L i b r a r y o f A r a b i c L i n g u i s t i c s

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linguistics, etc.
Viewed against this background, Arabic linguists may be defined as: the
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1
Library of Arabic Linguistics

A l l these reasons justify the establishment of a new forum which is devoted

to all areas of Arabic linguistic studies. It is also hoped that this Series will be
of interest not only to students and researchers in Arabic linguistics but also
to students and scholars of other disciplines who are looking for information
of theoretical, practical or pragmatic interest.

The Series Editor

ii
North east
Arabian dialects
Library of Arabic Linguistics

Series editor
Muhammad Hasan Bakalla
University of Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

Advisory editorial board

Peter F. Abboud University of Texas at Austin
M. H. Abdulaziz University of Nairobi
Yousif El-Khalifa Abu Bakr University of Khartoum
Salih J. Altoma Indiana University
Arne Ambros University of Vienna
El Said M. Badawi American University in Cairo
Michael G. Carter University of Sydney
Ahmad al-Dhubaib University of Riyadh
Martin Forstner Johannes Gutenberg University at Mainz
Bruce Ingham University of London
Otto Jastrow University of Erlangen-Nurnberg
Raja T. Nasr University College of Beirut
C. H. M. Versteegh Catholic University at Nijmegen
Boguslaw R. Zagorski University of Warsaw
Bruce Ingham
University of London

North east
Arabian dialects
Monograph No. 3

Routledge
Taylor &. Francis Group

LONDON AND NEW YORK

First published in 1982 by
Kegan Paul International

This edition first published in 2010 by

Routledge
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Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada

by Routledge
270 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

© Bruce Ingham 1982

Transferred to Digital Printing 2010

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or

utilised in anyform or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now
known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 10: 0-7103-0018-2 (hbk)

ISBN 13:978-0-7103-0018-8 (hbk)

Publisher's Note
The publisher has gone to great lengths to ensure the quality of this reprint
but points out that some imperfections in the original copies may be
apparent. The publisher has made every effort to contact original copyright
holders and would welcome correspondence from those they have been
unable to trace.
To Musa'id ibn Saif al-Saif
E d i t o r ' s n o t e

Arabic dialectology is an important branch of Arabic linguistics. The interest

in Arabic dialects is not a new p h e n o m e n o n , in fact it goes back to the early
stages of Arabic studies. This interest, though limited in scope and confined
to certain geographical regions, did not concentrate o n the dialects per se. It,
however, served as a means of definition and clarification of Classical Arabic
as described by the early A r a b and Muslim grammarians. Many statements
on dialectal variations covering many linguistic levels of the Arabic language
were reported in works dealing not only with Arabic g r a m m a r and philology
but also with the sciences of Tajwid and rhetoric, in addition to biographical
dictionaries a m o n g others. For instance, traditional discussion of vocalic
variations such as imala and consonantal changes covers some important
areas of Arabic phonology. Variations in the morphological syntactic and
semantic properties of Arabic were discussed by early A r a b and Muslim
grammarians and philologists or linguists. Therefore there is a rich mine of
information in early A r a b works which may be considered one of the main
sources in Arabic dialectology.
The modern interest in Arabic dialectology started seriously a r o u n d the
middle of the 19th century, partly as a result of the general tendency to study
modern societies anthropologically as well as linguistically. Since then scores
of Arabic dialects have been investigated. The Arabian Peninsula received
the least attention amongst the dialects studied.
Again very little has been written on N o r t h East Arabian dialects. The
present volume attempts to fill this gap in Arabic dialectology. It is the result
of several years' field work in the region under investigation. Geographically
speaking, the area covered includes the East Arabian region of al-Hasa and
Kuwait, the northern parts of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, southern Iraq
and Arabistan or Khuzistan. The present work, as is m a d e clear here, is not a
full description of any one dialect studied. It rather pinpoints the differences
between the dialects of the region.
There are two characteristics upon which this work is based. Firstly it is an
areal linguistic study in which the distributions of the dialectal features is
made and shown on the linguistic maps provided. Looked at from another

ix
Editor's note

angle, this study provides an excellent typological analysis of the dialects in

the region under discussion.
Secondly this work is based, in part, on sociolinguistic principles,
particularly those developed by W . Labov and J . J . Gumperz among others.
In this regard the b o o k attempts to stress the relationship between dialect
geography and extra-linguistic (sociolinguistic) parameters, such as com-
munication structure, geographical location and occupational groups. In
addition this study relates language change to ethnic movement, an idea
which has been followed by some sociolinguists such as P . Trudgill.
Although the book admits that there is no such thing as a North East
Arabian dialect g r o u p , the reader will soon discover the close relationships
between the dialects under discussion. The b o o k also illustrates the close
affinity of the Arabistan (Khuzistan) dialects to the southern Iraqi dialects,
and the other North East Arabian dialects, therefore the term introduced
here is correct. T h e first five chapters of the b o o k spell out the linguistic
affinities and their distribution within the regions concerned. Chapter 6
includes the texts with translation and annotation.
In Chapters 2 and 5 the author follows the traditions of the European
dialect geographers, in particular the German neogrammarians, in tracing
the geographical spread of dialect features and relating them to general
diffusion tendencies and historical population movements. A n interesting
parallel arises in the work of the American dialectologist Marvin Herzog,
writing in 1965. Although the author does not follow Herzog's typological
dichotomy between " c o m m u n i c a b l e " and " n o n - c o m m u n i c a b l e "
innovations, nevertheless the overall approach is summed u p well by Herzog
in " T h e Yiddish Language in Northern P o l a n d " , I J A L xxxi, pt III, N o . 2
(April 1965), p . 5:

" T h e spread of highly communicable innovations can then be analyzed as

reflecting the channels of communication in a sedentary society, while the
spread of relatively non-communicable innovations becomes a clear sign
of migration of populations. The goal of dialect classification is
abandoned and the geographic cross-section of a language comes to be
scrutinized as a reflection of the determinates of linguistic structure,
communication facilities and outside sources of stimulation."

As a methodological approach this is in accord with a recent tendency in

Arabic dialect studies following earlier more historically orientated methods.
The work of Ibrahim Samarrai (1968) on the Iraqi dialects, of J. Cadora
(1979) on the Syro-Lebanese dialects and the unpublished thesis of el-Hazmi
on the dialects of the Hijaz (1975) all follow this trend. One very clear charac-
teristic of this approach is that it is areal but non-political. This is stated very
clearly by C a d o r a (1979:17) " T h e inclusion . . . shows clearly that lexical
items do not necessarily change at political boundaries . . . Therefore no
classification can be considered valid or adequate if its groupings are
correlated primarily with political entities."
x
 Editor's note

In Chapters 3 and 4 the author treats a subject which linguists may feel will
warrant a more detailed study in order to reach definite conclusions; namely
the question of linguistic conservatism versus linguistic levelling and the
correlation of these two opposite tendencies with the extra linguistic
conditions of geographical and social isolationism versus cosmopolitanism.
The author attempts to illustrate a scale of complexity particularly with
regard to the grammatically relevant verbal measure system. The Polish
linguist A . Czapiewicz, writing in 1975, proposed a similar typological scale
but based his description on a cyclical view of morphological development
going from complex to simple and then through amalgamation back to the
more complex type. It may be that such a cyclical process underlies the
tendencies outlined by Ingham which on the short-term scale seem to be
unidirectional. Both I n g h a m ' s unidirectional and Czapiewicz's cyclical
hypotheses may be confirmed or refuted by later researchers.
The author is an authority on the dialects of the region under review. H e
was born in 1942 and obtained his BA in Arabic at the School of Oriental and
African Studies, University of L o n d o n , in 1964. H e was awarded his P h D in
Linguistics in 1974 from the same school. H e has been a lecturer in the
Linguistics Department at the School of Oriental and African Studies since
1967 and has supervised many students working for their MPhil and P h D
degrees. H e is fluent in both Arabic and Persian as well as being conversant
with several European languages. Dr. Ingham has travelled widely in the
Middle East and carried out research on Arabic dialects in Iran, Iraq,
Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan.
H e has published several papers and reviews covering not only Arabic
dialects but also child language and speech audiometry with emphasis on
Arabic. One of his latest articles is entitled "Languages of the Persian G u l f "
which appears in " T h e Persian Gulf States, a General Survey" edited by
Alvin J. Cottrell et al. which is published by Johns Hopkins University Press,
1980.

M . H . Bakalla
University of Riyadh
1 October 1981

XI
Contents

PREFACE xi

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS xiii

TRANSCRIPTION AND TRANSLITERATION SYSTEMS xv

INTRODUCTION 1
Collection of the Data 3
Availability of Data on the Dialects of the Area 4

1 THE AREA: NAJD AND THE OUTSIDE WORLD 6

Emigration from Najd to Mesopotamia and the Gulf 11
The Causes of Emigration 13
The Jabal Shammar 15
Southern Mesopotamia 17
Summary of the Communication Structure of the Area 22

2 THE NATURE OF DIALECT CONTRASTS 26

The Multivalency of Dialect Features 31

3 REDUCTIONAL CHANGES IN THE DIALECTS

OF MESOPOTAMIA AND THE GULF 33
General 33
The Verb Transitivity System 39
Geographical Distribution of the Transitivity Systems 45
The Noun Indefinite Marker 53
The Treatment of Final Clusters 56
Summary 61

4 NON-REDUCTIONAL CHANGES IN
THE NORTH NAJDI DIALECTS 63
The Analogical Basis of the North Najdi Features 74
xiii
Contents

5 GENERAL ISOGLOSS DISTRIBUTION OF THE AREA 77

Features Separating S. Mesopotamia from Arabia 79
Features Separating Northern and Southern Areas 87
Features Separating the Central Area from the Outer Fringe 95

6 TEXTS WITH TRANSLATION, BACKGROUND NOTES

AND INFORMATION ON SOURCES 102
Najdi:
1 'Ajmān: The Story of ThāmiribnSu'aidān 103
2 Mutair: 107
a The Story of Turki ibn Humaid
b Extract from the Bani Hilāl Epic
3 Harb: A Conversational Monologue Relating to
Modern-day Life Among the Harb of Hijaz 112
4 'Aniza: A Conversation Between Two Students
at Kuwait University 116
5 'Awāzim: A Conversation with the Poet
Sālim al-Dawwāy 120
6 Shammar: The Story of the Shilgān Raid 131
7 Rufai': Poems and Sentences about Nomad Life 136
8 Shammar (Mas'ūd): Qasīda from the Bani Hilāl Epic 139
9 Ahl al-Shimāl: The Story of Ibn Jash'am and Ibn' Arai'ir 142
Mesopotamian:
10 Kawâwila (Gypsies): Extract from the Bani Hilãl Epic 147
11 'Amāra: The Story of Mughdād 162
12 Kūt Sayyid'Anāya: Life in Kũt Sayyid'Anãya 167
13 Gachsãrãn: A Conversation with an Old Sayyid 170
14 Bani Turuf: An Account of the Tribes, Dialects
and Occupations of the Region of Huwaiza 173
15 Ka'b: The History of the Ka'b in Khuzistan 178
16 Mihirzi: Palm Cultivation on the Kārūn 185

BIBLIOGRAPHY 190

INDEX 196

GLOSSARY OF TECHNICAL TERMS 203

xiv
Maps and tables

Maps
1 NORTHERN AND EASTERN ARABIA 6

2 SOUTHERN IRAQ AND KHUZISTAN 18

3 APPROXIMATE DISTRIBUTION OF /y/ AND / ž / 36

4 RECORDED DISTRIBUTION OF NORTH NAJDI

FEATURES 64
5 ESTIMATED DISTRIBUTION OF THE MAIN ISOGLOSSES
characterizing North Najdi, Central Najdi and
Southern dialect types before recent population
movements since the 17th century; and
PRESENT DISTRIBUTION OF THE MAIN ISOGLOSSES
characterizing North Najdi, Central Najdi and
Southern dialect types, showing direction
of population movements 78

TABLES

I INTERNAL VOWEL MORPHOLOGY OF THE VERB

AND POPULATION GROUPS 52

II DISTRIBUTION OF NORTH NAJDI FEATURES 71

xv
Preface

Linguistic studies of dialects or groups of dialects can be

either mainly theory-orientated or mainly data-orientated.
In the theory-orientated type the data is used to test the
theory and a study of this kind aims to advance some part of
the theory by applying it to new data. In the data-orientated
type, on the other hand, the aim is to give an account of the
data at hand making use of the techniques evolved by descrip-
tive linguistics. In this approach the theory, or more
strictly the "metalanguage" as such is not of primary inter­
est; nevertheless consistency of approach and terminology
must be observed, although this is more a matter of presenta­
tion and readability than a theoretical tenet.
The theoretical branch of dialectology has seen a number
of "models" which reflect the advances of the theory in gen­
eral linguistics as a whole. The "historical" model was an
off-shoot of 19th century studies in historical linguistics
and used the data from the German dialects to test the
sound-laws of the Neogrammarians. With the beginning of the
structural phase various synchronic models were proposed
which aimed to characterize the mutual relationship of cog­
nate dialects or, in Weinreich's words, "to characterize
partially differing systems." Early structural models were
Smith and Trager's "Overall Pattern Analysis" (1951) and
Weinreich's "Diasystem Construct" (1954). Since the 1960s
various researchers have applied the techniques of genera­
tive grammar to dialect description with considerable
achievement. In all of these models the basic procedure was
to construct an underlying framework "a deep structure" and
then to state rules by which the actual dialects "the sur­
face structure" is derived. In all of these techniques the
recoverability requirement is foremost and the researcher
seeks to separate predictable dialect correspondences from
random dialect correspondences. In the transformational
approach random correspondences constitute differences of
input, predictable correspondences differences of rule.

xvi
xvii Preface

Following the transformational phase the sociolinguists,

led by Labov, have changed the focus of interest from rule
governed phenomena to the ragged edges of the linguistic sys­
tem, those areas where a speaker hovers between one system
and another and where factors of age, occupation, class or
group identity may be seen to have an active effect on the
speech of the individual.
The present study is data-orientated in so far as it is
not primarily involved with questions of linguistic theory
but seeks to present a descriptive analysis of a body of
data. The approach is basically geographical and seeks to
relate dialect geography to extra-linguistic factors of
geographical location, communication structure and occupa­
tional group over a wide area. It does however tend to con­
firm some of the observations of other writers such as
Trudgill on the effect of ethnic mobilization on language
change and to that extent adopts a rather determinist stance.
In inspiration it owes a lot to the work of Labov (1972)
and also Gumperz (1962) although the rather different nature
of the data may obscure this relationship in parts. In the
use of the concept of the linguistic "system" it owes much
to Halliday's and Palmer's work on the verb in English in
particular, and in general reflects the writer's upbringing
within a Firthian environment. The linguistic description
falls into three parts. Chapter 3 examines the relationship
of linguistic reduction or levelling to population mobility
and conversely the relationship of linguistic conservatism
to geographical isolation. Chapter 4 examines certain non-
reductional innovations which have developed within the
North Najd area and relates these to geographical isolation
and occupational group solidarity. Chapter 5 examines the
general isogloss structure of the area apart from the par­
ticular features examined in Chapters 3 and 4 and shows how
they relate to the geography of the area and to the history
of folk migrations in the area.
In essence this book is the result of an interest in
methods of linguistic description on the one hand and an
interest in traditional Arab life and customs on the other.
As such I hope it will be of interest both to the general
linguist and to researchers in the ethnography of the
Arabian Peninsula and the Gulf.
Acknowledgements

My initial thanks must go to the various institutions which

have assisted in the research which forms the basis of this
book. The School of Oriental and African Studies, London,
financed wholly or in part visits to the Middle East in 1969,
1971, 1974, 1977 and 1978. The University of Riyadh also
gave valuable financial help towards my visit to Saudi
Arabia in 1978. The Universities of Jundi Shahpur (Ahwaz),
Basra and Kuwait and also the Kuwait Radio and Television
services have also been of valuable assistance.
My thanks are also due to Charlotte Coudrille who pro­
duced the final typescript and contributed valuable editor­
ial advice; also to Elain Holly who produced the maps at the
School of Oriental and African Studies.
Mentors who at various stages have contributed useful
guidance, advice and discussion include Professor J.
Carnochan and Professor T.M. Johnstone of the School of
Oriental and African Studies, Sir John Glubb, Dr. Muhammad
Bakalla and Dr. Theodore Prochazka of Riyadh University,
Alan Rush of Kuwait and Dr. K. MacLachlan and Dr. D. Bivar
of the School of Oriental and African Studies.
The many friends and informants in the Middle East to
whom this book owes something would be far too numerous to
mention. All of them I remember by name and some of them
are mentioned at various places in this book. Some of them
are no longer alive but they will always be alive to me in
memory. Here I mention only a few. In Saudi Arabia I owe
a great debt of thanks to the late Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-
Sudairi and to Musā'id ibn Saif al-Saif; also thanks go to
'Ajimi ibn Suwait, Muhammad ibn Sa'dūn al-Suwait, 'Abdallah
ibn Baikhān, 'Abdallah Duhaithim, 'Uraifij ibn Zaid al-
Shilāzi and 'Abdallah al-Tamīmi. In Kuwait to Sayyār Rādhi
al-'Anizi, Mamdūh Rādhi al-'Anizi, 'Āyidh Tu'ma al-Dhafīri,
Murshid al-Badhdhāl, Sālim al-Dawwāy, Sālih Mansūr al-
'Alayyān and Talāl Sa'ĩd. In Iraq to 'Ābir ibn Fahd ibn
Sharshāb, Husain al-'Agab al-Sarāyifi and Abu Shahāb. In
Khuzistan to the late Tahrān Ka'bi and Hāj 'Abd al-'Azīz

xviii
xix Acknowledgements

Fadhili, to Hasan 'Arab and to Mahmūd and Sālim Fādhili,

also to Hajji Fālih and Shaikh Muhi of Shādigān.
Last but not least my thanks go to Shokooh and her family
who introducted me to the Middle East.
Transcription and transliteration
systems

The system of transliteration used for Arabic names is, with

some exceptions, a transliteration of the classical equival-
ent of the form, using the system normally used for Arabic.
Thus inter is rendered Mutair, sdēr Sudair, etc. In the
above, the correspondence of written ai with spoken ē and
the elision of unstressed short vowels is fairly well known.
This allows the use of the more familiar forms of names,
e.g. Kuwait rather than kwēt. This system is held to wher-
ever it does not lead to a too-wide divergence between
spoken and written form. However, where there is a differ-
ence of syllabication, vowelling or stress, the spoken form
is reflected, i.e. 'Aniza not 'Anaza, Ghatān not Qahtān.
Indeed, in the case of forms like Sba'a, Smida, etc. it is
difficult to know what the corresponding literary form
should be. Certain sound shifts have occurred with regard
to the letters and and these are
also reflected in the transliteration, i.e. Dhafīr not
Dafīr, Shilāzi not Shilāqi. in some cases also the more
strictly accurate form is eschewed in favour of the one
which is more familiar or which looks less unusual in the
Roman script, i.e. 'Ajmān, not 'Ujmān; 'Arai'ir, not
'Rai'ir.
Glottal stop, as a phoneme, has disappeared in the core
vocabulary of these dialects. In initial position it oc-
curs as a feature of initial vocalic position, i.e. amal
for 'amal "hope". In medial position it has been replaced
by • in many forms, i.e. sa'al for sa'al "he asked" or has
been elided as in yijjill for yu'ajjil "he postpones",
maddiba for ma'diba "correction, chastisement". It is only
transcribed in the rare occasions where it occurs medially
in words, i.e. mas'ūl "responsible". Glottal constriction
also occurs at the junction of one vowel with another across
word-boundary [ana w'ant]"you and I", transcribed ana
w ant . The alternative form without glottal constriction
[ana want] would be transcribed ana want.

xx
xxi Transcription & Transliteration

The subscript /. / is used to mark pharyngealization in

and which are not distinguished in the Arabic script.
Pharyngealization can also occur with the bilabial, velar
and uvular consonants, but this is not marked as it can be
referred to the occurrence of one of the consonants t, s ,
. With /1/itis minimally distinctive in a number of forms,
i.e. alla "God", alla "yes". Similarly with it occurs in
cases where it cannot be referred to any other consonant,
i.e. rāy "opinion", radd "he returned". In these cases it
is marked. Special symbols used in Arabic transcription are:

CONSONANTS
t voiceless interdental fricative
voiced interdental fricative
š voiceless palato-alveolar fricative
j voiced palato-alveolar affricate
or palatal plosive (in Najd)
x voiceless uvular fricative
voiced uvular fricative
q voiced or voiceless uvular plosive
voiceless pharyngeal fricative
' voiced pharyngeal continuant
, glottal stop (rarely used)
voiceless alveolar plosive, pharyngealized
voiceless alveolar fricative, pharyngealized
voiced interdental fricative, pharyngealized
The following sounds also occur which represent sound
changes from the Classical system:
ž voiced palato-alveolar fricative ('Amara area)
č voiceless palato-alveolar affricate
z voiced alveolar affricate palatalized
ć voiceless alveolar affricate palatalized
Ќ voiceless palatalized velar plosive
(Harb dialect, see Text 3)
voiced palatalized velar plosive
(Harb dialect, see Text 3)
xxii Transcription & Transliteration

VOWELS
a long open vowel, central to front in most environments
[a: ] or [Λ : ], back in pharyngealized environments [a: ]
i.e. [zΛ.-d] zad "provisions", [sa:r] sār "he became"
ī high front spread vowel šīl "take!"
ū high back rounded vowel kūd "except"
ē mid front spread vowel hēl "cardoman"
ei *glide from the above to fully close zeit "oil" (Najdi)
ie *glide from high front spread to central
[ lε ] or [ t ] ziet "oil" (Mesopotamian)
ō mid back rounded vowel mōt "death"
ou glide from the above to fully close mout "death" (Najdi)

The type /ou/ occurs in the Najdi dialects where certain

non-guttural plosives or fricatives follow, i.e. mout
"death", xouf "fear", zoud "increase", oub "dress", soub
"towards". In the outer dialects /ō/ is general for all
environments, i.e. mōt, xōf, zōod, tōb, sōb.

a half open vowel ranging from [ε] through [Λ] to [a]

depending on consonantal environment, i.e. [sεbb] "he
reviled", [šεbb] "he lit", [kΛbb] "he let go", [tabb] "he
entered". In Mesopotamia the realisation [ε] is more
widespread than in Najd in some environments; compare
Iraqi [sεbb] [ l i : f ε ], Najdi [sΛ&bb] [li.-fΛ].
i In all these dialects, in non final position, the vowel
& sounds covered by these symbols can be regarded as reali-
u zations of one phoneme /I/ These range through
[i], [i], [ ], [r], [ ] , [u].
Preceding w [u] occurs, emphatics produce [r] , [u] when
in conjunction with a bilabial. Apicals, palato-
alveolars and palatals produce [i] or [ ] , the rest
[a] : [xluww] "emptiness", [ !] "remain", [b sal]
"onion", [šzlib ] "rice", [liyyε] "tome", [x rza] "bead"
[s rΛ] "queue".
In final position the symbols i and u represent the short
tense vowels [i] and [u]. Sometimes also with a gliding
quality [ ] and [Vw] as in [xa:lly], xāli "my uncle",
[galti/w], galtu "come in!" (m.pl.).

*For details of the distribution of these vowels, see

Chapter 5, p.79-81.
xxiii Transcription & Transliteration

In the Shammari text certain phonetic details are includ­

ed which would not be recoverable from a more generalized
transcription. These are the labio velar glide after /b/
and /m/ in some environments, i.e. lugmwitin "a mouthful"/
mwihzam "belt", and the vocalic transition / / between cer­
tain consonants, i.e. fa du "his thigh", mi flu "like him".

STRESS

Word stress is not marked except in order to illustrate cer­

tain dialectal differences. In the main all dialects agree
as regards stress in accordance with the following rule:
1 Stress falls on the long syllable(1) nearest the end
of the word, counting final CvCC, Cv:C and çv: and non-final
CVC, CVCC, CV: and CV:C as long; xalīj, kitāb, kit bna,
kitábt, kitábna, kitábti, kitábaha, kitábtaha, márasa,
sāl aha.
2 If no long syllable occurs, stress falls on the initial
syllable: wálad, dáxal, kítab, š í l i b , wlídi, wlídak, ktíbaw.
Differences between the Central Najdi and the outer dia­
lects occur in connection with the following two cases:(2)
a In forms of the type inkisar, yinkisir, the Najdi type
shows initial stress in accordance with rule 1 above:
í n k i s a r , yínkisir. The other dialects show inkísar,
yinkísir.
b In nominal forms of the type mentioned under 2 above,
where the definite article precedes, the Najdi type shows
stress on the article: álwalad, álmutar, á l u x u , álubu. The
Mesopotamian type shows stress on the initial syllable of
the stem: ilwálad, ilmútar, ilúxu, ilúbu.

1 Note that the feminine ending - e i h of the Shammari dia­

lects (see Ch.4) does not count as a long syllable and
is equivalent to the -ah or -at of other dialects, i.e.
short. The slight lengthening of the vowel is purely a
function of pausal position, thus sinjāreih or sinjārah
"Sinjara".
2 See also p.60.
North east
Arabian dialects
Introduction

The title of this book could be misleading. There is in fact

no North East Arabian group of dialects and the designation
North East Arabian is used here territorially rather than
genetically indicating that the dialects are found in the
north-eastern corner of the Arabian peninsula and the areas
of southern Iraq and Persia adjoining it. Linguistically
these dialects fall into two main groups, an Arabian and a
Mesopotamian one. The Arabian dialects examined here include
those of the Gulf Coast in the area of Kuwait and al-Hasa,
the northern parts of Saudi Arabia and the dialects of the
bedouins of the western borderlands of Iraq. Mesopotamian
dialects examined are those of the river lands of southern
Iraq and Khuzistan in southern Persia. In a general way
they share certain characteristics and can be classed as
North Arabian(1) in contrast to (i) the South Arabian type
of Yaman, Hadhramawt, Oman and the Shi'a dialects of Eastern
Arabia and (ii) the West Arabian group comprising those of
Hijaz, Syria, Jordan, Palestine, Lebanon and Egypt.
However they are treated here together for a different
reason. The area of north-eastern Arabia and the river val­
leys of Iraq and Khuzistan have from the beginning of the
Christian era been subject to immigration from the central
Arabian peninsula. Further, considerable trade contact has
always been maintained throughout the area facilitated by
the existence of nomadic tribes linking them across national
boundaries. The dialects studied therefore cover a continu­
ous geographical area crossing national boundaries, but group
around certain foci of population which form the core politi­
cal areas of the states of Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait with
Khuzistan forming an Arab enclave within the state of Iran.
The procedure is therefore that we have chosen a geographical
area in which we know that patterns of human interaction
exist and then proceeded to study the linguistic geography of

1 See also JOHNSTONE (1967b)p.1-18.

1
2 Introduction

the area and attempted to relate it to what we know of its

communication structure. Certain general principles of dia­
lect geography can be well illustrated from the data obtained.
One is the correlation of linguistic conservatism and non-
reductional change with geographical and political isolation
and of reductional change and linguistic "simplification" in
areas of international contact where new social structures
are being evolved. It also emerges that in areas of continu­
ous population, classification into distinct sub-dialects is
impossible and the whole participates in a linguistic con­
tinuum. Among the nomadic tribes on the other hand, it is
possible to distinguish separate dialects for given tribal
groups not necessarily related to their present geographical
location.
As regards the linguistic procedure, I do not here attempt
a full linguistic description of any one dialect, but concen­
trate on the differences between them, and the geographical
distribution and demographic relevance of these differences.
The procedure is therefore to pick on certain variables rele­
vant to the whole area and to plot their realisation. These
are in the main phonological and morphological, but lexical
items of high frequency of occurence are also treated.
Considerable use is made of the traditional oral litera­
ture of the area which consists of tales of tribal battles
and raids of the recent past and older semi-mythical stories
dating back to the early centuries of the Islamic era. Also
included is poetical material consisting of gasīdas or "odes"
or fragments of these. The Arabic gasīda of the area con­
sists of rhymed couplets and is often of a highly standard­
ised structure. The imagery, vocabulary and epithetical
usage are also highly standardised so that, as a poetical
type, it is highly mobile and poems originating in the south­
ern region of Saudi Arabia are understood and appreciated by
the bedouin of the Syrian desert and vice-versa. Local dia­
lect features are, however, usually apparent in individual
poems either as an inherent part of the poem and expressive
of its origin or unconsciously introduced by the reciter.
Therefore although it is true that as a literary vehicle this
type of poetry is inter-tribal and inter-dialectal, one can
in no way say that the language used is an interdialectal
Koine. The origin of a poem or its reciter is always dis­
cernible to a certain degree. Collections of these poems are
available both as volumes published in the Arab world and in­
cluded in the works of orientalists in the earlier part of
this century. However as far as I know most of the gasīdas
presented here are published for the first time in the West.
They may also be interesting in that they cover a fairly
wide geographical and linguistic area, whereas earlier col­
lections such as Montagne's Shammari texts and Musil's
Ruwala texts were usually from one tribe only.
3 Introduction

Collection of the data

The collection of the data on which this study is based was

begun in 1969 on a visit to Khuzistan in southern Persia.
The main aim at the time was to collect data for a phonologi­
cal study of the Arabic dialects of the area. Gradually how­
ever the comparison of dialect type to social and regional
group became interesting especially as, to the speakers them­
selves, this was of primary importance. In order to obtain
further comparative data I visited Basra and Zubair in
southern Iraq in 1971. By this time it was becoming clear
that the dialects of Khuzistan were rather like the tip of
the iceberg and that many facts relevant to them were prob­
ably to be found in the Arabian peninsula, their original
geographical homeland. Khuzistan in fact represents the
final eastern outpost of continuous Arab population, although
there are pockets of Arabic speech in northern Afghanistan
and Central Asia. In 1973 I visited the marshlands of the
Haur al-Hammār in southern Iraq and also the area of
Nasiriyya on the Euphrates. In 1977 I was able to make re­
cordings of the speech of nomadic groups in Kuwait and in the
area around Nāsiriyya. Finally in Saudi Arabia in 1978,
based in Wadi Turmus in the northern Qasīm, I collected data
on the dialects of neighbouring nomadic and sedentary groups
and also visited the Jabal Shammar and Hafar al-Batin on the
borders of Iraq and Kuwait.
At this point perhaps it is wise to make a point about the
general orientation of the study. As a member of a highly
industrialised western society, I was attracted towards the
aspects of life in the Middle East which were materially dif­
ferent from our own. Therefore the study concentrates on the
dialectology of the traditional society of the area, based in
the rural areas, rather than the technological society of the
towns. It is therefore not a sociolinguistic study of the
type typified by the classic studies of Labov, Trudgill and
others which describe the dynamic factors of change alive in
the great urban centres and the relevance of personal speech
variation to these factors. This is not to say that these
processes are absent there, and indeed the growth of urban or
national standard dialects is noticeable in Iraq, Kuwait and
Saudi Arabia although not so much in Khuzistan, since there
the standard language is Persian. In the past, though not so
much in the last decade, the influence of the dialects of
Egypt and the Syrian area has been quite strong within the
educational system and news media tending towards the evolu­
tion of a type of international educated dialect. Recently
a trend in the opposite direction has taken place in the Gulf
countries and there has been a revival of interest in local
culture; but nevertheless a tendency towards the formation of
urban regional standards is noticeable. It is therefore true
that the urban dialectology of the area is not unlike the
4 Introduction

situation familiar to us from the writings of the sociolin-

guists. In the present study however this is disregarded
since it seemed that even within the field of the relatively
static rural dialectology there was interesting work to be
done both in the field of the "discovery" of undescribed dia­
lects and in the description of dialect geography. I say
"relatively static" since the historical perspective is one
of considerable dynamism, while the dialects are treated here
as though not subject to change at the rate of the urban
dialects.

