The Verb in the Amarna Letters from Canaan

The present dissertation is devoted to the Amarna letters from Canaan. This corpus of letters, directed to the pharaoh from Canaanite kinglets, dates to the fourteenth century B.C.E. and is inscribed on clay tablets in cuneiform writing. The dissertation focuses on the nature of the linguistic system of the letters and on their verbal system, its morphology and semantics. The language of the letters is a second language learners' interlanguage developed through time by the Canaanite scribes who failed to acquire normative Akkadian language in local schools because of the lack of access to proper educational materials and native speakers of the target language. Two linguistic mechanisms contributed to the formation of the Amarna interlanguage: the fossilization of linguistic knowledge on a level lower than the previous generation and the transfer of Canaanite features which affected the verbal system in a systemic manner. The resulting verbal system exhibits mixed verbal morphology: Akkadian forms used as lexical bases with added Canaanite morphemes. The morphology of the mixed forms is characterized by a great deal of variation which depends mostly on the place of the origin of letters and reflects the habits of individual scribes acquired during their scribal training. The semantics of the verbal system is characterized by the opposition between the perfective (yaqtul and qatal) and imperfective (yaqtulu) forms. These aspectual forms receive a default temporal interpretation in the past (yaqtul and qatal) and in the present-future (yaqtulu). Within the qatal paradigm, two forms are to be distinguished: the perfective verbal qatal and the nominal predicative qatal of the lexically stative verbs. The verbal syntax has a sequential nature: verbs have implications which are carried over sentence boundaries and guide the interpretation of the forms that follow in the same verbal sequence. The sequential nature of the verbal system is apparent in the modal sequence triggered by a directive-volitive form. This sequence may use the yaqtula form which is both modal and subordinated. This verbal system is used in Canaan, with the exception of the letters from Tyre which apparently emulate Akkadian morphology and semantics.

Department dc:contributor.department

Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations

Year dc:date.issued

2014

Author dc:creator

• Baranowski, Krzysztof J.

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Beaulieu, Paul-Alain

• Akkadian Language
• Amarna Letters
• Canaanite Languages
• Verbal Morphology and Semantics

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1807/88977

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:utoronto.scholaris.ca:1807/88977