Hebrew and Aramaic Lexical Substrate of Palestinian Arabic

Project Information

HALSPA

Grant agreement ID: 101027323

DOI

10.3030/101027323

Project closed

EC signature date 13 March 2021

Start date 1 September 2022

End date 31 October 2025

Funded under

• EXCELLENT SCIENCE - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions

Total cost

€ 278 196,48

EU contribution

€ 278 196,48

Coordinated by

TEL AVIV UNIVERSITY
Israel

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - HALSPA (Hebrew and Aramaic Lexical Substrate of Palestinian Arabic)

Reporting period: 2022-09-01 to 2025-08-31

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

Language shift is typically gradual, and earlier languages often leave traces in everyday speech, most clearly in the lexicon. This project explored such traces in Palestinian Arabic, focusing on words that reflected earlier Aramaic and, in some cases, Hebrew layers once spoken in the region. These items were treated as substrate words.
Scholars have long recognised that Palestinian Arabic preserves older lexical elements, particularly terms connected to toponyms as well as traditional agriculture, tools, food production, and rural life. Much of this vocabulary, however, is scattered across dialect dictionaries, ethnographic descriptions, glossaries, and older studies, most notably Gustaf Dalman’s Arbeit und Sitte in Palästina (1928–1942). The challenge was not a lack of data, but the difficulty of working with lexical material that was widely dispersed and largely unidentified and bringing it into a single comparative analysis.
The project aimed to identify the most plausible substrate words in Palestinian Arabic, analyse them with consistent criteria, and set them in their historical and cultural context. The project also aimed to combine linguistic analysis with visual material, such as photographs and drawings of traditional tools, in order to clarify the relationship between words, objects, and their etymology.
The results suggested that Palestinian Arabic preserved a notable layer of vocabulary best explained by in situ inheritance from local Aramaic varieties, and in some cases also preserved earlier Hebrew vocabulary.
Recurring phonological and morphological patterns supported this interpretation, including irregular consonant correspondences aligning more closely with Aramaic than with Arabic, and morphological markers visible in productive suffixal formations.
Many items also showed phonological and morphological doublets, where more than one substrate form circulated side by side, with small differences in consonants or word formation. This pointed to a more complex history than a single, straightforward lexical inheritance. In some cases, substrate words appear to have been adapted differently across geographical regions. In others, the variation is more consistent with later internal developments within what is now known as Palestinian Arabic, suggesting that substrate words remained part of the living lexicon and kept changing naturally over time.
The results also showed that most substrate words clustered in domains closely tied to traditional rural life and material culture, where continuity of practices and tools supported continuity of terminology. The same applied to local flora and fauna.
Finally, the project demonstrated the value of treating linguistic evidence together with material culture, since object-based documentation could reduce ambiguity in etymological proposals.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

From the start of the fellowship, the work focused on building a consistent corpus and an evidence-based framework for identifying and analysing Aramaic and Hebrew lexical substrate in Palestinian Arabic. The main source base was Gustaf Dalman’s Arbeit und Sitte in Palästina (1928–1942), supplemented by additional lexicographical and philological resources. Material was collected and sifted systematically according to a set of identification criteria (phonology, morphology, semantics, and distribution), with a particular focus on vocabulary connected to traditional agriculture, tools, and material culture.
During the reporting period, a core set of lexical case studies was produced. Twenty-five full detailed root entries were established and analysed in detail, with full comparison to counterparts in Arabic dialects and in substrate languages (Aramaic, and, when relevant, Hebrew). Circa an additional seventy substrate words were identified and analysed according to identification criteria, presented as shorter entries. This substrate lexical material forms the main empirical basis for the planned monograph. This gathered and analysed material led to drafting analytical chapters on phonology, morphology, and semantics, as well as the historical introduction, allowing broader synthesis rather than presenting a set of isolated etymological entries.
A second component of the work is the pictorial layer that accompanies the linguistic analysis. Over one hundred photographs and sketches of relevant objects and processes were gathered and organised, drawing on open resources and on cooperation with museums and institutions, in particular MUZA (Eretz Israel Museum, Tel Aviv) and the Gustaf Dalman Institute (Greifswald). The material was organised according to the major agricultural domains: cereals, olives, and grapes, as well as flora and fauna, with the aim of supporting etymological interpretation through object-based documentation.
Results were disseminated throughout the fellowship through publications and scholarly presentations. Two substantial peer-reviewed studies arising from the project were published: a Festschrift chapter (2025) and a journal article in Aramaic Studies (2025), both centred on terminology connected to olive-oil production and the value of Palestinian Arabic data for Hebrew and Aramaic philology. Project-related results were also presented in invited lectures and conference papers in Israel (TAU, HUJI), Germany (Freie Universität Berlin, 2025), and the United Kingdom (UCL, NAPH 2025). These activities enabled discussion of the project’s methodology and case studies with specialists in Semitic linguistics and dialectology.
The main form of exploitation was scholarly: the work was consolidated into a draft monograph in progress, combining lexicological analysis with historical, philological, and material-cultural context, supported by the assembled pictorial corpus. Beyond publications and conference dissemination, the project also contributed to training and knowledge transfer within the host environment through the initiation and running of a departmental PhD workshop over two academic years, focused on academic writing, conference participation, supervision relationships, and career planning.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

The project did not treat earlier linguistic material as isolated etymological notes. Instead, it developed a systematic, evidence-based method for analysing existing data and demonstrated how linguistic and material evidence could be integrated. The use of visual documentation provided an additional analytical dimension that is still relatively uncommon in historical linguistic research.
The broader significance of the project was in the documentation and interpretation of cultural heritage of the Holy Land. By re-examining local traditional vocabulary in relation to concrete practices and objects, the project made earlier linguistic layers more accessible and interpretable for both specialists and non-specialists. The results and findings of the project were particularly relevant for Jewish studies, as substrate words in Palestinian Arabic clarify numerous words in ancient Jewish sources, such as the Tosefta and the Talmudim.
The main remaining outcome is the completion of the full book manuscript, currently in preparation. Once finished, it will be made available as an open-access resource for researchers, students, and others interested in the linguistic history of the Levant.

Project presentation at HUJI departmental seminar