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Chapter 5
The Morphology of Babylonian Jewish
Aramaic
Geoffrey Khan
University of Cambridge

1. Introduction

The term Babylonian Jewish Aramaic (BJA) is generally used to refer to the
Aramaic of the Jewish communities in the Mesopotamian region during
the 1st millennium c.e. that has come down to us in various literary rec-
ords. The most extensive one is the Babylonian Talmud, which was com-
posed between the 3rd and 6th centuries c.e. Dating from the same period
are a number of Jewish Aramaic texts that were written on incantation
bowls from Mesopotamia. In the second half of the millennium the Baby-
lonian Geonim used Aramaic in their writings, many of which have been
preserved. The Aramaic of these texts is by no means uniform. The lan-
guage of the incantation bowls and the writings of the Geonim are in
some respects more conservative than that of the Babylonian Talmud.
Within the Babylonian Talmud itself, however, there is no uniformity. The
language of the tractate Nedarim has many conservative features parallel to
those in incantation bowls and Geonic writings. There appear to have
been two main types of literary Jewish Aramaic in the rst millennium,
one being represented by tractate Nedarim, the incantation bowls and the
Geonic texts and the other by the main body of the Babylonian Talmud
(see Harviainen 1983; Goshen-Gottstein 1978).
The language used in the Babylonian Talmud, although less conserva-
tive, was, nevertheless, not a faithful record of the contemporary vernacu-
lar form of Aramaic. It was a supra-dialectal literary language, which con-
tained a mixture of classical and vernacular features. This is reected by
the fact that a variety of alternative forms appear in its morphology (see
Morag 1969: 186; 1981: 14145; 1988a: 3740). During the 1st millennium
c.e. there was almost certainly a continuum of spoken Aramaic dialects
across Mesopotamia (see Boyarin 1981). By the 2nd millennium c.e. many
of these had been displaced by Arabic, but a group of spoken Aramaic dia-
lects survived to modern times in the northern part of the region. This
group of spoken Neo-Aramaic dialects, known as North Eastern Neo-
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Aramaic (NENA), included several that were the vernacular of Jewish com-
munities (see Khan, in this volume, 309327).
In this paper I shall focus on the Aramaic of the Babylonian Talmud. It
is not my intention to present a systematic overview of the morphology
of the language, but rather to concentrate on a few selected areas of mor-
phology in comparison with corresponding structures in the surviving

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Neo-Aramaic dialects of northern Mesopotamia. Such comparison often

throws light on historical changes in morphology that are in their embry-
onic stages in BJA but have reached completion in the later spoken dia-
lects. It also claries the supra-dialectal nature of the language of the
Babylonian Talmud, since none of the individual spoken dialects exhibits
the morphological diversity that is attested in the Aramaic of the Babylo-
nian Talmud.
It should be pointed out that there are various reading traditions of the
Aramaic of the Babylonian Talmud. The most archaic and reliable ones are
those reected in early vocalized manuscripts (see Morag 1988b) and the
orally transmitted tradition of the Yemenite Jewish communities (see
Morag 1969, 1998a; Morag and Kara 2002). The Yemenite reading tradi-
tion is a direct descendant of the Jewish Aramaic of medieval Babylonia.
Less reliable are the reading traditions of the Talmud that are reected by
the European printed editions. Unfortunately, there is no systematic gram-
mar of the Aramaic of the Babylonian Talmud based on the early, reliable
sources. 1 In this article I have adopted a transcription that reects the ear-
lier traditions, where this has been possible.

2. Pronouns
Pronouns occur in a variety of forms. They may be divided broadly into
those that express the grammatical subject and those that express some
other grammatical relationship.
2.1 Independent subject pronouns
The subject pronouns are used in an independent form and an enclitic
form that is sufxed to the predicate of the clause. Some of the pronouns
in each of these two categories have alternative forms. In the following
paradigms the alternative forms that are of relatively rare occurrence have
been put in parentheses.
1st pers. sg. ana
pl. annan (anana)
2nd pers. m. sg. att (ant)
f. sg. att (ant)
pl. attun, attu (antu, att, ant)
3rd pers. m. sg. hu, ihu
f. sg. hi, ihi
m. pl. inhu (innun)
f. pl. inhi
The third person pronouns exhibit the greatest degree of historical
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change compared with earlier forms of Aramaic. The earlier singular forms
are hu (3ms) and hi (3fs), which are still in use in the JBA. These forms are
commonly extended, however, by the prex i-, which may be identied as
1. The available grammars such as Levias (1900), Margolis (1910), Epstein (1960) are
based for the most part on late printed editions and manuscripts.

