Dissertation
The writing culture of ancient Dadan; a description and quantitative analysis of linguistics variation
Fokelien Kootstra defended her thesis on 23 April 2019
- Author
- Fokelien Kootstra
- Date
- 23 April 2019
- Links
- Leiden Repository
The Dadanitic inscriptions were carved in stone between 600 and 100 BCE in the north-west of the Arabian Peninsula. Most of the inscriptions are found in and around the ancient oasis of Dadān, modern-day Al-ʿUlā. The inscriptions display a remarkable amount of variation in both their language and level of execution. This work consists of two parts, part one contains a description and grammatical analysis of the corpus. This part will help contextualize the variation discussed in part two, by giving an overview of common and less common forms of the grammar, but also of the formulaic parts of and writing styles found in the inscriptions. Part two deals exclusively with the variation attested in the corpus, building on the description in part one. It offers a quantitative analysis of the variation in the corpus in an attempt to move beyond impressionistic accounts of its distribution and possible causes.
Promotor: prof. dr. P. Sijpesteijn; supervisor: dr. A.M. Al-Jallad