Talk:Eduard Friedrich Ferdinand Beer

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Gravestone inscription[edit]

@AnonMoos: could you help me solve a puzzle related to the Nabataean / Sinaitic inscriptions we were discussing? This article is about the decipherer of the script. I am trying to translate the inscription on his gravestone. I have copied over the inscription from the image into the image caption, using:

the explanation of the script as it was known when Beer died
The Nabataean unicode document
A Nabataean and Hebrew letter swap to convert the text to Hebrew

But the conversion doesn't make sense to me (other than the first word, Shalom). Onceinawhile (talk) 14:03, 6 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The first word is presumably "shelam" (or that's how it's pronounced in Biblical Aramaic anyway -- not sure what the Nabatean vowels were, or if anyone knows what the Nabatean vowels were). It's the Aramaic cognate and more or less functional equivalent to Hebrew "shalom".

The rest of the inscription, if I'm reading it correctly, is: Nun-Aleph-Resh Ayin-Beit-Mem Ayin-Mem-Yod-Qof-Shin Waw-Nun-Ayin-Mem Sade-Dalet-Yod-Qoph-Aleph.

Unfortunately, I don't have a general knowledge of Aramaic (only certain phonological and etymological connections with other languages). Ayin-Mem-Yod-Qof means "deep" in Biblical Aramaic, but not sure where the Shin would come in. Waw at the beginning of a word could be the conjunction "and". The triconsonantal root Sade-Dalet-Qoph is used to form words meaning "righteousness, right action" in both Biblical Hebrew and Biblical Aramaic. Sorry I couldn't help more... AnonMoos (talk) 06:55, 8 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you AnonMoos. That is good progress. Hopefully others will see this in the coming months / years and will help with the remaining questions. Onceinawhile (talk) 08:27, 8 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]