Carthaginians speaks Hebrew?

[Hooahguy]

nah- its "my "tenured profesor of ancient and medieval jewish hisstory and language" can beat up your "Professor of Ancient Near Eastern Languages"

lol

[Ibrahim]

nah- its "my "tenured profesor of ancient and medieval jewish hisstory and language" can beat up your "Professor of Ancient Near Eastern Languages"

lol

hm.. an exciting match. who will win.

speaking of which, I was wondering aloud if there is an online or library sourc(s) that i can use for the hebrew, aramac, and phoenician languages. (what appens when ye be head researcher-you ask big questions)

[bovi]

stuff

And what did he say then?

[Hooahguy]

he's out of town until this afternoon....

[Arcani_Bar_Kochba]

just to weigh in on this. Wherever the guy got his info from saying that Mishnaic Hebrew comes from punic, needs some serious scrutiny.

Either he means that Ancient Hebrew itself was a phoenician derivative, which is a whole other convo, or he means that somehow Ancient Hebrew and Mishnaic Hebrew are two different languages.

In order to answer the second question we first need to establish whether or not biblical hebrew counts as ancient hebrew.

If we all agree that biblical hebrew does indeed mean ancient hebrew, then i can't support the idea that Mishnaic hebrew is from punic or som other eastern language. Mishnaic hebrew isnt very different from Biblical hebrew generally. Some words had been imported from other languages, and some words had fallen out of use, but from a standpoint of grammar and the overwhelming majority of the shared vocabulary between the two, i totally fail to understand how anyone can claim that mishnaic hebrew comes from some other culture.

unless theres a premise here that we havent been informed of, such as "punic and ancient hebrew were virtually identical anyway", or unless this is really an extremely nuanced argument, then i have to remain incredulous in the extreme about the ideas presented here.

@foot.

citing one authority doesn't mean anything, cite 10 and then you might be getting somewhere. Academicians are notorious for infighting and disagreeing amongst themselves. Furthermore authoring an original theory, regardless of how ludicrous is a way to earn tenure or general standing within the academic community.

i'll be honest, usually you have alot of valuable contributions to make, and i usually respect your positions on things in these forums, but seeing you here waving around a reference based on one "authority" disappoints me. We dont even know when he wrote the work cited, it could have been in te 1800's for all we know right now. We dont know his sources, we dont know how he came to his conclusions.

What we do know is that he is running against the grain of the common academic consensus in place right now.

In summary, i find the idea that Mishnaic Period Hebrew comes not from Ancient Hebrew, a language spoken by the people in question themselves, but rather Punic, a language spoken by a different nation, to be suspect in the extreme, and not easily defended by citing one professor of eastern languages.

Shame on you for trying, and shame on the rest for eating this up so easily.

I love EB! Keep up the great work everyone!

[Hooahguy]

i got the answer- biblical hebrew did indeed have parts derived from phoenician, and all the way until the 1st destruction of the temple. after that, when we were exiled to Ba'vel, we lost the phoenician and picked up babylonian. then we kept the babylonian and when we got back, we still kept it. thats until the greeks got there. we picked up some greek, then when the romans got there, we picked up some latin as well. the word "europe" in hebrew is "europa," fopr example.
BUT- mishnaic hebrew and talmudic hebrew is WAY DIFFERENT!!! mishnaic is biblical + babylonian, while talmudic is aramaic, a combo of biblical hebrew and arabic.
modern hebrew, even through all the changes, isnt much different than biblical, save for a few pronouciantios and words and such. but the amount derived from the phoenician language is small.
btw Arcani_Bar_Kochba, you are absolutly correct- citing one source isnt much....

[Foot]

I'm not citing anyone, this isn't an argument. I'm posting a comment from correspondence between one of our team members (Shigawire) who works explicitly with voicemods for EB and one Dr Charles Krahmalkov. Shigawire made the decision for the team, I was relaying that information on, which we took as a basis for our position. So don't put shame on me, and don't jump to conclusions about who I am or what I do. If you disagree with our position, fair enough, put forward your 10 sources. Until then, shame on you for jumping on the bandwagon in such a disgraceful manner.

