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Ugaritic
Ugaritic () is an extinct Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language known through the Ugaritic texts discovered by French archaeology, archaeologists in 1928 at Ugarit, including several major literary texts, notably the Baal cycle. Ugaritic has been called "the greatest literary discovery from antiquity since the deciphering of the Egyptian hieroglyphs and Cuneiform, Mesopotamian cuneiform". Corpus The Ugaritic language is attested in texts from the 14th through the early 12th century BC. The city of Ugarit was destroyed roughly 1190 BC. Literary texts discovered at Ugarit include the ''Legend of Keret'' or Kirta, the legends of Danel (AKA 'Aqhat), the ''Myth of Baal-Aliyan'', and the ''Death of Baal''. The latter two are also known collectively as the ''Baal Cycle''. These texts reveal aspects of ancient Northwest Semitic religion in Syria-Palestine during the Late Bronze Age. Edward Greenstein has proposed that Ugaritic texts might help solve Bible, biblica ...
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Ugaritic Alphabet
The Ugaritic alphabet is an abjad (consonantal alphabet) with syllabic elements written using the same tools as cuneiform (i.e. pressing a wedge-shaped stylus into a clay tablet), which emerged or 1300 BCE to write Ugaritic, an extinct Northwest Semitic language; it fell out of use amid the Late Bronze Age collapse . It was discovered in Ugarit (modern Ras Shamra, Syria) in 1928. It has 30 letters. Other languages, particularly Hurrian language, Hurrian, were occasionally written in the Ugaritic script in the area around Ugarit, but not elsewhere. Clay tablets written in Ugaritic provide the earliest evidence of both the North Semitic and South Semitic orders of the alphabet, which gave rise to the alphabetic orders of the reduced Phoenician alphabet, Phoenician writing system and its descendants, including the Paleo-Hebrew alphabet, Hebrew alphabet, Hebrew, Syriac alphabet, Syriac, Greek alphabet, Greek and Latin alphabet, Latin, and of the Geʽez script, which was also in ...
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Ugarit
Ugarit (; , ''ủgrt'' /ʾUgarītu/) was an ancient port city in northern Syria about 10 kilometers north of modern Latakia. At its height it ruled an area roughly equivalent to the modern Latakia Governorate. It was discovered by accident in 1928 with the Ugaritic texts. Its ruins are often called Ras Shamra after the headland where they lie. History Ugarit saw its beginnings in the Neolithic period, the site was occupied from the end of the 8th millennium BC and continued as a settlement through the Chalcolithic and Bronze Ages. It was during the late bronze age that Ugarit experienced significant growth, culminating in the establishment of the Kingdom of Ugarit. The city had close connections to the Hittite Empire, in later times as a vassal, sent tribute to Ancient Egypt, Egypt at times, and maintained trade and diplomatic connections with Cyprus (then called Alashiya), documented in the archives recovered from the site and corroborated by Mycenaean Greece, Mycenaean and Cyp ...
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Ugaritic Texts
The Ugaritic texts are a corpus of ancient cuneiform texts discovered in 1928 in Ugarit (Ras Shamra) and Ras Ibn Hani in Syria, and written in Ugaritic language, Ugaritic, an otherwise unknown Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language. Approximately 1,500 texts and fragments have been found to date. The texts were written in the 13th and 12th centuries Common Era, BC. The most famous of the Ugarit texts are the approximately fifty Epic poetry, epic poems; the three major literary texts are the Baal Cycle, the Legend of Keret, and the Tale of Aqhat. The other texts include 150 tablets describing the Ugaritic cult and rituals, 100 letters of correspondence, a very small number of legal texts (Akkadian language, Akkadian is considered to have been the contemporary language of law), and hundreds of administrative or economic texts. Unique among the Ugarit texts are the earliest known Abecedarius, abecedaries, lists of letters in alphabetic cuneiform, where not only the ...
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Danel
Danel (, Ugaritic: 𐎄𐎐𐎛𐎍 DNỈL, " El is judge"), father of Aqhat, was a culture hero who appears in an incomplete Ugaritic text of the fourteenth century BCE at Ugarit (now Ras Shamra), Syria. Tale of Aqhat The text in ''Corpus Tablettes Alphabétiques'' '' TA' 17–19 is often referred to as the '' Tale of Aqhat''. Danel was depicted as "judging the cause of the widow, adjudicating the case of the fatherless" in the city gate. He passed through trials: his son Aqhat was destroyed but apparently in the missing conclusion was revived or replaced by Danel's patron god, Rpʼu, who sits and judges with Hadad and Astarte and was likely considered to be the equivalent of El. The text was published and translated in 1936 by Charles Virolleaud and has been extensively analysed since then. The Rephaim The text of ''The Rephaim'', a title given to the text by Mark S. Smith, also mentions Danel, who appears there and in the Tale of Aqhat as "a model figure in family matt ...
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Semitic Languages
The Semitic languages are a branch of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. They include Arabic, Amharic, Tigrinya language, Tigrinya, Aramaic, Hebrew language, Hebrew, Maltese language, Maltese, Modern South Arabian languages and numerous other ancient and modern languages. They are spoken by more than 330 million people across much of Western Asia, West Asia, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, Malta, and in large Immigration, immigrant and Expatriate, expatriate communities in North America, Europe, and Australasia. The terminology was first used in the 1780s by members of the Göttingen school of history, who derived the name from Shem, one of the three Generations of Noah, sons of Noah in the Book of Genesis. Semitic languages List of languages by first written account, occur in written form from a very early historical date in West Asia, with East Semitic languages, East Semitic Akkadian language, Akkadian (also known as Ancient Assyrian language, Assyrian ...