Availability of data on the dialects of the area

A fairly clear picture of most of the main dialect types of

the area can be obtained from the work of earlier linguists.
The standard dialects of Iraq and the Gulf are covered by the
studies of Blanc (1964), Erwin (1963) and Johnstone (1967).
A rural dialect of the Hilla area is also described by
Meissner and Weissbach and the dialect of the Bahama of
eastern Arabia and Bahrain by al-Tājir. The dialects of some
areas of central Arabia are covered to a greater or lesser
extent: Johnstone (1967a) discusses phonological problems in
the dialect of "Anaiza; Socin gives texts and poetry in a
mixture of central Arabian dialects which can be used with
circumspection; 'Abboud gives a comprehensive description of
the dialect of Hail and Badawi's intonational study of the
dialect of Riyadh gives useful, if scanty, phonological and
morphological data. The dialects of the bedouin of the area
are also surprisingly quite well covered in varying degrees
of comprehensiveness. The work of Landberg (1919) and
Wetzstein (1S68) provide useful data on an 'Anizi dialect of
the Syrian desert. Musil's ethnographic work on the Ruwala
supplies many interesting quotations and poems in their dia­
lect, which can be used in conjunction with some knowledge of
the dialects of the area. Montagne gives some very useful
texts and poems in the dialect of the Jarba Shammar of the
Jazĩra. Of great importance is Cantineau's "Études sur
quelques parlers de nomades arabes d'Orient" which gives
material from a number of smaller tribes of the Syrian desert
and also from 'Anizi and Shammari groups. Most recently
Blanc (1970) has given a detailed comparative description of
the dialect of the Negev bedouins. For the central Arabian
bedouin groups, Hess gives very useful and nicely transcribed
data from the dialect of the 'Utaiba; al-Hazmi gives an ac­
count of the dialect of the Harb over a wide geographical
area from Hijaz to Central Najd, being probably the only one
of its kind from the inner Arabian peninsula, and Johnstone
(1961 and 1964) gives extremely interesting texts and compar­
ative remarks on a dialect which is mainly 'Ajmi but with
Dawcisir influences. In addition, in his "Eastern Arabian
5 Introduction

Dialect Studies", he provides a text from the Bani Hājir dia­

lect. Much useful comparative data was also made available
to me by Theodore Prochazka on the dialects of the Ruwala,
South Western Arabia, the Central Najd region and al-Hasa.
Much of this is to appear in his forthcoming "Saudi Arabian
Dialects" and "The Shi'i Dialects of Bahrain".
Dialects for which generally accessible data in any great
detail is not available except in the writings of the author,
here or elsewhere, are the speech of the sedentary population
of Khuzistan and Iraq(l) south of Najaf, the dialect of the
Euphrates bedouin and the Budūr shepherds of the Nāsiriyya
region, and the Kawāwila or gypsies of the area. For the
Arabian type, the dialect of Sudair and of the Dhafīr, Mutair
and 'Awāzim tribes are, I think, dealt with here for the
first time in any great detail.

1 An unpublished manuscript on the dialect of Ahwaz by D.L.

R. Lorimer exists in the library of SOAS London; also
Edzard gives a list of vocabulary which he designates as
of Mi'dān origin; however the greater part of it is gen-
eral to much of southern Iraq.
 Karbala
6

land above 1 0 0 0 m
Northern and Eastern Arabia Harb tribes
.al-Kūfa localities
Madina
Main localities, regions and tribes mentioned Najaf QASIM regions
Amāra 100 200
0
N kms
M u n t a f iq
Shatra
Samawa Nāsrivah Ahwāz

Suq a s h S h u v u k h

Shibica •
Basra .Khorramshahr
Zubair Abadan

Fao
Raudhaiam
Jauf Umm
al-'Aish
Failaka
Tuwāi Jahra
* al-Dhafir Kuwait

•Līna Sufain
NAFUD Hafar al-Bātin

Baga'.
Mutair
J.A.B A L Shu'aibāt
Hai l al-Ajfar,
S HAMMAR

Madain Qaiif
Sāhh Artawiyah
(al-H.jr) Buraida A L - H A S A Dhahrān
Zilfi
QASIM •Anaiza .Ghat
Rass . * Midhnab Majma
Khaibar
• Attār

Shaqra
A R I D H
Dar.'iyya
Madīna Riyādh'

MAP 1. NORTHERN AND EASTERN ARABIA

1 The area: Najd and the outside
world

The study concentrates on an area of northern Arabia where

interaction takes place between three main centres: the
settlements of Central Najd, the settled area of Mesopotamia,
and the Gulf coast, in particular Kuwait. The history of the
area has been described by many writers and the rise and fall
of Emirates in the area is, according to one theory, depend­
ent on the balance of power between these centres.(1) How­
ever for our purposes there are two main themes which throw
light on the dialect geography of the area. These are the
constant process of immigration from Central Arabia to these
outer areas and the existence of permanent centres of civil­
isation in these areas, each of which has had periods of
growth and decline and changes of dynasty and affiliation
but nevertheless remained. A further factor which is less
we11-documented is that it seems that there is also a pro­
cess of emigration from southern Mesopotamia to the Gulf
settlements.(2)
Between these centres is a thinly populated area of
steppe and sand desert where permanent agriculture is impos­
sible except at scattered wells. These do not constitute an
agricultural region but exist as islands of settlement with­
in a nomadic environment. This region supports a population
of nomadic camel and sheep herders who form an important
link between the three centres. At one time it was supposed
that the nomads formed a quite separate and somewhat lawless
community. However more recently it has become obvious that
the nomads and settled people form two halves of a distinct
economic community.(3) In the area of north-east Arabia
each centre has its own particular nomadic tribes. These

1 MUSIL (1928b), p.303.

2 See LORIMER (1908), articles on Bahrain and Kuwait.
3 MUSIL (1928b), p.302, 316-19; also "Encyclopedia of
Islam", Badw, p.881, 885.

7
8 Chapter 1

may be ethnically and sometimes also politically distinct

from the centre to which they are attached, but they are
nevertheless economically quite closely tied either to
Kuwait, Mesopotamia or Najd.
To understand the nature of this connection we must look
at the yearly life cycle of the nomads. This has been des­
cribed in great detail by earlier writers at a time when wes­
tern technology had not intervened to cause quite striking
changes in their mode of life. However these changes have
only been in operation fully over the last thirty years or so
and the present overall dialect geography of the area relates
to the original situation rather than the present modified
one. The changes in fact affect mainly the type of flocks
used, the main means of transport and the area over which
grazing is possible while the basic nature of the life-cycle
is to a large extent unchanged.(1) It divides mainly into a
grazing period and a non-grazing period. In winter and
spring when the weather is cool, rain causes grass and var­
ious saline plants to grow in the desert. The rain falls
sporadically here and there and collects in hollows and de­
pressions known as riyādh, faidhāt or khuffiyyāt. This en­
ables the nomads to graze over a large area moving from
place to place as grazing is found.

1 In my statements about nomadic life in the area I am

heavily indebted to earlier writers particularly DICKSON
(1949), (1956), MUSIL (1928a,b), GLUBB (1960). These
writers describe the life of the nomad population and
their relations with the settled areas. In addition to
this the author visited nomad encampments and summer wells
in southern Iraq, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia and was able to
check the observations of earlier writers. These visits
cover the following areas: summer camps of the Humaid,
Rufai', Āl bu Sālih and Būdur north of Nāsiriyya in south­
ern Iraq in 1977; families of Mutair, Bani Khālid and
Shammar at Raudhatain and Umm al-'Aish north of Kuwait
town also in 1977. In the spring of 1978, thanks to the
hospitality of Prince Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-Sudairi, I
stayed for three weeks in the area of Wādi Turmus in
Qasīm in Saudi Arabia. There I was able to visit numbers
of families of Harb, Mutair and Shammar camped in the Wadi
Turmus area and on the edge of the Nafūd. At the same time
I visited Shu'aibāt, a summer well of the Sinjāra Shammar,
north of Hail on the southern edge of the Nafūd, and the
settlement of Sufairi near Hafar al-Bātin which is the
centre of the Dhafīr tribe in Saudi Arabia and the home
of their leader 'Ajimi ibn Suwait.
9 Chapter 1

The nomads have a remarkable knowledge of topography and

the flow direction of the various valleys and depressions of
the area and are able to make accurate guesses from the sight
of distant rainfall or lightning as to where grazing will be
found. The tribal system of the nomads is based on the need
to defend a large grazing area within which they can support
large herds. The tribe will have a grazing area or d rah
within which they control grazing and may in good years also
allow neighbouring tribes to graze. In the area between cen­
tral Najd Mesopotamia and Kuwait the dīrahs of a number of
large tribes converge. Although these dīrahs do of course
change with the changing pattern of power in the area and
with the changing alliances of the nomads, they have as far
as we know remained fairly stable over the last two hundred
years or so, although tradition tells of different configura­
tions in earlier times.(1)
In the late spring and summer grazing grows short in the
desert and the nomads come in to converge on certain perman­
ent wells and along the rivers of Mesopotamia. At this time
of year they are in close contact with the settled population
and also with other nomadic tribes. The main watering places
to be considered here are:
1 The Euphrates including the Haur al-Hammār region and the
various channels and subsidiary rivers such as the
Gharrāf.
2 The Jabal Shammar region. An area centred on the moun­
tains of Aja and Salma in northern Najd. It is bordered
on the north and east by the great Nafud and within its
perimeter a number of important permanent wells and set­
tlements are situated.
3 A number of smaller wells scattered between Jabal Shammar
and the Gulf Coast including Jahra to the north of Kuwait
and Hafar al-Bātin southwest of Kuwait. Also between
Jabal Shammar and Mesopotamia the centres of Zubair and
Khamĩsiyya.(2)
In the case of area 2 and to a large extent also area 3
the wells are owned by the nomads and maintained by hired
men or else the settlers and the nomads are members of one
tribe. In the case of area 1, some of the nomads are in

1 Toponmy also is indicative of the earlier location of the

tribes. This is referred to in some detail by PHILBY
(1922), p.108,249,288 as regards the earlier location of
the 'Aniza in central Najd. DOUGHTY (1964) also gives
indications of older tribal areas on his map appendixed
to Volume I.
2 Other unpopulated wells are also important, such as the
Tuwāl al-Dhafĩr wells between Iraq and Najd and the
Tuwāl al-Mutair wells towards Kuwait.
10 Chapter 1

contact with ethnically quite distinct populations and have

to enter into treaty relationships with them. It is however
equally true for all three cases that we see here the rela­
tionship between settled and nomadic people and also at an­
other level the relationship between the interior of Arabia
and the outer regions.
Although the nomads produce much of their own goods such
as woven tent furniture and traditionally also have amongst
them as clients certain craftsmen or sannā', who produce
saddles and other hardware, they must visit the towns to buy
clothing, kitchen utensils, arms, certain foodstuffs and,
more importantly perhaps, coffee, tea, sugar and tobacco
which form the centre of their social life and are the main
manifestations of hospitality. In the area we are consider­
ing this takes place mainly in the early autumn just before
the annual migration. Also during the summer tribes whose
wells are near the Euphrates will come in for shopping oc­
casionally although at this time travelling is more diffi­
cult. These shopping excursions, known as musābilah(l), are
made with the consent of the leaders of the settled areas
and are of economic benefit to both the settled and nomad
populations. The degree of contact and the actual relation­
ship of nomad groups to the settled areas may differ but in
all cases the result is that of a basically Najdi/Arabian
population in terms of dialect, religious affiliation and
culture coming into regular contact with the populations of
the settled areas of Mesopotamia and the Gulf, who are in
closer contact with the outside world and to some extent
live a far easier life.
At the time of the Shammar rule of Northern Arabia cen­
tred on Hail under the Ibn Rashīd dynasty this link was
strengthened by the existence of a colony of traders from
Najaf on the Euphrates who were allowed to settle in Hail
and organised regular caravans of goods to be brought to
Hail.(2) The general picture is therefore one of the econ­
omic dependence of Northern Najd on Mesopotamia in particu­
lar and also on Kuwait. As expressed by a Shammari inform­
ant: kānaw innajd killaham 'āyšin min al'arāg, "All the
people of Najd used to live on the produce of Iraq." The
Najdi expression: annajd tuwallid wa lā tagda, "Najd gives
birth but does not nourish" also reflects this situation.

1 See DICKSON (1949), p.49.

2 These are mentioned by various writers: MUSIL (1928b),
p.241,253; DOUGHTY (1924), p.656-7. The yearly caravan
was known as the hadra or "going down", i.e. to the
Euphrates. This term is still used by bedouins who
summer along the Euphrates for the yearly migration;
see Text 7.
11 Chapter 1

EMIGRATION FROM NAJD TO MESOPOTAMIA AND THE GULF

We know from historical records and from the oral tradition

that there has been from throughout the historical period a
process of emigration from Najd out to the settled lands.
This has been of two types: the movement of nomadic groups
on the one hand and the more sporadic movement of individuals
or families from the settled areas of Najd on the other. For
our purposes it seems that the larger movements of nomadic
groups are the most important and have had the greatest ef­
fect on dialect geography, since in most cases the nomads
have moved in as élite groups and taken over as rulers of
the settled areas.
Particularly in southern Mesopotamia this has resulted in
what has been referred to as "nomadization" meaning that the
nomadic section has had a profound effect on the culture of
the original settled inhabitants. It has been remarked by
earlier writers that in an area where the Caliphate of Bagh­
dad and the Shahs of Persia were well within historical mem­
ory, the local oral literature disregards them completely
and the main themes are those of nomadic life. Tales of the
Bani Hilāl, the 12th century nomad invaders of North Africa,
and of more recent heroes such as Sultān ibn Humaid and
Kan'ān al-Tayyār are the universal folk literature of the
area.
In material culture, too, the style of dress and household
furniture even among such a tightly-knit and isolated group
as the Mi'dān or marsh-dwellers of southern Mesopotamia are
basically those of central Najd as transmitted by the nomads.
This process has, it seems, in most cases been a gradual
one. Tribes whose main wells were in the Najd but grazed in
winter up to the borders of the settled lands and visited
them for provisions and trade may have gradually found it
easier to camp in summer in those very settled areas.
Changes of political structure of the area may influence
them in this and may indeed cause them to move back again
if times change.
During the last two centuries three large tribes of Najdi
origin have transferred their summer quarters to the Euph­
rates. The 'Amārāt branch of 'Aniza, a group coming origin­
ally from western Najd, now camp from Najaf northwards. The
Tūmān branch of Shammar camp from Najaf to Samāwa and the
Dhafīr, a tribe of mixed origin, partly Shammar and partly
of diverse other elements, camped near Nāsiriyya and south
to Zubair.(1)

1 See MUSIL (1928a), p.130,210, (1928b), p.31-33, 166-84;

LORIMER (1908) II A p.411-42, 83-88, II B p.1749-52; and
GLUBB (1960), passim, for these tribal areas. Lorimer
and Musil differ on the extent of the distribution of the
12 Chapter 1

All three of these however retained their purely Najdi

type of dialect and distinctive culture.
Within the last century during the early years of the
Saudi regime and later with changes of regime in Iraq,
various further movements of these tribes have taken place.
In the earlier years when times were troubled in Najd large
sections of the Shammar took refuge in Iraq, but have since
returned.(1) The Dhafir who were originally an Iraq tribe
in terms of their main grazing grounds and summer quarters(2)
are now split between Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, and
have their main centre at Sufairi near al-Hafar in Saudi
Arabia while sections of them still summer in Iraq.
Towards the Gulf the same process also takes place. In
the Kuwait area the tribes of longest standing would seem to
be the 'Awāzim and Rashāyida whose dialect is in many ways
very close to that of the settled population.(3) Later ar­
rivals such as the Mutair speak a dialect closer to that of
central Najd. It is not certain when they arrived on the
Gulf, but local tradition regards them as being more recent
arrivals than the 'Awāzim and Rashāyida. A western branch
of the tribe exists in western Najd which is said to be their
original home.(4) While on the subject of tribal groups and
population movement, it must be admitted that we cannot be
sure that a tribal group such as Mutair constitutes a homo-

Shammar in southern Iraq. I am here following MUSIL (B28b)

p.32, as regards the Shammar, who states that the Tuman
branch extend from Shibića to Iraq, as this was confirmed
by my own Shammar informants. 'AZZĀWI (1956) puts the
date of the arrival of the Dhafīr in Iraq as 1805 follow­
ing friction with the Āl-Sa'ūd; vol.1, p.295.
1 My information on recent movements of the Shammar is from
'Abdallah Baikhan of the Shilg'ān branch of the Sin jāra.
2 GLUBB (1960), passim.
3 See p.96f.below. According to their own tradition the
'Awāzim originate in western Najd in the area between
Abān Ahmar, Abān Aswad and Marrān within the present
'Utaiba dīra, al-'UBAYYID (1970), p.29.
4 See DOUGHTY (1964); his map gives the localities of Harrat
Bani 'Abdallah, S'feyna, Swergiah and El-Fereya as belong­
ing to the "Meteyr". Also vol.11 (1924), p.366-67, he
refers to their original home "Meteyr are of old Ahl
Gibly (southerners) and their home is in the great Harra
which lies between the Harameyn... They are now in part
Ahl es-Shemāl (northerners) for every summer these nomads
journey upward to pasture their cattle in the northern
wilderness; their borders are reckoned nearly to Kuwait
and Basra." For the northeastward expansion of the tribes
see for the Murra COLE (1975) p.106; for the Dawāsir and
•Utaiba PHILBY (1922) II p.203-4; for the 'Ajmān ibid 297
and also DICKSON (1949) p.284.
13 Chapter 1

genous group of people distinct from surrounding groups and

moving as a unit through geographical space and historical
time. Nomadic alliances and genealogies are remarkably
fluid(1) and even the oral tradition records the absorption
of foreign elements into tribes. However from our point of
view this is irrelevant, since whatever the ethnic make-up
of the population, it seems to be the case that the dialects
do move across the geographical landscape in a way which
reflects the movements of the main groups in terms of pres­
tige, whether or not the internal make-up of these groups
may be constantly changing.

THE CAUSES OF EMIGRATION

Different views have been advanced as to the causes of the

existence of large-scale nomadism in Arabia. Since it seems
to be the case that most Arabian nomad groups eventually
settle on the soil in the outer countries, the question
arises as to what causes them to adopt nomadic life in the
first place. One view is that progressive dessication of the
Arabian peninsula over the last millenia has led settled
people to forsake stable agricultural pursuits for the
nomadic life. Arab tradition traces the beginning of many
large Arab tribes in the breaking of the Maarib dam in Yemen.
Other authorities rather see the desert as the place where
strong tribal groups can survive, and where weaker groups who
could not protect their herds and grazing areas were forced
away to take up the settled life.(2) Whatever the case, it
does seem to be incontrovertible that there is a gradual
movement northward of nomadic groups through Arabia and out
into the steppe land of the Syrian desert, where they come

1 BARTH (1961) discusses in detail the different ethnic and

political loyalties of tribal groups in southern Persia
and formation of new social groups by splitting of old
ones and the aggregation of diverse units. See particu­
larly p.50-54, 130-33. The same process can be supposed
to have happened for Arab tribes of the area. Although
no detailed accounts exist, nevertheless local tradition
recalls their aggregational process for the Dhaflr and
Mutair tribes, both of which are said to include elements
of different tribal stocks. The name Dhaflr is expressive
of this, meaning "plaited, bound together".
2 See MUSIL (1928b) for a discussion of these two theories,
of which he favours the latter; Appendix p.311-13,316-19.
Also MONTAGNE (1935) p.38-9; "Encyclopedia of Islam",
Badw, p.881-5.
14 Chapter 1

into contact with the settled lands. The reasons for this
seem to have been analogous to the reasons for emigration
from Europe to the New World. Within Arabia competition for
grazing land was fierce. If a tribe was strong and could
hold on, it did. However some found it easier to move north­
wards towards the Syrian desert, where land was more spacious
and grazing was better.(1) Another incentive also must have
been easier access to the products of the settled lands, plus
the fact that the more temperate climate gave better oppor­
tunities for grazing and in general conditions are better.
The relative prosperity of the northern nomads is reflected
in the size of herds and tents and greater stature of the
people.(2) One flaw in this theory is that we have to pre­
sume that groups who have been forced out of one area are
then strong enough to displace other groups already in con­
trol of another more desirable area. It may be that the
background of these tribes in the harsher environment of
Arabia gave them an advantage over those already accustomed
to the better conditions of the Syrian desert. Whatever the
case, the important point from the linguistic point of view
is the existence of a continuous process of nomadic popula­
tion movement northwards through Arabia to the Syrian

1 This seems to be the case for the 'Aniza of the Syrian

desert who were displaced within Arabia as regards access
to the better grazing areas by the Dawāsir; see PHILBY
(1922) II p.108. This view of the causes for the north­
ward movement of the 'Aniza was also repeated to me by
informants in Saudi Arabia. However inter-tribal rivalry
still plays a great part in the interpretation of such
historical events, and these accounts, although fascinat­
ing for the investigator, cannot always be relied upon
as historically accurate. DOUGHTY (1924) p.400 mentions
droughts in the 19th century as the cause. AL-'UBAYYID
(1971) p.32 gives the succession of nomad power in cen­
tral Arabia as: Bani Lām up till the 10th century AH,
then fAniza in the 11th, who were ousted by Mutair in the
12th and forced northwards. Mutair in turn were followed
by Qahtān and then by 'Utaiba, who gained ascendancy over
both Mutair and Qahtān.
2 See also DOUGHTY (1964) p.316,385,389; (1924) p.400, for
comments on the relative prosperity of the northern and
southern 'Aniza. It would seem that the middle area
around Khaibar is a poor area for nomad life. He also
mentions (1924) p.367, 461-2, 511, that the land between
Qasīm and the Mecca country is regarded by the nomads as
good pasture country. This is now occupied by the
'Utaiba.
15 Chapter 1

bādiya area. This same process can be seen to happen in

eastern Arabia where tribes from the southern Najd area on
the borders of the Rub' al-Khāli have gradually transferred
their centres of influence northeastwards towards the Gulf.
In particular here the 'Ajmān and Āl-Murra tribes from the
area of Najrān are now basically al-Hasa tribes. Cole in
his fascinating study of the Āl-Murra tribe attributes this
to the existence of more favourable grazing lands in the
northeast corner of Arabia and a desire to be nearer to the
coast settlements.(1)

THE JABAL SHAMMAR

The above remarks concerning the reasons for emigration from

central Arabia to Mesopotamia and the Gulf must be taken to
refer to the areas south of the Jabal Shammar area. The
Jabal Shammar seems to form a natural enclave as regards
dialect geography and to have had a somewhat separate evolu­
tion from the rest of the area. Situated as it is within
easy travelling distance of southern Mesopotamia and the
Gulf, with a good supply of wells and cultivable land and
easy access to the good summer grazing of the Nafūd and the
steppe land to the north of it, it seems to have maintained
a very stable population over a long period.

1 COLE (1975) p.106. The only example I have found of the

opposite movement is the movement southward of the Qahtān
in the 19th century from central Najd as a result of
pressure from the north by the 'Utaiba. However this is
more a matter of contraction back towards a centre of
influence from a temporarily expanded area. See Text 2,
Story 1, for oral tradition on this point. DOUGHTY
(1924) Ch.XV gives an account of a similar war between
the Qahtān and the Mutair where the Qahtān are pushed
back towards the south. For movements of other tribes
within Arabia in a generally eastward and northward dir­
ection, see PHILBY (1922) II p.13, 203-4, 297, referring
to the eastward movements of 'Utaiba, Qahtān, 'Ajmān and
Dawāsir. Also DOUGHTY (1924) p.354-56 for movement of
Bani Khālid and 'Ajmān from Hasa to Kuwait, of the Subai'
from al'Ārid to Qasīm. The important houses of Āl-
Sudair and Āl-Saif, both of Sudair, are respectively from
the Dawāsir and Subai' in the southwest in the areas of
the Wādi Dawāsir and Wādi Subai'.
16 Chapter 1

The distinctiveness of the Shammar in dialect and other

cultural aspects has been noticed by a number of writers.(1)
One particular feature is the greater cohesion of nomadic
and sedentary sections of the various sub-tribes, which dis­
tinguishes them somewhat from other tribes.(2) The wells
and villages to which the nomadic Shammar return in summer
are in most cases occupied by their fellow tribesmen and
little social distinction is made between them. This makes
the Jabal Shammar and its desert hinterland a natural econ­
omic or ecological area of some permanence. The Shammar
traditionally regard the town of Hail as impregnable because
of its ring of mountains and this may have something to do
with the stability of Shammar occupation of the area.
Movements of other groups northward such as the 'Aniza
and the non-Shammari sections of the Dhafīr(4) and the
Mutair have passed to the west and east of the area.(5) This
will be important in explaining the relationship of the
Shammari type of dialect to those of surrounding groups.
In this connection we cannot do better than to quote
Hogarth(6) on the basic difference between the social
structure of northern and central Najd:
"This (the difference) resides in the fact that its main
constituent now settled and part of fellāh life has not
lost the spirit of the Badawin population from which it
sprang. To take the ruling family for instance; the

1 LORIMER (1908) II B p.1749. CANTINEAU (1937) II p.234.

2 Another example of this is the Dawāsir of southern Najd
as described by PHILBY (1922) p.203-204.
3 MONTAGNE (1935), p.39.
4 PHILBY (1955), p.26-7, 28, 47, 70, 108, 112, seems to
trace the Dhafīr (Samada i.e. Smida) through Sudair and
Sibila to Safwān and the Iraq borders.
5 The only explicit reference to this I have found is in
LAWRENCE (1935), Ch.l, p.36. However the permanence of
the tribal names associated with the area do seem to
imply the absence of invasions.
6 HOGARTH (1904), p.166-7. See also DOUGHTY (1924) p.443,
for a similar comparison between north and south: "But
Zâmil (the governor of Buraida) did not ride in company
with his nomad friends (el-Meteyr); the bedouins say the
townspeople are utterly deceitful ... It is only Ibn
Rashîd riding among the rajajîl and villagers who may
foray in assurance with his subject Beduw."
17 Chapter 1

chiefs of the house of Rashīd are not as the chiefs of the

house of Sa'ūd in Riyad, rulers of settled communities
with which they are at one, and surrounding tribes of
Bedawins, distinct from themselves; but they are chiefs,
in the first instance, of a great dominant Bedawin tribe,
and in the second of the settlements which serve that
tribe for markets and rallying points... Instead of dom­
inant oases surrounded by diverse distinct tribes of
Bedawins, who must be reckoned with as a potentially
antagonistic, and for geographical reasons a very influen­
tial element, and can be but indifferently controlled, as
is the case of southern Nejd, we find the northern oases
subject to one tribe, whose members have the closest rela­
tions and community of interest with the settled members."

SOUTHERN MESOPOTAMIA

The area of southern Mesopotamia dealt with here covers the

southern sections of the rivers Tigris, Euphrates and Kārūn
and their confluence, the Shatt al-'Arab, which runs into
the northern end of the Gulf. The northern limits of the
area within Iran are fairly easily set at the end of the
Khuzistan plain which forms the end of the continuous Arab
population as defined both linguistically and ethnically.
Arabs are found sporadically to the north of this line also,
but it does seem to form a fairly observable linguistic and
ethnic boundary.(1) The linguistic boundary between Arabic
and Iranic dialects crosses the Iran-Iraq border on a north­
west-southeast axis, following roughly the border between
mountain and plain. In Iraq to the north of this boundary
are found the Kurdish population who speak an Iranic dialect
and form a continuous ethnic area into eastern Turkey, west­
ern Iran and the southern Caucasus. Within Iraq this area,
as distinguished by linguistic and cultural features, is
centred around Basra, 'Amāra and Nāsirriyya, extending north
to Kūt on the Tigris, and gradually blending into a central
area around Baghdad, Musayyab, Ba'gūba and Hilla. The whole
of southern Iraq up to about Baghdad in fact forms a large
general dialect area as distinguished from the areas to the
north.(2) However we are concerned here with a more limited
area centred on the lower reaches of the rivers and more
strictly connected with the Gulf and the area of northern
Najd defined above. Some reference will however be made to
the central area where comparison is helpful.

1 The so-called "'Arab" tribes of Fārs such as the Khamseh

are in the main Turkish speaking, CHRISTIAN (1918) p.5.
2 For this division see in particular BLANC (1964) p.7.
 land above 2 0 0 m
18

Al Kūt
Ahwāz locality

Rufai' tribe

0 2b 50 kms

N
Chapter 1

Amāra
Halfāya

.Bisaitin
Humaid Sūsangard
Mulla Than i
Haur a l '
Salām. Huwaiza, Huwaiza
Shatra
Kūt Sayyid Anāya
Ahwāz
Birkat
Batha Nāsiriyya Bghadād
May'a
Gurna
Chibāyish

Sūq aI Shuyūkh Haur

al Hammār
Shadigan
Bandar Mahshūr

Rasra .Khurramshahr
Ashār Mihirzi ZAITĀN
Zubair Abū Khasīb Abadan
Siba •Giachsārān

Qusba

Fāu
Raudhatain.
Hauz 'Abd al-'Aziz
a I - Rāshid
Umm
al Aish

Southern 'lrāq and Khūzistān PERSIAN GULF

Localities and tribes mentioned
Kuwait

MAP 2. SOUTHERN IRAQ AND KHUZISTAN

19 Chapter 1

The area can be divided into three regions, from the point
of view of land use, which are relevant to its linguistic and
ethnic structure:
1 The core of the area, that part of it least open to
outside influence and from which it seems linguistic influ­
ences emanate, is the highly irrigated areas along the banks
of the main rivers. This includes both banks of the Shatt
al-'Arab, the Khaur Bahmashīr, the banks of the Jarrāhi
around Shādigan, and some parts of the Euphrates south of
Nāsiriyya, and perhaps also parts of the Tigris below
'Uzair.(1) This is an area of intensive palm cultivation
spreading out in a continuous band along the rivers of a
thickness of about two miles either side in some cases. The
land is divided into hauz (pl. ahwāz) or irrigation units,
which is to a large extent the basis of the social structure.
A hauz is the area between two anhār or irrigation channels.
Within the palm area other crops are easily grown, such as
grapes, vegetables, etc. and fishing is also carried on in a
small way. The population of the palm groves are of diverse
tribal origin in many cases, especially along the Shatt al-
'Arab. Non-Arab elements, mostly Persian, are also present
to a large degree in various stages of assimilation to the
predominant Arab elements. At certain times the area has
been united on a tribal basis. From the 17th century to the
late 19th century the Ka'b ruled the area, while subsequent
to that a tribal confederation called the Muhaisin, based at
Khorramshahr, superseded them. Both of these were based
economically on their control of this rich agricultural
region and also on their maritime strength in the Gulf.
Even today the local dhow trade of the north of the Gulf is
basically in the hands of the Khuzistan Arabs who bring
cargoes of dates and other agricultural products, even animal
fodder, down to Kuwait and return with luxury goods. In
Kuwait also the dhow builders are mostly emigrated Khuzis-
tanis. This central region, being based as it is on an in­
ternal river network of communication, has quite strong
links with the Gulf area, in particular Kuwait, Bahrain and
al-Hasa. The nature of this relationship and some complica­
tions which it poses for our model are dealt with later in
Chapter 3, p.23 and p.51.

1 See also INGHAM (1976) p.76-7. Localities visited in

southern Iraq and not mentioned specifically elsewhere
were the following: on the Shatt al-'Arab: Sība, Abu al-
Khasīb, Fao and Hauz 'Abd al-'Azīz al-Rāshid; near
Nasiriyya: Shatra, Sūq al-Gharrāf, al-Tumar, Khafāya,
Māy'a, al-Fuhūd, and Chibāyish; also Najaf, Karbala, Kūt
and Zubair. Mi'dān settlements were visited near Birkat
Bghadād, an Āl bu Sālih camp north of al-Fuhūd and a vil­
lage of the Āl Azīrij near Salām south of 'Amāra. Āl bu
Muhammad informants from Halfāya were also interviewed.
20 Chapter 1

2 A second sub-region is formed by the marshlands of the

Haur al-Hammār and Haur al-Huwaiza. This is an area of
marshlands and lakes interconnected by narrow channels. The
population, the Mi'dān or marsh-dwellers, are semi-nomadic
living in reed huts. They live by animal husbandry, keeping
sheep, cattle and water-buffalo (duwāb) and by the production
of reed matting for sale to the main towns of the area. The
term Mi'dān is used here as applied to them by outsiders and
includes all populations living in reed dwellings. Within
the area, however, the term Mi'dān applies strictly only to
the groups who keep buffalo. From the point of view of the
main dialect features, in fact, there is little difference
between Mi'dān and other marsh-dwellers.
3 A third sub-region is the Bādiya or open country be­
tween the rivers. Although here also irrigation channels
are found, non-irrigated cultivation of arable crops is also
possible. Animal husbandry of sheep, cattle and to some
extent also camels is also important. The population here
includes sedentary and nomadic groups. In some cases tribes
include nomadic and sedentary sections. Although breaking
into two parts, a western bādiya in Iraq and an eastern one
in Khuzistan, the bādiya forms a continuous belt of land
communication across the easily fordable rivers going north
of the Haur al-Huwaiza. The bādiya blends into the northern
part of the Haur al-Hammār and here semi-Mi'dān tribes like
the Āl bu Sālih and Āl-'Īsa exist, who are divided between
marshland and bādiya activities. It is also open to influ­
ence from the bādiya west of the Euphrates of which it forms
a continuation and there are nomadic groups who spend the
summer in the bādiya east of the Euphrates and the winter
out in the bādiya to the west. It seems that this zone is
one of gradual infiltration from the desert to the west.
The transition from Najd-based bedouin visiting the
Euphrates towns for supplies, to bedouin spending the summer
months along the western bank of the Euphrates, then leads
to sections of the tribe crossing the Euphrates to camp in
the Hamād in summer. In the region of Nāsirriya some sec­
tions of the Dhafīr(l) and the tribes of the Humaid and
Rufai'(2) spend the summer north of Nāsiriyya. Nowadays
the nomads bring their flocks across the Nāsiriyya bridge
by night when it is open to livestock. Before the construc­
tion of the bridge they used fords, as they still do at other
points on the Euphrates. The Humaid as a tribe consists of a
nomadic section who still follow this pattern and settled
sections living around Sūq al-Gharrāf.

