Punic language
The Punic language, also called Phoenicio-Punic or Carthaginian, is an extinct variety of the Phoenician language, a Canaanite language of the Northwest Semitic branch of the Semitic languages. An offshoot of the Phoenician language of coastal West Asia, it was principally spoken on the Mediterranean coast of Northwest Africa, the Iberian Peninsula and several Mediterranean islands, such as Malta, Sicily, and Sardinia by the Punic people, or western Phoenicians, throughout classical antiquity, from the 8th century BC to the 6th century AD.
History
Early history
Punic is considered to have gradually separated from its Phoenician parent around the time that Carthage became the leading Phoenician city under Mago I, but scholarly attempts to delineate the dialects lack precision and generally disagree on the classification.The Punics stayed in contact with the homeland of Phoenicia until the battle of [Carthage (c. 149 BC)|destruction of Carthage] by the Roman Republic in 146 BC. At first, there was not much difference between Phoenician and Punic. Developments in the language before 146 BC are largely hidden from us by the adherence of Carthaginian scribes to a traditional Phoenician orthography, but there are occasional hints that the phonology and grammar of Punic had begun to diverge from Phoenician after the sixth century BC. The clearest evidence for this comes from Motya in western Sicily, but there are also traces of it in sixth-century Carthaginian inscriptions and it is unclear whether these developments began in western Sicily and spread to Africa or vice versa. From the fifth-century BC, a shared set of alphabetic, orthographic, and phonological rules are encountered in Punic inscriptions throughout the western Mediterranean, probably due to Carthaginian influence.
Punic literary works were written in the period before 146 BC. For example, Mago wrote 28 volumes about animal husbandry. The Roman Senate appreciated the works so much that after taking Carthage, they presented them to Berber princes who owned libraries there. Mago's work was translated into Greek by Cassius Dionysius of Utica. A Latin version was probably translated from the Greek version. Further examples of Punic works of literature include the works of Hanno the Navigator, who wrote about his encounters during his naval voyages around what is today Africa and about the settling of new colonies in Iberia, North Africa, and the Mediterranean.
Neo-Punic
Neo-Punic refers to the dialect of Punic spoken after the fall of Carthage and after the Roman conquest of the former Punic territories in 146 BC. The dialect differed from the earlier Punic language, as is evident from divergent spelling compared to earlier Punic and by the use of non-Semitic names, mostly of Libyco-Berber or Iberian origin. The difference was due to the dialectal changes that Punic underwent as it spread among the northern Berber peoples. Sallust claims Punic was "altered by their intermarriages with the Numidians". That account agrees with other evidence found to suggest a North African Berber influence on Punic, such as Libyco-Berber names in the Onomasticon of Eusebius. Neo-Punic is mostly known from inscriptions, including Lepcis Magna N 19.Around the fourth century AD, Punic was still spoken in what is now northern parts of Tunisia and Algeria, other parts of Northwest Africa, and the Mediterranean. A version of Punic, known as Latino-Punic was written in the Latin alphabet and is known from seventy texts. These texts include the 1st-century Zliten LP1 and the second century Lepcis Magna LP1. They were even written as late as the 4th century, Bir ed-Dreder LP2. Augustine of Hippo is generally considered the last major ancient writer to have some knowledge of Punic and is considered the "primary source on the survival of Punic". According to him, Punic was still spoken in his region in the 5th century, centuries after the fall of Carthage, and there were still people who called themselves "chanani" at that time. He wrote around 401:
Besides Augustine, the only proof of Punic-speaking communities at such a late period is a series of trilingual funerary texts found in the Christian catacombs of Sirte, Libya: the gravestones are carved in Ancient Greek, Latin and Punic. It might have even survived the Muslim conquest of the Maghreb, as the geographer al-Bakri describes a people speaking a language that was not Berber, Latin or Coptic in Sirte, where spoken Punic survived well past written use. However, it is likely that Arabization of Punic speakers was facilitated by their language belonging to the same group as that of the conquerors and so they had many grammatical and lexical similarities.
Legacy
The idea that Punic was the origin of Maltese was first raised in 1565. Modern linguistics has proved that Maltese is in fact derived from Arabic, probably Siculo-Arabic specifically, with a large number of loanwords from Italian. However, Punic was indeed spoken on the island of Malta at some point in its history, as evidenced by both the Cippi of Melqart, which is integral to the decipherment of Punic after its extinction, and other inscriptions that were found on the islands. Punic itself, being Canaanite, was more similar to Modern Hebrew than to Arabic.Today there are a number of common Berber roots that descend from Punic, including the word for "learn".
Description
Punic is known from inscriptions and personal name evidence. The play Poenulus by Plautus contains a few lines of vernacular Punic which have been subject to some research because unlike inscriptions, they largely preserve the vowels.Like its Phoenician parent, Punic was written from right to left, in horizontal lines, without vowels.
