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Mon.script.sab. 7 A
Stein 2013: 152, fig. 1
INSCRIPTION INFORMATION
| Language | Ancient South Arabian » Sabaic » Early Sabaic | ||
| Script | Ancient South Arabian | ||
| Script typology | Minuscule writing | ||
| Text direction | Right-to-left | ||
| Text appearance | Recessed | ||
| Execution technique | Incision | ||
| Chronology |
| ||
| Textual typology | Incantation |
GENERAL NOTES
| Stein notes that the writing style of the texts belongs to Ry IIc, but the letter q has the characteristic shape of stage Ry IId. The text can be dated to the second quarter of the 1st millennium BC. The text shows a mixture of Sabaic and Minaic linguistic features. As for Sabaic: 3rd person suffix personal pronouns in -h, 1st person singular independent personal pronoun ʾn (l.2); as for Minaic: loss of nominal inflection ending or mimation, 1st person singular independent personal pronoun ʾnk (ll.3 and 5). The text exhibits several stylistic peculiarities - such as parallel expressions which share a rhyme and onomatopoeic words - which could represent a poetic structure (Stein 2013: 155). |
TEXT
1 ʿṯtr w-Wd tʾlk bn s²lṯ bn wld ʾnṯt w-lbʾ w-ḫs²s² w-s³rr Wd
2 s³rr Wd lḫs¹n w-ʾn l-ʾltḫs¹ ʾn bn kl(l) hn ḥbb w-bṯn w-s¹—
3 ʿr ys¹r bʿd-n ʾl ʾrʾ-h ʾl yrʾ-n w-ʾnk b-s¹ḥby s²hrn hmtʿ-n Wd
4 hmtʿ-n bn ḥfn s²wr |
5 w-s¹ʿr mwr ḏ-f-h kʿ w-hʾ mq w-rgl-h ḫq w-ʾnk b-ḏ-Rdn
| 5 | The line is written on the verso. ḏ-Rdn could be a name of tribe, of a sanctuary or a toponym. As Stein notes, a temple called Raydān is attested in the Sabaic inscriptions, although mainly coming from the southern highlands. Some attestations go back to the Early Sabaic period (RES 3943/4, DhM 206). For the occasional defective writing of ḏ-Rydn, see the evidence collected by Multhoff and Stein 2008: 6, with fn. 10. |
TRANSLATIONS
| English | |
1 ʿAṯtar and Wadd! I have sought refuge from three (things): from the child of a woman, a lion, and a serpent. Hear, oh Wadd, 2 hear, oh Wadd, the incantation! I will conjure of exhaustion (or: against all [evil]), for desire, expansion, and 3 inflaming he (i.e., the adversary) has sent. After I do not see him, he will not see me, as long as I am (hidden) in the darkness of new moon. Deliver me, oh Wadd, 4 deliver me from the presentation of (bad) counsel 5 and (from) the inflaming of "encirclement" by the one who's mouth be shut, who himself be a fool, and his legs be clattering, while I am (secure) in (the temple?) Ḏū-Ra(y)dān! |
| The following linguistic analysis derives from Stein 2013: 153-155. | |
| 1 | tʾlk: 1st person singular, suffix conjugation, of the T-stem derived of the root WʾL. s³rr: imperative in the passive voice, cf. Ar. sārra "to speak secretly (with someone, acc.)" (Stein 2013: 154). |
| 2 | For the noun lḫs¹n and the verb ʾltḫs¹ (1st person singular, as it is assumed by the following pronoun), Stein confronts LḤS¹ in the Arabic dialects of Yemen "to murmur, to whisper" and LḤS² with a sense of "magic" or "incantation" in North-West Semitic. kll: cf. Ar. kalal or kalāl "tiredness, exhaustion" or kl "all" (referring to the aforementioned evil?). hn: conjunction or deictic particle. ḥbb, bṯn (from root BṮṮ), s¹ʿr: objects of the verb ys¹r. |
| 3 | s¹ḥby: cf. Ar. saḥāb "clouds". hmtʿ: imperative. |
| 4 | The sense "to present (with both hands") of the infinitive ḥfn is based on the meaning "a handful" of the root attested in several Semitic languages. |
| 5 | kʿ, mq, ḫq: to be interpreted either as adjectives or verbal forms; if they are verbal forms, they are perfect with optative or imprecation sense. For kʿ cf. Ar. kaʿʿa "to shut up, confine". For mq cf. MWQ "to make a fool of, deride". For ḫq cf. the onomatopoeic word ḫaqq "clattering" in the Yemeni Arabic dialects. |
| Stein 2013: 158 | Stein, Peter 2013. The first incantation from Ancient South Arabia. Pages 151-160 in Françoise Briquel-Chatonnet, Catherine Fauveaud and Iwona Gajda (eds). Entre Carthage et l’Arabie heureuse. Mélanges offerts à François Bron. (Orient & Méditerranée, 12). Paris: de Boccard. |
OBJECT INFORMATION
| Deposit | München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Mon.script.sab. 7 |
| Support type | Stick |
| Material | Palm leaf stalk |
| Dimensions | w. 32 |
| Link to object record |
ORIGIN AND PROVENANCE
| Modern site | Unknown (wādī al-Jawf) |
| Ancient site | Unknown |
| Geographical area | wādī al-Jawf |
| Country | Yemen |
| Link to site record |
CULTURAL NOTES
This is the first Ancient South Arabian incantation known so far. The author asks the god Wadd for protection from evil and curses an enemy.
The noun s²hrn, "the new moon" in whose darkness the author of the text hides, is also an epithet of the god Wadd, to whom the incantation is addressed.
The noun s²hrn, "the new moon" in whose darkness the author of the text hides, is also an epithet of the god Wadd, to whom the incantation is addressed.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
| Stein 2013: 151-160, fig. 1 | Stein, Peter 2013. The first incantation from Ancient South Arabia. Pages 151-160 in Françoise Briquel-Chatonnet, Catherine Fauveaud and Iwona Gajda (eds). Entre Carthage et l’Arabie heureuse. Mélanges offerts à François Bron. (Orient & Méditerranée, 12). Paris: de Boccard. |
| Multhoff and Stein 2008: 6 | Multhoff, Anne and Stein, Peter 2008. Tempeldiebstahl und andere Schlechtigkeiten. Zwei verkannte sabäische Inschriften. Orientalia, 77/1: 1-44. |