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a deictic element. The third plural pronouns are regularly extended by an

addition of a deictic element. The original forms may be reconstructed as
*hun (3mpl) and *hin (3fpl). The deictic element in- has been added to
these and the nal /n/ of the original pronoun has been elided by a regular
phonetic development in the dialect.
This strengthening of the third person pronouns by further deictic ele-
ments reects the onset of a trend in the Eastern Aramaic dialects. In the
Modern Eastern Aramaic dialects the original third person pronouns have
been replaced by demonstrative pronouns or transformed by the attach-
ment of a variety of deictic elements. This has resulted in a very diverse
range of third person pronouns in the NENA dialects. In some dialects, for
example, the 3ms pronoun has the form aw, which has developed from
*ha-hu, i.e. the combination of the pronoun *hu (3ms) with the deictic
element *ha. In other dialects this is extended by further elements, for
example, awa (< *ha-hu-ha), awin (< *ha-hu-in). In Modern Mandaic the
original third person singular pronouns of Classical Mandaic hu and hi
have been replaced by the demonstrative particle hak (Macuch 1965: 154).
2.2 Enclitic pronouns
In addition to the regular third person pronouns, BJA also has a series of
third person pronouns that have the specialized function of expressing the
copula nexus between subject and predicate in a clause. These have the
following form:

Third person enclitic pronouns

3rd pers. m. sg. nihu
f. sg. nihi
m. pl. ninhu
f. pl. ninhi

Example: kulhu qa mina ninhu They are all one kind (Babylonian Tal-
mud, ullin 79a). These copula pronouns have been formed by the attach-
ment of the additional deictic element n- to the personal pronouns ihu,
ihi, inhu and inhi. This morphological element is used to extend various
pronouns in the NENA dialects, for example, awin he (< *ha-hu-in), atin
you (sing.) (< *at-in), and is also used to extend the existential particle it
there is, resulting in the form it-in. A special copula pronoun is used in
BJA only in the third person. In the NENA dialects, by contrast, copula
forms have developed for all persons. It should be pointed out, however,
that the paradigm of the copula in this dialect group arose by extending
morphological elements of the third person to the rst and second per-
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sons, which suggests that the third person copula is more original (Khan,
in this volume, 309327).
The shortened enclitic pronouns, which are only attested in the rst and
second persons, are used mainly as sufxes on active participles when they
are used predicatively to express the present tense. The participles are
inected for gender and number, for example, qael (ms), qala (fs), qalin

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First and second enclitic pronouns

1st pers. sg. -na
pl. -na, -nnan
2nd pers. m. sg. -at
f. sg. -at
pl. -ttun

(mp). When combined with the enclitic pronouns the resulting forms are
as follows:

Participle with enclitic pronouns

1st pers. m. sg. qael-na I kill
f. sg. qala-na I kill
pl. qali-na, qali-nnan We kill
2nd pers. m. sg. qal-at You kill
f. sg. qal-at You kill
pl. qali-ttu You kill

When the participle is from a root ending in the weak radical /y/, the
paradigm is as follows:

Third weak root participle with enclitic pronouns

1st pers. m. sg. mae-na I arrive
f. sg. maya-na I arrive
pl. mae-na, mae-nnan We arrive
2nd pers. m. sg. mae-t You arrive
f. sg. maya-t You arrive
pl. mae-ttun You arrive

The propensity to use these enclitics with participial predicates reects

a historical change in progress from the category of enclitic pronoun to
verbal inection, which has reached completion in the NENA dialects. In
NENA the descendants of these enclitic pronouns are only used as verbal
inection. The erstwhile active participles, moreover, are treated syntacti-
cally as verbs. It should be pointed out, however, that some small differ-
ences are found between the form of the BJA enclitic pronouns and the
NENA verbal inectional sufxes. Consider the paradigm of the Jewish
NENA dialect of Arbel in the following table.