Phonology
Punic has 22 consonants. Details of their pronunciation can be reconstructed from Punic and Neo-Punic texts written in Latin or Greek characters.Vowels
The vowels in Punic and Neo-Punic are: short a, i, and u; their long counterparts ā, ī, and ū; and ē and ō, which had developed out of the diphthongs ay and aw, respectively.Two vowel changes are noteworthy. In many cases a stressed long ā developed into /o/, for example in the third person masculine singular of the suffixing conjugation of the verb, baròk, 'he has blessed'. And in some cases that /o/ secondarily developed into ū, for example mū, 'what?', < mō < mā.
In late Punic and Neo-Punic the glottal stop and pharyngeal and laryngeal consonants were no longer pronounced. The signs’, ‘, h, and ḥ thus became available to indicate vowels. The ‘ayn came to be regularly used to indicate an /a/ sound, and also y and w increasingly were used to indicate /i/ and /o, u/, respectively. But a consistent system to write vowels never developed.
Grammar
In this section "Grammar" the notation "XX " is used, where XX is the spelling in Punic characters, while xxxx is a phonetic rendering, including vowels, as can be reconstructed from Punic language texts written in the Latin or Greek alphabets.Nouns
Nouns, including adjectives, in Punic and Neo-Punic can be of two genders, three numbers, and in two 'states', the absolute state or the so-called construct state. A word in the construct state has a close relation with the word that follows, a relation that is often translated by "of". For example, in the combination "sons of Hanno", "sons of" would be in the construct state, while "Hanno" would be in the absolute state.Morphology:
Pronouns
Demonstrative pronoun
The demonstrative pronoun 'this, these' was:Definite article
The definite article was evolving from Phoenician ha- to an unaspirated article a-. By 406 BCE, both variants were attested in the same inscription. Although in later times the h- was no longer pronounced, the "historical" spelling H- kept being used, in addition to ’- and Ø-, and one even finds Ḥ-.Personal pronoun
The personal pronouns, when used on their own, are:When used as a direct or indirect object or as a possessive the personal pronoun takes the form of a suffix. These suffixes can be combined with verbal forms, substantives, and particles.
Examples:
The paradigm for the suffixed personal pronouns is:
Relative pronoun
The relative pronoun, 'who, that, which', in both Punic and Neo-Punic is’ Š. In late Neo-Punic M’ emerged as a second relative pronoun. Both pronouns were not inflected. The combination ’Š M’ ' was also used in late Neo-Punic.Determinative pronoun
A pronoun 'Š- was used to express an indirect genitival relationship between two substantives; it can be translated as 'of'. This uninflected pronoun was prefixed to the second of the two substantives. Example:Interrogative pronoun
There are two interrogative pronouns:Neither of the two pronouns was inflected.
Indefinite pronoun
In Punic and Neo-Punic there was no exclusive indefinite pronoun. Whenever such a pronoun might be needed, it was circumscribed by means of words like ’ḤD , 'one', ’Š or ’DM , 'a man, a person', or KL , 'all'.Verbs
Morphology
The nucleus of Punic and Neo-Punic verbs is a "root" consisting of three or, sometimes, two consonants. By adding prefixes and suffixes, and by varying the vowels that are inserted into the root, the various forms of the verb are formed. These belong to six "stems". The basic, and most common, stem type is the Qal. The other common stems are:- Niph‘al ;
- Pi‘el ;
- Yiph‘il.
- Qal Passive;
- Pu‘al ;
- Yitpe‘el.
Qal
Niph‘al
The following Niph‘al forms are attested in Punic and Neo-Punic :Pi‘el
The following Pi‘el forms are attested in Punic and Neo-Punic :Yiph‘il
The following Yiph‘il forms are attested in Punic and Neo-Punic :Weak verbs
Many Punic verbs are "weak": depending on the specific root consonants certain deviations of the standard verbal paradigm occur. For example in the group I-n the n may disappear through assimilation. Summary:| Group | Example | Phenomena |
| I-n | N-D-R , 'to vow' | N- can disappear through assimilation |
| I-y | Y-T-N , 'to give' | Yiph‘il > yūph‘il |
| III-y | B-N-Y , 'to build' | -Y can disappear |
| II-gem | Ḥ-N-N , 'to show favor' | second and third root consonant are the same |
| II-wy | K-N , 'to be' | two-consonant root; Pi‘el > polel |
Form and use
In Punic there was no one-on-one correlation between form and use. For example, the suffix form is often translated by a present tense, but it may also refer to the past or future. Tense, aspect, and mood of verbal forms were determined by syntax, not by morphology.The tense, aspect and mood of a given verbal form may depend on:
- whether the form is part of the main clause, or of a subordinate clause;
- if in a subordinate clause, it may depend on the type of subordinate clause ;
- word order may be important: does the verbal form precede or follow the subject of the clause?;
- it also may depend on a verbal form earlier in the same clause: suffix forms or an infinitive absolute used consecutive to another verbal form, take the same tense, aspect and mood as the preceding form.
