The language which is denominated in the N. T. //. 6r< w, and of which a few specimens are there given, seems, so far as can be judged from the scanty mate- rials preserved, to have been substantially the same as the Chaldee of the Targums (Pfannkuche, On the Language of Palestine in the Age of Christ and his Apos- tles, translated in the Bib. Repository, Apr. 1831, and reprinted in the Bib. Cabinet, vol. ii). In this lan- guage some of the apocryphal books were written (Jerome, Prmf. in Tob't Judith, 1 Mace.'), the work of Josephus on the Jewish war (Z>e Bella Jud., prref. § 1), and, as some suppose, the original Gospel by' Matthew. It is designated by Jerome the Syro-Chal- daic (contr. Pelag. iii, 1), and by this name it is now commonly known. The Talmudists intend this when they speak of the Syriac or Aramaic (Lightfoot, /lor. Heb. on Matt, v, 18). See Hebrew Language.
The Chaldee is written in the square character in which the Hebrew now appears. This seems to have been the proper Chaldee character, and to have super- seded the old Hebrew or Samaritan character after the exile. The Palmyrean and the Egypto-Aramaic let- ters [see Alphabet] much more closely resemble the square character than the ancient Hebrew of the coins (Kopp, BUder und Schriften, ii, 164 sq.). See Chal- dee Language.
2. The Western Aramaic or Syriac— Of this in its ancient form no specimens remain. As it is known to us, it is the dialect of a Christianized peo- ple, and its oldest document is the translation of the N. T., which was probably made in the second cen- tury. Sec Syriac Versions.
As compared with the Arabic, and even with the Hebrew, the Syriac is a poor language; it is also harsher and Hatter than the Hebrew. As it is now extant, it abounds in foreien adulterations, having re- ceived words successively from the Persian, the Greek, the Latin, the Arabic, and even, in its more recent state, from the Crusader?.
The Syriac of the early times is said to have had dialects. This is confirmed by what has come down to us. The Syriac of the sacred books differs from that preserved in the Palmyrene inscriptions, so far as those can be said to convey to US any information on this point, and the later Syriac of the Maronites and of the Neatorians differs considerably from that of an older date. "What Adler has called the Hiero- Bolymitan dialect is a rude and harsh dialect, full of foreign words, and more akin to the Chaldee than to
ARAMAEAN LANGUAGE
the Syriac. The Syriac is written in two different characters, the Estrangelo and the Peshito. Of these the Estrangelo is the more ancient ; indeed, it is more ancient apparently than the characters of the Palmy- rene and the Egypto-Aramaic inscriptions. Asseman- ni derives the word from the Greek orfwyyvXoc, round (Bibl. Orient, iii, pt. ii, p. 378) ; but this does not cor- respond with the character itself, which is angular rather than round. The most probable derivation is from the Arabic esti, writing, and anjil, gospel. The Peshito is that commonly in use, and is simply the Estrangelo reduced to a more readable form. See Syriac Language.
3. The Samaritan. — This is a mixture of Aramaic and Hebrew. It is marked by frequent permutations of the gutturals. The character used is the most an- cient of the Shemitic characters, which the Samaritans retained when the Hebrews adopted the square char- acter. Few remains of this dialect are extant. Be- sides the translation of the Pentateuch [see Samari- tan Versions], only some liturgical hymns used Ly Castell, and cited by him as Liturgia Damaseenorum, and the poems collected and edited by Gesenius (Cnr- mina Samaritana) in the first fasciculus of his Anecdo- ta Orientalia, remain. (Morinus, Opuscula Ilebrceo- Samaritana, 1C57; Cellarius, Horm Samaritance, Jena?, 1703*; Uhlemann, Institutt. Ling. Samaritance, Lips. 1837.) See Samaritan Language.
4. The Sabian or Nazorean. — This is the lan- guage of a sect on the banks of the Euphrates and Ti- gris who took to themselves (at least in part) the name of Mendeites (Gnostics) or Nazoreans, but were-ealled Sabians by the Arabians. Some of their religious writings are. extant in the libraries at Paris and Ox- ford. Their great book (X^n &VT3&), the Liber A da- mi, has been edited with a Latin translation by Mat- thias Norberg, Prof, at Lund, who died in 1826, under the title Codex Nasarwvs, Liber Adami Appettatus (3 parts 4to, Lund, 1815-16) ; this was followed by a Lex- icon (1810) and an Onomasticon (1817) on the book by the same. The language is a jargon between Syriac and Chaldee; it uses great freedom with the guttu- rals, and indulges in frequent commutations of other letters; and in general is harsh and irregular, with many grammatical improprieties, and a large infusion of Persic words. The MSS. are written in a peculiar character; the letters are formed like those of the Nestorian Syriac, and the vowels are inserted as let- ters in the text.
5. The Palmyrene. — On the ruins of the ancient city of Palmyra or Tadmor have been found many in- scriptions, of which a great part are bilingual, Greek, and Aramaic. A collection of these was made by Pohert Wood, and published by him in a work enti- tled The Ruins of Palmyra (bond. 1753); they were soon afterward made the object of learned examina- tion by Barthelemy at Paris and Swinton at Oxford, especially the latter (Explication ofth Inscriptions in the Palmyrene Language, in the 48th vol. of the Philo- sophical Transactions, p. 090-750). These inscriptions are of the first, second, and third centuries; they arc of little intrinsic importance. The language closely resembles the Syriac, and is written in a character akin to the square character, but a little inclining to a cursive mode of writing.