I Sometimes Attended The Lectures Of A Sheikh In The
Mosque, Who To His Own Excellent Native Arabic Had Added The Result Of
His Studies At Cairo:
And I never heard finer Arabic spoken.
He prided
himself in sounding all the vowels, not only in reading, but even in
conversation; and every word he uttered might be noted as of standard
purity.
It is to their extensive commerce with foreigners that we must ascribe
the corruption of the Mekkan dialect when compared with that of the
neighbouring Bedouins, though it still serves as a model of softness to
the natives of Syria and Egypt. In pronunciation, the Mekkans imitate
the Bedouin purity - every letter has its precise and distinct sound: they
pronounce [Arabic consonant] like k, and the [Arabic consonant] like a
soft g, (as in the word going); although in the public service of the
mosque, and in reading the Koran, they express that letter with the
guttural aspiration given to it in Syria, and which is therefore
regarded as the true pronunciation. The [Arabic consonant] is pronounced
djem; but in the mountains to the south, and the interior of Yemen, it
is sounded gym, as at Cairo. The guttural pronunciation of the elif
[Arabic consonant], often neglected in other places, is here strictly
observed. The only fault in the Mekkan pronunciation is, that in common
with the Bedouins they sometimes give, in words of two syllables, too
great an emphasis to the last: thus they say Zahab, [Arabic] Safar,
[Arabic]Lahem, [Arabic] Matar, [Arabic] Saby, [Arabic] and others.
The people of Yemen whom I saw at Mekka pronounced and spoke Arabic
almost equally well as the Mekkans: those from Szanaa spoke with purity,
but a harsh accent; but the Hedjazi, like the Bedouin accent, is as soft
as the language will admit.
It has been said that the dialects of Arabic differ widely from each
other; and Michaelis, one of the most learned orientalists, affirms that
the Hedjazi is as different from the Moggrebyn dialect as Latin from
Italian; and a noble Sherif traveller makes a strong distinction between
Moorish and Arabic, pretending to understand the latter and not the
former; and even the accurate and industrious Niebuhr seems to have
entertained some erroneous notions on this subject. But my own inquiries
have led me to a very different opinion. There certainly exists a great
variety of dialects in Arabic; more perhaps than in other languages: but
notwithstanding the vast extent of country in which Arabic prevails,
from Mogador to Maskat, whoever has learned one dialect will easily
understand all the others. In respect to pronunciation, whoever can
spell correctly will feel little embarrasment
[p.467] from the diversity of sound, and soon become familiar with it.
The same sense is often expressed by different terms; but this is
applicable rather to substantive nouns than to verbs. Many words are
used in one country and not in another: thus bread is called khobs in
Syria, and aysh in Egypt; both terms being genuine Arabic, a language
rich in synonyms: but the Syrian dialect still retains what has become
obsolete in the Egyptian. From the specimen given by Niebuhr of the
Egyptian and Hedjazi dialect, I could show, word by word, that there is
not one provincialism in the whole. If the Egyptian says okod, and the
Arabian edjles, they both use genuine Arabic words to express the same
thing, one of which is more common in Arabia, the other in Egypt, when
both terms are well understood by all who have mixed in the busy crowd,
or have had even an ordinary education. An Englishman is justified in
using "steed" for "horse;" thus the Moggrebyn calls a horse owd, the
eastern Arab hoszan; but many poets use the word owd, which is at
present unknown to the vulgar in Egypt. This variation of terms arose
probably from the settlement of different tribes, each having their
peculiar vocabulary; for it is known that Feyrouzabady compiled the
materials of his celebrated Dictionary (the Kamous) by going from one
tribe to another. The Arabs spreading over conquered countries took
their idioms with them, but the joint-stock of the language continued
known to all who could read or write.
Pronunciation may have been affected by the nature of different
countries, retaining its softness in the low valleys of Egypt and
Mesopotamia, and becoming harsh among the frozen mountains of Barbary
and Syria. As far as I know, the greatest difference exists between the
Moggrebyns of Marocco, and the Hedjaz Bedouins near Mekka; but their
dialects do not differ more from each other than the German of a Suabian
peasant does from that of a Saxon. I have heard learned men of Syria
express their ignorance of many Bedouin terms used by tribes in the
interior of the Desert, especially the Aenezey, who, on the other hand,
do not comprehend certain words of the Syrian town-language; but the
wants and habits of a Bedouin are so different from those of a town-
person, that the one frequently cannot find terms to express the ideas
of the other.
As to pronunciation, the best is that of the Bedouins of Arabia, of the
Mekkans, and people of the Hedjaz; that of Baghdad and of Yemen is next
in purity. At Cairo the pronunciation is worse than in any other part of
Egypt; after which I should rank the language of the Libyan Arabs, who
have a tinge of the Moggrebyn pronunciation mixed with the Egyptian.
Then comes the Arabic spoken in the eastern and western plains of Syria,
(at Damascus, Aleppo, and on the sea-coast); then the dialect of the
Syrian mountaineers, the Druzes, and Christians; next, that of the
Barbary coast, of Tripoly, and of Tunis; and lastly, the rough
articulation of the Marocco and Fez people, which has a few sounds
different from any other, and is subdivided into several dialects. The
Arabs, however, of the eastern side of Mount Atlas, at Tafilelt, and
Draa, pronounce their Moggrebyn tongue with much less harshness than
their western neighbours.
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