SEMITIC LANGUAGES. The "Semitic" or "Shemitic" languages, so named in 1781 by Schlozer because most of those who spoke them were descended from Shem (Gen. x.–xi.), were spoken in Arabia, Mesopotamia, Syria and Palestine, whence they spread into Abyssinia, Egypt, northern Africa and elsewhere. All are closely related in structure and vocabulary (cf. Ass.-Bab. bitu, Hebr. bayith, Aram. baythd, Mand. bith, Arab. baitu, and Eth. bet "house") ; yet cognate forms and words have not infre quently in the course of history acquired a different connotation (e.g., Hebr. 'eleph, "one thousand," but Eth. 'elf, "ten thou sand"). Each language also contains much that cannot be referred to the common stock.
Originally, the Semitic languages were less clearly defined. Early Aramaic like Assyro-Babylonian prefixed the precative /- to the imperfect and like Hebrew used "wc7w- consecutive," but later dropped both constructions. Philologically they developed with varying rapidity ; thus classical Arabic and Babylonian re tained the case-endings of the primitive speech, while classical Hebrew and Aramaic used the accusative for all plural cases, ex hibiting the same decay as modern Arabic. They can hardly be classified chronologically. Geographically, they fall into four groups: eastern (Assyro-Babylonian or Accadian), central ("Am orite," Aramaic, Syriac), western (Canaanite, Moabite, Hebrew, Phoenician), and southern (Arabic, Ethiopic). Assyrian gave rise to "Cappadocian" in Asia Minor. Phoenician, which developed into Punic in the Mediterranean islands and northern Africa, reached Marseilles. Hebrew under Judaism passed into "Mish naic" Hebrew and the modern vernacular and literary dialects of the East, especially Palestine, and various European countries. From Aramaic sprang Samaritan after the schism at Samaria, Palmyrene at Palmyra and Nabataean in Syria and northern Arabia, the Syriac of the Church, which missionaries carried into China and India, and the gnostic "Mandaean" of Babylonia. The modern dialects of Aramaic near Damascus and of Syriac in parts of Kurdistan have devised a definite article, enriched the tense system, and admitted many contractions and other phonetic changes, thereby substituting an unexpected euphony for the stridentia anhelantiaque verba (Jerome) of the ancient speech.
In Arabia the "proto-Arabic" dialects, Sabaean ("Himyaritic"), Minaean (which like Ass.-Bab. sometimes preferred s to h), and Lihydni (or Thamudean), preceded Arabic; this was carried far and wide by Islam and now counts some 4o dialects. Of these Socotri (which changes s into h) and Mahri, are spoken in Shihr and Mahra respectively. Others are the Maghribi dialects of northern Africa, which have been contaminated by Berber influ ence, and that (now extinct) of Sicily; they affix to the first per son plural -u, which otherwise marks only the second and third person, and prefix to the first person singular n-, which otherwise marks only the first person plural. Maltese, also of the Maghribi family, but alone confined to Christians and generally written in European characters, has been for some goo years separated from Arabic, while exposed to Italian influence. Ethiopic or Ge`ez, originally the speech of the kingdom of Aksum and afterwards of the Church and literature of Ethiopia, yielded to the southern and largely non-Semitic Amharic (or Abyssinian) as the language of the court ; this developed into the northern Tigre and southern Tigrai or Tigrifia. Harari at Harar, an island close to eastern, and Gurague in southern, Shoa, are distant offshoots of Amharic.
In settling the connection between the various languages it is easy to be misled by isolated peculiarities in vocabulary or gram mar. Each of the older languages agreed in grammatical points with some other to which generally it bore no close resemblance, while more nearly related dialects exhibited different formations; each also possessed features peculiar to itself. For instance, on the one hand, Hebrew with Phoenician and Lihydni prefixed ha-, Nabataean and Arabic 'al-, and Tigre la-, as a definite article; yet the etymological connection between these forms is obscure. Aramaic suffixed -a and the other southern Arabic dialects -n to express determination. On the other hand, Arabic attached -n and the southern Arabic dialects -m to indicate indetermination. This -m was regularly used in Babylonian, where it had lost all force, even in the earliest documents, and has survived sporadically in adverbs in Hebrew and Abyssinian, a single instance of it being known in Phoenician.