As for Charles Krahmalkov, if you had read the link I gave you, you would know his academic history and that he is a current professor in this area (having written a number of books on the punic language). Now, I'm not defending him in the slightest, I no jackshit about this area, and I've never claimed otherwise. But even a quick Google search would have answered your question about whether he was writing in the 1800s or not.

So, perhaps a better way to christen yourself on these forums isn't to attack an EB team member on false charges with half your post, particularly as the charges are without basis. You are more than welcome to disagree with our position, but do so with a little more finesse and with a little less haste then your previous post, if you would.

I was just trying to be helpful for christ's sake. Next time I'll let someone else take the heat.

Foot

[Hooahguy]

I'm not citing anyone, this isn't an argument. I'm posting a comment from correspondence between one of our team members (Shigawire) who works explicitly with voicemods for EB and one Dr Charles Krahmalkov. Shigawire made the decision for the team, I was relaying that information on, which we took as a basis for our position. So don't put shame on me, and don't jump to conclusions about who I am or what I do. If you disagree with our position, fair enough, put forward your 10 sources. Until then, shame on you for jumping on the bandwagon in such a disgraceful manner.

As for Charles Krahmalkov, if you had read the link I gave you, you would know his academic history and that he is a current professor in this area (having written a number of books on the punic language). Now, I'm not defending him in the slightest, I no jackshit about this area, and I've never claimed otherwise. But even a quick Google search would have answered your question about whether he was writing in the 1800s or not.

So, perhaps a better way to christen yourself on these forums isn't to attack an EB team member on false charges with half your post, particularly as the charges are without basis. You are more than welcome to disagree with our position, but do so with a little more finesse and with a little less haste then your previous post, if you would.

I was just trying to be helpful for christ's sake. Next time I'll let someone else take the heat.

Foot

wre you talking to me or Bar_kochba?

[Foot]

Mostly Kochbar, but you also. Both of you assumed the worst of me, when I was simply supplying information. If you don't agree with what we've done we can talk about it, but insulting me without reason is not going to help either of you. However, its very difficult to get academicians to work with such a project as EB, so we are helpful for any correspondence we get. We cannot be experts or employ experts in every field, so if a Dr of an area we are interested in responds to a query we cannot then go and check the latest debate raging in that field.

Foot

[Hooahguy]

ehm, i dont think the worst of you? what made you think that? it makes me sad to hear that you think that i do....

[Foot]

You agreed with Kochvar that I cited only one source in an argument, a shameful act, when a far more reasonable conclusion would be that I was actually passing on information that I had got elsewhere. I was hardly given the benefit of the doubt. However, your agreement was more of a off-hand comment so I don't really hold anything against you, but half of Kochvar's post was on me and my shameful behaviour, which I thought was a bit much.

Foot

[Hooahguy]

no, you misunderstood- i agreed with him on the statement that citing only one source isnt much. never agreed with his entire argument....

[Shigawire]

First of all, as Foot said, we accept all the help we can get! And Krahmalkov is THE expert in this field.
He's the guy who excavated the ruins in Tripolitania giving us the Punic name for that province: "Syrthim." Instead of assuming he's some outdated 1800s scholar, just have a look on google, as already mentioned. Have a little look at his repertoire.

What we did in EB's voicemod was to use Modern Hebrew as a base to build on, then we "Punified" the vocabulary by skimming through our dictionary, replacing words where applicable. And also accomodating whatever grammar rules we found differed in Punic to Modern Hebrew. As Kikosemmek ran through the words in the Phoenician-Punic dictionary, he noticed that the words were uncannily similar to Modern Hebrew, but in some instances they differed a great deal as well. I suppose the greatest difference is pronunciation - for which there are actually a number of historical clues.

I have asked in total 3 experts though. One of them has, like Krahmalkov, also written a grammar book and dictionary on Phoenician:
Mark A. McMenamin - his grammar book is 24 pages, dictionary is 37 pages.
Krahmalkov - his grammar book is 300 pages, dictionary is 500 pages - with painfully detailed footnotes.
Dr. William Fulco (no grammars or dictionaries)

I have emailed with McMenamin, I asked him why his dictionaries were not as voluminous as Krahmalkov's dictionary and grammar. McMenamin replied that he had great respect for Krahmalkov, but that he did not have as much selfconfidence to do what Krahmalkov had done. Krahmalkov had reconstructed quite a bit of Punic by studying fragments of Neo-Punic poetry found on pottery. McMenamin stated that this was way over his head, and preferred to reduce the sheer volume of his work. Also, a sidenote, I had the nagging sensation that McMenamin was keen on making sales of his short books, rather than discuss.