1 OPPENHEIM (1939) p.57, referring to the Jawāsim section.

2 These two and other members of the Jash'am were west of
the Euphrates in the 18th century. See Text 9; also
OPPENHEIM (1952) 1-2, p.408-13.
21 Chapter 1

A similar fringe Shammari group is mentioned by Glubb.(l)

These are the Kwida, a small sub-tribe of seven or eight
tents of camel-breeding bedouin west of the Euphrates near
Samāwa. This Shi'ite group have probably been in Iraq for
three or four centuries in his estimation.
Also important in this link between Mesopotamia and Najd
is the existence of specifically Iraqi shepherd nomads known
as shāwiya (also shawāya and more usually shūyān in Najd).(2)
These shepherd tribes are completely Iraqi in culture(3) and
Shi'a by religious persuasion, like the rest of southern
Iraq and Khuzistan. These, of which the most important in
the area are the Budūr and Zayyād, also comprise sedentary
sections along the Euphrates, the Budūr being around Nāsir-
iyya and Batha, the Zayyād near Samāwa. Sheep and camels
graze on different pasture. While both can eat grass,
camels also eat the tough saline plants of the desert
(hamdh). Further, camels move over larger distances at an
easy speed and can subsist for long periods without water.
They are therefore not in direct competition for grazing.
The shepherd tribes also use donkeys as their main means of
transportation; they were therefore in the days of free raid­
ing at the mercy of the faster-moving camel-mounted bedouin.
Therefore in the winter grazing months when the shepherds
came out into the desert they would enter into a client
relationship with the more powerful bedouin.(4) In the past
the Budūr and Dhafīr formed a particularly strong alliance
crossing ethnic, occupational and religious boundaries and
raiding in all directions,(5); A further occupational distinc­
tion can be made between strictly Euphrates-based bedouin
such as the Humaid and Rufai' and others such as some clans
of the Dhafīr, less intimately connected with the settled
lands. The Humaid and Rufai', also the Smida section of
Dhafīr, breed the jūdi (pi. jwāda), camels of Iraq which are
immune to the ticks and insects which breed along the rivers
in early summer. This enables them to come in to the river
banks early in summer as soon as grazing grows scarce in the
desert. The Butūn section of Dhafīr, on the other hand,

1 GLUBB (1978), p.108.

2 They are also referred to in Najd and Kuwait as hakar or
hukra.
3 See also MUSIL (1928a), p.45. He mentions that the bed­
ouin regard the shawāya as 'ruhm al-dīra, "relatives of
the settled land".
4 For details of the grazing routes and relationship of
shepherds and bedouin in the area see GLUBB (1960) passim
but particularly p.32-4; also DICKSON (1949) p.546.
MUSIL (1927), p.107, states that among the Zayyād at the
end of the year each tent would give a sheep with all its
young to the protecting sheikh.
5 See BELL (1940) p.36, 39, 40, 43-4.
22 Chapter 1

breed the Najd camel and are forced to stay in the desert
longer until the danger of disease to their flocks is les­
sened. (1) Correspondingly, the Euphrates bedouin are Shi'a
like the rest of southern Iraq, while the Dhafīr are Sunni.

SUMMARY OF COMMUNICATION STRUCTURE OF THE AREA

The study of the distribution of linguistic variables in

conjunction with the geographical and demographic structure
of the area outlined above enables us to describe the dia­
lect geography in terms of three zones of communication
around certain cultural centres and of interaction between
them. The nature of the interaction is as far as we can see
that of the spread of linguistic features by the immigration
of groups using them and their subsequent adoption by the
surrounding population.
The term "zone of communication" is used here to denote
an area within which the internal lines of communication are
stronger than between the area and the outside. The three
zones are:
1 Najd. Comprising Jabal Shammar, Qasīm and Najd proper
(2) an area in which a concentration of wells, wādis and
basins exists which form a comparatively continuous agricul­
tural region and where important towns have grown up based
on this agricultural economy.
2 The Coastal Region. The towns of the Gulf and the
region of al-Hasa, which contains the important towns of
Qatīf, Dammām, Hofūf and Dhahrān. The last three are now
important primarily as oil industry centres; however they
were originally important as part of the Gulf trading area
and because of their agricultural prosperity.
3 Southern Iraq and Khuzistan. The river network of the
Tigris, Euphrates and Kārūn and their confluence, the Shatt
al-'Arab, also the Jarrāhi canal. This area contains the
important ports of Khorramshahr, Basra and the later devel­
oped agricultural centres of Ahwaz, Nāsiriyya and 'Amāra,
also the important oil industry centre of 'Abbādān.
The nature of the linguistic interaction between these
three areas is to be seen in the light of a sea and a land
network. The sea network is traditionally based on the com­
munity of interests in fishing, trade and particularly the
pearl industry (although this is now almost completely

1 J.B. Glubb in a private conversation, but see also

GLUBB (1960) p.227.
2 I.e. the districts of Sudair, 'Āridh and Washm. As a
general term it denotes the central region of the Arabian
Peninsula within the desert ring of the Nafud and Rub'
al-Khāli. See also PALGRAVE (1965) I, p.336-7 for the
use of the term Najd.
23 Chapter 1

extinct) . A strong connection exists between the coast set­

tlements and those of the Shatt al-'Arab and Khuzistan, and
even the Persian side of the Gulf. This is seen in a certain
racial, religious and architectural uniformity. The land
connection is dependent mostly on the existence of nomadic
populations living in the steppe-lands between the three
areas and particularly on the following factors:
1 The necessity of the nomads to camp on wells for four
months of the summer at which time their living area will
contract inwards towards one of the three main zones.
2 The necessity for them to visit the settled areas in
order to buy supplies. The coastal region and southern Iraq
being in closer contact with the outside world are naturally
preferable to Central Najd for this purpose.
3 The tendency either because of population pressure in­
side the Najd or general expansionist tendency for Najd
tribes to move their main grazing areas and summer encamp­
ments from Najd up to the Euphrates and the Gulf Coast.
The basic division of communication zones as indicated by
the linguistic and human geography of the area is into a
Mesopotamian and an Arabian area, with the Gulf Coast form­
ing a sub-division of the Arabian(1) one. One factor diffi­
cult to fit into this model is that there are sections of
the population of Kuwait who had traditionally very little
contact with the interior of Arabia at all, and it is there­
fore difficult to see why their dialect should retain a
basically Arabian character. These people, the Bahārna(2)
(pl. of Bahrāni) "seafarers" were seafaring by culture,

1 The term Arabian is used here to indicate the north cen­

tral and eastern areas discussed here, i.e. Jabal Shammar,
Qasīm, al-'Āridh and the eastern region. No implication is
made that Arabia as a whole is distinguishable linguistic­
ally in any easily definable way from Mesopotamia as a
whole. These larger areas fit into a major dialect con­
tinuum which it is not so easy to separate along these
lines. However in the area we are discussing a fairly
discernible polarization into these two types can be
traced.
2 For the use of this term see LORIMER (1908) Bahrāni. In
dress and general appearance these coastal population are
strikingly different from those of the interior of Najd
or Iraq. The Arab of Iraq and Najd wear the head-cloth
(ghutra, shmāgh or chaffiyya) with head-rope ('agāl) in
the traditional Arab way. The coastal population wear a
thin white head-cloth without head-rope in the form of a
turban, or sometimes as a scarf over the shoulder. This
turban style was always the mark of the Ka'b of Khuzistan
(WILSON (1911), p.117). I have never seen the 'agāl worn
in Khuzistan except by holy men although it appears in
24 Chapter 1

Shi'a by religious persuasion and in terms of communication

nearer to the populations of the Shatt al-'Arab than to those
of the interior. In dress and other cultural externals also
they resemble them closely, while their dialect shows no such
affinity.
One explanation for this may be that in the Gulf settle­
ments over the last two hundred years or so the ruling groups
have been of Najdi origin; the Āl Subāh of Kuwait/ Āl-Thāni
of Qatar and Āl-Khalīfa of Bahrain all arrived within the
last two centuries. It is possible that the more racially
mixed Bahārna, the earlier inhabitants of the coastline, have
been influenced by these prestige groups and their dialect
has become increasingly of the Najdi type, particularly in
Kuwait.
The history of the Gulf region is important in this con­
nection. In the 9th century the Qarāmita dynasty controlled
the whole area of al-Hasa, the Kuwait region and southern
Iraq. The Ottomans also at the height of their power united
the region on two occasions as part of their empire for more
than a century. These historical indications and the ethno­
logical factors mentioned earlier would seem to support the
conjecture that in earlier times there was a greater degree
of uniformity between the Shatt al-'Arab area and the coastal

photographs in the 50s as worn by the Ka'b tribesmen in

general. Lately also during the period of revolution in
Iran the Khuzistan Arabs took to wearing the ' agāl as
symbolic of Arab identity emphasising claims to autonomy
within Iran. Dress is important as a tribal and general
ethnic "diacritic" in this area. In Iraq non-coastal
Arabs refer to themselves as jamā'at il'ugul (people of
the 'agāl) referring disparagingly to the coastal people
as ahl itta'ti'ōh (people of the ta'ti'ōh - a type of
coastal amphibian frog) implying that this was eaten by
them. Coastal groups also refer to those of the interior
as badu "bedouins" or Arab "nomads" in a similarly dis­
paraging way. To the people of Najd and the tribes of
bādiya of Iraq racial purity is important and they will
often refer to the coastal population as "non-Arabs". The
term Bahārna in some ways implies this. To the coastal
groups this is unimportant. They are cosmopolitan in
their attitude, depending for much of their livelihood on
contact with the outside world. For a discussion of var­
ious views on the origin of the Bahāma, see al-TĀJIR
(1979), p.31, 49. For our purposes the question of actual
racial origin or ancestry is unimportant in this connec­
tion and we would only point to certain cultural con­
trasts.
25 Chapter 1

region(1) as regards dialect.

It is important also to stress here that the relevance of
these ethnic factors is different in Iraq and the Peninsula.
Along the coast the division into Bahāma and badu or ahl
innajd correlates with the Shi'a-Sunni division, while in
Iraq the whole population is Shi'a and the difference is
rather between a completely sedentary somewhat de-tribalised
society and a traditional, tribally organised society, with
some connection with the nomadic way of life.(2) These occu­
pational factors are of course also relevant to the coastal
region.

1 See also JOHNSTONE (1967b) on pre-'Anazi elements in the

dialects of the Gulf, p.90-2. The discussion here is
mainly with reference to Kuwait. In Bahrain and al-Hasa
a specific Bahrāni dialect exists cognate with the 'Omani
dialect. See'PROCHAZKA (1981).
2 For further discussion of this division see also FIELD
(1949) I, 2, p.251-52, who divides southern Iraq into
non-tribal, semi-tribal and tribal regions, the non-
tribal region being the lower Shatt al-'Arab region.
In the relevant passage she states that "Although the
majority of rural settled Arabs have a regular tribal
organization such as the 'Abūda or Bani Asad, there are
many thousands who belong to so mixed a community that
tribal ties have become entirely or almost entirely ex­
tinct. Such conditions are found in the highly civilized
areas and among the population of the date-gardens on the
banks of the Shatt al-'Arab downstream from Basra."
2 The nature of dialect contrasts

A problem which has vexed dialectologists from the earliest

days of the subject is that of the impossibility of making
clear-cut divisions between dialect areas, especially in
regions with an uninterrupted geographical spread of popula­
tion. The German neogrammarians of the 19th century noticed
that in such areas one speech variety blends imperceptibly
into the next through intermediary varieties so that rather
than discrete entities we are confronted with a continuum
which is only dividable into clearly demarcated regions if
we choose very simple criteria for differentiation. As an
example of this we may take the important isogloss which
divides areas with /j/ from areas with /y/ as a reflex of
OA j* in such forms as /rayyāl, rajjāl/ "man". The pronunci­
ation /rayyāl/ is regarded in Iraq as "southern" as con­
trasted with /rajjāl/ which is the pronunciation of the cen­
tral area and north. Disregarding for the moment the pronun­
ciation /ražžāl/ which is characteristic of parts of the
southern marshlands, this gives a fairly clear division into
a /J/ area north of Batha on the Euphrates and Kūt on the
Tigris, and a /y/ area south of it. This is an important
"characteristic" isogloss since the pronunciation /rayyāl/
is widely recognised as a "southern" characteristic and it
would be tempting to take this line as the demarcating one
between "southern" and "non-southern" types in Iraq. However
when we examine other isoglosses which are equally regarded
as dividing "southern" and "non-southern" types, we find
that they do not correspond to this. For instance the suffix
/-an/ characteristic of first person singular verbal forms,
such as /arīdan/ "I want" /arūhan/ "I go", is used as far
north as Najaf on the Euphrates, while the occurrence of the
/šuffix /-man/ "who" or "which" post-verbally in such forms as
/šifit-man/ "who or which did see", /šāf-man/ "who or which
did he see" is used as far north as Hilla on the Euphrates.
Thus we are faced with the decision as to whether to regard
as "southern" only the core dialects which have all three
characteristics or to include all dialects up to the outer

26
27 Chapter 2

ring at Hilla. Furthermore there are other contrasts which

cannot be strictly called "isoglosses" since their geograph­
ical distribution is more fragmented, which cut across these
boundaries entirely, dividing "nomadic" from "sedentary"
speech types,(1) Therefore, if we persist in trying to di­
vide "southern" from "non-southern" types we are forced to
consider a "core" area of "southern" speech with a band of
"border dialects", while disregarding the fact that nomadic
"southern" and nomadic "non-southern" are united by some
features which separate them from their non-nomadic counter­
parts.
The above type of situation is typical of areas with a
high population density and has led some dialectologists in
the past to despair of the possibility of dividing a speech
area into discrete dialect areas. Others, on the other hand,
have maintained that a sufficient conglomeration of dialect
characteristics is a good enough justification for talking
about a "dialect area" even though the isoglosses may not
follow each other exactly. However, in view of the emphasis
on exactness and scientific demonstrability which has become
the hallmark of modern linguistic studies, one is forced in
the end to accept the view that the search for discrete geo­
graphically defined dialects is probably a fruitless one in
the majority of linguistic landscapes. Only when one speech
community is cut off from the next by some impassable geo­
graphical barrier are distinct and geographically definable
dialects likely to exist in close proximity.(2) The more
usually found situation is for different speech varieties to
blend into one another without definable cut-off points.
However since native speakers themselves have no diffi­
culty in the majority of cases in making statements about
the regional and social identity of particular speech var­
ieties, one feels that the linguist should be able to incor­
porate these statements into the main body of his discipline.
The most striking advances in this direction have been made
in the branch of sociolinguistics, where particular con­
trasts or "speech variables" are analysed in terms of their
social distribution and significance both from the point of
view of the speaker and the local hearer. In this type of
approach one is not bound to make definite statements about
the geographical distribution of the variables, but rather

1 These are referred to in Chapter 3 "Reductional Changes".

2 In our area good examples of this occur. The island of
Failika off the coast of Kuwait has a dialect easily dis­
tinguishable from standard Kuwaiti. Similarly the dialect
of al-Zubair southwest of Basra in an area of non-settled
steppe is geographically clearly separated from the dia­
lects of the Mesopotamian river network.
28 Chapter 2

concentrates on discovering their social significance. Re­

cent studies of this type have often pointed to a situation
of confrontation between two or more social groups with which
this contrast correlates. A classic study of this type is
Labov's early work on diphthong variation in the speech of
the island of Martha's Vineyard in Massachusetts.(1) Here he
showed how the contrast between open and close vowel types
was socially significant in the confrontation between the
native islanders, the "Vineyarders" and the mainlanders or
"Yankees" on whom the Vineyarders were gradually becoming
economically dependent. One advantage of this approach is
that since one is freed of the necessity of drawing a defin­
ite boundary between dialects, one is not forced to regard
so many features as "exceptions" to the main rule which is
itself only a rule because it is in the majority. Since one
is interested in a situation of confrontation between two
poles, just as it is natural to find that populations between
the two poles may be indeterminate or historically fluctuat­
ing in their political affiliation, so it is natural to find
that their speech shows features common to both poles. Fol­
lowing Labov we also recognise the possibility that certain
contrasts may be non-distinctive(2) from the point of view
of the speakers although noticeable to the linguist.
If we keep in mind the fact that we are now concentrating
on the relevance of individual linguistic contrasts and not
looking for exact geographical borders between discrete geo­
graphical dialects, we can now go back to early dialectolo-
gists' difficulties with the definition of the dialect. The
German dialectologists of the 19th century found that, al­
though isoglosses did not follow each other exactly, never­
theless there was a pattern to their occurrence. They found
that it was possible to distinguish "core" areas which had
all the features of a particular type and in which no con­
flicting isoglosses occurred, and "transitional" areas be­
tween these "cores" in which isoglosses crossed one another.
The "core" areas were situated around cultural and political
centres while "transitional" areas occurred at the borders
between these. Thus although this meant one could not ex­
actly speak of "dialects" one could with more justification
speak of "dialect areas", since the geographical configura-

1 LABOV (1972).
2 See LABOV's (1966) reference to the lower degree of sen­
sitivity of speakers to variation in initial th- than
to variation in the vowels eh and oh in New York speech.
p.85-113; p.91-93 especially.
29 Chapter 2

ation plainly reflected the spread of particular linguistic

features out from centres of influence into the intervening
areas. Therefore we are justified in talking of dialect
features of a particular area i.e. "northern" features or
"southern" features. We can also with reasonable justifica­
tion talk, for instance, of "core" northern dialects and
"core" southern dialects. Transitional dialects in such a
configuration would not be classified as of either type
primarily, but described purely as transitional types.
In our area of interest this type of approach gives a
highly satisfactory picture of the dialect distribution.
This is because the population distribution, as mentioned
before, is one of certain highly populated zones of sedentary
population separated by large intervening areas roamed by
nomadic tribes who, although extremely few in number, cover
immense geographical areas with great mobility. This means
that it is easy to talk of "core" dialect areas centred on
the main populated zones with transitional types at their
borders. The dialects of the nomads in turn can be related,
within a historical perspective of two to three hundred years,
to the population zones from which they originate. Typolog-
ically also we can distinguish between the isogloss structure
of the sedentary speech area and that of the nomads. As men­
tioned above, in areas of continuous settlement such as the
river valleys of Mesopotamia or bands of relatively closely
situated wells and settlements such as the central Najd area
or the Gulf coast, different dialect types blend into one
another without definite boundaries. This linguistic con­
figuration is parallel to the communication structure of such
areas, where people are in touch with neighbouring groups in
a continuous way across the landscape. With the nomads, on
the other hand, group identity and cohesiveness are much
stronger and tribal units cover a larger geographical area
although the numbers are probably less.(l) For this reason
actual tribal dialects are more easily discernible although
geographical and ethnic proximity between tribes is also
reflected in dialect similarities. If we examine the area
of southern Mesopotamia we find that the main factors cor­
relating with dialect identity are geographical location and
occupation, while different occupational groups may be united
in one overall tribal unit. Prime examples of this are the

1 Statistics on the actual numbers of members of nomadic

tribes are by the nature of their way of life difficult
to obtain and unreliable. However earlier writers such
as DOUGHTY (1924) p.427 and LORIMER (1908)passim, reflect
this numerical relationship. In the past the military
superiority of the bedouins has rested on mobility and
inaccessiveness rather than numerical superiority.
30 Chapter 2

Muntafiq and Bani Huchaim confederations of the lower Euphra­

tes near Samāwa and Nāsiriyya which include shepherd, sedent­
ary and semi-nomadic marshmen groups. In these areas the
main dialect division seems to be between marsh-dwellers
(Mi'dān) and other rural tribal groups whether primarily
shepherds (shāwiya) or settled agriculturalists (hadhar).
Factors involved in this are certain distinctive Mi'dān
characteristics such as the occurrence of /ž/ as a reflex
of OA j* rather than /y/ or /j/ and the occurrence of the
negative particle -š as in mūš "not",mā yfūtīš "it doesn't
pass".
For the main large bedouin tribes of the area on the other
hand dialect corresponds to tribe in an easily distinguish­
able way and can be related to the history of the migration
and ethnic makeup of the tribes. Going from north to south
along the Euphrates, the first, the Sba'a and 'Amārāt groups
of the 'Aniza, speak a Central Najdi type of dialect with
some northern characteristics.(1) South of these from Najaf
are the Shammar with their own distinctive North Najdi dia­
lect. South of these from around Samāwa are the Dhafīr with
a very mixed type of dialect, a combination of the North and
Central Najd type. South of these again from the Bātin de­
pression and in the vicinity of Kuwait are the Mutair, again
with a Central Najdi dialect but without the northern fea­
tures of the 'Aniza dialect. These linguistic characteris­
tics correspond closely to the original geographical location
of these tribes. The 'Aniza originate in western Najd in the
area of Khaibar and have spread out to the north of their
originally northeastern neighbours, the Shammar. The Dhafīr
are reputed to be of mixed origin combining Shammar and Cen­
tral Najdi elements with, it seems, a high degree of ex-slave
admixture who moved over to the south Euphrates in the early
19th century. The Mutair in turn moved over to eastern Ara­
bia from western Najd in the area of Madina in the 18th and
19th centuries. This type of close correspondence of dialect
grouping to ethnic origin irrespective of present geographi­
cal location is similar to the picture of dialect geography
held by the early neogrammarians, that of the "family tree"
or Stammbaum Theory. In this view, as expounded by A.
Schleicher, dialects are seen as moving through time and
space with groups of people. We have therefore a linguistic
mirror of the history of folk migration. The dialect geo­
graphy of the sedentary population on the other hand is
closer to the view presented by the "Wave Theory" (Wellen
Theorie) of J. Schmidt and G. Wenker, namely that the lin­
guistic features spread across geographical landscapes from
centres of importance irrespective of the original geograph-

1 The features distinguishing these various dialects are

described in detail in Chapter 7.
31 Chapter 2

ical or ethnic origin of the population concerned.(1) We

therefore have here an interesting example of how a different
history of population movement can produce different types of
linguistic landscape.

THE MULTIVALENCY OF DIALECT FEATURES

Within the basic framework of attributing social and geo­

graphical relevance to particular linguistic contrasts we
have to make the qualification that the relevance of a con­
trast may be different from place to place, i.e. the valency
of the contrast is stated for a particular sub-region of the
total area. A prime example of this is the contrast /j/ vs.
/y/ as a reflex of OA j* mentioned above. In the context of
Iraq the pronunciations /rayyāl/ "man" /yīb/ "bring" etc.
are a mark of southern and therefore Shi'a speech as opposed
to /rajjāl/ /jīb/ which are more characteristically Sunni
pronunciation. The fact that the Sunni population of Zubair
in southern Iraq and also Sunni speakers of Kuwait use the
/y/ pronunciation is within the Iraqi context generally un­
known or disregarded in the face of the predominant corres­
pondence of /y/ with Shi'a identity. In Kuwait on the other
hand and presumably also in the other Gulf states /y/ is the
predominant form and characterises the sedentary population
while / j / is the pronunciation of the bedouins whether no­
madic or settled. Similarly in southern Iraq the form /-u/
rather than /-ah/ for the pronominal suffix for "him" or
"his" is along the Euphrates taken as a "bedouin" character­
istic since the bedouin tribes of the area, namely Shammar,
Dhafir and other smaller tribes such as the Humaid and Rufai',
all show this form as opposed to the more usual southern
Iraqi /-ah/ .
Within Najd however this /-u/ pronunciation is of geo­
graphical significance marking North Najdi dialects in con­
trast to Central ones and is not relevant to the nomad vs.
sedentary division. Similarly in Kuwait the occurrence of
/-k/ as the form of the pronominal "you" or "your" masc.s.
is regarded as "bedouin" since it is characteristic of the
speech of some important bedouin tribes of the area, i.e.
Mutair and 'Ajmān, also to a lesser extent the 'Awāzim and
Rashāyida (see below, p.98.). Within Najd however the /-k/
form is geographically significant marking Central Najd and
al-Hasa vs. the northern area. In Bahrain a complete revers­
al obtains since this /-k/ form is characteristic of the
Shi'a population or Bahāma vs. the later Sunni arrivals.
Generally we see that what are geographically regional

1 See BYNON (1977) p.190-4 for a discussion of these

views.
32 Chapter 2

features within Arabia are transported with population move­

ments to the outer area and there acquire occupational or
social significance. This is a natural process insofar as
the outer lands are in general ignorant of the geography and
political divisions of Inner Arabia with which they have very
little contact. To the people of these areas the main func­
tional characteristic is that people coming from Inner Arabia
are "bedouins" and contrast with themselves in their way of
life. Within Arabia the contrast of nomad vs. sedentary is
in many areas less important. The important factor is
locality and tribal allegiance, since people will easily
move from a nomadic to a sedentary way of life and vice
versa(1) and dialect geography to a great extent reflects
this. The word "bedouin" in fact in Arabia means "member
of an established bedouin tribe" and does not necessarily
imply a nomadic life-style.

1 See KATAKURA (1977) for a detailed and revealing account

of this process, especially p.55-9.
3 Reductional changes in the
dialects of Mesopotamia and the
gulf

GENERAL

Comparison of the dialects of inner Arabia with those of the

outer fringe, namely Mesopotamia and the Gulf, reveals a
marked generalisation: that the outer dialects, and more
particularly those of Mesopotamia, have reduced a number of
contrasts still extant in the dialects of the interior.
These operate at the grammatical, morphological and phono­
logical levels, and in some cases, such as that of the verb
transitivity system, it may involve more than one level at a
time. In the main it is more accurate to regard the process
as one of simplification than one of reduction, since the
ability of the language to make grammatical distinctions is
not reduced, but the method of doing it is simplified. Il­
lustrative of this is the elimination of the so-called
"internal passive" in the outer dialects. In these the con­
trast between /nišad/ "he asked" and /nšid/ "he was asked"
is replaced by the forms/nišad/ "he asked" and /innišad/
"he was asked". Here the process of prefixing, which is the
more general verbal inflection process in the dialects, re­
places the process of internal vowel and syllable modifica­
tion, which is not present to the same degree elsewhere in
the verb system. The process of reduction can be seen to
proceed along the parameters of identification or contact
with the Najd or the outer regions, as outlined in Ch. 1.
In general the most conservative dialects are those of Najd,
whether of the Northern or Central type. Somewhat less con­
servative in some features are the dialects of the bedouin
of the Syrian desert, followed by the badiya dialects of
Iraq. The least conservative are those of the riverine
population of Iraq and the Gulf towns.
In some cases the features levelled are redundant(1)

1 The term redundant is used here in its technical sense,

meaning "not signalling a grammatical distinction ex­
clusively" .
33
34 Chapter 3

features, as in the case of the different morphological noun-

classes mentioned below (p.37) and in the simplification of
the syllable structure types by the introduction of an anap-
tyctic between the two elements of a final cluster, as shown
below (p.56f,60f). In others they are distinctive linguistic
features which are replaced by some other feature which is
of a type more extensively used within the language, such as
in the reduction of the internal passive and the indefinite
marker /-in/. Very rarely can it be said that a particular
grammatical term is lost, although in some cases marking of
it is lost in some word classes. In the case of the reduc­
tion of gender distinction in the plural, the verbal word
class ceases to show this distinction in some dialects.
The use of the terms reduction and levelling perhaps
necessitates some qualification. When one uses them in this
sense, one does not mean to imply that the capacity of the
language to express thought accurately is diminished. All
that is implied is that the number of types of grammatical
and phonological structures used to convey meaning is re­
duced. This process of reduction has been noted for a number
of languages and standard English is perhaps one of the most
well-documented examples.(1)
Compared to many English rural dialects, standard English
has undergone considerable reduction in the stressed vowel
system. Such reduction is in most cases correlated with
mobilisation of the population, or with the influx of foreign
groups into the speech community. The term mobilisation, as
used here, denotes the entry of elements from the whole pop­
ulation into the activities of the community.(2) In the case
in question we know that the Gulf ports, the area of Bahrain
and al-Hasa and the Shatt al-'Arab region have for a long
period been subject to immigration from central Arabia, from
the Syrian desert and also from Iran. In Khuzistan and
Bahrain, in particular, the Shi'a sect of Islam forms a link
with Iran. In addition, a tradition of one-way intermarriage
with the neighbouring Iranian populations is quite common
among the Khuzistan Arabs, in which Arab tribesmen take Per­
sian wives who are absorbed into the Arab population. It is
important to stress that bilingual, rather than inter-racial,
contact is the important factor here. Within central Arabia
a high degree of intermixture with the slave population of
African origin is present, although under somewhat restricted

1 See TRUDGILL & FOXCROFT (1978); also KURATH (1972) for

simplification in Afrikaans as compared to Standard
Dutch, p.116-18.
2 See in particular GUMPERZ (1962), p.36.
35 Chapter 3

conditions. However the slave(1) population speak only

"Arabic" with no discernible dialect difference, and no
linguistic effect is evident from this mixture. The actual
process by which language contact can lead to language change
has been described in detail by other writers.(2) Since no
actual comparison of bilingual and monolingual families was
made in connection with this research I do not go into this
here, but point only to the general correlation between lin­
guistic conservatism in stable populations and linguistic
levelling among populations of diverse origin. The two main
areas in which this levelling can be seen here are in the
verb transitivity system and in the reduction of the indefin­
ite nominal marker /-in/. These are dealt with in detail
below (pp.39-56). Certain other examples will now be given
briefly:
1 Phonological merger of certain consonant elements has
taken place in the periphery area and also in the dialect of
Mecca. In the dialects of the Gulf litoral and much of Khu-
zistan and southern Iraq, /j/ and /y/ have merged to /y/.
This is true in all of southern Iraq, up to about al-Batha
on the Euphrates and Kut on the Tigris, with the exception
of the speech of the marsh-dwellers of the Haur al-Huwaiza
and Haur al-Hammār, who have /ž/ for OA /j/.(3) Isolated
examples of this merger are also attested for the interior
in the dialect of al-Hauta south of Riyadh and in the speech
of the Sardiyya of the Syrian desert.(4)

Examples:
Retaining System Merged System
(Central Najd) (S. Iraq)
yōm yōm "day "
yimīn yimīn "right"
yamm- yamm- "beside"
jāb yāb "he brought"
jimal yimal "camel"
jibal yibal "mountain"

In the dialect of the al-Hasa region and in the Shi'a dialect

1 The word "slave" is used here in direct translation of

Arabic /'abd/ which is synonymous with "negro" and implies
people of slave ancestry in Arabia, many of whom hold high
social and financial status.
2 See in particular WEINREICH (1970) passim, but especially
p.14-71.
3 JOHNSTONE (1967b) p.9-11; INGHAM (1976) p.67.
4 CANTINEAU (1937) p.137.
 36

land above 200 m

/y/
/ž /
/j/
outer limit of /j/
N
'Kerbala 0 50 100
Hilla
Chapter 3

Kūt kms
direction of spring migration

Naiaf,
Diwāniyya
Amāra
•Bisaitin
Susangard

Salām
Huwaiza Kūt Sayyid 'Anāya
Shatra
Rufai' Ahwāz
Humaid
Samāwa
Budūr
Bātha Ālbu Sālih, Fuhūd
Māya Chibāyish

Khafāva
Sūq al Shuyūkh al-Tumar
Shādigān
Budūr
Basra
Rufai
Humaid Zubair Abbādān
Dhafir
Mut.a i r Fāu

Approximate Distribution of / y / and /ž /as

Failika
reflexes of Classical jim at the North of the Gulf
Kuwait ,

MAP 3: APPROXIMATE DISTRIBUTION OF /y/ and /ž/.

37 Chapter 3

of Bahrain(1) /d/ and / d/ have merged to /d/ while /t/ and

/f/ have merged to /f/. Similarly in the dialect of Mecca(2)
where again considerable immigration from outside Arabia has
occurred the mergers /d/ and // to /d/, and /t/ and /t/ to
/t/ have taken place.

Examples:
Retaining System Merged System
(Central Najd) (Meccan) (Shi'a Bahrain)
talātah talāta falāfeh "three"
tāni tāni fāni "second"
tizīl tagīl fagī1 "heavy"
dūn dūn dūn "near to.."
bidāl bidāl bidāl "instead of
hāda hāda hāde "this"
axad axad axad "he took"

2 In a particular set of nouns reduction of morphological

classes has taken place in the extreme Mesopotamian type,
whereas in the Najdi type a more complex system is maintained.
In the marginal Mesopotamian types also the more complex sys­
tem is maintained. This set of contrasts obtains for nouns
relatable to OA forms of the type: /fa'ala, fa'la, fi'la/ and
/fu'la/. In the Najdi type, the class fa'la has split into
/fa'la/ and /f'ala/, while /fa'ala/ has become /f'ila/.
/fi'la/ and /fu'la/ remain, although the contrast of /i/ and
/u/ is now phonologically conditioned. In the Mesopotamian
type /fa'ala/ has merged with the /fi'la, fu'la/ type, while
the /fa'la/ type remains undifferentiated.

