Gramm. Heb. Chald. Syr. et Arab. (Heidelb. 1658, 4to) ; Walton, Tntrod. ad Lingg ^ Orient. (Lond. 1655) ; Schaaf, Opus Aramamm (Lugd. Bat. 1686, 8vo) ; Opitz, Syriasmus Hebraismo et Chaldaismo harmonicus (Lips. 1678) ; Fessler, Instil, lingg. Orient. (2 vols. 8vo, Vra- tisl. 1787, 1789); Hasse, llandb. d. Aram. (Jen. 1791, 8vo); Jahn, Aramaische Sprachlehre (Wien, 1793; tr. by Oberleitner, Elementa Aramaica, ib. 1820, 8vo) ; Vater, llandb. d. Hebr. Syr. Chald. u. Arab. Gramm. (8vo, Lpz. 1802, 1817) ; Fiirst, Lehrgebdude d. arama- ischen Idiome (Lpz. 1835) ; Bliicher, Grammatica Ara- maica (Vien. 1838). The only complete Lexicons are Castell's Lex. Heptaglottum (2 vols. fol. Lond. 1669), and Buxtorf's Lex. Chald. -Ta'nuidicum (fol. Basil. 1639) ; also Schonhak, Aramaisch-Rabbinischis Worter- buch (Warsaw, 1859 sq., 4to) ; Rabinei, Rabbinisch- Aramaisches Worterb. (new ed. Lemb. 1857 sq., 8vo) : of these, the first alone covers both the Chald. and Syr., and includes likewise the sister languages. See Shemitic Languages.
The following may be specified as the different Ar- amaean dialects in detail :
1. The Eastern Aramaic or Chaldee. — This is not to be confounded with '-the language of the Chal- dees" (Dan. i, 4), which was probably a Medo-Pcrsic dialect ; but is what is denominated Aramaic (FHEHSt) in Dan. ii, 4. This was properly the language of Babylonia, and was acquired by the Jews during the exile, and carried back with them on their return to their own land. See Chald.ean.
The existence of this language, as distinct from the Western Aramaic or Syriac, has been denied by many scholars of eminence (Michaelis, Abhandl. von der Syr. Spr. § 2; Jahn, Aramaische Sprachlehre, § 1; Hup- feld, Tkeol. Stud, vnd Krit. 1830, p. 290 sq. ; De Wette, Einl. § 32; Fiirst, Lehrgeb. der Aram. Idiome, p. 5), who think that in what is called the Chaldee we hava only the Syriac with an infusion of Hebraisms. The answer to this, however, is that some of the peculiari- ties of the Chaldee are such as are not Hebraistic, so that it cannot have derived them from this source. Thus the preformative in the future of the third per- son masc. sing, and of the third pers. masc. and fern, plur. in Chaldee is "\ while in Syriac it is 2 ; and in Heb. the last is Fi ; the pron. this in Chaldee is Ty] and ■•n, while the Syr. has UOP and the Heb. H 7 ; the Chaldee has the status emphatievs plur. in x*— , while the Syr. has a simple X— ; and to these may be added the use of peculiar words, such as Xpbp^ "Wr) (Dan. v. 7, 16), WQ33 (Ezra iv, 8; v, 9, 11; vi, 13), MM (Ezra iv, 1(£ 11, etc.), P3nb (Dan. v, 2, 23) ; the use of 1 for ? in such words as ItX, etc. There are other differences between the Chaldee and Syriac, such as the absence from the former of otiant consonants and diphthongs, the use of dagesh-forte in the former and not in the latter, the formation of the infin. without the prefixing of "2 except in Peal ; but as these are common to the Chaldee with the Hebrew, they cannot be used as proofs that the Chaldee was a dialect inde- pendent of the Hebrew, and not the Syriac modified by the Hebrew; and the same may be said of the dif- ference of pronunciation between the Syriac and Chal- dee, such as the prevalence of an a sound in the latter where the former lias the o sound, etc. It may be added, however, to the evidence above adduced, as a general remark, that when we consider the wide range of the Aramaic language from east to west, it is in the highest degree probable that the dialect of the people using it at the one extremity should differ considera- bly from that of those using it at the other. It may be further added that not only are the alphabetical characters of the Chaldee different from those of the Syriac, but there is a much greater prevalence of the scriptio plena in the former than in the latter. As,
ahaMjEan language
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however, the Chaldee has come down to us only through the medium of Jewish channels, it is not probable that we have it in the pure form in which it was spoken by the Shemitic Babylonians. The rule of the Persians, and subsequently of the Greeks in Babylonia, could not fail also to infuse into the lan- guage a foreign clement borrowed from both these sources. (See Aurivillius, Dissertt. ad Sac. Litems et Philol. Orient, pertinentes, p. 107 sq. ; Hoffmann, Gram- ., Proleg., p. 11; Dietrich, De Serm. Chald. proprietate, Lips. 1839; Hiivernick, General Introduc- tion, p. 91 sq. ; Bleek, Einl. in das A. T., p. 53 ; Winer, Ckaldaische Grammatik, p. 5.)
The Chaldee, as we have it preserved in the Bible (Ezra iv, 8, 18 ; vii, 12-20 ; Dan. ii, 4-vii, 28 ; Jer. x, 11) and in the Targums, has been, as respects linguist- ic character, divided into three grades : 1. As it ap- pears in the Targum of Onkelos, where it possesses most of a peculiar and independent character ; 2. As it appears in the biblical sections, where it is less free from Hebraisms ; and, 3. As it appears in the other Targums, in which, with the exception to some extent of that of Jonathan ben-Uzziel on the Prophets, the language is greatly corrupted by foreign infusions (Winer, De Onheloso ejusque Paraphr. Child., Lips. 1819; Luzzato, De Onkelosi Chald. Pent. versione,Yien. 1830 ; Hirt, De Chaldaismo Biblico, Jen. 1751). See Targum.