Another expert I emailed with was Dr. William Fulco, who helped Mel Gibson with the ancient languages in "The Passion of Christ." When Vin Diesel decided to work on an epic about Hannibal Barca, he asked Mel Gibson for professional directing advice. From Mel, Vin got into contact with Fulco. Fulco is now going to head the translation work on the Hannibal movie. Ancient Greek, Punic, Latin etc.. I mentioned Krahmalkov to Fulco, and Fulco stated exhuberantly that Krahmalkov was in his opinion clearly the best scholar in the field.

Ok, so I'm "ashamed" I've only asked the opinions of 3 experts on Phoenician-Punic. Not exactly a whopping 10. But is this a dissertational thesis that we're writing here? In every single instance of implementing a culture's history and language into EB, we see some or other national grievance or controversy (contrived or not). In each case it's very difficult for us to take into account ALL the possible controversies between scholarly consensus and the respective culture's self-image. For example, we've had bouts with certain Greek jingoists because their national and cultural self-image was on a direct collision course with what the scholarly consensus was, and what the evidence suggested. No doubt this self-image was a product of indoctrination from an institutionalized educational system (lower/middle education). They were certainly confident in their point of view, yet they've been proven wrong time and again. I hope for your sake this criticism of your's is something more substantive than information taught in an institutionalized Israeli educational system (I take it that you're from there). However, the personalization of the grievance you exhibit, by claiming "shame" unto us, suggest that the grievance is wholly emotionally motivated. As you're reading this, you're probably sizzling inside, as you're contemplating how you're going to pound on me for daring to psychoanalyze you.

Not only is your prostration of our "shame" indicative of your motivations, but it is also employed in your manner as a fruitless and demagogic trick; namely the appeal to emotional guilt. A logical fallacy. One of those logical fallacies that are disallowed in rational discourse. With this in mind, how can you expect anyone to take this particular sort of criticism seriously?
I'm fairly confident Krahmalkov will be able to read between the lines of your demagoguery as he's reading a direct quote of your grievances in my correspondence. But there are indeed some objective arguments in what you say, and that's why I simply could not dismiss it out of hand. That is why I took the time to write to the professor. We will now be awaiting a response from him.

I am prepared for Krahmalkov being proven wrong. But are you equally open-minded? If you are scientifically-minded individuals, you have to also be at least prepared for the eventuality that you could be proven wrong. What you may eventually need to do, is to find a scholar whose point of view does not correspond with Krahmalkov on this issue. Then you have the seeds for an objective and factual debate.

[Jolt]

Well explained, Shigawire. Indeed that is just the proffessional approach I'd expect from the EB Team, weighing the fact that we have scarce amount of information about the Punic culture when compared to other illustrious cultures.

As far as the shame argument goes, I couldn't agree more with Shigawire. Most people in these forums have no knowledge about the Hebrew language, and even fewer about the Punic language. How can you expect the fans and players, (who for all purposes are here to discuss the game itself, and not to have academical discussions), to supposedly take part in the guilt you are trying to dish out? The way I immediatly saw it, either it was a nationalistic driven shun, or either you put too much expectations on a group of unpaid modders, who even actually being able to gain the help of a single expert in the area, is already good enough (For an unpaid video game project).

[YonatanIlan]

Firstly, as a new forum member, I'd like to state my thanks for the EB team; you've made a deep and engaging mod, well done!

Regarding this whole discussion, I find it not too hard to believe that Phoenician would be somewhat related Modern Hebrew (which I speak as my mother tongue); after all, the two languages are Semitic, with roots in basically the same geographic area. Reading Biblical Hebrew is easy enough for a Modern Hebrew speaker, but the exact nature of Ancient Hebrew seems to be somewhat unknown. Anyways, this relation of two similar languages does not bother me at all; to the contrary, for me it seems an interesting possibility.

