Taymanitic Explained

Taymanitic
Region:	Taymāʾ
Era:	second half of the 6th century BC
Familycolor:	Afro-Asiatic
Fam1:	Afroasiatic
Fam2:	Semitic
Fam3:	West Semitic
Fam4:	Central Semitic
Fam5:	Northwest Semitic?
Iso3:	none
Glotto:	taym1240
Glottorefname:	Taymanitic
Script:	Ancient North Arabian

Taymanitic was the language and script of the oasis of Taymāʾ in northwestern Arabia, dated to the second half of the 6th century BC.^[1]

Classification

Taymanitic does not participate in the key innovations of Proto-Arabic, precluding it from being considered a member of the Arabic language family. It shares one key isogloss with Northwest Semitic: the change w > y in word-initial position. Examples include yrḫ for *warḫum 'moon, month' and ydʿ for wadaʿa 'to know'.^[2]

It is clear that Taymanitic script expressed a distinct linguistic variety that is not Arabic and not closely related to Hismaic or Safaitic, while it can tentatively be suggested that it was more closely related to Northwest Semitic.

Phonology

Consonants

! rowspan="2"
				Palatal	Velar	Pharyn- geal	Glottal
Bilabial	Alveolar			Palatal	Velar	Pharyn- geal	Glottal
Nasal		pronounced as /ink/	pronounced as /ink/
Plosive/ Affricate		pronounced as /ink/	pronounced as /ink/	pronounced as /ink/			pronounced as /ink/		pronounced as /ink/
		pronounced as /ink/	pronounced as /ink/	pronounced as /ink/			pronounced as /ink/
			pronounced as /ink/	pronounced as /ink/	pronounced as /ink/		pronounced as /ink/
Fricative				pronounced as /ink/	pronounced as /ink/		pronounced as /ink/	pronounced as /ink/	pronounced as /ink/
Fricative							pronounced as /ink/	pronounced as /ink/
Liquid			pronounced as /ink/
Liquid					pronounced as /ink/
Semivowel						pronounced as /ink/	pronounced as /ink/

Vowels

! colspan="2"
Front	Back	Front	Back
Short	Long
Close	pronounced as /i/	pronounced as /u/	pronounced as /link/	pronounced as /link/
Open	pronounced as /a/		pronounced as /link/

There were two diphthongs of a vowel and semivowel: pronounced as //aj// and pronounced as //aw//.

Characteristics

Taymanitic exhibits two major features which are innovative:

The change w > y in word-initial position: yrḫ for *warḫum 'moon, month' and ydʿ for wadaʿa 'to know'.
The mergers *z, *ḏ > *z, *s³, *ṯ > *s³, and *ṣ, *ẓ > *ṣ (loss of interdentals).

Unlike Arabic, Taymanitic does not exhibit the merger of Proto-Semitic [s] and [ts].

Notes and References

Kootstra. Fokelien. 15 August 2016. The Language of the Taymanitic Inscriptions and its Classification. Arabian Epigraphic Notes. en. LeiCenSAA. 68.
Book: Al-Jallad . Ahmad . The Routledge Handbook of Arabic Linguistics . 2018 . Routledge . 9781315147062 . 315-331 . The earliest stages of Arabic and its linguistic classification . Elabbas . Benmamoun . Reem . Bassiouney . https://www.academia.edu/18470301.