Examples:
Najdi Type Mesopotamian Type
tfuga tufga "rifle"
wruga wurga "leaf"
rguba rugba "neck"
gsuba gusba "reed/ rifle barrel"
grufa gurfa "room"
mruga "stew"
htuba "firewood"
šbića šibča "bird trap"
hurma hurma "woman"
fikra fikra "thought"
turba turba "earth"
zibda zibda "cream"
'idla 'idla "basket"

1 PROCHAZKA (to appear).

2 INGHAM (1971) p.273.
38 Chapter 3

ghawa gahwa "coffee"

n'aja na'ya "ewe"
nxawa naxwa "call for help"
shala "pot"
nxala naxla "palm tree"
lgaha "pregnant camel"
šagla šagla "work"
šanta šanta "suitcase"

3 In certain areas of the periphery, and also in certain

large urban centres, the distinction of masculine and femin­
ine in the 2nd and 3rd persons plural of the verbal and pro­
nominal system is lost. Material for Iraq, Khuzistan, Kuwait
and Northern Najd showed that the distinction was maintained
almost everywhere, except in the urban centres of Zubair,
Kuwait, Basra and Baghdad. Prochazka's material for Shi1a
Bahraini and al-Hasa, and my own from the dialect of Mecca,
also showed the reduced system. The affixes and pronouns
concerned are shown below:

Retaining System

ktib-aw ktib-an
"they (m) wrote" "they (f) wrote"
kitab-tu kitab-tin
"you (m p) w r o t e " "you (f p) wrote"

yaktibun yaktibin
"they (m) write" "they (f) write"
taktibun taktibin
"you (m p) write" "you (f p) write"

ikitbu ikitbin
"write! (mp)" "write! (f p ) "

intu/intam /intaw intin/intan

"you (m p subj)" "you (f p subj)"
hum hin
"they (m)" "they (f)"
-kum/kam -kin/cin/čan
"you (m p obj)" "you (f p obj)"
39 Chapter 3

Reduced System

kitb-aw kitabtu
"they (m/f) wrote" "you (m/f p) wrote"

ykitbūn tkitbūn
"they (m/f) write" "you (m/f p) write"

kitbu intu
"write! (m/f p)" "you (m/f p subj)"

hum -kum
"they (m/f)" "you (m/f p obj)"

The independent pronouns and objective suffixes are somewhat

more resilient than the verbal subject affixes, and in some
varieties these remain while the latter are collapsed.(1)

4 In some dialects of southern Iraq, Khuzistan and

Bahrain there is a tendency to reduce the four morphological
form classes of the perfective of verbs. Preceding certain
subject suffixes a vowel /-ē-/ is inserted, while with the
geminate verb class a vowel /-ā-/ precedes object suffixes
with the third person singular. Both these features assimil­
ate the Strong, Hollow and Geminate verb classes to the Final
Weak Class.(2) This type of system is attested for the dia­
lects of the Shatt al-'Arab and for the Shi'a dialect of
Bahrain.

Examples:
Retaining System Reduced System
Strong: kitabt kitbēt "I wrote"
Hollow: nimt nāmēt "I slept"
Final Weak: ligēt ligēt "I found"
Geminate: šaddih šaddāh "he tied it"
Final Weak: ligāh ligāh "he found it"

THE VERB TRANSITIVITY SYSTEM

The old Arabic verb showed a system of stem vowel alternation

which marked the active and passive voice distinction and
also, in a somewhat less consistent way, the transitivity
characteristics of the verb marking transitive, intransitive
and causative types. In its classical form this is marked

1 JOHNSTONE (1967b), p.41.

2 INGHAM (1973) p.544; JOHNSTONE (1967b) p. 92;
PROCHAZKA (to appear).
40 Chapter 3

mainly by vowel quality, but also involves syllable struct-

ure. The traditional interpretation separates the active/
passive system from the transitive/intransitive/causative;
since the first is regarded as being more strictly "grammati-
cal" and applicable to any verb, while the second can be
treated as a system of lexical derivation, since in many
cases semantic modifications are also involved. This system
can be illustrated by the following verb items:

Transitive Verb Type

katab "he wrote" yaktub "he writes"
kutib "it was written yuktab "it is written"

Intransitive Verb Type

sami' "he heard" yasma' "he hears"
sumi' "it was heard" yusma' "it is heard"

Causative Verb Type

asma' "he caused someone to hear"
yusmi ' "he causes someone to hear"
usmi' "he was caused to hear"

The verbs showing the pattern / a - a / , like katab, are fully

transitive, while those showing the pattern /a-i/ or /a-u/
may be intransitive: like /sa'id/ "he ascended", /dabut/ "it
became firm"; or may express states or processes of sensory
perception: like /sami'/ "he heard", /'alim/ "he found out".
Here the subject is involved as the patient, or undergoer, of
the action rather than as a strict actor.
The dialects of the Najd have preserved this old Arabic
system to a great extent, while those of Mesopotamia have
shown a tendency to level them, cutting out these distinc-
tions as shown by the vowel pattern. Passivity and causa-
tivity are shown in these dialects by means of other morpho-
logical features connected with the "Measure" system of the
verb. Various intermediate types are distinguishable, pre-
serving part of the system. The degree of retention corres-
ponds, to a large extent, with the degree of contact with
Central Najd. Here the dialects of Qasīm (Midhnab) in Najd
and the Shatt al-'Arab in Mesopotamia are taken as extreme
types.(1)

1 In the following account of the verbal systems not all

forms are given since the remaining forms can be predicted
from those shown, l.e.nšidaw "they (m) asked", nšidan
"they (f) asked", nišadti "you (f s) asked", nišadtu "you
(m p) asked", nišadtin "you (f p) asked", nanšid "we ask",
tanšdūn "you (m p) ask", tanšdin "you (f p) ask".
41 Chapter 3

QASĪM
Transitive Verb Type

Active Passive
nišad "he asked" nšid "he was asked"
nšidat "she asked" nišdat "she was asked"
nišadt "I asked" nšidt "I was asked"
nišadna "we asked" nišidna "we were asked"
yanšid "he asks" yinšad "he is asked"
tanšid "she asks" tinšad "she is asked"
anšid "I ask" inšad "I am asked"
yanšdūn "they (m) ask" yinšdōn "they (m) are asked"
yanšdin "they (f) ask" yinšdan "they (f) are asked"

Causative Verb Type

ablaš "he involved somebody in something"

ablišat "she involved somebody in something"
ablašt "I involved somebody in something"
ablašna "we involved somebody in something"
yibliš "he involves somebody in something"
tibliš "she involves somebody in something"
abliš "I involve somebody in something"
yibilšūn "they (m) involve somebody in something"
yibilšin "they (f) involve somebody in something"

Intransitive Verb Type

Active Passive
simi' "he heard" smi' "he was heard"
sam'at "she heard" sim'at "she was heard"
simi't "I heard" smi't "I was heard"
simi'na "we heard" smi'na "we were heard"
yasma' "he hears" yisma' "he is heard"
tasma' "she hears" tisma' "she is heard"
asma' "I hear" isma' "I am heard"
yasma'ūn "they (m) hear" yisma'ōn "they (m) are heard"
yasma'in "they (f) hear" yisma'an "they (f) are heard"

A property of this system is that a certain approximation

obtains between the Passive and Intransitive patterns in the
perfective, reflecting their semantic relationship as both
involving a non-active subject. The resemblance is particu-
larly close with the first and second persons, where they are
separated only by the presence of one unstressed /i/, i.e.
/simi't/ "I heard", /smi't/ "I was heard". In certain mar-
ginal types there is identity of form between these two (cf
p.49 below).
42 Chapter 3

SHATT AL-'ARAB

Active(1) Passive
nišad "he asked" innišad "he was asked"
nišdat "she asked" innišdat "she was asked"
nišadt "I asked" innišadt "I was asked"
nišadna "we asked" innišadna "we were asked"
yinšid "he asks" yinnišid "he is asked"
("you (m s) ask" ("you(m s) are asked"
tinšid ("she asks" tinnišid ("she is asked"
anSid "I ask" annišid "I am asked"
ynišdūn "they (m) ask" yinnišdūn "they (m) are asked"
ynišdan "they (f) ask" yinnišdan "they (f) are asked"

As can be seen from the above examples, in the Najdi type,

the patterns /nšidat/ and /nišdat/ have quite different
functions: one being active, the other passive. Also, the
imperfective patterns /yaf'il; yif'al/ and /yif'il/ mark
active, passive and causative. In the extreme Mesopotamian
type these internal vowel and syllabication contrasts are
collapsed. Certain Mesopotamian perfective active forms
such as /nišdat, nišdawr nišdan/ resemble the corresponding
Najdi passive forms. Further, in the imperfective the vowel
of the stem is always /if/ or /a/, depending on certain
phonological factors. This means that forms of the type
/yif'al/ and /yif'il/ are both plain active with the vowel
alternation being non-functional.
In the Mesopotamian type the passive function is served by
the addition of the prefix in- to the stem. This prefix
/in-/ is the mark of the seventh Measure. These "Measures"
are forms showing modifications of the basic verb meaning.
In all of these the modification is signalled by the addition
of some consonant element, or by the lengthening of an exist­
ing consonant or vowel. The more common verbal Measures are
illustrated below as extant in the Mesopotamian type.(2)

Measure
1 fi'al yif'il
nišad yinšid "to ask"

1 The Intransitive verb follows the same pattern as the

Transitive in this system, i.e. sima', sim'at, sima't.
2 The numbering of these Measures follows the traditional
numbering employed in Classical Arabic Grammar. Measure
4 - / a f ' a l yif'il/ - does not occur in the variety shown
here.
43 Chapter 3

2 fa"al yfa,"il
dawwax ydawwix "to confuse"

3 fā'al yfā'il
hārab yhārub "to fight"

5 tfa"al yitfa' 'al

tkattar yitkattar "to increase"

6 tfā'al yitfā'al
tbādal yitbādal "to exchange"

7 nfi'al yinfi'il
nnišad yinnišid "to be asked"

8 fta'al yifti'il
ntišal yintišil "to catch a cold"

9 fall yif'all
xraff yixraff "to panic

10 istaf'al yistaf'il
istafham yistafhim "to enquire"

The meaning of Measure 7 in Classical Arabic is said to have

been "reflexive"; however, it has clearly always had passive
connotations. In Classical Arabic and modern Najdi speech
the internal (vowel marked) passive serves as the basic pro­
ductive passive form. Measure 7 is restricted to certain
roots only, forming specific verbal items with passive or
intransitive connotation, such as /inqalab/ "to be turned
over", /inkasar/ "to be broken", /insahab/ "to retreat",
/intalaq/ "to go out".
In the Mesopotamian varieties, this has become a product­
ive passive form, also having the connotation of "possible"
or "-able" in such structures as /yinšāf/ "it is visible",
/mā yinšāf/ "it is invisible", /yingiri/ "it is legible".
The /in-/ prefix is also attached to the other measures
giving compound forms of the type /mā yinhārab wiyyāh/ "he
cannot be fought with", /mā yinsōlaf wiyyāh/ "he cannot be
spoken with".
The move from the use of the internal vowel marked trans-
itivity system to the use of the Measure 7 prefix /in-/ as
the passive marker can be considered as a process of simpli-
fication. In the internally marked system the vowelling of
all verbal forms except the Transitive Active type has to be
stated as phonologically basic for the form. Only in the
44 Chapter 3

Transitive Active form can the vowelling of many forms be

stated as derivable according to the rules of verb phonology.
Further, it stands out as exceptional in being the only word
class in which internal short vowels are grammatically dis­
tinctive. In the typical Mesopotamian system the vowelling
can, to a great extent, be stated as a part of the phonologi-
patterning of words in general, and the grammatical marking
of the passive is effected by prefixing which is the main
verbal marking system. The simplification, therefore, lies
in the following factors:
1 Reduction of the features specified as underlying in
the phonology, reducing much of the vowel phonology to the
level of surface derivation.
2 Reduction of the number of verbal form classes: the
original Transitive - Intransitive - Passive - Causative
system being reduced to Active - Passive.
3 Analogical levelling of the morphology of the verbal
grammar: internal vowel change being eschewed in favour of
the more universal consonantal prefixing.
4 Simplification of the number of possible syllabic
structures for verbal forms. This factor cuts across the
verb/noun word class division. Its result is the elimination
of structures of the type CCV(C(V(C))); i.e. those with an
initial consonant cluster followed by a stressed short vowel.
In the extreme Mesopotamian type this structure occurs only
in a very few words, and is regarded as a mark of rural ori­
gin. The following list gives examples of the Najdi type
contrasted with the extreme Mesopotamian type, i.e. that of
the urban and some of the riverine population.

Najdi Mesopotamian
nšidat nišdat "she asked"
nšidaw nišdaw "they (m) asked"
nšidan nišdan "they (f) asked"
nšidih nišadah "he asked him"
rguhah rugba "neck"
xšibah xišbah "piece of wood"
wlidi waldi "my son"
wlidih waldah "his son"

A considerable number of tribal names of this pattern also

occur in Najdi dialects, which of course have no equivalent
in the Mesopotamian. Of these may be cited /'nizah, rwugah,
'bidah, hsinah, sba'ah, xrusah/. There is some reason for
thinking that structures of this type which distinguish the
speech of Najd from other neighbouring areas, i.e. the west
(Hijaz) and the north (Syria and Mesopotamia), may have been
reinforced as a marker of Arabian identity.
45 Chapter 3

Geographical Distribution of Transitivity Systems

As stated before, the full system outlined above is preserved

to a greater or lesser degree in Najdi speech. Between this
and the reduced Mesopotamian type there are various intermed­
iary grades. The clinal nature of this contrast operates
along a number of different parameters:
1 The use of the passive may be confined to the third
person, or to the perfective tense.
2 The use of the passive may be reduced stylistically and
become confined only to formal styles, such as narrative and
poetry.
3 The passive and intransitive forms may show partial
merger, becoming formally indistinguishable in certain per­
sons. Similarly, the intransitive and transitive may merge
in the imperfective, both showing the prefix /yi-/.
4 The passive, and also the causative, may become lexi­
cally reduced, occurring in only a number of lexical items.
They then lose their grammatical significance as a form, and
become purely somewhat irregular lexical items.
The following remarks on the distribution of these forms
are, of necessity, somewhat incomplete, since they cover only
the groups for whom material is available. However, they do
show a definite correlation between maintenance of the old
system and Najdi identity. Further, the material can only
be considered as a sample of the whole dialect, showing a
leaning towards the use of these forms or a relative reduc­
tion of them. The dialects can be grouped in terms of this
type of variation into the following types:

Type 1

This is attested for Shammar, Sudair and Midhnab, and largely

confirmed by Abboud's and Prochazka's material from Hail and
Johnstone's material from 'Anaiza.
In these dialects the internal passive was at least poten­
tially fully productive for all verb Measures of all classes,
and the paradigms for these were easily elicited. Sudair
also shows a very regular use of the internal passive. Here,
however, the vowel of the imperfective prefix is /i/, with
stems in /a/, giving such forms as /nifham/ "we understand",
/nit'an/ "we strike" and /yilbas/ "he dresses". This means
that the active and passive of such verbs are identical in
form. These forms are, nevertheless, used with passive
function; the passivity being apparent from collocation and
context.(1) Such examples as the following illustrate this:

1 Another example of this sort of phonological merger in

the speech of 'Asir was given to me by T. Prochazka:
/šifthum ušift/ "I saw them and was seen". Similarly, I
46 Chapter 3

/halmawgū' lāzim yibhat/ "this matter must be investigated",

/haćyuhun mā yifham abad/ "their talk cannot be understood at
all". Here the verbal form /yif'al/ is used with the passive
function, while the same form is active in such cases as
/yibga/ "he remains", /yiftah/ "he opens", /yinsa/ "he for­
gets", /tigdar/ "you are able", /nilga/ "we find", /tisrab/
"you drink", /nitla'/ "we go out", /nidhar/ "we go out in the
evening", /nisma1/ "we hear", /yislah/'"it is right",
/yitbax/ "he cooks".
Having said that in these dialects the passive is fully
productive for all persons, it must be mentioned that by far
the most common use is with third persons. The forms for the
other persons were readily given by my informants, but occur
quite rarely in material as non-elicited forms, except in
poetry and set phrases.
The only non-elicited first person passive was in an ac­
count of a dream: /šift nafsi agawwad firriyād/ "I saw myself
being led to execution in Riyadh", and /ti'iddīt/ "I was of­
fended" (Shammar). Elicited examples included: /mita jībīt/
(1) "when were you born" (Shammar), /abinšad 'ank/ "I will be
asked about you" (Midhnab), / idā nišidt 'anna/ "if you are
asked about us" (Shammar), /gilibt/ "you were deceived"
(Shammar). Non-elicited third person passives were, however,
far more frequent. The following are representative exam­
ples: /wildat/ "it (f) was born", /dbih/ "he was killed",
/binyat albeit/ "the tent was built", /wiš yigāl-lu/ "what
is it called", /sillih/ "it has been repaired", /yuxad/ "it
is taken", /mā yilga/ "it is not found", /rubtat/ "it (f) was
tied up", /dibhaw/ "they (m) were killed", /wiźźfat u
tirkat/ "it (f) was stopped and deserted", /guwwid/ "he was
led to execution" (Shammar), /yibgā-lih/ "it is required for
it", /širyat/ "it was bought", /rikkib/ "it was assembled",
/xillus/ "it was finished", /suwwiyat/ "it was done", /mā
yšāl/ "it cannot be lifted", /mā yidra 'awāgbih/ "its results
are not known" (Sudair.).
The intransitive and causative conjugations are also fully
operative in these dialects. The following examples are not
differentiated for tribe or locality, but would seem to be
general for this group.(2) The examples are given in the

have heard a Sudairi rendering of the well-known gaslda of

Sājir al-Rfidi as /nit'an u nit'an/ "we strike and are
struck at". In the 'Anizi dialect of the composer the two
forms would be differentiated as /nap'an u nit 'an/.
1 Contrast 'Anizi (Sba'a) /wēn jābakk ummak/ "where did your
mother bear you", where the passive is avoided for the
second person.
2 The forms would apply to all dialects with the exception
of that of Sudair in the case of the Imperfective Transi­
tive in cases where the vowel of the stem is /a/.
47 Chapter 3

third person masculine singular. In the intransitive the

vowel of the second syllable is /i/ or /u/, depending on the
factors mentioned earlier. The vowel of the first syllable
is / i / , except in the environment of the gutturals or preced­
ing / l / , /n/ or / r / , with some exceptions.(1)

Intransitive

galut ygalut "to make a mistake"

nisi yansa "to forget"
tili' yatla' "to come out"
rićib yarćab "to mount"
sidig "he was truthful"
fihim yafham "to understand"
širib yašrab "to drink"
gidir yagdar "to be able"
libis yalbas "to get dressed"
ćibir yakbar "to grow"
nizil yanzal "to descend"
ti'ib yat'ab "to tire"
halim yhalim "to dream"

Causative

ag'ad yig'id "to wake"

anbat yinbit "to make something grow"
adra yidri(2) "to make someone know"
asga yisgi "to water"
ablaš yibliš "to cause someone to be involved"
amda yimdi "to allow"(3)
axbar yixbir "to inform"
arćab yircib "to cause to mount"
adrak yidrik "to understand" (Sudair)
asbah yisbih "to be in the morning"(4)
a'bhar yibhir "to spice"
akram yikrim "to treat kindly"
abga yibgi "to make someone remain"
aflah yiflih "to enjoy oneself"
aš'ar yiš'ir "to make someone feel"
adneih tidni "to bear (a child)" (Shammar)

1 See also JOHNSTONE (1967b), Appendix 1.

2 Occurring in the expression /wis yidrik/ "how do you know,
what makes you know?".
3 Impersonal verb, occurring in such expressions as /yimdik/
"can you?", /mā yimdīni/ "I cannot", and /mā amdāni/ "I
couldn't".
4 Certain of these forms do not have causative significance;
cf p. 50 below.
48 Chapter 3

Type 2

This type comprises the speech of the Sba'a informants inter­

viewed, from whom quite substantial data was obtained. Cer­
tain other groups interviewed seemed to have a similar sys­
tem. However for these slightly less data was available and
therefore the classification is less conclusive. These are
the other 'Aniza groups, namely 'Amārāt and 'Awāja; also the
Dhafīr. The system for Type 2 is identical with Type 1, ex­
cept that the internal passive is confined to the third per­
son except in certain set phrases and in poetry. The follow­
ing Perfective passives are from the Sba'a unless otherwise
marked. Examples are given showing masculine and feminine
singular:

dbih dibhat "he/she was killed"

drib dirbat "he/she was beaten"
šrib širbat "it (m/f) was drunk"
ćtil citlat "he/she was killed"
gdir gidrat "he/she was deceived"
smi' sim'at "he/she was heard"
ksir kisrat "it (m/f) was broken"
wćil wićlat "it (m/f) was eaten"
tirkat "it (f) was deserted"
šīf šīfat "he/she was seen"
hći 'alēha "she was spoken about"
rmi rimyat "he/she was shot"
lźi liźyat "it (m/f) was found"
bni binyat "it (m/f) was built"

Imperfect examples were fewer, namely: /yūxad/ "it is taken",

/yūkal/ "it is eaten" (Dhafīr) , and /ysamm/ "he is poisoned"(l)
This slightly reduced system is consistent with the posi­
tion of the groups mentioned who are emigree Najdi popula­
tions living in the Syrian desert, in closer contact with the
settled populations of the outer areas.(2)

Type 3

The basic characteristics of this type are that the internal

passive is lost except in a very few special usages and in

1 This occurs in the common ritual exchange /samm!/ "Call

(on God)/", /'aduwwak ysamm/ "May your enemy be poisoned",
appropriate on offering coffee to a guest.
2 In Landberg's 'Aniza material only two examples of the in­
ternal passive occur, namely /dibih/ "he was killed"
(/dibeh/ in his notation) and /wussfat/ "it was described".
(1919)p.14-72. Examples of the Intransitive and Causative
conjugations are fairly common, such as /a'rad/(p.14),
/rićib diri diryat/(p7),/biźi biźyat/(p6),/ćībir/(pl).
49 Chapter 3

narrative and poetry; also there is partial or total merger

of the transitive and intransitive conjugations in the Imper-
fective. Here we have to consider two subtypes, a Najdi and
a Mesopotamian one, based on the morphology of the imperfec-
tive causing this merger. However, functionally they are
very similar. This type is shown in the speech of the Meso­
potamian nomadic groups investigated, namely the Humaid,
Rufai', Budūr shepherds and Kawāwila; also the Bani Khalid
and the Gulf dialects investigated, namely Kuwait town,
Jahra, Zubair and Failika island. On the basis of John­
stone's Gulf material(1) and Meissner's material from Hilla,
it would seem to be general for the Gulf coast with the ex­
ception perhaps of al-Hasa, for which our information is
limited, and for large areas of rural southern Mesopotamia.
In this type Transitive and Intransitive are distinguished
in the Perfective; however the Intransitive and the passives
occurring in the same strong verb classes are identical, re­
sulting in a functional eclipse of the passive as a separate
type.(2) Examples:

Transitive (General)

kitab ktibat "he/she wrote"

kisar ksirat "he/she broke"
sahab shabat "he/she pulled"
nišad nšidat "he/she asked"

Intransitive/Passive

Kuwait:
simi' sim'at "he/she heard"
š i r i b širbat "he/she drank"
wisil wislat "he/she arrived"
fihim fihmat "he/she understood"

Humaid, Rufai':
ričib ričbat "he/she mounted"
wirid wirdat "it (m/f) came to water"
libis libsat "he/she got dressed"
wisil wislat "he/she arrived"
čibir čibrat "he/she grew up"

1 See particularly 1967b p.41-43.

2 The examples of the passive obtained were the following:
Kuwaiti: /wilid wildat/ "he/she was born", /xilig xilgat/
"he/she was born"; Mesopotamian Kawāwila : /čitil/ "he
was killed", /gidir/ "he was deceived", /ruwā-li/ "there
was seen by me (a dream)", /wilid wildat/ is marginal,
and could be regarded as Intransitive depending on wheth­
er or not a form /wlidat/ "she bore" exists.
50 Chapter 3

In the Imperfective the Mesopotamian type and the Bani Khālid

show the vowel / i/ in the prefix in all cases. In the Kuwait
type there is dissimilation of stem and prefix vowel, giving
two types: /yif'al/ and /yaf'il/- The vowel of the stem is
/i/ except where the stem involves one of the gutturals as
second or third radical. Compare the following:(1)

Mesopotamian and Bani Khālid Kuwait

yinšid yanšid "he asks

yiksir yaksir "he breaks"
yidri yadri "he knows"
yibči yabči "he cries"
yirbut yarbut "he ties up"
yitbax yitbax "he cooks"
yiftah yiftah "he opens"
yitla' yitla' "he comes out"
yirja' yirja' "he returns"

A slightly more reduced, but related, system was recorded for

the Kawāwila or gypsies of Iraq. This showed complete merger
of transitive and intransitive in the perfective, giving
/sima' sma'at/ "he/she heard", /širab šrubat/ "he/she drank",
etc. for the intransitive items. This would seem to be also
true of the Gulf dialects for some speakers, and a situation
of instability exists as regards these forms.(2)
The position of the causative was not plain for the dia­
lects in this system. The speech of the Humaid and Rufai'
showed the item /amrah yimrih/ "to rest in the evening",
Meissner's material also shows some examples.
The speech of the Kawāwila showed /agma 'al- / "to faint",
/agbal/ "he approached", /adbar/ "he went" and /aslah/ "he
was encouraged". In the Mesopotamian type the Causative
could only be distinguished in the Perfective, since in the
Imperfective the prefix distinction /ya-, yi-/ is no longer
present, all the verbs showing /yi-/.
In the Gulf dialects, since the vowel /a/ is preserved for
prefixes of the Imperfective, a number of examples of the
Causative conjugation are found.(3)
Examples: /axbar yixbir/ "to inform", /arsal yirsil/ "to
send", /asbah yisbih/ "to be in the morning", /amsa yimsi/
"to spend the night", /axla yixlij "to destroy".

1 A certain amount of variation occurs with a number of

items, particularly /yig'ad yag'id/ "he sits", /yitbax
yatbux/ "he cooks", /yinzal yanz.il/ "he descends".
2 JOHNSTONE (1967b), p.42.
3 Ibid., p.73, 79.
51 Chapter 3

Type 4

This type is attested for the Shatt al-'Arab, southern Khu-

zistan and the larger settlements and towns of southern
Iraq. This is basically the type represented by standard
Baghdad colloquial, although differing from it in terms of
features not connected with the transitivity systems. In
this system, as shown above, distinctions of transitivity
are dealt with within the verbal Measures system, using con­
sonantal morphology. The causative is expressed by Measure
II using gemination of the medial radical. The distinction
of transitive and intransitive is not morphologically marked
in the verb, all verbs being of the pattern /fi'al yif'il/
or /yif'al/.(l) Verbs which in the other dialect types have
the form /af'al yif'il/ are either not extant or use the
forms /fi'al yif'al/ or the Measure II, /fa''al yfa''il/.
Examples:

Najdi Mesopotamian
akram karram "he treated kindly"
ablaš ballaš "to involve"
arkab rakkab "to cause to mount"(2)
ag'ad ga''ad "to waken"
axbar xabbar "to inform"
asga siga "to water"

Summary

The above shows a definite correlation between geographical

and ethnic closeness with the populations of central Arabia,
and preservation of the system of transitivity as marked by
internal vocalisation. Within Mesopotamia nomadic popula­
tions, or those more recently sedentarised such as the
Kawāwila and bādiya population, show a higher degree of con­
servatism in this respect. The dialects of the Gulf area
are in general closer than those of Mesopotamia to the Najd.(3)

1 In some marginal types, verbs of the form /fa'al/ are en­

countered as in Types 1-3, the vowel being determined by
phonological factors; see JOHNSTONE (1967b) p.257,
INGHAM (1973) p.540.
2 In the Najdi type /rakkab/ means"to mount or erect" a
thing on another, ie "to fix, build". In the Mesopotamian
type it has both the constructional and the equestrian
meaning of "mount".
3 However, as Johnstone mentions, the dialect of the Shi'a
population of Bahrain shows a similarity to the Mesopotam­
ian type in a number of respects (1967b, p.92-94). The
dialect of Bahrain has no /af'al yif'il/ form and shows
/yif' il/ for /yaf' il/ in some varieties.
TABLE 1: INTERNAL VOWEL MORPHOLOGY OF THE VERB AND POPULATION GROUPS
52

Najd settled Euphrates

population & Sba'a & Gulf bedouin & Mesop. Mesop. Me sop.
Shammar bedouin DhafIr States shepherds KawSwila badiya hadhar
Internal Passive
Chapter 3

1st & 2nd persons

dbiht, dbihna etc.
Internal Passive sporad­
sporad­
3rd person ically ically
dbih, dibhat etc.
Intransitive
Perfective
simi',sim'at or sam'at
Causative
Imperfective
yismi', tismi' etc.
Causative
Perfective
asma', asmi'at etc.
Transitive
of the form
fi'al, f'ilat
Transitive
of the form
fi'al, fi'lat
53 Chapter 3

Table 1 shows the distribution of the different morpholog­

ical forms for the main population groupings. The Mesopotam-
ian bādiya and hadhar groups show functionally the same sys­
tem, having only one verb class. However, the bādiya popula­
tion in some cases show the pattern /fi'al f'ilat/ as the
form of the verb corresponding to the Najdi type which has
/fi'al f'ilat/ as the major type.