I do not think that one should blame Israeli education for any perceived bad feelings about this issue; while like many systems it is quite flawed, it had never seemed to insinuate a sense of language exclusivity, the way I see it. At most, it glorifies the history of the Jewish people, but that is not a unique feature, now is it?

[Theodotos I]

What we did in EB's voicemod was to use Modern Hebrew as a base to build on, then we "Punified" the vocabulary by skimming through our dictionary, replacing words where applicable. And also accomodating whatever grammar rules we found differed in Punic to Modern Hebrew. As Kikosemmek ran through the words in the Phoenician-Punic dictionary, he noticed that the words were uncannily similar to Modern Hebrew, but in some instances they differed a great deal as well. I suppose the greatest difference is pronunciation - for which there are actually a number of historical clues.

Just curiosity, Shigawire, but where do I find the Punic voice mod? All my folders are labeled Greek, a variation of Gallic, Latin, or the new Pahlava. Sorry, if this is a dumb question, but I wanted to know. Your work to date has been superb and I look forward to more in the future.

EDIT: Oh, and Germanic. But no Punic.

[Tellos Athenaios]

It's not yet included with EB; the OP asks the question (presumably) based on the Unit & Building & Trait names...

[Strategos Alexandros]

Punic is still being made. IIRC the team have said it will be released as a patch for 1.1 and will be in EB2.
Edit: Damn, beaten to it.

[hoom]

I find it not too hard to believe that Phoenician would be somewhat related Modern Hebrew (which I speak as my mother tongue); after all, the two languages are Semitic, with roots in basically the same geographic area.

I agree with this. Its not hard to imagine a fair bit of cross-pollination happening given the physical proximity & apparently good relations.

But I'm certainly not claiming any expertise

[Theodotos I]

It's not yet included with EB; the OP asks the question (presumably) based on the Unit & Building & Trait names...

Good news!

[machinor]

I would like to thank Shigawire for describing the process of his research. I knew of course, that EB was the excellent product of quite some excellent research but I could never have imagined the amount of work. I'm really quite impressed (not that that should be any surprising given the quality of the product we all enjoy).

I bow before you, good sirs.

I'm definately looking forward to the Carthaginian voice mod!!

[oudysseos]

Can I just say that I am astounded by Shigawire's post: the amount of work that he (assuming your gender here) and the rest of the EB team have, of their own free will, voluntarily and unpaid, put into assuring as much as possible the authenticity of a few sentences spoken in a language so dead that almost no knowledge of it exists puts all the trolls to shame. That such a minor gameplay detail is taken so seriously, even after the 'final' release, by people who have consistently had to put up with the immature and uninformed rants of people who have themselves produced nothing at all except insults is a testament to their virtue.

And shame on you, Bar Kochba. I'm ashamed of you.

[Arcani_Bar_Kochba]

@Shigawire

"Ok, so I'm "ashamed" I've only asked the opinions of 3 experts on Phoenician-Punic."

Being that Punic died as a language before Hebrew did maybe you are asking the wrong people. Start speaking to people who are experts on hebrew before you make a judgement as to where Hebrew came from. If i want to know about Punic i'll speak to someone about it, im talking about Hebrew here wasnt that apparent?

"In each case it's very difficult for us to take into account ALL the possible controversies between scholarly consensus and the respective culture's self-image."

In this case you havent followed any scholarly consensus at all. Like i said before, unless the working assumption was that Ancient (Biblical) Hebrew was itself a dialect of phoenician or vice versa, then i fail to see anyone claiming that the Israelis somehow used a long dead, and extremely obscure language as a blueprint for Modern Hebrew in lieu of hebrew itself which has an unparalleled literary tradition to draw from. This is almost comical.

As for the idea tha rabbinic or Mishnaic Hebrew stems from Phoenician... based on? You responded with rhetoric in place of concrete assertions of fact and or logical operations based on a premise. Dont play around with me. If you have something to defend yourself here then do so, if not just leave it be and let that professor guy have a dialog with me.

Lots of people here were throwing this idea around as if this was common knowledge or a given. It is not, this is a pretty radical theory (unless of course the assumption is that Hebrew was a dialect of phoenician in the first place), and should be scrutinized rigorously before it's lapped up by all the pseudo-intellectuals here.

