewish religious life in late antiquity. Their practices of prayer and worship increasingly moved toward Mount Gerizim rather than Jerusalem in Judah. While the two sects…

ANELC eLecture Series 2020: Egyptian Influences in Semitic Languages

This past Wednesday, the ANELC eLecture was presented by Dr. Aaron Rubin, a Semiticist at Penn State University. Dr. Rubin walked us through linguistic exchanges that suggest a kinship between Egyptian and Semitic languages. Semitic and Egyptian are two branches of a group of ancient Near Eastern languages referred to as Afroasiatic. Dr. Rubin’s presentation…