The Noun Indefinite Marker

In Classical Arabic a system of indefinite marking existed

associated also with the case system. Indefinite nouns,
adjectives, and particles took the endings -un (nominative),
-an (accusative), -in (genitive). These collectively were
referred to as tanwīn(adding the letter nūn "n"). The def­
inite noun added the article al- and dropped the n of the
ending. This produces the following paradigm:

nom. kitābun alkitābu

acc. kitāban "a book" alkitāba "the book"
gen. kitābin alkitābi

In pausal position the case endings -un, -ant -in, or -u,

-a, -i were freely elidible giving kitāb and alkifāb. in the
modern dialects the case distinctions have been completely
lost. The distinction between definite and indefinite is,
however, retained. In the majority of dialects outside the
Arabian Peninsula the distinction is born purely by the
presence or absence of the definite article al-, the indef­
inite being formally "unmarked". In some areas of central
Arabia however a modified form of indefinite marking is re­
tained. In this system one suffix -in (1) remains to mark
the indefinite with, however, no distinction of case. The
occurrence of this marker is governed by syntactic, grammat­
ical and stylistic factors and not all nouns lacking the def­
inite article al- show the suffix -in. Therefore the present
system may be represented as:

definite: alkitāb "the book"

indefinite: kitābin or kitāb "a book"

The factors governing the occurrence of this marker are not

altogether clear. However it is plain that certain syntactic
structures favour its occurrence without regard to semantic
considerations of "definiteness" and "indefiniteness" in any
general sense. In other cases also the marker has an ad­
verbial function reminiscent of the accusative ending -an in
Classical Arabic. The only case in which it may be that the
1 Phonetically /-in/, /-un/ or /- n/ depending on the pre­
ceding consonant. See also p.xvii.
54 Chapter 3

occurrence of the marker signals some measure of "indefinite-

ness" or "vagueness" in a semantic sense is where a noun
occurs as the sole constituent of a nominal phrase. In this
case it seems that the occurrence of -in signals something of
the semantic value of "a certain...", "a particular...", i.e.
one single but undefined member of a class, whereas the ab­
sence of the marker means purely "a member of the class in
general", as in the following two sentences:
(a) nidawwir sāyig
"we are looking for a driver
(b) lig ēna saygin ... wlidin harbi
"we found a driver ... a Harbi boy"
In the example (b) a particular member of the class of "dri­
vers" is referred to known to the speaker, but unknown to
the addressee. In the first sentence the class of "drivers"
in general is referred to; any driver will be sufficient and
no specifications are made. It must be said however that it
is difficult to establish this since numerous exceptions
occur and perhaps even more importantly because the occur­
rence of -in seems to be a definite marker of Najd/bedouin
identity and is thus socio-symbolic. In certain contexts
the occurrence of -in may therefore be increased in order to
emphasise this social identity. For the moment, if we dis­
regard semantic and socio-symbolic factors, syntactic struc­
tures favouring the ending -in are the following:(1)
1 Nouns followed by a qualifying element which may be an
adjective, a verb phrase, or a sequence of preposition and
pronoun suffix. Examples:
ma yhāćlna alia bnafsin šēn
"he only talks to us with an unpleasant expression"
rūtinin m'ayyan
"a definite routine"
mat'amin tāni
"another restaurant"
nōbtin tānya
"another time"
ma'raktin tuwila
"a long battle"
'ala mōgfin ābit
"in a firm position"
rifīizin-li
"a friend of mine"
jiz'in minh
"a part of it"
fodan mā-lih taraf
"chaos unlimited"

1 CANTINEAU (1937) p.204-5, gives almost the same environ­

ments, but differently grouped. Compare also BLANC (1970)
p.143 [32].
55 Chapter 3

azmitin mā lib. taraf

"an extreme crisis"
kalmitin gālōhāli
"a word which they had said to me"
mištāgin-lik
"anxious (to see) you"
mā fīh hadin jayyin
"there is no one coming"
haguwtin-li
"a thought of mine" (Sudair)
bīrin bu-ma
"a well with water in it" (Shammar)
gahawtin abahayyilha
"some coffee which I want to mix cardoman with"('Awāja)
2 Verbal participles occurring with verbal function in
the sentence and not followed by an object suffix. Here the
ending -in may have the function of separating verbal from
non-verbal use of the participle. In particular where the
participle is followed by the sequences /li/ "to me", /lak/
"to you", /lib/ "to him", etc. the occurrence of the marker
is obligatory. Examples:
min jāyibin hu
"whom has he brought"
whu 'ārifin inn-
"and he knew that ..."
jīt mbaććirin
"I came early"
māhu gāsdin ihtiyāl
"he did not intend any deception"
uhu gāylin-lik...
"and he had said to you ..."
hādi mnawwirtin albalad killih
"this has lit up the whole city"
hu āxdin turīgathum
"he had adopted their ways"
3 Certain adverbial expressions show the ending -in
reflecting the classical use of -an for this purpose:
gasbin
"by force, of necessity"
hagwitin
"it seems"
gōlt in
"it was said, as you would say"
'ugbin
"afterwards"
gazwin
"on a raid"
hirwitin
"approximately"
dōrin
"once upon a time"
56 Chapter 3

nōbtin
"one time" (Shammar)
snitin min hā-ssnīn
"one of these years" (Mutair)
Certain expressions are more commonly heard with the end­
ing -an, which probably reflects borrowing from classical,
i.e. /tagrīban/ "approximately", /abdan/ "at all",(1)
/kullan/ "in toto",(2) /jimī'an/ "all together".
It can be seen from the above that in environment 1 the
retention of -in can be said to have phonological causes,
i.e. it may have the function of effecting a juncture be­
tween a noun and a following qualifying element. In 2 and
3 however it has specific grammatical function as the marker
of verbal function in the participle in 2 and as the marker
of adverbial function in 3.
Occurrence of the marker -in in a similar way to that
noted above was recorded for the dialect of Qasīm, Sudair,
Shammar, 'Aniza and Dhafīr. In the speech of the Euphrates
bedouin it occurred in poetry and was recognised as a syn­
tactic possibility. It occurred less however than in the
more central Najdi dialects, but this may be a reflection
of the more limited material. Examples include:
'isbin lā ytūl
"grass which will not last" (Text 7)
lu šāwrin bah čīs
"he has a tobacco box with a pouch"
čabdin tyabbisah u čabdin tibillah
"you dry one heart (lit.liver) and moisten another" (Text 9)
In the Gulf dialects it occurs only rarely and that mostly
in set expressions. It was not recorded at all for the non-
bedouin dialects of Mesopotamia and in fact in these dialects
a preposed indefinite marker /farid/ or /fad/ has been
evolved. The use of /fad/ is equally a marker of Mesopotam-
ian identity and occurs in all varieties examined.

The Treatment of Final Clusters

General

A phonological feature of high incidence which separates

Mesopotamian and Nadji varieties is the treatment of under­
lying consonant clusters in word and stem final position.
In brief the difference is that in the Mesopotamian type an
anaptyctic vowel is introduced between the two consonants
when in pause or preceding a consonant while in the Najdi
type this happens in a more restricted set of cases. Taking

1 But also /abad/ without nunation, and /labdin/"not at all".

2 The dialect form /killin/ would mean "each one".
57 Chapter 3

a fairly generally applicable example the contrast is as

follows:

Mesopotaraian Najdi

1 šifit šift "I saw"

2 šifitha šiftaha "I saw her"
3 šiftah šiftih "I saw him"

In forms 1 and 2 the Mesopotamian variety shows a vowel /i/

between the two elements of the final cluster /-ft/. In
form 3 this is not present as the cluster is followed by the
initial vocalic suffix /-ah/. In the Najdi variety no such
anaptyctic occurs although in form 2 /siftaha/ a different
type of anaptyctic occurs between the stem /sift-/ and the
suffix /-ha/ preventing the junction of three consonants,
which is non-permissible in certain environments.
These contrasts occur with (a) nominals of the form CaCC
or CiCC /galb/ "heart", /bišt/ "cloak"; verbal forms with the
suffix /-t/, /riht/ "I, you m.s. went"; and (c) a small num­
ber of imperatives of final weak verbs such as /imš/ "walk/",
/ihć/ or lihč/ "talk/".(1) In these three cases the under­
lying form can be regarded as identical so that the contrast
is one of surface derivational phonology as revealed by the
total scatter of forms such as those shown above. There are
also certain other structures involving the suffixes /-k/ and
/-ć/ where some Najdi varieties show a final cluster, i.e.
/anšidk/ "I ask you m.s.", /anšidć/ "I ask you f.s.".(2)
These forms do not have corresponding underlying structures
in the Mesopotamian type where the suffixes are /-ak/ and
l-ič/ giving /anišdak/, /anišdič/. However the existence
of these various final cluster forms in the Najdi varieties
taken as a whole constitutes a defining characteristic in
contrast to the Mesopotamian type.
The contrast between the two varieties is of a clinal
nature rather than being a straightforward contrast between
the presence and absence of final clusters. This clinality
is due to the following factors:
1 An anaptyctic vowel of this type does occur in the
Najdi varieties associated with certain consonant cluster
types. Particularly relevant to this point are those anap-
tyctics associated with voiced plosives and the liquid
group 1, n, r, g, m.

1 This contrast is not relevant to all Mesopotamian dia­

lects since in some a form with a final vowel occurs for
these imperatives, i.e. /imši/, /ihči/.
2 See page 96-7.
58 Chapter 3

2 In the Mesopotamian variety where the anaptyctic

occurs, it is, at least in the extreme type, regarded as a
full vowel from the point of view of stress placement and
syllabication. In the Najdi varieties however it does not
count as a full vowel for stress placement.
3 In general the nature of the transition from consonant
to consonant in certain consonant sequences differs in the
Najdi and Mesopotamian types. Particularly with voiced con­
sonants a definite vocalic transition of a shewa type is
heard in the Central Najdi varieties which is absent in the
Mesopotamian type, giving contrasts of the type:

Mesopotamian Najdi

dgārabna tigārab na "we became relatives"

hubatna hubat na "we went down"
batni bat ni "my stomach"

This is clearly reflected in the transcriptions of earlier

linguists. It seems that speakers of these varieties do not
themselves perceive this as a vowel, but regard it as a
feature of the release of the consonant. The existence of
these highly non-structural vocalic features in the variety
makes the status of the final cluster anaptyctics of less
structural importance than in the Mesopotamian type.
This vocalic transition is heard with sequences of voiced
consonants and also with the /t/ particularly where the
first consonant is a plosive or the second is /r/. The
inclusion of /t/ among this group of otherwise voiced con­
sonants is interesting. Instrumental investigation(1) has
shown that the segment of voicelessness in /t/ is shorter
than for the other voiceless plosives and it may be that in
many environments it is in fact voiced. In these dialects
the voicelessness feature is not essential since it con­
trasts with /s/ and /d/ only, not /s/ and /d/ as in the dia­
lects of the West. It is also relevant that the Arab phon­
eticians classed /t/ as /majhūr/ "loud, sonorant" a class
which otherwise includes voiced consonants.(2) Examples are
given below from the speech of various Najdi groups. The
'Utaiba, Qatari and Dawāsir examples are from Hess and
Johnstone retranscribed into my own notation.
'UTAIBA: /'atani/ "give me", /wiz rih/ "his loincloth",
/mišib rih/ "his staff"; QATARI: /'awwad na/ "we returned";
DAWĀSIR: /bak ratna/ "our camel", /gid rin/ "a pot",
/igsar na/ "our neighbour"; SHAMMAR: /rij lu/ "his leg",
/fax du/ "his thigh", /nat la'/ "we come out", /mintat rih/
"broken f.", /bat ni/ "my stomach", /sumat ri/ "perfume from

1 MARCAIS (1948), p.21-6.

2 SA'RĀN (1951), p.218-30.
59 Chapter 3

Sumatra", /wajedi/ "my heart"/ /asgar ham/ "the smallest of

them"; HUMAID: /xēz rānih/ "staff, stick", /igedub/ "hold!";
RUFAI': /tigārab na/ "we became relatives", /nijerin/ "cof­
fee pot"; MUTAIR: /haj ra/ "room", /zug ba/ "slut"; HARB:
/hubat na/ "we came down"; SBA'A: /axad na/ "we took";
DHAFĪR: /nišad ni/ "he asked me", /īš b/ "grass".
Bearing in mind the occurrence of the above type of voc­
alic transition in the Najdi dialects we can now examine the
stem final clusters in which differences of syllabication
occur. In terms of their general phonological behaviour
these fall into two classes: (1) those involving a liquid
as the second element; (2) other types. Type 1 differs in
terms of stress assignment, while type 2 involves different
syllabic structures in the majority of cases.
1 Clusters involving nominals of the structure CaCC or
CiCC in which the first element of the cluster is not one of
the guttural group h, h, x, g, ' , and in which the second
element is one of the liquids mt 1, r, n, w and y show an
anaptyctic i or u in all dialects. There are a number of
exceptions with m which do not show the anaptyctic.
Examples:
SBA'A: /zidir/ "pot", /hadir/ "under", /sagur/ "hawk",
/fikir/ "thought", /sitir/ "curtain", /sabur/ "patience",
/hisin/ "beauty", /tiliy/ "lamb", /tagum/ "set", /xasum/
"enemy", /ragum/ "number"; HUMAID: /zamur/ "rifle hammer",
/zamil/ "camels", /ačil/ "food", /habil/ "rope"; SHAMMAR:
/badir/ "full moon", /matin/ "back", /batin/ "stomach",
/gusin/ "branch", /baduw/ "bedouins", /gazuw/ "raiding
party", /giruw/ "girl", /hazim/ "hill", /rijim/ "cairn of
stones", /xasum/ "enemy", /wagul/ "dried yoghurt cakes";
'ĀWAZIM: /itil/ "Ithil, a plant", /wabil/ "Wabl, a plant",
/hijil/ "anklet", /hijil/ "young camel", /'ijil/ "young
camel", /'adil/ "straight"; RWALA(l): /idin/ "ear",
/jifin/ "eyelid", /ifim/ "mouth"; HARB: /gabilf "before";
MESOPOTAMIAN: /sugur/ "smallness", /kubur/ "size", /sibir/
"a span", /xamur/ "wine", /xusur/ "blood money", /sugul/
"work", /mitil/ "like", /sibil/ "lion cub", /hadum/ "digest-
tion", /xasum/ "enemy", /wazin/ "weight", /dihin/ "oil",
/gabul/ "before".
With a following initial vowel suffix or before a vocalic
initial word, both types have elision of the anaptyctic.
However in the Najdi type, as a number of these forms con­
tain combinations of voiced consonants, the vocalic transi­
tion is often heard. This is absent in the Mesopotamian
type, giving contrasting sets of the type:

1 CANTINEAU (1937), retranscribed into the present notation

system, p.216-7.
60 Chapter 3

Mesopotamian Najdi

mi il mitil "like"
mi li mit li "like me"

With a following consonantal suffix both types in general

retain the anaptyctic vowel. However while in the Mesopotam­
ian type the vowel counts as a full vowel for stress assign­
ment, in the Najdi type it is disregarded for this purpose
giving contrasting sets of the following type:

Mesopotamian Najdi

mitīlhum mītilhum "like them"

wazīnha wázinha "its weight"
gabúlha gábulha "before it f."

In some cases also in the Najdi type these forms act like the
non-anaptyctic forms in this structure giving forms of the
type: mitl hum, mit l hum.
With the final y and w especially Najdi dialects show the
non-anaptyctic forms occasionally:

gazw na "our raiding party"

badw na "our bedouins"
haćy kum "your talk"

2 Other cluster types. It is with clusters not involv­

ing combinations of the type mentioned under 1 above that a
clear contrast is seen between the Najdi and Mesopotamian
types. In the Najdi type as a rule no anaptyctic occurs
although there are cases where a sporadic vocalic transition
occurs of the type described above. In the Mesopotamian
type, however, the anaptyctic i or u always occurs.
Examples:
MUTAIR: /' išb 'iš b/ "grass", /wagt/ "time", /zibd/
"cream", /gand/ "lump sugar", /barg/ "lightning", /libs/
"clothing", /najd/ "Najd", /šams/ "sun"; HARB: /ig t/
"dried yoghurt cakes", /galb/ "heart", /bišt/ "cloak"; AHL
AL-SHIMĀL:(1)/galb/"heart", /'abd/ "slave", /šift/ "I saw";
HUMAID: /xurb/ "knot of the tent rope", /harb/ "war",
/rimd} rim d/ "Rimth, a type of desert plant", /šams šamis/
"sun"; fAwĀziM: /sid g/ "truth", /ćidb/ "lying", /ćalb/
"dog", /ćabd/ "liver", /katf/ "shoulder", /'ijizt/ "I became
tired", / ' i š g/ "love", /darb/ "path",/had b/ "camel hump",
/ams/ "yesterday", /habs/ "prison"; SHAMMAR: /wagt/ "time",
/'at š/ "thirst", /tifattant/ "I remembered", /riht/ "I
went", /širibt/ "I drank", /rimt/ "Rimth, type of'desert
grass" (compare Hunaid /rimd/); MESOPOTAMIAN: /'išib/
"grass", /wakit/ "time", /zibid/ "cream", ,/ganid/ "lump

1 See below Text 9.

61 Chapter 3

sugar", /barug, barug/ "lightning", /libis/ "clothing",

/šamis/ "sun", /galub/ "heart", /bišit/ "cloak", /'abid/
"slave", /šifit/ "I saw", /harub/ "war", /sidig, sidij/
"truth", /ćidib/ "lying", / ć a l i b / "dog", etc.
With the vocalic beginning suffixes as with type 2 above,
both varieties show elision of the anaptyctic giving forms
such as /'abdi/ "my slave", /bištik, bištak/ "your cloak",
/darbuht, darbah, darbih/ "his road". With the consonantal
beginning suffixes in the Mesopotamian variety the anaptyc­
tic is maintained. As with type 1, it counts for stress in
the extreme Mesopotamian type. In the nomad-influenced type
it can in some cases be disregarded for stress. This gives
variants of the type: /wākitna, wakítna/ "our time",
/šífitha, šifítha/ "I saw her", /gálubha, galúbha/ "her
heart". In the Najdi type there are two possible structures,
one with a further anaptyctic separating the stem and the
suffix, one with a tri-consonantal cluster. Here it seems
that the speech of the north of Najd and the Syrian desert
favoured the introduction of this second anaptyctic while
the southern area, i.e. Mutair, 'Awāzim, Rashāyida and
Sudair showed a heavier incidence of the triconsonantal
cluster type. Examples:
'AWĀZIM: /rimšha/ "her eyelash", /milkhum/ "their prop­
erty", /šifthum/ "I saw them", /istašartni/ "you asked my
advice"; MUTAIR: /galbaha/ "her heart", /šuftahum/ "I saw
them"; 'AWĀJA: /abhartaha/ "I have put spice in it",
/kitabtaha/ "I wrote it"; SUDAIR: /nutgaha/ "its f. pronun­
ciation", /darsina/ "our studies", /wagtukum/ "your m.p.
time", /nafsaha/ "her self", /harjhum/ "their talk"; AHL
AL-SHIMĀL: /šiftakan/ "I saw you f. pl."; KUWAIT: /galbha/
"her heart", /šifthum/ "I saw them".

Summary

The different treatment of stem final clusters and the asso­

ciated function of stem and affix is one of the clearest,
most generally recognised variables separating the speech of
Mesopotamian and Najdi populations. Najdi speakers, when
presented with forms with the anaptyctic, usually recognised
them as Iraqi, while Iraq bedouins regarded them as a Mi'dān
characteristic. Iraqis usually regarded the non-anaptyctic
form as "Kuwaiti" or "bedouin". The vocalic transition be­
tween stem and affix was, however, not widely perceived as a
dialect marker and informants felt that the difference be­
tween such forms as /bētha/ and /bētaha/ was unimportant
and non-significant. The only exception to this was that
certain informants involved in local folk culture and oral
poetry in Kuwait were aware that the forms such as /bētaha/
were characteristic of certain important local bedouin
tribes, namely Shammar, Dhafīr and 'Aniza.
62 Chapter 3

Forms with the anaptyctic of the type /gilit/ "I said"

were used by all Mesopotamian groups including the nomadic
shepherd tribes of the Euphrates and southern desert, but
excluding the Euphrates bedouin groups Rufai', Humaid and
Ahl al-Shimāl. These last did show some sporadic occur­
rences of it in my material, which may be the result of
assimilation to a Mesopotamian type. In terms of their
general characteristics, however, they were clearly dis­
tinguished from them, showing in addition the highly idio­
syncratic Northern Najdi features mentioned in Ch.4.
In the speech of the population of the Najd itself, in
general no examples of anaptyxis with type 3 clusters were
found except that some Shammar informants gave sporadic
examples of it in interrogatives /šifit?/ "did you see?",
/inbusatit?/ "did you enjoy yourself?". On this point my
material is inconclusive.
4 Non-reductional changes in the
North Najdi dialects

As was mentioned in Chapter 1, in the dialects of the North

Najdi type, exemplified particularly by the speech of the
Jabal Shammar and the Shammar bedouin of the Syrian desert
and the Jazīra, the process of linguistic change has produced
a somewhat idiosyncratic(1) morphological and phonological
system. The term idiosyncratic is used here to denote that
there are more features distinguishing these from the var­
ious neighbouring dialects than there are distinguishing
neighbouring dialects from each other. These features are
non-reductional in that they do not constitute mergers of
distinct items but changes in the form of particular items.
In some cases they result rather in an increase in complex­
ity. Further, they can in most cases be characterised as
analogical in nature, i.e. resulting from structural pressure
within the language and in no sense due to extralinguistic
factors of the type suggested for the reductional changes
described in Chapter 3. The core dialect of the group is
the speech of the Shammar nomads whose dīra extended tradi­
tionally north from the Jabal Shammar across the Nafūd and
along south of the Darb Zubaida, reaching the Euphrates be­
tween Najaf and Samāwa. North of this was the area of
'Aniza but both met in the Hajara, which they disputed. To
the south they extended to the area of their cousins, the
Dhafīr, with whom they were intermingled with no definite
boundary, roughly along the line from Samāwa to Līna.(2)

1 CANTINEAU (1937) also remarks on the idiosyncratic type

of the Shammari dialect when compared with 'Aniza type,
p.230 and 234;
2 For details of the Shammar tribal area and their neigh­
bours, see PHILBY (1922) Ch.VI p.248; MUSIL (1928b) p.32-
33; LORIMER (1908) "Shammar" (Southern) p.1749; GLUBB
(1960) passim. DOUGHTY (1964) p.329 also mentions the
Shammar colony of Taima and refers explicitly to their
dialect: "their fathers came to settle here, by their
saying, not above two hundred years past... Theirs is
63
 64

Recorded d i s t r i b u t i o n o f the
N o r t h Najdi Features.
(Approximate areas of the Shammar and
DhafIr tribes are also shown, after Raswan). Amara
Chapter 4

Ahwaz

Taima?
Hail

Buraida
Anaiza
land above 1 0 0 0 m
Bass Midhnab
Dialects showing the
masc.plur suffixes
-kam , -ham, -intam
Dialects showing the
singular objective suffixes;
~an.-uh.-ah
0 100 200
N kms

MAP 4: RECORDED DISTRIBUTION OF NORTH NAJDI FEATURES

65 Chapter 4

This group were known as the Najd Shammar and owed a vague
suzerainty to the Rashīd dynasty of Hail, themselves of the
Shammar. Another group, the Shammar Jarba or Shammar of the
Jazīra, are split off from this group and occupy the northern
Jazīra between the Euphrates and Tigris. From the point of
view of dialect there seems to be little difference between
these two groups(1) and I will concentrate here on the Najd
Shammar from whom I have first-hand material. Fringe dia­
lects showing only some features of this type are, to the
south, the dialect of the settled population of Qasīm, the
Qusmān; to the east the dialects of the Dhafīr and Bani
Khālid; and to the north the dialects of the Euphrates bed­
ouin Humaid, Rufai' and Ahl al-Shimāl.
The Bani Khālid are a tribe al-Hasa of whom large sections
are now found in the area of Kuwait. The previous ruling
dynasty of Kuwait, the Āl-'Arai'ir,(2) were from the Bani
Khalid. As a tribe of al-Hasa the north Arabian dialect type
may seem at first difficult to explain. However, a number of
links exist between them and the more northerly groups. A
clan of the Bani Khālid, the Āl Kathīr, is mentioned by
Lorimer (1908, p.1014) as migrating with the Dhafīr.
'Azzāwi (1956, III-IV, p.76) also mentions that the Ajwad
group of the Muntafiq were once ruled by the Āl Humaid of
the Bani Khālid. However none of the sources mention whether
the latter have any connection with the present Āl Humaid of
the Euphrates. A further Bani Khālid tribe was investigated
by Cantineau in the Syrian desert also showing the North
Najdi features mentioned here (1936, p.232). These he re­
gards as identical with the eastern Bani Khālid (1936, p.11).
Unfortunately, the sum of his material and mine are not suf­
ficient to demonstrate this. None of the sources is very
illuminating on the present position of the Bani Khalid or
their origins; however the connection of the Āl-Kathīr sec­
tion to the Dhafīr may explain to some extent the North
Najdi dialect of my informants in the Kuwait area. These
various links between the Bani Khālid with the Dhafīr on the
one hand and the Muntafiq on the other make it possible to
surmise that, in their original position occupying al-Hasa
and stretching north to the Iraq borders, they formed part
of a general North Najdi block (see Map 5). They were then
cut off from them as a relic area in al-Hasa after the west­
ward drive of the Mutair which separated them. The Mutair
defeated them in the 'Arma plateau in 1823 with the help of
the 'Ajmān.(3)
even now in another dîra, the speech of Shammar."
1 But see also MONTAGNE's (1935) remarks on the assimila-
tion of the speech of Shammar to the Iraqi type, p.37.
2 See Text 9.
3 PHILBY (1955), p.156.
66 Chapter 4

In dress also the nomadic Bani Khālid informants resembled

the northern tribes wearing ghutra and 'agāl and having short
groomed beards in contrast to the Harb and Mutair of the area
who very often have no 'agāl and wear long untrimmed beards.
Other fringe dialects are the Syrian desert nomads mentioned
by Cantineau, i.e. the 'Umūr, Slūt, Sardiyya, Sirhān, western
Bani Khālid and Bani Sakhar. These are outside our area but
represent a parallel type. One particular feature, feature
4, has an even more extensive distribution and is found in
the dialect of al-Jauf, in the speech of the Ruwala, a branch
of 'Aniza in the Syrian desert, and also across the Euphrates
in the areas of Kut, 'Amāra and Ahwaz.
The North Najdi features are described below giving the
geographical distribution of each as far as possible in order
of greatest generality.
1 The form of the third masculine singular object suffix
has an inherent bilabial feature and is basically -u(h) with
positional variants /-u/ or /-uh/ postconsonantally, /-w/
after /a/ and /-h/ after other vowels. The form in the rest
of the area is /-ih/ in Central Najd and /-ah/ in the Gulf
area and Mesopotamia. A complication of our model is that
the form /-u/ is general to the whole of the area to the
west, i.e. Hijaz and the dialects of Syria, Lebanon, Pales­
tine and Jordan. However in these the post-vocalic form /-w/
does not occur so that the differentiation is maintained at
least for the core type, while features 2 and 3, which also
occur in the Syrian desert dialects, separate them from the
above western sedentary dialects. Contrasting types are
shown below from the North Najdi and more general types:

North Najdi Other Areas

bētu (h) bētah, bētih "his house"

šāfu (h) šafah, šafih "he saw him"
bu(h) bih, bīh "in it"
šifriāw šifnā(h) "we saw him"
wiyyāw wiyyā(h) "with him"
rumāw rumā (h) "he shot it (m) "
xadāw xadā(h) "he took it (m)"
jāw jā(h) "he came to him"
māw mā(h) "its water"(1)

Following other vowels the North Najdi and other types agree
showing /-h/ and lengthening of the preceding vowel as in
/'alē(h)/ "on it", /ligō(h)/ "they (m) found him", /šūfū(h)/
"look (m.pl.) at it (m)", /šūfl(h)/ "look (f.s.) at it (m)",

1 In many dialects the basic form of this item is /māy/

"yielding" /māyah/ as in the Mesopotamian type.
67 Chapter 4

/šūfī(h)/ "look (f.s.) at it (m) , /yhāčī(h)/ "he speaks to

him".
The core dialect, that of Shammar, shows both /-uh/ and
/-w/ variants as also do the dialects of the Dhafīr and of
Qasīm. My material from the Euphrates bedouin and Ahl al-
Shimāl shows a mixed type with /-uh/ postconsonantally and
/-h/ postvocalically, i.e. /ismu/ "his name", /'indu/ "he
has", but /sammāh/ "he called him", /antāh/ "he gave him".
Cantineau (1936, p.104) gives similar mixed systems for the
'Umur, Slūt and Sirhān. My material for the Bani Khālid
does not show examples of this suffix in post-vocalic posi­
tion.
2 The form of the third feminine singular suffix is
/-a(h)/ with the positional variant /-h/ following the vowel
/a/. The form in the rest of the area is /-ha/ in all posi­
tions. Associated with the form /-ah/ forms ending in the
vowels /-i/, /-ay/, /-u/ and /-aw/ show /-y/ and /-w/ for
these vowels thus giving a quite different syllabication for
the forms concerned. Compare the following examples:

North Najdi Other Areas

šāfah šāfaha "he saw her"
baytah baytaha "her house"
ligāh ligāha "he found her"
abyah abīha "I want it (f) "
'alyah 'alēha "on it (f)"
šilyah šīlīha "take (f.s.) it (f) away"
tilyah tillīha "pluck (f.s.) it (f)"
idbahyah idbahīha "kill (f.s.) it (f)"
abwah abūha "her father"
škumwah škimōha "they (m) bridled it (f)"
sāgwah sāgōha "they (m) drove it (f)"
sigwah sūgūha "drive (m.pl.) it (f)"
ajjalwah ajjalōha "they (m) postponed it (f)"
a'tyah (Dhafīr) a'tīha "I will give it (f)"

Forms with /-ah/ and forms with the semi-vowels /-y/ and
/-w-/ preceding such as /'alyah abwah/ are attested in my
material for the Shammar and Dhafīr and for Qasīm. The form
/-ah/ is also shown for the Bani Khālid, Ahl al-Shimāl and
Euphrates bedouin, although no instances of the type /'alyah
abwah/ occurred. The form /yintī-ha/ "he gives her" occurs
in the Ahl al-Shimāl text rather than the North Najdi type
/yinty-ah/. A similar mixed type is given by Cantineau
(1937 p.183-4 and 232) showing both /-ah/ and /-ha/ for the
Bani Sakhar and Bani Khalid. Examples of /-h/ are attested
for Shammar, Qasīm, and Dhafīr only in my material.
68 Chapter 4

3 The form of the first person singular is /-an/(1) post-

consonantally, /-nan/ post-vocalically, contrasting with
/-ni/ in all positions elsewhere. Compare the following:

North Najdi Other Areas

šāfan šāfani, šāfni "he saw me"

tirkan itrikni "leave me!"
ysubban ysibbini, ysibbni "he insults me"
thabsan thabisni, tihbisni "you imprison me"
xallōnan xallōni "they left me"
itnan itnini (Dhaf r) "wait for me"
'atan 'atni (Dhaf r) "give me"

This feature is less widespread than those mentioned above.

It is attested for the Shammar, for Qas m and for the Euphra­
tes bedouin. The Dhaf r and Ahl al-Shimāl showed /-ni/ in
all cases, i.e. Dhaf r /'atni/ "give me", /itnini/ "wait for
me", /taggini/ "he hit me", /'atāni/ "he gave me", /nišadni/
"he asked me"; Ahl al-Shimāl /'atni/ "give me", /'ayyarōni/
"they insulted me". The Euphrates bedouin showed /-an/ but
/-ni/ post-vocallically, i.e. /yāni nšidan/ "he came to me
and asked me", /m'allman buh ant?/ "did you teach me it?".
Cantineau (1937, p.176, 232) shows a similar system for
'Umūr, Slūt and Sirhān and Bani Khālid.
4 Certain masculine plural morphemes show an open vowel
/a/ in contrast to the more usual /u/ in the following forms:

intam "you (m.pl.)" independent pronoun

-kam "you (m.pl.)" suffixed
ham "they (m.pl.)" independent pronoun
-ham "they (m.pl.)" suffixed

These contrast with the more usual /intu, -kum, -hum, hum/.
They are attested for the Shammar, Dhaf r, Bani Khālid and
also for certain areas of Mesopotamia, namely 'Amāra, Kūt and
Ahwaz. It also occurs in the dialect of the Ruwala investi­
gated by Prochazka and in the speech of Cantineau's Shammar
sattelite tribes of the Syrian desert, namely the Sardiyya
and Bani Sakhar (1937, p.185). This is one of the most wide­
spread of the North Najdi features and can be more accurately
described as a Syrian Desert characteristic. It is also the
only one adopted by an 'Anizi tribe of the Syrian desert,

1 A suffix /-an/ also occurs as a non-obligatory subject

marker for the first person singular in the dialects of
Southern Mesopotamia (see p.83 ) . It may be that there
is a connection between these two as a number of other
connections also exist (see p.87-94).
69 Chapter 4

'namely the above-mentioned Ruwala.(1) Informants from other

'Aniza sections, namely the Sba'a, Sugūr and 'Awāja, showed
the more expected forms, as also did other Najd bedouin in­
formants from the Harb and Mutair tribes. Inexplicably the
Euphrates bedouin who exhibit feature 3, one of the less-
widespread North Najdi features, did not show these forms.
Neither did the Ahl al-Shimāl.
5 Fronting has taken place with certain feminine suffixes
and /-y/ replaces an original /-t/ in pausal position, giving
/eih/ or /-ih/ for the feminine singular nominal suffix,/-āy/
for the feminine plural nominal suffix, and /eih/ for the
feminine singular verbal suffix in place of the more usual
/-ah r -āt, -at/. Fronting of the nominal feminine singular
is the most common and is attested for the Shammar, Euphrates
bedouin and the dialects of Qas m. In the dialects of Qas m,
the Euphrates bedouin and the speech of Hail the form is
/-ih/.(2) In the speech of my Shammar informants it was
usually /-eih/, but /-h/ in non-pausal positions. With the
Shammar it occurred following all consonant types, whereas
with the Euphrates bedouin it occurred mostly following non-
guttural consonants. Examples:
SHAMMAR: /mareih/ "woman", /sinjāreih/ "Sinjāra",
/gwāreih/ "hillock", /tim leih/ "well", /frugeift/" journey",
/nāzyeih/ "sand dune", /maršaheih/ "saddle", /faj'eih/
"suddenly", /musābleih/ "expedition", /šić meih/ "bridle",
/tal'eih/ "a pass", /birćeih/ "well", /lugweih/"language",
/širriyyeih/ "small pass".
EUPHRATES BEDOUIN: /mallih/ "boredom", /sāhi/ "tent cur­
tain", /d rih/ "tribal area", /ghawih/"coffee", /šibāyih/
"gunsight", /riblih/ "type of grass", /siyyādih/ "prayer
carpet", /mih lih/ "drought", /yiz rih/ "Jaz ra", /nhēdih/
"breast", /tamānyih/ "eight", /xēzarānih/ "camel stick",
/dōlih/ "state; but /saffārah, š i g g ā r a , gfē'a / "types of
grass".
Contrast the following forms from the dialect of the
phaf r: /timānyah/ "eight", /ghawah/ "coffee", /laga/
"language", /sāha/ "tent curtain", /markābah/ "fireplace
frame".