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Northwest Semitic Languages
Northwest Semitic is a division of the Semitic languages comprising the indigenous languages of the Levant. It emerged from Proto-Semitic in the Early Bronze Age. It is first attested in proper names identified as Amorite in the Middle Bronze Age. The oldest coherent texts are in Ugaritic, dating to the Late Bronze Age, which by the time of the Bronze Age collapse are joined by Old Aramaic, and by the Iron Age by Sutean and the Canaanite languages (Hebrew, Phoenician/ Punic, Edomite and Moabite). The term was coined by Carl Brockelmann in 1908,The Semitic Languages: An International Handbook, Chapter V
page 425
who separated Fritz Hommel's 1883 classification of

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Cuneiform
Cuneiform is a Logogram, logo-Syllabary, syllabic writing system that was used to write several languages of the Ancient Near East. The script was in active use from the early Bronze Age until the beginning of the Common Era. Cuneiform scripts are marked by and named for the characteristic wedge-shaped impressions (Latin: ) which form their Grapheme, signs. Cuneiform is the History of writing#Inventions of writing, earliest known writing system and was originally developed to write the Sumerian language of southern Mesopotamia (modern Iraq). Over the course of its history, cuneiform was adapted to write a number of languages in addition to Sumerian. Akkadian language, Akkadian texts are attested from the 24th century BC onward and make up the bulk of the cuneiform record. Akkadian cuneiform was itself adapted to write the Hittite language in the early second millennium BC. The other languages with significant cuneiform Text corpus, corpora are Eblaite language, Eblaite, Elamit ...
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Legend Of Keret
The Legend of Keret, also known as the Epic of Kirta, is an ancient Ugaritic epic poem, dated to Late Bronze Age, circa 1500 – 1200 BCE. It recounts the myth of King Kirta of Hubur. It is one of the Ugaritic texts. In the legend, Kirta is the son of the great god El but is considered unfortunate. He has been widowed seven times, and has no surviving children. He has survived all of his brothers, and he is the last surviving member of his family. He begs his father for an heir of his own, and El instructs him to wage war against another kingdom and to demand its princess as his wife. Kirta wins his war and has several children by his new wife. But he angers the goddess Athirat by reneging on a promise to her, and is cursed with an illness. El intervenes to heal his son. Kirta is then challenged for the throne by his oldest son, who wants him to abdicate in his favor. Kirta curses his son, but the ending of the story has been lost. The story is thought to have similariti ...
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Tale Of Aqhat
The Tale of Aqhat or Epic of Aqhat is a Canaanite myth from Ugarit, an ancient city in what is now Syria. It is one of the three longest texts to have been found at Ugarit, the other two being the Legend of Keret and the Baal Cycle. It dates to approximately 1350 BCE. While the complete tale has not been preserved, there remain of it, according to David Wright, "approximately 650 poetic lines", with the bulk of its content concerning "ritual performances or their contexts". The remains of the story are found on three clay tablets, missing the beginning and end of the story. These tablets were discovered in 1930 and 1931. The Tale of Aqhat was recorded at Ugarit by the high priest Ilmilku, who was also the author of the Legend of Keret and the Baal Cycle. The three primary characters of the Tale are a man named Danel, his son Aqhat, and his daughter Pugat. The narrative First tablet Danel is described as a "righteous ruler" (Davies) or "probably a king" (Curtis), providing ...
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West Semitic Languages
The West Semitic languages are a proposed major sub-grouping of Semitic languages. The term was first coined in 1883 by Fritz Hommel.The Semitic Languages: An International Handbook, Chapter V
page 425
The grouping supported by Semiticists like Robert Hetzron and John Huehnergard divides the Semitic language family into two branches: Eastern and Western. The West Semitic languages consist of the clearly defined sub-groups:

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Daniel (biblical Figure)
Daniel (Biblical Aramaic, Aramaic and ; ; ) is the main character of the Book of Daniel. According to the Hebrew Bible, Daniel was a Nobility, noble Jews, Jewish youth of Jerusalem taken into captivity by Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon, serving the king and his successors with loyalty and ability until the time of the Persians, Persian conqueror Cyrus the Great, Cyrus, all the while remaining true to the God of Israel. While some conservative scholars hold that Daniel existed and his book was written in the 6th century BCE, most scholars agree that Daniel, as depicted in the Book of Daniel, was not a historical figure, wherein the character was probably based on a similar legendary Daniel from earlier traditions. It follows that much of the book is a Roman à clef, cryptic allusion to the reign of the 2nd century BCE Diadochi, Hellenistic king Antiochus IV Epiphanes. Six cities claim the Tomb of Daniel, the most famous being that in Susa, in southern Iran, at a site known as Tomb ...
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Archaeology
Archaeology or archeology is the study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of Artifact (archaeology), artifacts, architecture, biofact (archaeology), biofacts or ecofacts, archaeological site, sites, and cultural landscapes. Archaeology can be considered both a social science and a branch of the humanities. It is usually considered an independent academic discipline, but may also be classified as part of anthropology (in North America – the four-field approach), history or geography. The discipline involves Survey (archaeology), surveying, Archaeological excavation, excavation, and eventually Post excavation, analysis of data collected, to learn more about the past. In broad scope, archaeology relies on cross-disciplinary research. Archaeologists study human prehistory and history, from the development of the first stone tools at Lomekwi in East Africa 3.3 million years ago up until recent decades. A ...
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