Participle with enclitic pronouns ( Jewish Arbel)

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1st pers. m. sg. qalen I kill

f. sg. qalan I kill
pl. qalex We kill
2nd pers. m. sg. qalet You kill
f. sg. qalat You kill
pl. qaletun You kill

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It can be seen that in this dialect, which is typical of many others of the
group, the inectional sufxes that are added to a verbal root with strong
radicals are based on those that were originally added to roots with the -
nal weak radical /y/, as in the BJA paradigm of mae given above. The ad-
vantage of this is that the ambiguity between the 2ms and 2fs of the BJA
strong verb paradigm (i.e., qal-at for 2ms and 2fs) has been resolved, since
a morphological distinction is made in the nal weak paradigm (cf. BJA
mae-t 2ms versus maya-t 2fs). The NENA dialects have resolved another
ambiguity in the morphology of the BJA, namely that between the 1ms
and 1pl forms, which are sometimes identical in nal weak verbs (cf. BJA
mae-na I arrive or We arrive). This has been adjusted in the NENA dia-
lect by adopting the 1pl inectional sufx -ex, by analogy, it seems, with
the independent 1pl pronoun axnan, axni (cf. BJA anana).
It would appear, therefore, that the enclitic pronouns are used in BJA as
an embryonic form of verbal inection and that this became fully devel-
oped in the NENA dialects where various morphological ambiguities were
resolved.
2.3. Pronominal sufxes
The pronominal sufxes are added to nouns to express, broadly, a genitive
relationship, and to verbs to express pronominal objects. The forms of pro-
nominal sufxes that are attached to nouns differ in some persons accord-
ing to whether the noun is singular or plural. In addition, some sufxes
are attested in a variety of alternative forms. The following paradigm gives
some of the more common forms of pronominal sufxes attached to
nouns, though it is not exhaustive.

Singular nouns Plural nouns

1st pers. sg. -i, -ay -ay
pl. -in, -an, -ana -in, -nan
2nd pers. m. sg. -ak -ak
f. sg. -ik -ayik, -ek
m. pl. -ku -ayku
f. pl. not attested -eki
3rd pers. m. sg. -eh, -e -eh, -ahu, -ohi
f. sg. -ah, -a, -ha -ah, -aha
m. pl. -hu, -hon, -ayhu, -ehon, -ehen
f. pl. -hi -ehi

Amid this diversity of forms for the pronominal sufxes one may dis-
cern certain trends that have been developed further in the NENA dialects.
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In a number of the sufxes, for example, there is a tendency to level the

distinction between those that are attached to singular nouns and those
that are attached to plural ones. This is seen in the 1s, 1pl, 2ms, 3ms and
3fs. In most of these, alternative forms still exist that maintain the distinc-
tion, but in the 2ms the distinction has been totally levelled with no ves-
tige of distinct forms. In the NENA dialects the tendency towards the

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levelling of these distinctions has been carried further to the extent that
most dialects have a single set of pronouns that are attached to both sin-
gular and plural nouns. The only known dialect to preserve any such dis-
tinction is that of the village of Qaraqosh on the Mosul plain. In the
Qaraqosh dialect there are distinct pronominal sufxes for the 1pl, 2pl and
3pl on plural nouns. There is, however, only one set of sufxes for the 1s,
2s and 3s. The tendency to reduce the distinction does, in fact, seem to be
more advanced with the singular sufxes also in BJA.
Another observation that can be made when comparing the forms of
sufxes attested in BJA with those of the NENA dialects is that in individual
dialects the diverse range of alternative forms has been reduced to a single
form, although differences in the form of the sufxes exist across the dia-
lects. One may, in fact, explain the different sufxes that are found across
the dialects as being derived from different forms of sufxes corresponding
to many of the types that are found in BJA. The form of the 2pl and 3pl
sufxes in some NENA dialects, such as Jewish Arbel, correspond to the
form of the corresponding BJA sufxes that are attached to singular nouns:

2 pl. -xun cf. BJA -ku

3 pl. -u cf. BJA -hu

In other NENA dialects, such as Aradhin, the forms for these sufxes
correspond to the form of the corresponding BJA sufxes that are at-
tached to plural nouns:

2 pl. -Exun cf. BJA -ayku

3 pl. -Ehin cf. BJA -ehen

The diversity of the forms of sufxes attested in the Babylonian Talmud

corpus seems rather perplexing when one compares it to the uniformity of
the individual spoken NENA dialects. This diversity is likely to reect a
conation of different dialects in the various layers of the corpus, some
differences being attributable, perhaps, to different regional dialects and
others to the distinction between vernacular spoken dialects and conserva-
tive literary dialects.
2.4 Demonstratives
As with the pronominal sufxes, BJA contains a diverse range of demon-
strative pronouns. The table below presents a selection of some of these.
The pronouns may be categorized into those expressing near deixis and
those expressing far deixis.
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Near deixis
m. sg. haqen, hay
f. sg. haqa, hay
m. pl. hanhu, halen
f. pl. hanne, halen

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Far deixis
m. sg. hahu, haik, iqak
f. sg. hahi, hak, iqak
pl. hannak, inak

These diverse demonstrative pronouns are formed from a variety of de-

ictic elements. Many contain the prex ha-. The deictic element i can be
identied in some forms, for example, ha-y, i-dak. Some of the far deixis
forms contain the element k, which may be identied with the 2ms pro-
nominal sufx. In the Yemenite tradition the demonstrative hay is pro-
nounced haye and the corresponding far deixis form hayek (see Morag
1969: 184; Morag and Kara 2002: 342).
As is the case with the pronominal sufxes, this diversity has been re-
duced in the individual spoken NENA dialects. In the dialects on the Mo-
sul plain (e.g., Qaraqosh) the singular near deixis forms are related to the
haqen series of BJA, whereas the singular far deixis forms are derived from
the forms *hahu and *hahi:

Near deixis
m. sg. aqa
f. sg. aqi
Far deixis
m. sg. awa < *ha-hu-ha
f. sg. aya < *ha-hi-ha

In many dialects the set of demonstrative pronouns is levelled still fur-

ther in that all singular demonstratives are derived from the forms *hahu
and *hahi, the other series being lost. In such dialects these forms are usu-
ally extended by further additions of the ha element, as in En Nune:

Absent deixis
m. sg. aw < *ha-hu
f. sg. ay < *ha-hi
Near deixis
m. sg. awwa < *ha-hu-ha
f. sg. ayya < *ha-hi-ha
Far deixis
m. sg. awaha < *ha-hu-ha-ha
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f. sg. ayaha < *ha-hi-ha-ha

Some NENA dialects have near deixis forms corresponding to the BJA
forms with the i deictic element. Such dialects also exhibit a levelling in
gender, as is the case with BJA hay, e.g., Jewish Arbel:

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Near deixis
m. sg. iyya < *i-ha
f. sg. iyya < *i-ha
Far deixis
m. sg. o < *ha-hu
f. sg. o < *ha-hu

The series of demonstratives in BJA with the k element does not have
any corresponding forms in NENA.
The diversity of demonstrative forms in the Talmudic corpus contrast-
ing with the greater uniformity and symmetry of the individual spoken
NENA dialects, as with the diversity of pronominal sufxes, is likely to
have arisen due to the conation of various different dialects within the
corpus of the Babylonian Talmud.

3. Verbs

BJA has three basic conjugations of verbs, which are normally referred to
as Perfect, Imperfect and Present. The inection of these conjugations in
several cases exhibits alternative forms. The most commonly attested
forms are shown in the table on the following page.
As was remarked above, the Present conjugation is formed from the
base of the active participle. The third person forms are the basic particip-
ial forms inected for gender and number. In the rst and second person
forms the participle is combined with enclitic subject pronouns, which are
shortened forms of the independent subject pronouns. Some of the inec-
tions of the Present conjugation have been extended to the other conjuga-
tions by analogy. In the Perfect the original 3mp for qalu is sometimes
replaced by qali, which has the inection of the 3mp Present qali. The al-
ternative forms of the 2pl and 1pl of the Perfect qalitu and qalinan also
have the inection of the Present. We may note, furthermore, that the al-
ternative form of the Perfect 3fs qala, has the inection of the Present,
though in this case the ending -a probably arose by a phonetic process, in
which the nal -t was elided. The Imperfect rst person forms sometimes
have the Present inectional endings -na (sg.) and -inan (pl.). Note also the
3fp Imperfect inection -an, which is identical with the Present inection.
There are sporadic cases of the Present conjugation being inuenced by
the inection of other conjugations, as in the rare alternative form of the
3mp Present qalu, which has the ending of the Perfect qalu. In general,
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however, the Present conjugation is the dominant one with regard to in-
ection, in that the inection of the Present tends to be extended analog-
ically to the other conjugations rather than vice versa. This inectional
dominance of the Present conjugation may be a harbinger of what was to
come in the later NENA dialects, in which the Present conjugation sur-
vived but the Perfect and Imperfect conjugations were lost.