1 Landberg's 'Aniza material also shows forms of this type

as optional variants, i.e. /likam/ "for you", /laham/ "for
them" (1919 p.71). My Sba'a informants also gave sporadic
examples of /ham/, i.e. /hādōla ham/ "there they are!" The
Budūr shepherds of the Nāsiriyya area also show /intam/
and /-kam/, but not /-ham/. Wetzstein regards these forms
as characteristic of "bedouins" in general as opposed to
sedentaries (1868 p.196), presumably as a result of the
selection of his bedouin informants.
2 The form /-ih/ also occurred in fronting environments in a
somewhat more restricted fashion in the speech of the
70 Chapter 4

Fronting of the other two suffixes occurred only in the

dialect of the Shammar. Examples:

Shammar Other Areas

salāy salāt "prayer"

sayyārāy sayyārāt "cars"
dārāy "curved sand dunes"
thādāy "pegs for hobbling camels"
taggāgāy taggāgāt "drills, borers"
kalimāy kalimāt "words"
batārāy batārāt "batteries"
hwētāy hwētāt "Huwaitāt (tribal name)"
hurmāy hurmāt "women"
banāy banāt "girls"
dukturāy dukturā "Doctorate"
inglubeih inglubat "it overturned"
tāheih tāhat "it (f) fell"
xluseih xlusat "it (f) finished"
mišeih mišat "she went"

A further difference connected with the feminine suffixes is

that in the Shammar dialect the final /-t/ is present in non-
pausal position. This agrees with the more general type in
the verbal form and in the feminine plural, but in the nom­
inal feminine singular contrasts, since the rest show /-ah/
except where suffixed. Contrast the following:

SHAMMAR
1 yōm waslat ittal'at u ti'attilat issayyāreih
2 yōm waslat ittal'at w assayyārat ti'attileih
"When it reached the pass, the car broke down."
3 'abdat u sinjāreih "'Abdah and Sinjāra (tribal names)"
4 'itēibat u harb "'Utaiba and Harb (tribal names)"
5 halfēdat hādi "this hollow"
6 lighawt assah heih "the correct coffee"

OTHER AREAS
1 yōm waslat ittal'ah u ti'attilat issayyārah
2 yōm waslat ittal'ah w assayyārah ti'attilat
3 'abdah u sinjārah
4 'itēbah u harb
5 halfēda hādi
6 lighawh issah hah

Sudair informants, i.e. /timānyih/ "eight", /talātih/

"three", /tayyibih/ "good", /'ārfih/ "knowing", /hādrih/
"ready", /ćit rih/ "many".
71 Chapter 4

The following table shows the distribution of the North

Najdi features examined. The most widespread general fea-
tures are the third person pronouns /-ah/ and /-uh/. The
masculine plural forms /-kam/, -ham, -intam/ have a more
northerly distribution but do not occur in the dialect of
Qaslm.
'Amara
Ruwala
Ahl al-
Shimal
Bani Khalid
DhafTr
& Rufai'
Hum aid
Qaslm
Shammar

-nan 1st s. obj.

as f.s. nominal
as 3 m.s. ob j.
as 3 f.s. obj.

nominal ending

as f.s.
-ay as f.pl.
-an as 1st
m.pl.
-ham

-eih or-ih

s. object
TABLE II

ending
intam
-kam,

-eih
-uh
-ah
72 Chapter 4

As can be seen from the maps on p.64 and p.78 , before

the movement of the 'Aniza tribes to the Syrian desert and
the subsequent move of the Shammar Jarba to the Jazīrah, the
North Najdi dialect features formed a distinct enclave cover-
ing the North Arabian desert or Bādiya centred on the Jabal
Shammar and surrounded on all sides by dialects which, al-
though not identical, nevertheless were similar in certain
features which contrast with the North Najdi type. These
latter features are in fact those common to the majority of
Arabic dialects and similar to the form of Classical Arabic.
It seems likely that this widely divergent form has grown
up as a result of isolation from the surrounding settled
areas and as the speech of the Syrian desert nomadic area or
the historical Arabia Deserta. In the surrounding areas con-
centrations of settlements form a zone of communication which
stretches from the settled areas of the Mediterranean coast
down to the Hijaz across the Arabian peninsula from the Hijaz
to Qasīm and the Jabal Tuwaiq, al-Hasa and the Gulf Coast,
the Gulf being then linked to the Shatt al-'Arab and Meso-
potamia by sea or from Kuwait via Zubair to Basra. The
circle is then completed by the towns of the northern Euphra-
tes which are linked to northern Syria.(1) Although when
compared with the more populous areas of the world such as
western Europe none of these constitute a continuous band of
settlement,except perhaps the rivers of Mesopotamia, and are
in places separated by quite extensive desert tracts,(2)
nevertheless it seems that contact has always been maintain-
ed. The old trade routes also reflect this, going from
Yaman northwards via Hijaz to Syria or northeastwards up the
Jabal Tuwaiq to the Gulf Coast and Mesopotamia, also joining
Mesopotamia to Syria along the north of the Syrian desert.
(3) The exception to this is the Darb Zubaida pilgrim road
from Najaf, via Hail, to Mecca. However this is not a
natural route and had to be maintained by specially con-
structed water cisterns across the desert region. Large
bedouin tribes of these areas have similarly been in close
contact with these settled areas in a consistent way which
is reflected in the less idiosyncratic type of their dia-
lect. The 'Aniza, although now spreading north into the
Syrian desert, were originally a tribe of the Haj road of
Hijaz, stretching up from the Holy Cities to the towns of

1 The resemblance of the dialects of northern Mesopotamia

to northern Syria is described in full by BLANC (1964)
p.7-10.
2 This particularly between Najd and the Hijaz in the
'Utaiba steppe. See DOUGHTY (1924) p.367.
3 See BLüME (1976), p.93; also GRANT (1937), p.258.
73 Chapter 4

Syria. The Harb were a tribe of the Hijaz closely connected

with the town of Madina and whose dīra stretched from Madina
eastward to Qasīm. The 'Utaiba similarly are closely con-
nected with the town of Mecca and spread eastward to the
Qasīm and al-'Āridh.(1) The Mutair,also originally from
western Najd, now have their main central area from Qasīm to
Kuwait and were originally of great influence in Kuwait. The
'Awāzim and Rashāyida tribes of the Gulf Coast have for cen-
turies been intimately connected with the town of Kuwait and
have had settled sections in that region since the 15th cen-
tury. (2) In the central area, however, the old Arabia
Deserta, nomadism on the grand scale has been possible. As
was outlined earlier in Chapter 1, the Shammar tribes occupy
a self-enclosed area utilising the grazing of the Nafūd and
the Syrian desert in the spring and relying on the wells and
settled areas of the Jabal Shammar in summer. We know that
in the past the Shammar held sway over the greater part of
the Syrian desert, probably since the middle ages.(3) We
can presume that the North Najdi type of dialect became in
that epoch the symbol of nomadic identity. Subsequently
fringe dialects of the type of the Ahl al-Shimāl, Dhafīr,
Euphrates bedouin and Bani Khālid developed. These parallel
exactly the fringe dialects of the desert of Syria mentioned
by Cantineau.(4) Since then, probably between the 17th and
18th centuries,(5) the 'Aniza have forged up from western

1 See DOUGHTY (1924) p.331, 366-67, for the relation of

Mutair and 'Utaiba to the towns of Hijaz and Qasīm. An-
other explanation of this relative uniformity of the cen-
tral Najdi type may be that the constant and gradual move-
ment of populations northward and eastward across the
peninsula recorded by tradition and toponymy which was
referred to in Ch.l maintained a constant contact and re-
newing of the central Najdi type from a possible source
in the southwestern Najd area. The Jabal Shammar, as
mentioned earlier, would have been isolated from this.
2 See 'UBAYYID (1971) p.28.
3 Authorities differ on the date of their initial expansion
but probably in the 16th and 17th century. See in parti-
cular CANTINEAU (1937) p.233, DICKSON (1949) Appendix I,
MONTAGNE (1935) p.37, 47.
4 CANTINEAU (1937) p.233 talks of "tribus peut-être d'abord
geographiquement voisines des Šammar, peut-être satél-
lites des Šammar, peut-être apparentées indirectement aux
Šammar," namely 'Umūr, Slūt, Sardiyya, Sirhān, Bani
Khālid and Bani Sakhar.
5 For the arrival of the 'Aniza see PHILBY (1922) p.108,249,
288; MUSIL (1928b) p.112; MONTAGNE (1935) p.40; CANTINEAU
(1937) p.122; PHILBY (1955) p.6; OPPENHEIM (1939) p.68;
Encyclopaedia of Islam, "'Anaza", p.482.
74 Chapter 4

Najd and taken over the central Syrian desert, splitting the
Shammar into two, those of Najd and the Jarba Shammar across
the Euphrates. This has complicated the dialect map somewhat
insofar as a central Najdi dialect, that of the 'Aniza, is
now spread over wide areas north of the North Najdi type. It
has however not affected the core area of the North Najdi
dialect type, the Jabal Shammar, which still stands apart
from the other settled areas and from the nomad tribes of
the Syrian desert. Although 'Aniza, Shammar, Dhafīr and
Mutair all border closely on each other in the spring graz-
ing grounds, in the summer the Shammar in the main contract
inwards to the Jabal Shammar, while the others move
outwards to the settled lands. The Wild Sulaimān and Wild
'Ali go towards the Hijaz, the Ruwala towards Syria, the
Sba'a, 'Amārāt and Dhafīr towards the Euphrates.(1)

THE ANALOGICAL BASIS OF THE NORTH NAJDI FEATURES

If we compare the pronoun system of the North Najdi with the

Central Najdi type, it can be seen that although both show a
modification of what we presume to be the OA system, the
North Najdi type has gone further and the modifications can
be characterised as resulting from structural pressure with-
in the language based on analogy with other forms. The fol-
lowing shows Old Arabic, North Najdi and Central Najdi

OA CENTRAL NAJDI NORTH NAJDI

"me" -ni -ni -an/-nan
"you m.s." -ak -(i)k/(a)k -ak
"you f.s." -ik - (i)ć -1ć
"him" -uh -(i)h -uh
"her" -ha -ha -ah
"us" -na -na -na
"you m.pl." -kum -kum -kam
"you f.pl." -kunna -ćin -ćin
"they m.pl." -hum -hum -ham
"they f.pl." -hunna -hin -hin

1 This pattern is contradicted to some extent by the Mutair

who occupy their own summer wells in the desert between
Kuwait and Qasīm, DICKSON (1949) p.563. However, their
central dialect type can be related to their earlier
location in western Najd.
2 The forms given are those appropriate to forms with a
final consonant such as /anšid/ "I ask", /yanšid/ "he
asks", i.e. /anšidk/ Central Najdi,/anšidak/ Northern
Najdi "I ask you m.s."; /yanšidni/ C.Najdi, /yanšidan/
N.Najdi "he asks me".
75 Chapter 4

Both types show the split of OA /k/ to /k/ and /ć/ and the
specialisation of /i/ and /u/ for separate consonantal en-
vironments. Thus the Central Najdi forms /-kum/ and /-ćin/
and /-hum/ and /-hin/ at a higher level of analysis share the
same vowel, i.e. /-kIm, -ćIn, -hIm, -hIn/. in the North
Najdi type it would seem that the development of the forms
/-kam/ and /-ham/ also /intam/ is by analogy with the /a/ of
/-ak/, giving a system of the following type:

Sing. Plural
2nd person
masculine intam -kam
- ak
(vowel a)
3rd person ham -ham

2nd person
intin -ćin
feminine
(vowel i) - ić
3rd person hin -hin

The development of the forms /-an/ "me" and /-ah/ "she" seems
to represent levelling of the syllabically diverse OA set to
the pattern /-vc/in conformity with the majority of the set,
i.e. /-ak, -ik, -uh/. This produces a system where singular
affixes are of the form /-vc/ and plural affixes of the form
/-c v (c)/.
The fronting of the feminine suffixes /-at/ and /-āt/ to
/-eih/ and /-āy/ can be considered to be by analogy with
other feminine pronominal elements all of which have a front
vowel feature, i.e. /-i/ f.s. imperative, /-īn/ f.s. imper-
fective, /-ti/ f.s. perfective, /anti/ 2nd f.s. pronoun,
/hi/ 3rd f.s. pronoun. A parallel development has occurred
in Hebrew where the old Semitic 3rd f.s. pronoun suffix /-at/
has been changed to /-ā/ by analogy with the feminine ending
of the noun.(1)
Although most of the developments shown here are regular-
izing and levelling in nature in terms of the individual sys-
tems in which they operate, nevertheless in terms of the in-
ventory of items involved in each case they either retain the
same level of complexity or increase it, i.e. in producing
more forms to be learnt in each case. This can be seen by
comparing certain of the units concerned with those of the
Central Najdi type. In each case it will be seen that the
North Najdi is the more complex. This is in contrast to the
levelling and reductional changes outlined in Chapter 3 for
the periphery dialects.

1 See MOSCATI (1969), p.137.

76 Chapter 4

North Najdi Central Najdi

1st sing, object -an / -nan -ni

3rd m.s. object -uh / -w / -h -ih / -h
3rd f.s. object -ah / -h -ha
3rd f.s. subject -eih / -at -at
3rd f.pi. nominal -ay / -at -at

A similar case of increase in complexity occurs in some of

the Central Najdi type, namely the development of two forms
for the third masculine plural perfective suffix /-aw/ and
/-am/.(l) The form /-am/ occurs when final in the form, and
/-aw/ when followed by a further suffix, e.g. /šāfam/ "they
m. saw", /šāfawk/ or /šāfōk/(2) "they saw you". Some dia-
lects also show / -urn ~ -ū / for the masculine plural im-
perative /tfa alum/ "come in (m.pl.)". These are presumably
on analogy with the masculine plural forms /-tum, -kum,
antum, hum/ etc. These forms are attested for a group of
geographically central dialects, i.e. the Harb, 'Awāzim,
Rashāyida and some 'Aniza groups of the Syrian desert,
namely Sba'a and Ruwala. It does not occur in the Shammar
dialects or in the dialect of Mutair and Dhafīr or in the
'Utaiba dialect as described by Hess. This makes it geo-
graphically North Central. This is still consistent with
our model since the Central Najd area is still relatively
isolated although, as we have tried to point out above,
less so than the Northern Najd area.

See also CANTINEAU (1936) p.80, who gives examples of

this suffix for the 'Umūr, Slūt and Manādhra. LANDBERG
• • •
(1919) gives such examples as gālom, šāfom.
The existence of the forms /aw~ō/ and /u-vū/ in the rest
of the area is not regarded as of parallel complexity
since the sounds /aw~ō/ are in many areas in complement-
ary distribution and can be regarded as related, as also
can the alternation final /-u, -i, -a/, non-final /-ū,
-ī, ā/. This however is not true of /-am~-aw, ō/.
5 General isogloss distribution of
the area

A set of important lexical and phonological isoglosses

separates the area running in an east-west direction and
separating it into northern and southern blocks. However
the distribution is generally of the non-territorial type(l)
and does not divide the region into distinct sub-areas but
shows a gradual spread out from the Central Najd to the other
regions. A number of contrasts separate Mesopotamia from the
Arabian peninsula, while a further group separate Mesopotamia
and Northern Najd on the one hand from the rest of the Ara-
bian peninsula on the other, with the majority of Syrian
desert bedouin dialects falling in with the northern area.
A further set separate Najd and the bedouin dialects from
the outer rim, i.e. Mesopotamia and the Gulf. As was shown
with the reductional changes, the Euphrates bedouin and Ahl
al-Shimāl are grouped sometimes with Mesopotamia and some-
times with the Arabian area. This is also true of the Budūr
shepherds who show a basically Mesopotamian type with some
general Arabian and some specifically North Najdi features.
There are, however, significantly, no isoglosses which group
North Najd with the Gulf against the rest, or which group
Inner Arabia with Mesopotamia against the Gulf. The isogloss
structure therefore corresponds to the general history of
population movement in the area out from Central Arabia to
the Gulf and to Mesopotamia in successive waves with a sub-
sidiary division into a generally northern and a generally
southern peninsular area. Of the bedouin dialects studied,
the Mutair, 'Awāzim, Rashāyda and Central Harb(2) show an

1 These terms are used by IVIć (1962) p.34-7.

2 Central Harb designates the Harb informants from the Wādi
Turmus area who were of the Bani 'Amr and Bani Sālim.
These differ in some respects from my main Harbi inform-
ant, Hamza Muzaini, who was from the Hijaz, and from
Hāzmi's informants, also Hijazis. Qasīm denotes the
dialect of my main Qasīm informant, Abdallah Tamīmi, from

77
 Northerly extent of the
Central Najdi 2nd person
78

suffixes - k . - c among
nomadic populations
0 250 Urban localities
500 Areas of the North Najdi
kms
suffix set-uh,-ah.-an/-kam
- ham among the nomadic
populations
Urban localities
Northern limit of South
Arabian features
Chapter 5

Amāra
Ahwāz

Dhafir

Aniza Harb Mutair

Ha r b
'Awāzi m
Mutair
Mutair Riyadh
Riyādh
U t a i ba
Suba i'

Estimated distribution of the main isoglosses Present distribution of the main isoglosses
characterizing North Najdi, Central Najdi and characterizing North Najdi, Central Najdi and
Southern dialect types before recent population Southern dialect types, snowing direction of
movements since the 17th century. population movements.

MAP 5: ESTIMATED DISTRIBUTION OF THE MAIN ISOGLOSSES/

PRESENT DISTRIBUTION OF THE MAIN ISOGLOSSES
79 Chapter 5

affinity to the dialects of Central Najd investigated, i.e.

Riyadh and Sudair. The 'Aniza, although in their basic
structural features of the same type, show some affinity to
the northern area as regards the features mentioned under 2.
The Dhafīr show a very mixed dialect type divided between a
North and a Central Najdi type similar to that of the 'Aniza
and with sporadic addition of Mesopotamian features. The
place of the Bani Khālid is not entirely clear due, in part,
to the scantiness of my material. However they seem to be
of a type similar to the Euphrates bedouin. The features
looked at here are lexical, phonological and morphological
and in one case syntactic. In the main I concentrate on the
form of lexical and functional elements of high frequency of
occurrence which are the ones most apparent to a foreign in-
vestigator. These differ in some cases in the choice of a
completely different element, as in the case of the verb "to
want" /rād, yrĪd/ in Mesopotamia vs. /baga, yabi/ in Arabia.
In other cases they differ in the phonological form of what
is in essence the same element, i.e. Mesopotamian /man/ "who"
vs. Arabian /min/. One important syntactic difference is
mentioned, namely the structure of interrogative sentences
which shows an important difference between Mesopotamian and
Arabian types. The features are listed under the main con-
trastive cleavages, i.e. Mesopotamia/Arabia, Northern/South-
ern, Inner Arabia/Outer Fringe. A number of other features
of more restricted distribution are also mentioned connected
with a North Central Najdi type and with the central marsh-
land area of Southern Mesopotamia.

FEATURES SEPARATING SOUTHERN MESOPOTAMIA FROM ARABIA

1 In the Mesopotamian type the reflex of OA /ay/ in cer­

tain consonant environments(1) is a close front gliding
vowel of the type [ ] or [\z] contrasting with /V. ] or /eij
in the rest of the area. In the Arabian type the distribu­
tion of the pure vowel fe: ] and the glide [ ei ] differs
somewhat from place to place. (2) In general the pure vowel

Midhnab. 'Aniza, unless otherwise stated, denotes the

dialect of my Sba'a informants in Kuwait. The Sudair
material is from my informants in Saudi Arabia. Zayyad
denotes Rakan al-Zayyadi, an attendant of Muhammad al-
Sudairi in Qaslm. 'Utaiba denotes Hess's material. All
other sources were informants in the place of origin.
1 In general those in which the initial consonant is not a
guttural or r and the following consonant is not r.
2 See in particular LEHN (1967), p.129; also INGHAM (1979)
p.28.
80 Chapter 5

occurs preceding the emphatics , , , the gutturals ', ,

h, ġ, x and also the apical continuants 1, nt r. In other
environments the glide occurs. The vowels [ ] and [ ] are
symbolised /ie/.
MESOPOTAMIA: /biet/ "house", /liel/ "night", /bien/ "be-
tween, /zien/ "good", /šien/ "bad", /šiex/ "sheikh", /ties/
"goat", /hsien/ "Husain", /ligiet/ "I found", /ligiena/ "we
found", /šiel/ "loading", /zied/ "zaid", /kiliet/ "I ate",
/yieb/ "pocket", /ziet/ "oil", /lieš/ "why", /'alieh/ "on
him", /sief/ "sword", /'aliek/ "on you".
ARABIAN (SHAMMAR): /zen/ "good", /šēn/ "bad", /bēn/ "be-
tween", /bētēn/ "two houses", /šēlf "rain, flood", /'alēh/
"on him", /blēhi/ "Blaihi (p.n.)", /šeix/ "sheikh", /ligeit/
"I found", /zeid/ "Zaid", /kaleit/ "I ate", /jeib/ "pocket",
/zeit/ "oil", /leiš/ "why", /seif/ "sword", /'aleik/ "on
you", /leit/ "would that", /jeiš/ "troup of camels", /feid/
"Faid (n.loc.)", /x eif/ "Khulaif", /ćeif/ "how", /wgeid/
"young boy".
The Mesopotamian type is recorded for the core of the
Mesopotamian dialect area, namely the banks of the Shatt
al-'Arab up to Gurna, Shādigān, Ahwaz, Huwaiza and Khorram-
shahr in Khuzistan, the settlements of the southern Euphrates
near Sūq al-Shuyūkh, Nāsiriyya and Samāwa, Dīwāniyya, Najaf
Karbala and Baghdad, and also for Mi dān informants in the
area of Chibāyish, Fuhūd and Butaira. Groups showing the
Arabian type were the Euphrates bedouin and Ahl al-Shimāl,
the Budūr and Zayyād shepherds, also some parts of the
'Amāra area. In these the vowel /ē/ occurred but not /ei/.
EUPHRATES BEDOUIN (RUFAI'): / ēf/ "how", /šēl/ "rain",
/bētana/ "our house", /zēn/ "good", /lēi/ "night", /'alēman/
"about who", / ōd n/ "two herds", /šēl/ "moving camp",
/gf'ē'a/ "gufai'a (plant name)".
AHL AL-SHIMĀL: /klēb/ "kulaib (n.p.)", /nihētak/ "I for-
bid you", /bētēn/ "two verses".
In the 'Amāra type /ē/ and /ī/ occur as distributional
equivalents of the usual Mesopotamian /ie/. The variant /ē/
occurs in final weak verb forms of the type /ižēt/ "I came",
/ligēt/ "I found", /kilēt/ "gate", /xa ēt/ "I took", while
/ī/ seems to occur in non-verbal forms /bīt/ "house", /xīl/
"horses", /hsīn/ "Husain" , /čīf/ "how, what", /wīn/ "where",
/'alīš /"why".(l)

1 A similar type of system is shown for the Negev bedouins

by BLANC (1970) p.118. He suggests that this type of sys-
tem may be general to much of the Syrian desert area.
'Anizi forms such as zīn "good", šīn "bad", gī "summer"
seem to support this. This shows a connection between the
Syrian desert and the bādiya area of Iraq between the Eu-
phrates and Tigris. See also INGHAM (1976) p.68-9. Also
Shammar bwīrag "flag", z ī n e i h "good", s ī n e i h "bad", g ī r
"other than me". MONTAGNE (1935) p.85, 102.
81 Chapter 5

In other consonantal environments the distinction between

the two types is only maintained in cases where the Arabian
type shows the glide /ei/ which contrasts with /ē/ in the
Mesopotamian. In the majority of cases however both show
/ē/ as in /hēl/ "cardoman", /hēl/ "strength", /xēl/ "horses",
/xēr/ "good", /wēn/ "where", /fē ah/ "hollow", /gēd/ "sum-
mer", /fēsal/ "Faisal", /gēr/ "except".
But compare Shammari: /seif/ "summer", /seid/ "game",
/breiceih/ "well", /deif/ "guest", /'eib/ "shame", /sawweit /
"I did"; Mesopotamian: / s ē f , ē d , e f , ' ē b , sawwēt/.
However it seems that particularly in the Syrian desert
area the vowel /ē/ may be general to all environments. This
was the case with some of the Sba'a informants who gave /lēt/
"would that", /ligēt/ "I fund", /waddētih/ "I brought it",
and regarded the pronunciation /leit, ligeit , waddeit/ as
characteristic of "Southern" tribes such as the Mutair.(1)
The main distinction therefore between the Mesopotamian and
Arabian type remains that of the characteristic gliding vowel
of Mesopotamian [ ] or [ ] in anterior consonantal environ-
ments vs. the [ē] or [] of the neighbouring areas.

2 Certain feminine plural pronominal elements show a

segment /-an/ in the Mesopotamian type but /-in/ in the
Arabian type. These are /-čan/ "you (f.pl.obj.)", /-tan/
"you (f.pl.subj. perfective)", /intan/ "you (f.pl.)", also
/-an/ "f.pl. suffix of the imperfective and imperative". These
contrast with /-ćin, - č i n , - k i n , - t i n , i n t i n and - i n / in the
rest of the area. Compare:
S. MESOPOTAMIAN (KAWĀWILA): /intan dibban arwahcan
'alieh/ "you (f.pl.) throw yourselves upon him", /'yūni
y h i m l a n / "my eyes are watering", /yōm a l b a ' a r ī n yšīlan
r ū s h i n / "and when the camels lift up their heads";
DHAFIR: /yšūfin/ "they (f.) see";
SHAMMAR: /ydillinihin/ "they (f.) know them (f.)",
/haā ō l i n ć ilyamšin/ "those (f.) who walk", /alhīran ynūhin/
"the yearlings call for their mothers", /mā y š ā l i n / "they
cannot be removed,(2) /šuftin/ "you (f.pl.) saw" /šuftinnu/
"you (f.pl.) saw him", /ašūfakin/ "I see you (f.pl.)";
MUTAIR: /y'āydinnih/ "they (f.) visit him";
QASīM: /antin š i f t i n n u / "you (f.pl.) saw him", /hin
yašrabin/ "they (f.) drink", /hin yanksin/ "they (f.) go
back", /antin t a n š d i n / "you (f.pl.) ask".

1 On this point see INGHAM (1979) p.28. This was also re-
corded for the area of Kūt Sayyid 'Anāya in N. Khuzistan
in such forms as sigēt "I watered", j a l ē t " I polished",
g a t l e t "I killed", ligēt"I found", šta l ē t " I worked".
2 This is unexpected in view of the normal -an of the
passive. It may be that in these forms the open vowel
of the stem šāl - is sufficient to mark the passive and
therefore the more common -in is used.
82 Chapter 5

In the Arabian type the form /.an/ does occur in the imperfec-
tive structures but under more restricted conditions. Where
there is an internal passive it is the normal feminine plural
suffix as /yinšdan/ "they (f.) are asked", /tinšdan/ "you (f.
pi.) are asked", It also occurs in the V and VI Measures of
the verb which are intransitive in nature: Qasīm /ytigahwan/
"they (f.) take coffee", Mutair /ytisābigan/ "they (f.) com-
pete". In the dialect of the Sudair it occurs with final
weak verbs in /-a/, i.e. /yilgan/ "they (f.) find", /yibgan/
"they (f.) remain", /yibdan/ "they (f.) begin". The Sba'a
material showed examples of a type which seemed to operate
with a vowel harmony system(l), i.e. /y'atan/ "they (f.)
give", /irtaćan/ "lean (f.pl.)", but /taktibin/ "you (f.pl.)
write", /yhasbinhin/ "they (f.) think them (f.)", /gūmin/
"rise (f.pl.)", /bahhrin/ "look (f.pl.)", /irtać/ "lean (m.
s.)", /irtići/ "lean (f.s.)", /irtućum/ "lean (m.pl.)". The
Ruwala dialect showed the form /-in/ in the expected places,
but for the second feminine plural /-tan/ and /intan/, i.e.
/intan l i b i s t a n / "you (f.pl.) dressed". Also /-an/ in certain
final weak verbs, i.e. /ićwan/ "brand (f.pl.)", /yalwan/
"they (f.) twist", /yamšan/ "they (f.) walk", /yaćwan/ "they
(f.) brand", /insan/ "forget (f.pl.)". In this they resemble
the Sba'a.
The Gulf dialects group more closely with the Arabian type
showing /intin, - k i n , - t i n / but also with /-an/ as the suffix
of the imperfective and imperative /yaktban/ "they (f.)
write", /yišrban/ "they (f.) drink", /iktban/ "write! (f.
pl.)"(2) The Euphrates bedouin show the Arabian type:
Humaid /yirćibin/ "they (f.) mount", /yiktibin/ "they (f.)
write", /šūfin/ "look (f.pl.)", /intin/ "you (f.pl.)"
/yhasbinni/ "they (f.) consider me"; Rufai' /yidrin/ "they
(f.) know", /yimšin/ "they (f.) walk", /mā y i n ' a d d i n / "they
(f.) are uncountable". The Budūr also show this type /intin/
"you (f.pl.)" and /yšūfin / "they (f.) see". The Ahwaz
informant who was from the Zuhairiyya, a branch of the Budūr,
also gave /attīčin/ "I give you (f.pl.)". The Ahl al-Shimal
showed the Mesopotamian type in /šiftakan/ "I saw you (f.
pi.)", /šiftanni/ "you (f.pl.) saw me", /thatban/ "they (f.)
cut wood", /intan/ "you (f.pl.)". The position with the
imperative is not completely clear however as examples with
/-an/ occur in non-conditioning environments in some exam-
ples: Rufai' /ibnan i b s ā ' / "build (f.pl.) the tents quick-
ly"; Qasīm /šfanl "look (f.pl.)", /šfannuh/ "look (f.pl.)
at him".
The above shows a generally wider distribution of the
form /-an/ in the Mesopotamian type with some overlap in

1 A similar system occurs for the Negev bedouin, see BLANC

(1970) p.136, y i k i t b i n , y u g u ' d i n , y i m š i n , but yašraban,
yansan.
2 JOHNSTONE (1967b) p.42-50. Zubair shows intin also.
83 Chapter 5

the dialect of the Sba'a, northern 'Aniza of the Syrian des-

ert. (1) In the more southerly Najd dialects /-in/ is even
more widespread. One Harb informant gave /šāfin/ "they (f.)
saw" /šāfinnih/ "they (f.) saw it". It is interesting that
as with a number of other features the North Khuzistan infor-
mant from the area of Kūt Sayyid 'Anāya showed the feature
appropriate to the Euphrates nomadic type.

3 The feminine plural demonstrative also shows an element

/-an/ as with 2 above in the forms /hā a n n i / "there (f.)"
/ a n n ī č / "those (f.)" in contrast to forms of the type
/hā l ī c / 'Aniza, Central Najd, /hā l i n , hā l i n ć / Shammar.
The Dhafīir show /hādōlin/, but also /hā a l l i / and / a l l ī i ć /
approximating to the Mesopotamian type. The forms / a n n i ,
dannīć/ were also used by the Budūr and the Humaid and Rufai'.
In Zubair the form / annay/ occurs showing the common East
Arabian feature of /-ay/ for /-i/ in final position.(2) The
forms / a n n i , hā a n n i / were confirmed for all dialects of the
South Mesopotamian area. Sporadic examples of /hā ōlīč/ ōlīč/
were recorded in al-Fao.

4 A non-obligatory suffix /-an, -ann/ occurs in the first

singular imperfective in much of the South Mesopotamian area.
This occurs most commonly with the hollow and doubled verb
types. This is not found outside the area and is recognised
as a specifically South Mesopotamian feature. Examples:
/arūhan/ "I go", /ašūfan/ "I see", /anāman/ "I sleep",
/asubban/ "I pour", /ašufanna/ "I see him", /arīdanna/ "I
want it", /agasman-ilkam/ "I divide it up for you!" (Ahwaz)
/ayībanhin/ "I bring them (f.)". This feature did not occur
in the speech of the Euphrates shepherds Budūr and Zayyād
who regarded it as a Mi'dān characteristic.

