Today was my first day teaching this semester. I have a great group of students for a Biblical Hebrew Syntax and Exegesis class–they make teaching tremendously fun. If this were not wonderful enough, my awesome wife gave me a little gift to celebrate the new semester (it’s good to have an Eisenbrauns wish list):
Assyrian-English-Assyrian Dictionary
Edited by Simo Parpola and Robert M. Whiting
Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project – NATCP, 2008
xxii + 289 pages, English and Akkadian
Paper
ISBN: 9789521013324
Your Price: $75.00
www.eisenbrauns.com/wconnect/wc.dll?ebGate~EIS~~I~PARASSYRI
As soon as I saw the announcement that this volume was coming out, I knew that it was something that I would want to add to my library. However, I must admit that I had a bit of a “wait and see” attitude with respect to the English-Assyrian part of the dictionary. I just wasn’t too sure how extensive the English lemmas would be.
Well, I’ve waited and seen and it turns out that my initial skepticism was not warranted. This dictionary is very well done and if you are interested in Assyriology or Semitics, it will be very handy for you. I knew that they would include all the standard English words, but when I saw that they had Assyrian lemmas for the following I was really impressed: itch, itsy-bitsy, jaded, jingle, jocund, and jokester.
Here’s a pdf scan of the beginning of the J’s so you can see the graphical layout and a further sample of the book:
Thanks for the preview, Charles. I was wondering about the usefulness of the English-Assyrian part, too. But the preview shows the section is better than I expected. Thanks.
I’m glad it was of help.
Hmmmm. An Assyrian word for “jet”? What’s up with an entry like that?
Good eyes, Mike. I think that naba’u refers to streams of water. AHw lists is as “aufsteigen, aufsprudeln” and in the G this word describes the “Tigrisflut.”
An Assyrian word for “jet� What’s up with an entry like that?
This is what is known as the lexicographer’s nightmare. English in particular has so many homographic homonyms as well as semantic shifts of a word to a new nuance that falls into a different semantic domain that trying to correlate the English meanings with another language requires extensive context clues to make sure that the association between the lemmata fall into the same semantic domain. There is a note in the introduction to the dictionary that warns of this and suggests that one back-check the meaning by looking up the Assyrian lemma to make sure that it is actually the equivalent of the English word that you want. So with “jet” one could have added a context clue “(of water)” but, as I say, this would rapidly expand the size of the dictionary to no particular point since the context is provided by the Assyrian entry. Similarly, one might wonder whether “jam” is something you put on toast or that musicians do, but by checking the Assyrian one will find that it is something that logs do.
In any case, I’m glad that our attempts to make the English-Assyrian section of the dictionary actually functional and possibly of some practical use are appreciated. After all, you won’t find another English-Assyrian dictionary anywhere else.
Geek.
Oh, wait. I want one, too.
Thanks for the explanation of the thinking behind the dictionary. I certainly do not envy the job of the lexicographer–there are so many hard decisions that one encounters. However, you produced a very fine work that will be helpful to many.
To Kyle – yep – this was the answer I expected, of course. I just thought it was a good entry to bring up. And you highlight the simple “fix” – add a few words for contextual clue. The bigger problem will be a word that isn’t obviously anachronistic (unless you are Erich von Daniken) where there is multivalence. Would be nice to have some clues there.
And for the record, I’ll get a copy, too (and Logos will be inquiring about a license for it)! It’s certainly a useful tool.
Mike
Chances are very high that if you are reading this, you are indeed a GEEK. Embrace it!