17).* The later relations of Aramaic to Hebrew con sist entirely of gradual encroachments on the part of the former. The Hebrew language was indeed always exposed, particularly in the north of Palestine, to Aramaic influences ; whence the Aramaisms of the book of Judges and of some others are derived. It also had always a closer conjunction, both by origin and by intercourse, with Aramaic than with Arabic. But in later times great political events secured to Aramaic the complete ascendency ; for, on the one hand, after the deportation of the ten tribes, the repeopling their country with colonists chiefly of Syrian origin generated a mixed Aramaic and Hebrew dialect (the Samaritan) in central Palestine ; and on the other, the exile of the re maining two tribes exposed them to a considerable, although generally overrated, Aramaic influence in Babylon, and their restoration, by placing them in contact with the Samaritans, tended still further to dispossess them of their vernacular Hebrew. The subsequent dominion of the Seleucidm, under which the Jews formed a portion of a Syrian kingdom, appears to have completed the series of events by which the Aramaic supplanted the Hebrew lan guage entirely.
The chief characteristics in form and flexion which distinguish the Aramaic from the Hebrew language are the following :—As to the consonants, the great diversity between the forms of the same root as it exists in both languages, arises principally from the Aramaic having a to avoid the sibilants. Thus, where 1, ii', and S are found in Hebrew, Aramaic often uses 1, Ti, and Ci ; and even j7 for Y. Letters of the same organ are also frequently interchanged, and generally so that the Aramaic, consistently with its characteristic rough ness, prefers the harder sounds. The number of vowel-sounds generally is much smaller : the verb is reduced to a monosyllable, as are also the segolate forms of nouns. This deprives the language some distinct forms which are marked in Hebrew ; but the number and variety of nominal formations is also in other respects much more limited. The
verb possesses no vestige of the conjugation Niphal, but forms all its passives by the prefix mi. The third person plural of the perfect has two forms, to mark the difference of gender. The use of the imperfect with vav tonsegnativnnr is unknown. There is an imperative mood in all the passives. Each of the active conjugations, Pad and Alhei, possesses two participles, one of which has a passive signification. The participle is used with the personal pronoun to form a kind of present tense.
The classes of verbs 6 and and other weak forms, are almost indistinguishable. In the noun, again, a word is rendered definite by appending the vowel d to the end (the so-called status emphaticus); hut thereby the distinction between simple feminine and definite masculines is lost in the singular. The plural masculine ends in hr. The relation of genitive is most frequently expressed by the prefiel, and that of the object by the preposition 5.
All these peculiarities are common to the dialects of Aramaic, and may therefore be considered to constitute the fundamental character of the language. —J. N.
[Amira, Gram. Syriaca sive Chaldaica, Rom. 1596 ; Buxtorf, Gram. Chald. et Syr. Libri Basil. 1615, ed. 2. 1650 ; De Dieu, Gram. Ling. Orient. Heb. Chald. Syr. inter se collatarum, Francof. 1683 ' • Erpenius, Gram. Chal. et Syr., Amst. 1628 ; Hottinger, Gram. Chald. Syr. a Rabbin.,Turic.1652; Walton, Intfrmi ad lectionem Lingg. Orient. Neb. Chald. Syr. Samaritan., etc., Lond. 1655 ; Schaaf, Opus Arneenm complectens Gram. Chald. Syr., etc., Lug. Bat. 1686 ; Jahn, A,nmaische Sprarhlehre, Wien. 1795, translated into Latin by Oberleitner, 7ahnii Elei,zenta Ara maker Ling., Vien. 182o ; Fiirst, Lehrgeb. Aramiiische Idiome, Leipz. 1835 ; Castell, Lexicon Heb. Chalet. Syr., etc., Loud. 1669.] In addition to the above general account of the Aramaic language, some more special notice of the different dialects may be given.