Numbers
The numbers from one to ten are:| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | |
| ’ḤD | ŠNM | ŠLŠ, Š‛LŠ | ’RB‛ | ḤMŠ | ŠŠ, Š’Š | ŠB‛ | ŠMN, ŠMN’ | TŠ‛ | ‛ŠR, ‛Š‛R, ‛SR | |
| ’ḤT | ŠTM | ŠLŠT | ’RB‛T | ḤMŠT | ŠŠT | ŠB‛T | ŠMNT | TŠ‛T | ‛ŠRT | |
| ’eḥād | šenáyim | šalóš | ’arbá‛ | ḥamēš | šēš | šèba‛ | šemonèh | tēša‛ | ‛èśer |
Punic and Neo-Punic take part in the so-called "Semitic polarity": the numbers 3-10 take the feminine form with masculine nouns, and vice versa. Thus with masculine BN or YM, numbers take the feminine form ending in -T, while with feminine ŠT, they take the masculine form without -T. For example:
Multiples of ten take the form of a plural of the word for 10 or 3-9:
| 20 | 30 | 40 | 50 | 60 | 70 | 80 | 90 | - | |
| ‛SRM, HŠRM | ŠLŠM | ’RB‛M, ’RBM | ḤMŠM, ‛MŠM | ŠŠM, ŠYŠM | ŠB‛M | ŠMNM’ | TŠM, ṬYŠM |
One hundred is M’T, its dual M’TM is 200; 1000 is ’LP, and 10,000 is RB’.
Particles
An important particle is the so-called nota objecti, or accusative particle, ’YT . It is placed before a substantive and indicates that that substantive is an object in the sentence.Syntax
Word order in Punic and Neo-Punic can vary, but this variation has its grammatical limits. For example, in a clause with an imperfect prefixing form the subject can either precede or follow the verb. However, as a rule, if the verb precedes it refers to the present, while if the subject precedes, the verb refers to the future.The repertoire of possible ways in Punic to express a certain combination of tense, aspect, and mood seems to be more restricted than in Phoenician, but at the same time the rules seem to have become less strict.
Example
Act V of Plautus's comedy Poenulus opens with Hanno speaking in Punic, his native language, in the first ten lines. Then follows a slightly different version of the same lines. Charles Krahmalkov is of the opinion that the first ten lines are Neo-Punic, the next ten Punic.Krahmalkov proposed the theory that Plautus, who often translated Greek comedies into Latin, in this case too reworked a Greek original, the Karkhedonios. In this case, there probably also existed a Punic translation of the Greek comedy, and Plautus took parts of this Punic version to give his Carthaginian character authentic speech. Moreover, in this way he could enter puns by introducing in his play would-be translators who, to comical effect, claimed to, but did not in fact, understand Punic, and thus gave nonsensical 'translations'.
Hanno's Punic speech
Plautus next provided a Latin translation of the preceding lines:Comments
As a Latin transliteration, the text as recorded necessarily departs from the original Punic speech. Lines 930-939 have only survived in one manuscript, the "Ambrosianus" A. The "unknown" text, lines 940-949, has also survived in three manuscripts of the Palatine family. The several manuscript sources show many differences among them, with the P scripts showing some words being split out and some mis-interpretations. The "unknown" text used here is from the Ambrosianus A; both families have lost small chunks of text over time. Recently efforts have been made to, among other things, fill in the redactions in the "unknown language" part and to properly split the morphemes. The close mirroring between lines 930-931/940 and lines 937/947 suggests that the "unknown language" text is also Punic. Gratwick and Krahmalkov conclude that the more corrupted "unknown" form is earlier, while lines 930-939 reflect a “late 'scholar's repair'” from Late Antiquity in Neo-Punic.Some Punic phrases known in the text include:
- 930/940: Yth alonim ualoniuth sicorathii hymacom syth = ’T ’LNM W-’LNT ZKRT H-MQM ST.
- 937/947: yth emanethi hy chirs aelichot / sitt esed anec naso ters ahelicot = ’T-M ’NKY H’ ḤRŠ H-HLYKT / Š-’TY ’Z ’NK NŠ’ ḤRŠ H-HLYKT.duber, dubyr in 936, 946, 948: Semitic root D-B-R, 'to speak, word'fel, 'he did', li-ful and lu-ful, 'to do' : Semitic root P-‘-L, 'to make, to do'.