"In every single instance of implementing a culture's history and language into EB, we see some or other national grievance or controversy (contrived or not)."

Wait... Being that the Jews arent implemented here what the hell are you even talking about? Im referring to a bunch of comments made by a bunch of yahoos claiming that Mishnaic Hebrew came from Phoenician... Now go back and read that again... now one more time. Got it? Now that we are back on the same page i'd like to know how you or anyone else can go about proving that. It was said repeatedly with great confidence by alot of people here, so let's hear it... Again unless the premise is that Hebrew and Phoenician were virtually identical in the first place, and that Mishnaic Hebrew seemed to drop certain elements from Ancient Hebrew, which then made it more similar (relatively) to Phoenician (go back and read that again Shigawire i know im losing you here) then i think any such assertion is impossible to prove and probably rests on flimsy premises and wishful thinking.

"...taught in an institutionalized Israeli educational system (I take it that you're from there)."
EPIC FAIL

"taking that" i.e. another unwarranted assumption, makes you two things:

1 Wrong again!
2 Kinda sad for trying to discredit my viewpoint as a product of institutional bias as opposed to being a very serious question that you should be taking seriously... shame shame

Im american born and raised, im a law student, and i dont like BS. We could be discussing latin or how to make doughnuts for all i care, what matters here is that i happen to know a decent amount about Hebrew itself along with the history of that region and this whole thing sounds ridiculous to me... Unles of course the assumption is that Hebrew itself was a dialect of Phoenician or that trhey were sister languages or whatever. if thats the assumption then ill disagree and walk away from this discussion because at least that would be logically consistent, and im not gong to try to prove or disprove a premise based so far back into antiquity. Let Archaeologists quibble about that.

"the personalization of the grievance you exhibit, by claiming "shame" unto us"

didnt mean to get personal, just a figure of speech. Mainly letting you ll know that I think EB is great and respect what's been done here so far, but was pretty disappointed to see this kind of nonsense being accepted without a fight, and then seeing guys backing down at someone's word, not actually going deeper to question the authority cited.

so im sorry if you thought i was getting personal. Not my intention at all, but i was a little surprised to see a revolutionary idea like this being accepted so readily.

"As you're reading this, you're probably sizzling inside"

Not really... if you actually had anything intelligent to throw at me i might be because i enjoy a challenge. This is kinda grade-school if you ask me. You havent addressed a single point of my argument, all you have done is addressed me individually and that's pretty disappointing. So shame on you for that too :p.

"your prostration of our "shame" indicative of your motivations, but it is also employed in your manner as a fruitless and demagogic trick"

blah blah blah more empty rhetoric. Whatever, i dont care just deal wit my argument from now on please. Dont waste both of our time.

"you have to also be at least prepared for the eventuality that you could be proven wrong."

retard... how the hell am i going to proven wrong when the answers to this whole thing might lie in splitting hairs about linguistics going back 4000 years or more... no one is gonna "prove" anything ether way short of unearthing some massive phoenician library or something (and even that would just be a starting point) or at least clarifying what the underlying premises are behind this whole position.

Im not open minded at all, im judgemental, but im fair as hell. I doubt the ability to be "proven wrong" through this medium as it would require alot of discussion presented in an orderly way with consistent logic applied from premise to conclusion, and that doesnt really happen on an online forum. Its usually a bunch of flaming rhetoric... case in point your last post. But being a fair man i'll always admit when a conclusion is logical or not. i may still disagree with a premise but proving that premise could require endless debate which is not only tedious and frustrating but well beyond the scope of this forum.

In closing stop wasting my time because you like to hear yourself type. Dont flame me, deal with what i've raised. You didnt do that though, you talked a bunch of trash, tried to discredit me, and even tried to assassinate my character... dude that's low.

Epic Fail.

@Foot

Sorry, i didnt mean to jump on you and i apologize if the "tone" of that last message was out of line. Like i said you always have solid input and i've always respected what you've brought to the table in other posts. Please accept my apology.

@The EB team

Thanks for all the effort you've made in making this fantastic mod.

P.S. Shgawire
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrkg...eature=related

[a completely inoffensive name]

@Shigawire

"...taught in an institutionalized Israeli educational system (I take it that you're from there)."
EPIC FAIL

[...]