5 The form of certain interrogative structures is quite

different in these two types. In the Mesopotamian type the
element /-man/ "which or who" can follow a verb preposition
or noun as an enclitic often fusing with it by certain sandhi
processes. The element /-š-/ "what" can also follow preposi-
tions or nouns, although it also precedes verbs, as in the
area generally. The element /wēn/ "where?" also can occur
following prepositions.
This gives the following types of forms: /mnēn/ "where

1 CANTINEAU (1936) p.80 shows similar forms for the 'Umūr of

the Syrian Desert, i.e. ygūman "they stand", tgūman "you
(f.pl.) stand".
2 See particularly PROCHAZKA (to app). This is also mentioned
by JOHNSTONE (1967b) p.71-72, who gives daxlay "enter (f.
s.)!", sim'ay "listen (f.s.)".
84 Chapter 5

from?", /'ala wēn/ "where to?", /luwēn/ "where to", /'alēman/

"on whom, which", /ilman/ "to whom, which?" (also /ilnan/
'Amāra) , /mimman/ "who from, from which?", /bīman "who by or
with, by which", /'idman/ (for /'ind-man/) "who with?",
/wiyyāman/ "who with?", /ibin-man/"whose son?", /māl-man/
"whose property?" /šifit-man/ "whom did you see?", /šāfat-
man/ "whom or which did she see?", /xi ēt-man/ "whom or which
did you take?", /mšanēš/ "what for?", "/bēš/ "what by?",
/ m ā l t ē š / "belonging to what?", / l i w ē š / "what for?", /ktāb-ēš/
"a book of what?".
In the Arabian type the question word precedes and may be
reflected following the noun, preposition or verb by the
Damīr a l - ' Ā y i d or "returning pronoun". Where the preposition
/l-/ "to" or /b-/ "with" occur, the independent pronoun /hu/
"he", /hi/ "she" are often introduced with, it seems, the
function of giving phonological substance to the form.
/min'anh/ "who about?", /min ' a l ē h / "who on?", /min wiyyāh/
"who with?", /min ' i n d i h / "who with?", /min hu mihh/ "who
from?", /min h u - l i h / "who for?", /wēn minh/ "where from?",
/wēn hu-lih/ "where to?", /wēn fīh or wēn hu-buh/ "in, at
where?", /wiš ' a l ē h / "what about?", /wišhu-lih/"what for?",
/wiš 'anh/ "what about?", /min ibnih/ "whose son?", /wiš
haggih/ "belonging to what?", /min j ā y i b t i n h i / "who has she
brought?", Sudair; /min ant šāryinluh a?/ "who have you
brought that for?", Qa īm. With longer sentences the order
of the elements is variable. The interrogative complex may
precede the verbal as a unit as /wēn minh j ī t ? / "where did
you come from?" or the preposition and object pronoun may
follow the verb as in /wēn j ī t minh/.
SUDAIR: /wēn y i j i Ihawa minh/"where does the air come
from?", /min hu ' i n d i h a l f a r a s / "who is the horse with?"
/wēn r i h t u - l i h / "where did you go to?", /wēn antum m t i l l ī n i n
' a l ē h / "where do you look out upon?", /wiššu 'anh y a n/
"what are they talking about?".
QASĪM: /min t a k t i b lammu/(1) "who are you writing to?",
or /min h u - l i h t a k t i b / ; /min i t t i g a h w a ' i n d u / "who are you
going to drink coffee with?"
SHAMMAR:/min nimt 'indu b a l - h a f a r / "whose house did you
sleep in at al-Hafar?", /min ana bwajhu/ "under whose pro-
tection am I?"(2)
DHAFIĪR: /hād a wiš sōtuh/ "what is this the noise of?"
In the area studied the Arabian type of structure was ex-
emplified for the Najd localities, Dhahrān, Kuwait and also
Zubair. The Budūr and Euphrates bedouin showed the Mesopotam-
ian type of structure while, however, the Rufai' showed /min/
for "who" rather than the usual /man/.

1 For the distribution of the preposition lamm see p.101.

2 MONTAGNE (1935) p.76.
85 Chapter 5

RUFAI': /šift-min/ "who did you see?", /'inn-min yis'al/

"who or what is he asking about?"(1)
HUMAID: /yinšid 'alēman/ "who is he asking about?",
/lwēn r i h t / "where did you go to?"
BUDŪR: /'alēman n i š a d / "who did he ask about?", /hā a
ilman/ "what is this for?", /wāyahit-man/ "who did you meet?"

6 The use of the terms translatable as "also", "more",

"still", "yet" separates Mesopotamia from the rest of the
area. In all of the area the word /ba'ad/ has the general
meaning of "more" as in /ba'ad wāhid/ "one more". The mean-
ing "after" is served by /'ugub/ as in /'ubgin/ "afterwards",
/'ugub ma-/ "after ...". Examples of this use of /ba'ad/ are
/j na b a ' a d a l ā ah/ "there came to us three more", /'atni
b a ' a d wāhid/ "give me one more"; Mesopotamia: /ba'ad sōlif/
"tell us more!"; Sudair: /u f ī h b a ' a d anwā'in t ā n y i h / "and
there are also other types", /a inn f ī h b a ' a d / "I think there
is still more". In negative sentences it gives the meaning
"yet" in such examples as Sudair: /ma b a ' a d j ā n a s s ē l
assanah d i / "this year no rain has come to us yet", /ana mā
b a ' a d š i f t i h / "I haven't seen him yet". In the Mesopotamian
type /ba ' a d / is also used with the meaning "no longer" in
negative sentences, while in the Arabian type the particle
/'ād/ is used; contrast:
MESOPOTAMIAN: /ba'ad mā n r ī d a h / "we don't want it any
more", /hā anni b a ' a d mā yfīdannah / "these (f.) are no use
to us any more", /ba'ad ma yi a l min hā a nnō'/ "that type
is no longer available".
SUDAIR: /mā 'ād bagi lha lzūm/ "there is no need for it
any longer", /mā 'ād š i f t i h / "I have not seen him any longer",
/mā 'ād yimdīhum/ "they can no longer do it", /mā 'ad bāgi
'indana illa yōmēn a l ā i h / "we have no longer any time ex-
cept two or three days".
In affirmative sentences it gives the meaning "still",
/wa law hinna 'ād n a s b i r ' a l ē h / "although we would still be
patient with him", /ba'dēn 'ād f ī h / "and again there is still
something left". The most striking difference however is in
sentences where the meaning "also" is given. In the Arabian
type /ba'ad/ may be used or also one of the adverbs /zoudin,
zād/ "in addition".(2) In many examples "also" is expressed

1 Compare also Ahl al-Shimal min tabūn min albadu "which of

the bedu do you want?" This may have been under the in-
fluence of Kuwaiti interlocutors.
2 This may also be the meaning of z ī d (yazīd) as given by
JOHNSTONE (1964) and glossed "another time" p.92. An ex-
ample of zād occurs in MONTAGNE (1935) p.108 h i n rāhan
l a h a l h i n u hu zād rāh m i ' i a r h i n i l h a l u h "they went to
their families and he also went on their tracks to their
family".
86 Chapter 5

by a special syntactic construction of the type "X, he and Y"

with the meaning "X and also Y". Examples: Shammar: /jāna
rākān hu wuswēlim/ "Rakan came and also Suwailim", /u g a l a t
ibn h id wu wijmā ' t u h / "Ibn Humaid came into camp and also
his followers", /want b a ' a d t a y y i b / "and you also are a good
person", /jāna x l e i f u ba ' ad (zoudin) (1) 'rēfij/ "Khulaif
came to us and also 'Uraifij". In the Mesopotamian type an
element /ham/ of Persian origin is used. In initial position
/hammēn/ or /hammēna/ occurs. This is also common in the
dialect of Kuwait, but is completely absent in the Arabian
dialects. It was recorded also in the speech of the Ahl al-
Shimal: /u glitaw ham ma'zūmin/ "they came into camp as well,
as guests", /hamšift wāhid akram minni/ "have you also seen
anyone more generous than me?" The following examples from
the dialect of the Kawāwila illustrate the use of this par-
ticle: /ham iya sabi' 'alīh ham abbaha/ "another lion came at
him and he killed that one also", / āk ham libas u širad/
"that one also got dressed and fled", /ham 'ēnha šab'āna u
ham 'idha halāl wāyid/ "she is both contented and has (also)
much property", /waddaw innōb 'alīh xayyāl ham mā rāh/ "they
sent again a rider against him and again he didn't go".

7 Certain common lexical items separate the two groups.

In some cases an area of vagueness occurs in so far as a par­
ticular item may be used in one area but infrequently, where­
as in the other area it is the most common term. This is the
case with the word for "now". In the Mesopotamian type this
is /hassa/ or /hassa'/. in the Arabian type it is /halhīn/.
However /bassā''/ is also found in the Shammar and 'Aniza dia­
lects but with the more emphatic meaning "at this instant".
(2) Similarly with the verb "to want". In Mesopotamia it is
always /rād, yrīd/. In the Arabian dialects the most common
verb is /baga,yabi / but /rad,yrīd/ also occurs in the nor­
thern bedouin dialects as a less common alternative.(3) The
following are the clearest contrasts:

1 Also in MONTAGNE (1935) p.77: lēh tatlub 'ala xūy albil

walfaras zoudin 'alayy "why do you ask from my brother
camels and a horse in addition to me?"
2 MONTAGNE (1935) p.106: igsid hassā'eih "compose a poem on
the spot". In the dialect of the Rufai' hēhīn, Budūr
halhin.
3 MONTAGNE (1935) in the texts from the Khrusa p.99, 104,
106; also baga/yabi p. 108 from the Khrusa. No examples
of rād/yrid occur in the !Abda texts, but baga/yabi p.82,
90, 92, 95. LANDBERG (1919) p.4, 7, 9, 10.
87 Chapter 5

Mesopotamian Arabian

yāmta mita "when"

yāhu min "who"
yāhu ayy "which" (1)
māl- hagg- "belonging to"
la'ad (2) ajal "so, then, therefore
sin- (3) wis "what"
lo ... lo ya ... y a (4) "either ... o r "
kadd/ykudd jawwad/yjawwid
gidab/yaggub (5) "to grasp"
dabb/ydibb jida1/yajda' (6) "to throw"
da, wilak, w i l i č
wilkutn, wilcan no equivalent expletives (7)
hawan (8) nijr "pestle"
bawa'/ybawi i bahhar/ybahhir (9)
fa ar/yfaccir "to look at"
čann- inn- činn- (10) "as t h o u g h "
lo walla "or"

FEATURES SEPARATING THE NORTHERN AND SOUTHERN AREAS

A number of contrasts link Northern Najd with Mesopotamia

and in some cases with a more general northern area as
against Central Najd and the Gulf to the south. In general
the isoglosses seem on the basis of the evidence available to

1 BLANCU970) also notes yat "which" for the Negev, p.144.

2 WETZSTEIN (1868) also gives la'ad "then, so" for the
•Aniza, p.126, 127.
3 wišhu was regarded by my Būdur informants as "bedouin";
they used š i n u "what is it". See also CANTINEAU (1936)
p.108 who gives forms of the type š i n u , š i n h u , w i š i n h u for
the 'Umūr, Slūt, Bani Khālid and Mawāli. The Dhafīr also
used š i n h u , š i n h i etc. as well as wišhu.
4 Also in the Ahl al-Shimāl, Text 9.
5 yawwad/yyawwid in the Rufai1 dialect; also Zubair who
show gi ab as well.
6 Also in'the dialect of Zubair yida'/yiyda'.
7 Kawāwila: wilak ča yahaw ilšaf martah yku un bīha
wiygādūn bīha jiddāmak winta xāyif. "Look, really, who
could watch his wife being pulled and dragged about in
front of your eyes and you are afraid (to do anything)."
wak in the dialect of the Zubair.
8 Persian havang
9 bahhar also in the dialect of the Rufai' and Humaid.
10 cinn in the Humaid dialect.
88 Chapter 5

run between the Jabal Shammar and the northern Qāsīm area in
Central Arabia for the sedentary dialects. As regards the
nomads, those regarded as "southern", i.e. Harb, Mutair,
'Awāzim, Rashāyda, 'Utaiba, 'Ajmān and Dawasir have the
southern form, and those regarded as northern, i.e. 'Aniza,
Shammar, Dhafīr, Bani Khāīid and Euphrates bedouin, have the
northern form.(1) The Harb are divided for feature 1 into
Hijazi and Najdi types. The Hijazi type show the northern
feature which is also the form for the Hijaz urban dialect.
(2) The Najd Harb showed the southern feature. The 'Aniza
although northern show the southern feature for feature 4 and
for one of the cases mentioned under 3. The dialect of my
Qasīm informant showed the southern form for all cases except
2 where it seems to have the northern type. However my mat­
erial on that point was not complete. In general the iso-
gloss distribution reflects the view of a later emergence of
the various 'Aniza dialects into the northern area as they
show considerably more southern characteristics than the
Najd Shammar and Dhafīr dialects although now more northerly
in location.

1 The form of the second person masculine singular object

suffix is basically /-ak/ in the north, /-ik/ in the south.
In the southern area the two suffixes of the singular are
distinguished for gender purely by the nature of the conson­
ant, i.e. /-ik, -i / Qasīm and Central Najd, /-ik, -ič/ the
Gulf area, and /-ik -iš/ Southern Najd and Oman. (3) In the
northern type the realisation of the /k/ consonant in the
masculine suffix is often a very back velar i.e. /-ak/• The
Inner Najdi type dialects also show /-uk/ or /-ik/ [- k ]
while the Gulf type has /-ik/ [-ik] In my material /-ak/
is recorded for all of Khuzistan and South Iraq, the Euphra­
tes bedouin, Shammar, Dhafīr and all 'Aniza dialects invest­
igated, that is: Sgūr, Sba'a, Hiblān and 'Awāja. The 'Awāja
are the southernmost group, being a branch of the Wild
Sulaimān west of Hail. It seems that the Bani Khālid also
show this form.(4)

1 Interestingly DICKSON (1949) p.155 gives almost the same

division for the wearing of the burgu' or women's face
mask. This is worn only among the southern tribes, which
include however the Bani Khālid, southern by location but
not by dialect.
2 See INGHAM (1971) p.289.
3 See JOHNSTONE (1967b) p.14.
4 My information on the Bani Khālid was inconclusive, as
one informant also gave -ik, but Shammar informants were
agreed that -ak was the most common form among the Bani
Khālid.
89 Chapter 5

SBA'A: /tabini agulha lak/ "would you like me to recite it

for you?", /nisīhti lak/ "my advice to you".
SGUR: /wisbalak/ "what's wrong with you", /ummak/ "your
mother", /wišbak/ "what's wrong with you".
SHAMMAR: /anšidak/ "I ask you", /mrutak/ "your wife",
/wlidak/ "your son", /mnak/ "from you", /yidak/ "your hand".
DHAFIR: /šlonak/ "how are you", /'indakl "you have",
/'ateitak/ "I gave you".
AHI/AL-SHIMAL: /axbirak/ "I tell you", /'abdak/
"your slave", /š'alāmak/ "what's wrong with you".
RUFAI': /a'allmak/ "I will tell you", /xallak hnayya/ "stay
here I"
HUMAID: /anšidak/ "I ask you".
HARB (Bani 'Amr): /'induk/ "you have".
MUTAIR: /ašufuk/ "I see you", /rawwihlik/ "send for your­
self".
'AWĀZIM: /lihyitik/ "your beard", /waguftik/ "your position",
/šofuk/ "your sight", /ša'bik/ "your people".
RASHAYIDA: /ābanšdik/ "I will ask you", /lihālik/ "for your­
self", /y'āwnik/ "he helps you", /wajhik/ "your face".
FAILIčA: /šāfik/ "he saw you", /bagūllik/ "I say to you",
/šāfitik/ "she saw you", /wlāyhimmik/ "let it not concern
you".
QASIM (Midhnab): /wišnōhik/ "what's wrong with you?",
/byāltik/ "your cup", /buh 'indik ghawa/ "have you any
coffee", /bintik/ "your daughter".
SUDAIR: /ana jayyin lammik/ "I am coming to see you",
/nhawwilhā-lik/ "we will transfer it to you", /mištāgillik/
"looking forward to seeing you".
'AJMĀN: /dūnuk/ "before you", /kānuk/ "if you are...",
/'induk/ "you have".
ZUBAIR: /bētik/ "your house", /anšdik/ "I ask you".
'UTAIBA: /xallik/ "leave yourself", /jārik/ "your neighbour",
/xawiyyik/ "your companion", /'irfik/ "your knowledge".
'AWAJA: /xawiyyak/ "your companion".
Dialects showing /-ik/ are the Gulf,Sudair, Qasīm and
Riyadh; also the Mutair, 'Awāzim, Rashāyida, Najdi Harb,(l)
'Utaiba, 'Ajmān and Dawāsir.

2 In the northern type the prepositions /fi/ and /bi-/

have merged leaving only /bi-/ as a general locative and
instrumental preposition. In the south /fi/ remains with the
meaning "in" while /bi-/ designates "at" or "by". The dis­
tribution of this contrast seems to be identical with 1
above. Although the evidence for the 'Aniza dialects is not
absolutely clear, both Landberg's and Wetzstein's material

1 The Harb of Hijaz also show -ak. This is true of the dia­
lect of my informant and also of el-Hāzmi's.
90 Chapter 5

and my own suggest that /fi/ is replaced by /bi-/ in these

dialects. In neither Landberg's nor Wetzstein's material are
there examples of /fi/. In my own Sba'a material /fi/ occurs
but this may be under the influence of the more common type.
A factor which supports this interpretation is that the word
for "here" is / b i h ā a/ "in this place" and the word for
"there is" is /baha/ or /bih/ "in it". In some other dia­
lects with /fi/ the word for "there is" is /fīh/ and "here"
is /fīdih/.(1) Sentences suggesting this interpretation
from the texts are the following: (Landberg, 1919):
/xašš bwust halganam/ "he entered into the middle of these
sheep" (p.2); /wilya" lhadid brijlēn azzlima/ "and there were
the irons on the legs of the man" (p.5); /yimalli I irbah
ukullma yhutt baha šwayyat ma/ "he filled up the skin and
every time he put some water in it" (p.7); /walā titwāsa
lgahawa ibbētak/ "and you will not order coffee in your tent"
(p.6); /hu bak ši wuja'/ "is there some pain in you" (p.6);
/sar ibbet ibn swēt/ "he came into the tent of Ibn Suwait"
(p.8); /al'ūd yinbut ibmacanu 'ūd/ "a stick grows up as a
stick in its own place" (p.10); /rakaz arrumh bilbalad/ "he
stuck the lance in the earth" (p.13). From my own material
we find: Sgūr: /halmukan alii hinriā-bha/ "this place which
we are in"; Sba'a: /mā ligeitkum ibbeitkum/ "I didn't find
you at your house". In the Shammar dialects and those of
Iraq and Khuzistan the non-existence of /fi/ is well known.
Consider the following: Shammar: /laffuh balhizām/ "he
wrapped it in the belt"; /ga'ad balgasur/ "he stayed in the
castle" (Montagne, 1935, p.176); /šāl gadfituh uhattah
balxarj/ "il enleva son voile de tête et le mit dans son
bissac" (Montagne, 1935, p.91). Kawāwila: /irrumh tāf 'ala
batn ilfaras winšijax birričab/ "the lance went around the
stomach of the horse and stuck into the saddle"; /u šaggah
bwast iddarwāza mālt ilgasur/ "and he stuck it in the middle
of the gate of the castle"; /asma' bilbīr hiss ixtibātāt/
"I hear the sounds of movement in the well". Zubair:
/bilbēt/ "in the house"; /hi 1grufa/"in the room".
In contrast the following examples show the use of /fi/ in
the more southern dialects:
MUTAIR: /warā mā ri ibtum min dīratkum all antum fīha
gabul/ "why did you not set out from your dīrah in which you
were before?"; /twallawh min najd u min hāk alkasrah mā šabb
flha nār/ "they drove him out of Najd and after that defeat
he did not light a campfire there"; /lēh mā simaht libin
hmeid yrabbi' fi najd/ "why did you not permit Ibn Humaid
to graze in Najd?"

1 However it seems that some dialects which show fi also

have bih, cf. JOHNSTONE'S Hajiri text (1967b, p.226).
91 Chapter 5

'AWĀZIM: /wutanna alii hinna fīh/ "our homeland which we

are in"; /min istišārik daxal fi immitik/ "he who asks your
advice enters into your protection"; /ana a'allmik fīh/ "I
will teach you about it"; /wagūl fi wahdin mnal'iyāl/ "and I
say about one of the family".
'AJMĀN: /doulat alatrāk falhasa/ "the government of the
Turks was in al-Hasa"; /'indi lkum sālfa ltāmir ibn s'edān
issbe'i fisābg izzimān/ "I have a story for you about Thāmir
ibn Su'aidān the Sbai'i in earlier times"; /hāttīnin
firjīlih hadid/ "and they had put chains on his legs";
/arrajjāl dāxlin 'alēha filgrufah alii hi fīha/"the man
entered in to see her in the room which she was in"; /sōb
ahalih fil'ārid/ "towards his family in al-'Āridh".
HARB: /bagat tiži fīha rgāb umasāyib/ "there was going to
come in it rivalries and problems"; /u tisawwagna fassūg/
"and we did our shopping in the market"; /utidaxxal wallah
fiha 'beid/ "and 'Ubaid interceded in the matter".

3 A number of lexical items have somewhat different forms

distributed roughly north and south although they are ob­
viously cognate, unlike the non-cognate items mentioned above
for the Mesopotamian/Arabian contrast. These are the follow­
ing:
Northern Southern
anta yinti 'ata y'ati "to give"
kala/yākil akal/yākil "to eat"
xada yāxid axad yāxid "to take"
heč, hič, hić čida,ćidah,ćidlh,čidi "thus, so"

The division into Northern and Southern for these features is

the same as the general division outlined above except that
the 'Aniza and Shammar seem to show both types for the verb
"to give", while some fAniza show the northern and some the
southern type for "to take" and "to eat". My Shammar mater­
ial gives /yi'tun/ "they give", /'ateituni/ "you gave me".
Cantineau (1937, p.231) mentions the northern forms for the
two items, while Montagne gives nasalised forms in /'atlk/
"I will give you". For the 'Aniza my Sba'a and 'Awaja in­
formants gave /'ata y'ati/ and said that /nita yanti/ meant
"to weave". However both Landberg (1919) and Wetzstein
(1868) give numerous examples. Landberg (p.4): /tantīh/
"you give him", /anpīk/ "I give you"; Wetzstein (p.80):
/antāhin/ "he gave them(f.)". For the verbs "to take" and
"to eat" Cantineau, agreeing with my Sba'a informants, states
that the 'Aniza show the southern type of form (p.234), while
both Landberg and Wetzstein give examples of the northern.
Landberg: /kala/ (p.5); /xa a/ (p.6,7), /xa ēna/ (p.80),
/xa ā h/ (p.14) passim. Wetzstein: /kala/ (p.5), /xa a/ (p.
6,7) passim. The Dhafīr surprisingly show the southern type
for all three cases: /'atāni/ "he gave me", /almira 'atatni/
92 Chapter 5

"the woman gave me", /a'tyah/ "I give her", /'atni/ "give me','
/axadt/ "I took", /akaltah/ "I ate it (f.)".
Apart from the above the distribution is as expected for
these items: Iraq and Khuzistan /nita, yinti/ "to give",
/xida, yāxid or xada/ "to take", /kila(or kala) yākil/ "to
eat"; all Arabian dialects investigated (1) /'ata y'ati (or
yi'ti)/, /axad,yaxid/, /akal, yākil/. The Ahl al-Shimal
gave /antik/ "I give you" but also /'atni/ "give me". How­
ever it seems that /'atni/ as an imperative is used in dia­
lects where the normal form of the verb is /nita, yinti/ as
this was also the case in the dialect of 'Amāra. With the
word for "thus, so" the north/south division is easily estab­
lished. All 'Aniza dialects investigated have /hīć/; Khuzis­
tan and Iraq have /hīć/ except for the Shatt al-'Arab and
Karun which have /hīć/. The Bani Khālid, Euphrates bedouin
and Budur have /hīć/. From my Shammar informants I heard
/hīć/ and /hīć/, though far more commonly /hallōn/ which is
also heard in Iraq. The Dhaflr accepted /hīć/ but gave as
more typical /hassuwa/ or /hassuwayya/. In the south /ćidal
Was the most widespread, common to Rashāyida, Harb, Mutair,
Sudair, Riyadh and Qasīm. The 'Awāzim show the form / ei£ih/,
the East Coast and Zubair /či i/.(2) A feature with corres­
ponding distribution to this is the occurrence of / a/ or
/ i/ as a form of the demonstrative. All dialects of the
area show /hāda/ "this (m)", /hādi/ "this (f)", but dialects
of a southern distribution also show /da/ and / i/ as an
alternative form. The 'Aniza, Shammar and Dhaflr informants
regarded this as "southern"; however it does occur in res­
tricted conditions in the 'Aniza material of Landberg and
Wetzstein: Landberg (1919 , p.6, 59, 72, 79) /min 'ugubda/
"after that"; Wetzstein (1868, p.179, 78) /dil wćet/ "at
that time", /yōm min dāt ilayyām/ "one of those days".(3)
Examples from the southern dialects include:
HARB: /had al yadhar min dah/ "this is what appears from
that", /atturīgah i/ "that matter".
MUTAIR:* /fda Ifēdah/ "in that hollow", /u šlōn aljiha
da, 6idah?/ "and what about in that direction, like that?".
SUDAIR: /fda lisbū'/ "that week", /tabi hād walla dah/
"do you want this or that?", /wana da lli ana sām'ih/ "and
that is what I have heard", /alwruga i/ "that paper",
/alharakih i/ "that action".

1 One exception outside our area is the Dawāsir who show

xa a (JOHNSTONE, 1964, p.97).
2 In the West nēk is common to most of Syria and Lebanon,
while kidah or kida is the form in the Hijaz. BLANC
(1970) gives ki iy or ki i for the Negev bedouins, p.35,
146. See BERGSTRASSER (1915) for details of the situa­
tion in Syria.
3 JOHNSTONE (1967b) also mentions that phrases like alhīn
93 Chapter 5

QASĪM (Midnab): /mnant šāryin luh an' "who have vou

bought that for?"
RIYADH: /albēt da/ "that h o u s e " , / a š š i j a r a h i / "that
tree", /wis da/ "what is that?", /wen tabun di walla di/
"which do you want, this or that?"(l)
DOSIRI: /wis hu da ššayy li m a y y i g i š / "what is that
thing which has upset you (f.s.)?", /ma' il fintōg-da/
"through that pass", /ma' a ljabal/ "across that mountain"(2)
/li'irg a/ "that sand dune".
QATARI: / ah min allah mu mink/ "that is from God not
you".
HĀJIRI: /da ygūlih/ "that is what he said", /wlē a B
mitlagihu N/ "and there was B and N who had met B" .(3)

4 A further feature which seems to have a north/south

distribution, but which is somewhat more difficult to estab­
lish exactly, is the form of demonstratives cognate with OA
/hunā/ "here". In the north the forms /hnā/ or /hna / and
/nān/ occur; in the south /hnayya/ or /hni/. The problem in
determining this is that in the inner Najd and bedouin dia­
lects alternative forms of the type "in this (place)" have
developed (see following section) and the reflexes of /hunā/
are not always used. Forms of the type /hnayya/ are found
only in the southern area and also in some 'Aniza dialects.
Landberg gives it for the Wild 'Ali, but only one occurrence
(/hěneyya/). Blanc gives /hni/ and /hniyya/ for the Negev
bedouins. Examples from my notes include Sba'a, Sgūr, Harb,
Mutair: /hnayya/; 'Awāzim: /hniyya, hnīh/; Kuwait, Zubair:
/hni/. The Shammar and Dhaflr said that they did not use
/hnayya/ and regarded it as "southern". The form used in
Iraq and Khuzistan is regularly /hnā/, with /hān/ also used
in the areas of North Khuzistan and 'Amāra.(4) The Euphrates
bedouin showed both forms; Rufai1: /xallak hnayya/ "stay
here", /hni yāy/ "in this direction", /hān/ "here"; Ahl al-
Shimal: /minu hnā/ "who is here?". The form /hna / is used
in the central dialects but with a less deictic function,
corresponding to "there is", in such examples as:
SGŪR: /hna tnēn jaw/ "there are two people coming".(5)

dilayyām "those days" are common to dialects which do not

normally show da (p.118).
1 BADAWI (1965) p.216, 214)
2 JOHNSTONE (1964) p.98, 101, 103, 102.
3 JOHNSTONE (1967b) p.119, 122.
4 Also in many of the "petits nomades" of the Syrian desert,
CANTINEAU (1936) p.110.
5 But also Dosiri hna, JOHNSTONE (1967b) p.17.
94 Chapter 5

RIYADH: /mā hna mrāja'a/ "there is no blasphemy", or even

meaning "there".
DHAFĪR: /ruh hna/ "go there!"
And in combination with /min/i
SHAMMAR: /šiddaw min ihna/ "load up and move away (from
here)".
'AWAJA: /mišaw min ihna/ "they went from here".
The form /hān/ is used by the Shammar in /min hān/ "from
here". Generally then /hna/ is used in most of the area as a
general demonstrative, but only in Iraq and Khuzistan as
"here", /hnayya/ and /hni/ are used in the so-called south­
ern dialects but also among the 'Aniza.(1)

5 The occurrence of the negative construction with /mā

b-/ is generally distributed to the south. To the north the
plain negative /mā/ occurs. The construction with /bi-/ was
recorded for Riyadh, Sudair and for the dialects of the Harb,
Mutair and 'Awāzim. It does not occur in the dialects of
Mesopotamia, Kuwait or Zubair or in the dialects of the Dha-
fIr, Shammar and 'Aniza.(2) My material for the Qasīm is
inconclusive on this feature. Examples:
HARB: /mā hu b'indak/ "it is not with you", /mā hum
biygassirūn/ "they will not let us down".
MUTAIR: /ma hi bhi/ "it is not so", /zimānhum wagt ma
hu btayyib/ "there was a time of drought, it (was) not good".
'AWAZIM: /ma hu bišši'r ilawwal/ "it is not (like) the
early poetry", /māhu bsid / "it is not the truth", /mani
bnasin/ "I have not forgotten", /māhi bhilu/ "it is not nice".
SUDAIR: /manta bjayy/ "you are not coming", /mā hum
biyjun/ "they will not come", /māni bbalhēl/ "I am not so
well", /mā hinna bmihtājīnillihum/ "we are not in need of
them", /ma hu biyxālif/ "it doesn't matter".
RIYADH: /mā hi bihkumiyya/ "they are not from the govern­
ment", /mā hu bma'gūl/ "it is not reasonable", /ana mā
bb'arif ilia hal 'arabi/ "I know nothing except this (lan­
guage) Arabic", /māhu bilyōm/ "not today".

1 It may also be relevant that a form /hna / seems to be

used meaning "bravo" in some 'Aniza dialects; see
LANDBERG (1940) p.91.
2 None of my 'Aniza informants gave forms of this type and
in the material of Landberg and Wetzstein it is absent
except for one instance in a poem in LANDBERG (1919) p.
123. mani bsaggam "je ne mangerai pas pour soutenir ma
vie".
95 Chapter 5

FEATURES SEPARATING THE CENTRAL AREA FROM THE OUTER FRINGE

A number of features not connected with the reductional

changes mentioned in Chapter 3 separate the interior from
the outer fringe, i.e. Mesopotamia and the Gulf. For a num­
ber of these features, namely 2 and 3, the outer bedouin
tribes (Euphrates bedouin and the 'Awāzim and Rashāyida)
group with the outer region. For feature 1 also the Euphra­
tes bedouin group with the outer region, while the 'Awazim
and Rashāyida group with the inner tribes, i.e. 'Aniza,
Shammar, Dhafīr, Mutair and Harb. The distinction is some­
what obscured in respect of 2 and 3 by the fact that the
Shammar also show the form characteristic of the outer region
to the west, i.e. Hijaz and the East Mediterranean lands. In
3 the Dhaflr also show similar forms. However this does not
invalidate the inner/outer distinction but only relates to a
rather more restricted inner area.

1 One of the most widely recognised features and one

amply described elsewhere (1) is the type of fronting which
has occurred with OA /kāf/ and /qāf/ in fronting environments.
In the interior type these have been fronted to /c/ [ tS ]
and /z/ [ dz ] , while in the outer type they appear as /č/
[ t] and /j/ [ ] . In this feature the Euphrates bedouin
and Bani Khalid and the shepherds group with the outer area,
while the Mutair, Rashāyidā, •Awāzim, Shammar, 'Aniza,
Dhaflr and Najd Harb group with the inner area. Within the
peninsula Qaslm, Sudair and Riyadh are recorded as showing
the /ć, / forms while the Gulf dialects (2) show /č/ and / j / .
The 'Ajmān, who originate in Southern Najd, do not have af-
fricated forms of /kāf/ and /qāf/ and show /k/ and /g/ in all
reflexes of these units.(3) Examples:
MUTAIR: /ricib/ "he rode", /sī ān/ "legs", /tafri / "it
is different", /hacim/ "ruler", /yadć/ "your hand (f.s.)",
/ćima/ "like, as", /ćidah/ "thus, so", /rī/ "spittle",
/a ablah/ "tomorrow evening".
'AWAZIM: /yabci/ "he cries", /faććir/ "look!", /yaćdib/
"he lies".
RASHAYIDA: /ti il/ "heavy", / il/ "talk", /xālzik/ "your
creator".
HARB: /smāć/ "period after the rain season", /ćannah/
"summer", /marāći/ "cushions", /mrećib/ "fire hearth frame",
/ t a l ī / "tent pole", /aćil/ "food".