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Perfect
3rd pers. m. sg. qal
f. sg. qalat, qala,
m. pl. qalu, qul, qali
f. pl. qalan, qala
2nd pers. m. sg. qalt
f. sg. qalit
pl. qaltu, qalitu
1st pers. sg. qalit, qali
pl. qalna, qalnan, qalinan
Imperfect
3rd pers. m. sg. liqol, niqol
f. sg. tiqol
m. pl. liqlu, niqlu
f. pl. liqlan
2nd pers. m. sg. tiqol
f. sg. tiqoli
pl. tiqlu
1st pers. sg. eqol, eqolna
pl. niqol, liqol, liqolinan
Present
3rd pers. m. sg. qael
f. sg. qala
m. pl. qali, qalu
f. pl. qalan
2nd pers. m. sg. qalat
f. sg. qalat
pl. qalittu
1st pers. m. sg. qaelna
f. sg. qalana
pl. qalinan
Another factor that brought about the loss of the Perfect and Imperfect
was the infringement on their functional domains by other conjugations.
In very broad terms, the BJA Perfect expressed the past tense, the Imperfect
the future or modal (irrealis), and the Present the progressive or habitual.
When the Present expressed the progressive, it was often preceded by the
particle qa, which is generally thought to be derived historically from the
active participle qaem (rising, undertaking), for example, qa saleq he is
ascending. In NENA this particle, which has been attentuated phoneti-
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cally to k-, has come to be interpreted as an indicative marker, with the re-
sult that the modal irrealis is expressed by the Present conjugation without
the prexed particle, which made the old Imperfect conjugation redun-
dant. In addition to the Perfect, BJA occasionally expressed the past also by
a construction formed from the passive participle with the agent expressed
by a pronominal sufx attached to the preposition l-, for example, smi li

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I have heard, literally: (It) was heard by me. It is likely that this form
tended to be used initially in BJA for the present perfect, expressing a past
action the effect of which extended into the present. In conformity with a
common development in languages, this present perfect became extended
with the passage of time to include also the preterite and in the NENA dia-
lects we nd that the smi li construction has totally replaced the old Per-
fect qal form.
The Present conjugation of BJA was, in fact, often used with past time
reference as historical present. This was a further factor that gradually
made the Perfect conjugation redundant. This functional overlap between
the Present and the Perfect conjugations led, in fact, to a morphological
levelling between the two in the Yemenite reading tradition of BJA. This is
reected by the fact that in the Yemenite tradition the initial vowel of the
singular Present forms is elided, as it is in the Perfect, for example, sqeln
I take < saqelna. In the plural of the Present conjugation, by contrast, a
secondary morphological distinction has arisen in the Yemenite tradition
in that Present conjugation forms that have present time reference tend to
have a qame vowel // after the rst radical, whereas forms with past time
reference tend to have a pata vowel in this position, for example, nfqe
They go out, nafqe They went out. In this tradition the nal -i of the 3pl
Present conjugation has shifted to -e by analogy with the mpl. of nouns. 2
Furthermore the syllable structure of the Perfect forms has become assimi-
lated in some cases to that of the Present conjugation, for example, qalu
They killed (rather than qalu), qala she killed (rather than qala)
(Morag 1969: 18687; 1988a: 12329).
The past progressive or habitual in BJA was expressed by combining the
Present with the Perfect of the verb to be hwa. On some occasions this aux-
iliary verb hwa is inected in agreement with the verb, for example, hwu
yatb4 i They were sitting. In many cases, however, it is fossalized and re-
mains in the basic 3ms form hwa irrespective of the inection of the main
verb, for example, hwa yatb4 a She was sitting, hwa qaemna I was rising.
This reects a historical change that has reached completion in the NENA
dialects, in which the auxiliary is totally fossilized and never inected.
Five verbal stems are commonly used in BJA, these being the 1. p al,
2. pael, 3. ap$el, 4. itp el and 5. itpaal. The t in the last two stems, which
characteristically express passive, reexive or otherwise intransitive ac-
tions, is usually assimilated to the rst consonant of the root, for example,
innqeb4 (< *itnqeb4 ) it was pierced (Babylonian Talmud, ullin 46a), la
izzabban (< *itzabban) it was not sold (Babylonian Talmud, Nedarim
31b). The participles of the four derived stems (stems 25 above) have an
initial m-:
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pael stem: mqael