"your prostration of our "shame" indicative of your motivations, but it is also employed in your manner as a fruitless and demagogic trick"

blah blah blah more empty rhetoric. Whatever, i dont care just deal wit my argument from now on please. Dont waste both of our time.

[...]

In closing stop wasting my time because you like to hear yourself type. Dont flame me, deal with what i've raised. You didnt do that though, you talked a bunch of trash, tried to discredit me, and even tried to assassinate my character... dude that's low.

Epic Fail.

P.S. Shgawire
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrkg...eature=related

I don't know know if I should praise you, befriend you or just put your post in my sig so it can be remembered forever.

[satalexton]

lol? I'm just lost of words. just lol.

[bovi]

If i want to know about Punic i'll speak to someone about it, im talking about Hebrew here wasnt that apparent?

Of course not. The thread is about the language that the Carthaginians speak in EB. We are talking about the Punic voicemod, and you dismiss authorities on Punic out of hand. Why would we be discussing Hebrew in the EB forum? Hebrew is not part of the mod, Punic is. Get on topic. And seeing as you think Punic experts are disqualified about Hebrew, I'm sure you would consider consulting Hebrew experts about Punic a waste of time.

You may want to read this post. Carefully. Possibly it would preclude usage of "retard", "yahoos" etc. There is no reason to apologize for insults when you use the rest of the post to spout fresh insults.

Now, before you start flaming me, I am not an authority on anything historical, but rather the civil tone of this forum, which you sir are not adhering to.

[Arcani_Bar_Kochba]

Of course not. The thread is about the language that the Carthaginians speak in EB. We are talking about the Punic voicemod.

well i think you're wrong chief. Topic thread is "carthaginians speak Hebrew?" about one third to one half of the 56 (now 57) posts here are a discussion of either the origin of hebrew or general languages that Jews speak (about 5 posts talking about yiddish alone).

So, sorry charlie, it should have been very apparent that i've been talking about hebrew for anyone who has been following this discussion.

[Hax]

Bar_Kochba, what exactly is your point here?

[Cimon]

well i think you're wrong chief. Topic thread is "carthaginians speak Hebrew?" about one third to one half of the 56 (now 57) posts here are a discussion of either the origin of hebrew or general languages that Jews speak (about 5 posts talking about yiddish alone).

So, sorry charlie, it should have been very apparent that i've been talking about hebrew for anyone who has been following this discussion.

The reason the thread is "Carthaginians speak[s] Hebrew?" is because the OP was interested to find out if that is true. That's inherent in the question mark at the end. Further, if you read the end of the first post, it is apparent that he is asking about a Punic voicemod.

The reason that so many points are on the Hebrew and Yiddish languages are that they are tangential to the original purpose of the thread. I know this because I wrote several of them, and even at the time I was thinking, "Hmm, this is tangential, but it's interesting, so I'll post it."

I'm not an expert on ancient Punic or ancient/modern Hebrew, so I have no idea what the relationship was/is. I do know that it's unlikely to ever know for sure, and that to act like the answer is a foregone conclusion is not only against the spirit of academia and EB, but also as unfounded as to suggest that the otherside's conclusion is similarly foregone.

I also know that, right or wrong, you will get a lot farther if you spot using epithets like "chief" and "charlie." Just some food for thought, slugger.

[Arcani_Bar_Kochba]

thanks for the advice Cimon, duly noted. It seems to me that there has been so much tangential content added here that this thread has been effectively hijacked but whatever, thats not important.

In any event the only thing i'm concerned about is the discussion about the origin of Hebrew that started taking place here. Some guys were confidently throwing around the idea that Hebrew came from Punic, and I popped in to challenge that or to at least get a clarification as to what the underlying premises are behind that assertion. Im still waiting on that to decide whether or not it would be an impossible point to argue. I mean im not gonna try to influence people to my side, im either gonna prove it outright or let it lie, and i think that's reflected in my utter disregard for any diplomacy thus far.

I think it's great hearing the Carth's speaking in sorta Hebrew. Hebrew probably makes a great temporary solution for providing a distinct voice mod untill a more thorough Punic one can be created. So im not taking issue with what EB has done so far, Im taking issue with some tangential crap thats been thrown around in this thread about Hebrew.