ap$el stem: map$el
itp el stem: miqqel
itpaal stem: miqqaal

2. For these aspects of the Yemenite tradition see Morag (1969: 186; 1988a: 13135).

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Since the t is assimilated in the itp el and itpaal stems there is a close
phonetic resemblance between the participles of these stems, on the one
hand, and the participles of the pael and ap$el stems, on the other. This
resemblance paved the way for a levelling of the morphological distinc-
tion between these two sets of stems. This levelling has come about in the
NENA dialects, which lack the itp el and itpaal stems. In the NENA dia-
lects the meaning of the itp el and itpaal stems has been absorbed by
stems corresponding to the p al and pael stems of BJA, for example,
Qaraqosh k-msakr he loses (transitive = BJA qa mqael) or he becomes
lost (intransitive = BJA qa miqqel, qa miqqaal) (Khan 2002: 132).
The innitives of verbs exhibit a large diversity of morphological forms
in BJA. We present here a selection of these.

p al stem: miqal, qala, qole, qaloye

pael stem: qaole, qaaloye
ap$el stem: aqole, maqole, aqaloye

In some medieval manuscripts and in the Yemenite reading tradition of

BJA, the o vowel in these innitive forms is pronounced as a diphthong
aw, which seems to be a secondary phonetic development (see Morag
1988a: 11012). 3 Such diversity is not found in the individual NENA dia-
lects, which have one xed form of innitive for each stem (see Khan, in
this volume, 309327). As with other areas of morphology, the diversity of
morphological forms in the corpus of the Babylonian Talmud is likely to
reect a conation of different dialects or different historical layers of the
language.
The weak verbal roots in BJA include the categories of nal geminate
and middle weak. There are, however, incipient signs of levelling between
these categories. The nal geminate verbs are given the form of middle
weak verbs in the p al participles:

Active participle ll to enter qwm to rise

(nal geminate) (middle weak)
m. sg. ayel qayem
f. sg. ayla qayma
Passive participle
m. sg. il qim
f. sg. ila qima

In the rest of the paradigm the two categories of verb have distinct forms
in the p al, though in the pael nal geminate roots are treated like middle
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weak roots throughout the paradigm. In the NENA dialects this levelling
between the two categories of weak verb is complete, since the category of
nal geminate verbs has been lost and most verbal roots that belonged

3. For the historical background of the innitives with o see Nldeke (1875: 14243).

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 118 Geoffrey Khan
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historically to this have changed to middle weak roots. This process was no
doubt facilitated by the fact that the participles, in which the levelling had
already taken place in the BJA basic p al conjugation, came to dominate
the verbal system of NENA. It should be noted that in the Yemenite tradi-
tion some nal geminate verbs are treated as medial y even in the perfect
p al, for example, yel He entered (Morag 1969: 187; 1988a: 233).
In BJA the category of middle weak verbs included those with medial
y and those with medial w. These have distinct forms in some parts of the
paradigm, for example, Imperfect lequm he rises (root qwm), lekil he
measures (root kyl). In the participles, however, both types of root are
treated as medial y:
Active participle: qayem, kayel
Passive participle: qim, kil
This incipient levelling in BJA has reached completion in the NENA dia-
lects, since verbs that are historically medial w are all treated as medial y.
As with the levelling of nal geminate and middle weak verbs, the fact
that the levelling of medial y and medial w verbs had already taken place
in the participles of BJA and participles dominate the verbal system of
NENA no doubt accelerated the morphological change.

References
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applicable copyright law.

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