1 See JOHNSTONE (1967b) "Affrication", p.2-6; CANTINEAU

(1937) p.139-43).
2 See JOHNSTONE (1967b) p.4.
3 See JOHNSTONE (1964) p.84-6; also see Text 1.
96 Chapter 5

SHAMMAR: /šićīimeih/ "bridle", /rifīz/ "friend", /hći/

"it was said", /wi ifat/ "it (f.) was stopped", /birćeih/
"well", /banādic/ "guns", /yinwićil/ "it is edible",
/ni 'idu/ "we will make him sit", /ćabd/ "liver, small hill",
/citād/ "thorny tree".
SUDAIR: /mbaććirin/ "early", /asā'idć/ "I will help you
(f.s.)", / id/ "verbal particle", /haćyikum/ "your talk",
/ćidb/ "untruth".
DHAFIR: /rićibt/ "I mounted", /tarćab/ "you mount",
/sjarāt ć i t l r a t / "many trees", / ćeif int/ "how are you?"
QASĪM: /hādōlīć/ "those (f.)", /ćibab/ "rope fixing to
well bucket", /dannaz/ "he bent down".
•ANIZA: /farić/ "tent-dividing curtain", /hīć/ "like
this", /lihi / "he followed", /irtać/ "lean!", /Izi/ "it was
found", /wćll/ "it was eaten", /ćls/ "bag purse", /mwarrić/
"sitting cross-legged", /msa il/ "polished".
EUPHRATES BEDOUIN: /čō l/ "desert", /jilīb/ "well", /čīs/
"tobacco pouch", /hič/ "thus", /čitab/ "camel saddle", /čabd/
"liver", /činn-/ "as if", /yirčib/ "he rides", /čef/ "how".

2 In the central area, except Northern Najd, the object

suffixes /-ak or -ič, -ić and -ih/ lose their vowel in struc­
tures in which they follow a syllable of the type -VC. The
/-t/ of feminine suffixes is often assimilated to /k/ and
/ć/ giving /-ćć/ and /-ćć/ for /-tk/ and /—tć/. In the outer
area and in Northern Najd the vowel is retained more fre­
quently. Although the Northern Najdi type does not show this
feature it is nevertheless characteristically a feature of
the inner area rather than "southern", as in general the
Gulf dialects (1) and also the dialects of the 'Awāzim and
Rashayida do not show it. (The vowel of the third person
masculine singular suffix /-ih/ also loses its vowel under
similar circumstances.) Dialects showing this feature are
the 'Aniza, Dhafīr, Harb, Mu^air, 'Utaiba, 'Ajmān and
Dawasir for the bedouin, also the dialects of Riyadh, Sudair
and Qasīm. As mentioned by Cantineau, in the Syrian desert
area this had become a prestige marking feature as charact­
eristic of the powerful 'Aniza tribes of the area and as
such was adopted by certain sedentary groups.(2) Examples:
HARB: /lizmatk/ "your promise", /naxalk/ "your palms",
/yadk/ "your hand", /yadć/ "your (f.) hand", /waladk/ "your
son", /wilyā minh—/ "when he...", /anšidk/ "I ask you",
/ma jabh harih akalih batnih/ "what his back brings, his
stomach eats", /mādri 'anh/ "I don't know about him",
/salāmatk/ "your health".

1 An exception to this is the Shi'a dialect of Bahrain and

the dialect of al-Hasa; see PROCHAZKA (to appear).
2 CANTINEAU (1937) p".236.
97 Chapter 5

'ANIZA (Sba'a): /jābakk/ "she bore you", /ghark allah

yā šīn/ "God abhores you, 0 evil one! (an expression used to
a person of great cleverness)", /ahasibc/ "I think of you (f.
s.)", /ćinh.../ "as though he..." / / jābh allah/ "God brought
him".
DHAFĪR: /sa'alk 'anni/ "he asked you (m.s.) about me",
/ma trūh lahalk/ "aren't you going home to your family?",
/wilyā mink / "and when you have..." /sa'atk mbāraka/
"your hour is blessed (an expression of welcome), /alla
yhafudk/ "God preserve you", /a'allimk/ "I will tell you",
/sahhāraćć/ "your (f.s.) suitcase", /xallah 'ank/ "leave it
alone".
'UTAIBA:(1) /rgubatk/ "your neck", /ana ba awwirk/ "ich
möchte dich einschreiten lassen gegen", /yarhamk alia/ "God
have mercy on you", /' i y ā t l i wudā 'atk/ "my family are your ran­
som", /'iyālć/ "your (f.s.) family".
QASĪM (Midhnab): /akramk allah/ "God reward you",
/simi'k/ "he heard you", /nšiditan 'ank/ "he asked me about
you", /'ajabk/ "it pleased you", /anšidć/ "I ask you (f.s.)".
SUDAIR: /wāldakk/ "your mother", /sayyārakk/ "your car",
/gōlakk/ "as you say", /axābirk/ "I will telephone you",
/ eifk alii 'indik/ "your guest who is with you", /jiz'in
minh/ "a part of it", /asā'idć/ "I will help you (f.s.)",
/yha irūnh ilna/ "they will prepare it for us", /yirsilūnh
Una/' "they will send it to us", /' ateitk/ "I gave (it) to
you".
MUTAIR: /alia birxustin minh/ "except by permission from
him",/salāmatk/ "your health", /šālh azza'al/ "anger drove
him away", /rajilć/ "your husband (f.s.)", / immatk/ "your
protection".
In the outer type the vowel is retained in these forms.
In the north, i.e. the Shammar dialect and the Mesopotamian
type, the vowel of the second masculine singular is /-a/,
while in the Gulf area peninsular type it is /i/. Examples:
SHAMMAR: /šāfitak/ "she saw you", ,'mrutak/ "your wife",
/hurmitak/ "your wife", /anšidak/ "I ask you (m.s.)",
/'wlidak/ "your son", /yidak/ "your (m.s.) hand", /yidić/
"your (f.s.) hand", /'nuh / "from him", /mnuh/ "from him",
/mnak/ "from you (m.s.)", /mnić/ "from you (f.s.)",
/abanhabić/ "I am going to elope with you", /mnuh/ "from
him".
MESOPOTAMIA (bādiya): /šāfitak/ "she saw you", /frusak/
"your house".
RASHĀYIDA: /wlidik/ "your son", /salāmtik/ "your health",
/tanglik/"she carried you", /waguftik/ "your situation",
/haguwtik/ "your thought", /y'āwnik/ "he helps you",
/abanšdik/ "I will ask you", /wāldik/ "your father".

1 HESS (1938) p.97, 94, 155, 94, 155.

98 Chapter 5

'AWĀZIM: /šāwarik/ "he consulted you", / immitik/ "your

protection", /a'allmik/ "I will tell you", /lihyitik/ "your
beard". (1)

3 The form of the third person masculine singular suffix

is /-ih/ in the inner area, /-ah/ in the periphery with the
exception of areas with the North Najdi form /-uh/. The form
/-ih/ is attested for the Mutair, 'Aniza, Harb, 'Ajmān and
Dawāsir, also for Riyadh and Sudair. The form /-ah/ is found
in the Gulf dialects, al-Hasa and Mesopotamia and also
in the dialects of the 'Awāzim and Rashayida. In dialects
where the form is /-ih/ the vowel is regularly elided when
followed by vowel initial forms giving similar forms to
those mentioned under 2 above, even where the form /-h/ would
not normally occur, i.e. following syllables of the type
Cv:C. Examples:
'AJMI: /yag i lizumh imn issūg/ "he completes his errands
in the market".'
SUDAIR: /yhaddirūnh-ilna/ "he prepares it for us".
'ANIZA: /jābhallah/ "God has brought him".
MUTAIR: /šalh azza'al/ "anger carried him away".
HARB: /mā jābh dharih akalih batnih/ "what his back
brings his stomach eats".
'UTAIBA: /alxāyin yxūnh allah/ "May God betray the
betrayer".(2)

4 In the inner dialects alongside reflexes of OA /hunā/

"here", expressions of the type "in this (place)" occur.
These are used commonly with the meaning "here" and are more
common than the reflexes of /hunā/ which have lost some of
their deictic function and can be used as purely syntactic
elements (see 5 below). The forms occurring are /bhā a/
'Aniza, Shammar, Dhafīr; also /bhāh/ Shammar; /b a/ Qasīm;
/fīdah/ Sudair; /fīdih/ Riyadh. The form /bhā a/ is also
recorded for the Syrian desert 'Aniza by Landberg (1919, p.
2). /flhāda/ or /bhāda/ is recorded by Blanc (1970, p.146)
for the Negev bedouins. Examples:
SHAMMAR: /bageit asuf anta bhada walla mānta bhāda/ "I
wanted to see if you were here or not", /ligēnāw bhāda/ "we
found him here.
DHAFIR: /ta'āl bhada/ "come here".
QASIM: /atnak bda/ "I will wait for you here", /gim min
da/ "go away from here", /siddu min a/ "move away from
here!", /šufēhum b a/ "see (f.s.) them here!".

1 But also 'ank "from you", mink "from you". It seems that
this form of the suffix is common with these prepositions
even in dialects where it is not common in other struc­
tures .
2 HESS (1938) p.155.
99 Chapter 5

SUDAIR: /ywaggifūn fīdah/ "they park (their cars) here",

/want fīdah/ "so you are here!".
RIYADH: /'abd il'azīz fl ih/"is Abd el'Azīz here?"(1)
'ANIZA: /ig'idum bihāda/ "sit here".(2)
My notes do not reveal whether or not these expressions
are used by the Euphrates bedouin or by the 'Awāzim,
Rashāyida, Mutair or Harb.

5 In the inner dialects the existential predicate is con­

veyed by an expression of the type "in it" or by the word
/hna/ "here". In the north the form is /bah, buh or baha,
bih/ depending on the dialect. In the central area /fīh or
fīha/. Expressions with /hna/ "here" also occur. The forms
/bah or buh/ etc. are recorded for Qasīm and for the Shammar,
'Aniza, Dhafīr and Euphrates bedouin. The form /fīh/ is re­
corded for the Mutair, Harb, Dawāsir, 'Awāzim and Rashāyida
and for the Sudair and Riyadh. In the outer dialects the
form /aku/ is common, which may be derived from /yakūn/ "it
is", and also /hast/ or /hassit/ from Persian /hast/ "there
is".

a) Expressions with fi- or b-

•ANIZA (Sba'a): /wišbaha? baha l'išb u baha ra'i wājid/
"What is there there? There is grass and much pasture."
EUPHRATES BEDOUIN: /abassirkum bēh xer u baha 'išbin la
ytūl/ "I give you good news. There is good fortune and
grass which will not last."; /adding a sāhi u la bah gēm/
"The weather is clear and there is no cloud."; /adding a
mahal u gahat ma buh sši/ "The world is in drought, there is
nothing."
SHAMMAR: /addyar gtū' mā bah had/ "The area was desert­
ed. There was no one there."; /bīrin bu ma/ "A well with
water in it."
QASIM: /a ilīb bah ma? īh bah/ "Is there water in the
well? Yes there is."; /buh 'indik ghawa? ī buh. lā mā
buh, mā buš/ "Is there any coffee with you? Yes there is.
No there isn't, there is nothing." /iććan darb alhawa buh
'eb.../ "If there is any shame in the way of love..."
MUTAIR: /fīh gisāyid wājid/ "There are many Qasīdas
(odes)."; /wadarrsa fīh sabi' alhmu āt u mrabbi'/ "In Wādi
al-Risha there are the seven hamadhat (saline plants) and it
is in flower."
'AWAZIM: /albil fiha nagah u fīh mwassata u fīha dilūl/
"Among camels there are racing camels, ordinary camels and
guide camels."; /flh gāgi yimil u gādi yichif/ "There are
judges who are dishonest and some who are honest."

1 BADAWI (1965) p.78.

2 LANDBERG (1919) p.2.
100 Chapter 5

DAWASIR: /mā flha ha arin asīlīn/ "There were no original

settled people there."; '/willēl mugdar mā flha gamrā/ "The
night was dark. There was no moonlight in it."(1)

b) Expressions with hna

'ANIZA: /hna i£nen jaw axāf in minhum/ "Here are two
(people) coming. I think they are from them."
RIYADH: /mā hna murāja'a/ "There is no blasphemy.";
/ma hna bnayyāt/ "Are there no daughters?"(2)

c) Expressions with aku or hast

MESOPOTAMIAN (Kawawila): /mir'i hāss aku rbīd bilbīr/
"Mur'i sensed that there was a snake in the well."; /walla
maku bdīratna hna/ "There are none in this dīrah of ours
here."; /gāl: māku 'amal, šayy basīt/ "He said: there is not
(much) work, it is a simple thing."; /halyōm ba'ad maku
ahad/ "Today there is no one any longer."; /bhīn mā dašš
habīb māku bīda tahīn/ "When Habib entered there was no flour
in his hand".
SHATT AL-'ARAB: /māy hassit/ "There is water."
GULF (Kuwaiti): /mā hast šayy āni/ "There is nothing
else."(3)

As can be seen from the above examples the interior type

continues the system of Classical Arabic insofar as there is
no existential verb "to be". Expressions of the type /buh
ma/ "there is water" are extensions of the ordinary preposi­
tional use of /b-/ in /a ilīb buh ma/ "the well (there is)
in it water". The /-h/ of /buh/ or /fih/ is a dummy object
referring perhaps to "the world" or "the place" so that
/buh ma/ is at a higher level of analysis, "In it (the
world) (there is) water." In the outer type on the other
hand actual existential verbal particles have developed.

6 A number of lexical differences also follow the lines

of those mentioned above. However, in the main, lexical dif­
ferences separate Mesopotamia from Arabia and fall under
"Features Separating Southern Mesopotamia from Arabia" (see
p.79 ff.). In the main these differences consist of special
lexical usages developed in the central area and differen­
tiating it from the area outside Arabia in general. The most
easily statable are shown below. Not all of these have been
checked for all inner dialects, but can be expected to occur
generally. However the dialects for which they are attested
are marked.

1 JOHNSTONE (1964) p.97, 108.

2 BADAWI (1965) p.291, 293.
3 JOHNSTONE (1967b) p.155.
101 Chapter 5

/balhēl/ "good, well so good" normally occurring in the

expression /māhu balhēl/ "not so well" Shammar, Mutair,
'Aniza, Sudair; /wara/ "why" in negative expressions i.e.
/wara mā rićibtum/ "why did you not set out?", /hallahalla/
"exactly, that is so!" Sudair, Mutair, 'Aniza, Shammar;
/bnōb/ "at all" (in negative expressions) Sudair, Shammar;
/hagwiti hagwitin/ "it seems, I think, it appears" Shammar,
Sudair, Euphrates bedouin; /mār, mēr/ "but" Mutair, 'Aniza,
Shammar, Harb; /lamm-/ "towards" 'Aniza, Shammar, Sudair,
Mutair; /nikas, yankis/ "to return" Shammar, 'Aniza, Qasīm;
/dahar, yadhar (or yidhar)/ "to go out at evening" 'Aniza,
Sudair; /źid/ emphatic verbal particle preceding the perfec-
tive, as /źid riht/ "I did go" 'Aniza, Sudair, Qasīm;
/galat, yaglut yiglut)/ "to come in, approach" 'Aniza,
Euphrates bedouin, Mutair; /dūn- dūr-/ deictic particle as
in /dūnak/ "here it is" Mutair, 'Awāzim, Sudair, Shammar,
Euphrates bedouin, 'Aniza,(1) also in some Bādiya areas of
the Euphrates; /kūd/ "except" 'Aniza, Shammar, Sudair. This
particle also passes into the meaning "must" (2) by the
extension "There is no alternative but that..." In this
meaning it has spread into Southern Mesopotamia in the form
/kūn/ or /wākūn/. Compare Shammari /kūd/ or /yakūd/; /yad/
"hand" contrasting with /īd/ in the outer area Shammar,
Dhafīr, 'Aniza, Sudair, Qasīm, Riyadh, 'Awāzim, Rashayida;
(3) /a adi, a adē-/ "perhaps, lest", Mutair, Dhafir.
6 Texts with translation,
background notes and information
on sources

The texts which follow are divided into two groups: Najdi
(Arabian) and Mesopotamian, although there is some diffi-
culty in assigning some of the more marginal types, such as
Text 8, Shammar Mas'ūd, to any of the groups. The division
is therefore designed mainly for the guidance of the reader
and does not constitute a classification system. The ar-
rangement of the texts is generally in order of the degree
of relationship to the speech of inner Najd and therefore
proceeds in a general northerly and easterly direction.
Two of the texts, Text 3 Harb and Text 4 'Aniza, are not
strictly north-eastern in terms of their main location.
However the Harb tribe are distributed in a north-easterly
line from Hijaz to Hafar al-Bātin, while 'Aniza dialects
similar to the one shown are found to the east well within
our area. They therefore participate in a linguistic con-
tinuum which centres on our area and are in any case of
comparative interest.

102
103 Chapter 6

TEXT 1

'AJMĀN: THE STORY OF THĀMIR IBN SU'AIDĀN

This text was given to me by the Kuwait radio service and is

an excerpt from the radio programme Diwān al-Bādiya. The
speaker is Māni' ibn Dhanbūh al-Shāmiri (abu Fahhād) of the
'Ajmān tribe. The 'Ajmān are a tribe of the Eastern region
but originating in the Southern Najd in the area of Najrān.
The dialect is very similar to that of T.M. Johnstone"s two
texts in "Some Characteristics of the Dōsiri Dialect of
Arabic as Spoken in Kuwait" (1961) and "Further Studies on
the Dōsiri Dialect of Arabic as Spoken in Kuwait" (1964),
which are of mixed 'Ajmāh-Dawāsir origin, but basically
'Ajmān. Features marking it as Southern are the absence of
the affricated variants of kāf and qāf. Otherwise it is very
similar to the Central Najdi type of my Sudair informants.

TEXT 1

'indi lkum alyōm sālfah whiyya l āmir ibn s'ēdān issbē'i fi

sabg izzimān. tāmir hāda hanšūli u nahhāb rajjāl tammā'.
u gisam allah annahu āk alwagt alatrāk / dōlat alatrāk
fal asa. 'indihum ixburih wa hā pīn 'alēh 'yūn ytisayyidōl-
lih u gulubōh wihbisōh. u 'ind ma-hbisōh hattlnin firjllih
hadid. f-ta aggab a ajjāl ilfuras wa a hayyālih fur ah u
ala' min issijin. wa bēt imhammad ibin imsāmih mn āl
slēman fal asa' u gāl: "ana mā li ilia 'āzmin bēt im ammad"
u yōm axa at uxt imhammad / u hi fi bētaha 'ugb il'asir lā
wa a a ajjāl dāxlin 'alēha fil rufah alii hi fīha. u
gālat: "yā walad, kānuk dēf šuf al / rufat arrjāl warāk."
gāl: "ana halhīn māni ba iy (1) rjāl. ana b i lmukān xāssin
xsūs" (zābin) ay na'ami yōm axa at im ammad 'ind u bānillih

1 Jba i < bāgi. This shortening of the vowels is more com-

mon in the Central and Southern Najd area. See also
INGHAM (1979) p.28. Interestingly this was also noted
104 Chapter 6 (Text 1)

min tijjār ilhasa lēn jāt il'asēr u yōm axa ih, lā wa ah

jayy imrawwi yōm ja axūha gālat: "yā m ammad Šuf a-l an
(1) i l l i dūnuk, awwitlih 'induk u yōm talla' 'alēh, lā
wallah hā a tāmir ibn s'ēdān." gāl: "ibn s'ēdān!" gāl:
"na'am." gāl: "ugelu jayy!" (2) u yōm ja lā wa a fi
rjīlih adīd u m ammad xābr innih masj - ha ōlāk, yōm
ivgudōh(3) arkubōlhum xayyāl yab a 'annih. u 'ayyanih 'ind
ibn imsāmi gāl: "'a na-yyāh yā bn imsāmih.n gāl: "al īn
arrajjāl eif, wa ah b'adik ilkarāmtih, u 'indi kunnih
'indukum hafu ." ilmuhimm yōm a ba i ub alaf 'alēh inn
yrū il-issūg u yag i lizūmih imnissūg. gāl ibn s'ēdān:
"axāf asabbib 'alēkum" gāl: "abdan!" wa 'ugbin yag i
lizūmh imnissūg uyzammlih g'ūdin-lih i'māni sōb ahalih fil
'āri 'ugub mā wi l - ihnāk arsal-lih kam bēt yahni bilma'rūf
yigūl:

yā rākbin min 'indina fōg faddād

mā fōgha ilia lxarj mi' jā'd iššdād
yasra min il'āri mi' i ub ilā ngād
wal'a ir bil abil irwitin m'aššah
yalfi 'ala 'amr manā'īr wajwād
zabn il usān ilyā wugaf sēr 'ilbāh
wilēh jīt bēt im ammad innih fahhād
garm il'iyāl la'all alar āl tifd āh
m ammad ibn imsāmih garm al awlād
bētih kibīr u sālmin min tana āh
wilēh wi lih ilma rūd mašyitih bi'dād
yag i l ara fissūg walā adin jāh
rab'ih m awwi't a a'āb lēn yangād
yuwwābrin wir āt fuhūdin mfa ah
garmin i l y ā min jara algi a yraxx izzād
ugarmin šijā' u tarfig issamin yamnāh
yistāhl albēda 'ala rūs alašhād
m ammad almašhūr mā -bih ma āwāh

by t h e t r a v e l l e r PALGRAVE (1865) I, p . 4 6 3 . He r e f e r s h e r e
to t h e vowels ā, ē, ū being " s t a r v e d down" to a, e, u in
Riyadh and Southern Najd. The e x i s t e n c e of t h e in t h e
form /ab i/ "I want" is a l s o c h a r a c t e r i s t i c of t h e south-
ern region. In t h e n o r t h /abi/ is more common. See a l s o
JOHNSTONE (1964), p . 9 9 and p a s s i m , which g i v e s /ab ei/,
/tab ei/.
1 / a/ " t h i s , t h a t " , a s o u t h e r n c h a r a c t e r i s t i c . See p . 9 2 - 3 .
2 ivgudōh < ifgudōh
3 /jayy/ c h a r a c t e r i s t i c of t h e s o u t h ; n o r t h e r n /jāy/.
105 Chapter 6 ( T e x t 1)

TEXT 1 ('AJMĀN) TRANSLATION

Today I h a v e a s t o r y f o r y o u and i t i s a b o u t T h ā m i r i b n
Su'aidān the Subai'i.(l) T h i s man T h ā m i r was a l o n e r o b b e r
and r a i d e r . H e was a n a m b i t i o u s man, and God made i t h i s
f a t e t h a t a t t h a t t i m e t h e T u r k s / i t was t h e r u l e o f t h e
T u r k s i n a l - H a s a , ( 2 ) and t h e y h a d i n f o r m a t i o n o n h i m . And
t h e y s e t s p i e s o u t t o h u n t f o r him a n d t h e y o v e r c a m e him and
imprisoned him. And when t h e y h a d i m p r i s o n e d h i m , t h e y p u t
chains on h i s legs. And t h e man w a t c h e d h i s o p p o r t u n i t i e s
and God g a v e him a n o p p o r t u n i t y a n d h e g o t o u t o f t h e p r i -
son. And t h e h o u s e of Muhammad i b n Musāmih of t h e Āl
S u l a i m ā n ( 3 ) was i n a l - H a s a . And h e s a i d : "I have no a l t e r -
n a t i v e e x c e p t t o g o t o t h e h o u s e o f Muhammad." And when
Muhammad's s i s t e r b e g a n t o / and s h e was i n h e r h o u s e i n t h e
e v e n i n g , n o b y God t h e r e was t h e man coming i n t o a p p r o a c h
h e r , i n t h e room w h i c h s h e was i n . She s a i d , "Oh b o y , ( 4 )
i f you a r e a g u e s t s e e t h e / t h e m e n ' s room i s b e h i n d y o u . "
He s a i d : " I d o n ' t w a n t t o s e e t h e men now. I want a
special private place." (Seeking refuge) Yes! And when
s h e f o u n d Muhammad w i t h some f r i e n d s o f h i s , some o f t h e
a l - H a s a m e r c h a n t s , when s h e came i n t h e e v e n i n g and when h e
b e g a n , n o b y God h e was coming home. When h e r b r o t h e r c a m e ,
she s a i d : "Oh Muhammad, s e e t h a t h o r s e w h i c h i s i n f r o n t
of you, c a l l it to y o u ! " And when h e l o o k e d a t i t , n o b y
God i t was T h ā m i r i b n S u ' a i d ā n . H e s a i d : "Thamir i b n
Su'aidan!" He answered: "Yes!" He s a i d : "Come h e r e ! "
And when h e came (he saw t h a t ) n o , b y God, h e h a d c h a i n s o n
h i s l e g s a n d Muhammad r e a l i s e d t h a t h e was a n ( e s c a p e d )
prisoner. T h o s e o t h e r s ( t h e T u r k s ) when t h e y r e a l i s e d t h a t
h e was m i s s i n g , s e n t o f f a h o r s e m a n t o s e a r c h f o r h i m . He
saw him w i t h I b n Musamih and s a i d : "Give him to me Ibn
Musāmih!" He s a i d : "At t h e moment t h e man i s a g u e s t , and
b y God you m u s t t r e a t him k i n d l y and h e i s p r o t e c t e d w i t h m e
as he is with you."(5) The r e s u l t was t h a t h e ( i b n Musāmih)
a d j u r e d him ( t h e h o r s e m a n , t o l e t i b n S u ' a i d ā n ) g o t o t h e
m a r k e t and g e t h i s p r o v i s i o n s from t h e m a r k e t . Ibn Su'aidān
said: " I ' m afraid I w i l l cause (trouble) for you," He said
"Not at a l l ! " And a f t e r w a r d s h e g o t h i s p r o v i s i o n s from t h e

1 S u b a i ' , a t r i b e o f S o u t h e r n and E a s t e r n N a j d .
2 The O t t o m a n T u r k s o c c u p i e d a l - H a s a i n t h e 1 7 t h and 1 9 t h
centuries.
3 The Ā l S u l a i m ā n a r e a s e c t i o n o f t h e 'Ajmān o f w h i c h t h e
I b n Musāmih c l a n a r e t h e h e a d ; DICKSON (1949) p . 5 6 9 .
4 The word /walad/ " b o y " i s o f t e n u s e d i n a d d r e s s i n g grown
men.
5 The m e a n i n g o f t h i s s e c t i o n i s u n c l e a r . However h e seems
to be saying t h a t as a guest, he is dear to both of us by
t h e laws o f h o s p i t a l i t y .
106 Chapter 6 (Text 1)

market and mounted him on a •omani camel(l) (to ride) towards

al-'Arid. (2) After he had arrived there he sent him a few
lines of poetry thanking him for the favour, saying:

0 rider going from us on a strong mount

on \':hich there is nothing but the sheepskin cover and
saddlefr arne
Riding out from al'Arig with the morning when it breaks
"
arriving at dusk at al-�abl,(3) probably at evening
He comes in to the 'Amr(4) strong and generous men,
coming in like a stallion when it arches its neck.(S)
If you come to the house of MUQammad, he is
the hero of the valiants, may all treacherous men die in
his place.
MuQammad ibn MusamiQ hero of the young men.
His house is large, and he who seeks refuge with him
is safe.
When the refugee reaches him his step becomes firm (in con­
fidence) .
He carries out his errands in the market and no one comes
to him (i.e. no one harms hi.m) .
His comrades put down strong men when lead out
heroes and sons of fierce lions
A hero who, when hardship strikes, counts his property cheap
a brave hero whose right hand distributes sustenance
He deserves the white turban of the martyrs(6)
Famed Mu�ammad in whom there is no doubt.

1 In the Arabian peninsula the small black 'Qmani camels

were considered the best for speed. See DICKSON (1949)
p.410.
2 al-'Ari9h, the area of Central Najd south of Riyadh.
3 al-?abl. This seemed to be a place name, but was not
known to my informants.
4 Bani 'Amr, one of the branches of the Subai'.
5 In anger or excitement.
6 This may also refer to the ceremony of "whitening" per­
formed in gratitude for a favour; GLUBB (1948) p.l38.
107 Chapter 6

TEXT 2

MUTAIR

The Mutair m a t e r i a l c o n s i s t s of two s t o r i e s recorded i n

Kuwait i n 1977. The f i r s t was recorded a t a Dīwāniyya, which
i s a s o c i a l g a t h e r i n g of men f o r t h e purpose of exchanging
news and w i t h a s t r o n g b i a s towards o l d e r c u l t u r a l forms such
as p o e t r y r e c i t a t i o n , s t o r y t e l l i n g and m u s i c . The second
s t o r y was recorded i n t h e t e n t of a Mutair family encamped
a t Raudhatain, a w e l l about half-way between Kuwait town and
t h e I r a q b o r d e r . Both of t h e s e appeared p r e v i o u s l y i n
" Z e i t s c h r i f t fur Arabische L i n g u i s t i k " , 2 , 1979, although
t h e t r a n s c r i p t i o n used t h e r e was s l i g h t l y d i f f e r e n t . The
d i a l e c t of t h e Mutair a s p r e s e n t e d h e r e shows t h e c l a s s i c
f e a t u r e s of t h e C e n t r a l Najdi t y p e a s o u t l i n e d on p . 8 7 - 9 4 .
I n t e r j e c t i o n s of t h e audience a r e enclosed between b r a c k e t s .
The r e a d e r of t h e f i r s t t e x t i s āmid i b n Mu ammad a l -
Mu a i r i .

TEXT 2(a) THE STORY OF TURKI IBN UMAID

snitin min hā ssnīn, youm il 'ašāyir u youm ilbadāwah ukab

tu ki bin i meid. hum 'alēhum wagt (1) u zimānhum wagt ma
hu-b ayyib wal alāl mihzil. u rićib turki bin ihmeid u
mi'ih lih gi 'at rabu' (minhu mizyad?) min i'tēba w ibin
garmalah bin hādi (min hū-minh?) min g a ān šēx ghatān āćm
innajd u mihtimīh wa lā add yi ubb najd alia bruxu tin (2)
minh, min ibin garma a. ikab tu ki bin i meid mi'ih lih
gi 'at rabu' u gōlin: "nabi nistarxa imn ibin garmala
agadih (3) yasma -inna nimīl 'ala wad-arša. nimīl 'ala wad-

1 wagt " t i m e " . Here "bad t i m e s " .

2 birxu tin: CI. birux atin.
3 a adīh "perhaps h e . . . " . Compare a r b indīh "perhaps"
AZMI (1975) p . 1 5 1 ; Negev a'adīh"! suppose" BLANC (1970)
p.37.
108 Chapter 6 (Text 2)

-arša." wad-arša flh sabi' al mudāt. i wumrabbi' wiybi (1)

yarta'ūn flh. rikib hu wujamā'tih u nawwuxaw 'ala bin
garma a. yōm agbaw 'ala lmajlis wilyā hdūmih ti ubb i l g ā
'alēh libs u 'alēh jūxah u 'alēh libs, ibin i meid, ti ki
sallam 'ala bin garmala u jalas ugāl: "hinna jāylīn zāyirīnik
ya lamīr jāyīn zāyirīnik nabīk tarxu inna naba nimīl 'ala
wadarša naba-rrabi' flh u alalna mihzil." gāl: "wēn
aha kum?" gāl: "aha na xa eynāhum yamm aššifa." gāl:
"wiš adda kum min dyarkum?" gāl: " adda na lwagt." gāl:
"wara ma rićibtum min dlratkum illi intum flha gabul u jītu
tistarx ūn?" gāl: "wa a inna ta adda na u youm jiīna
bma nat i urīź, inna jīnāk gāltīn." gāl: "mā nasma -
ilkum alia tarja'ūn utiriddūn li-dyarkum w i l ā minkum
ibattum bidyarkum tarkbiīn u tistarxsūn." hā a gōl ibin
garmaa libin i meid. gāl: "ma hī-b hi ya alamīr." gāl:
"alia,(2) hi." ba aw minh, mā wāfag tišayyal ibin i meid u
gām mnalmajlis za'lān. u youm gām wlih hdūmih mā talag ila
mi āni slźīānih alii tas ab gabul š ā l h - a z z a ' a l . 'ala mā miša
u hi thāyag 'alēh m'azzibtih,(3) m'azbat ibin garma a gālat:
"yā bin garma a lēh mā sima t libin i meid yirabbi fi najd?"
gāl: " i'ugbi yā zugbal anti š i m ī l i h . " gālat: "ana mā
š i m t ī l i h lākin yā rajjāli š i f t i h wa a yā rajjāi byirji'k(4)
al ā r a . " gāl: "i'ugbi yā zugba mā 'indić xabar." riji'
ibin i meid u youm jā j i m ā 'tih u yi izz albērag. jima'
'atēba gāl: "ibin garmala 'ayya yasmah-inna wiš arrāy?"
gālaw: "arrāy 'ala bin garma a." u yajma' azwih u
y abbi ih ibin garma a wiytilāga ōn hum way ahum u min tal 'at
iggams len garrab miglbaha. u halxeyl ytimāwah wiy'īnahum
a a 'ala bin garma a wyaksrūnih wiyšīl ibin garma a min
najd u min hiāk alkasra mā šabb fīha nār tiwallawh 'tēbah u
jala yamm wādi g a ān u yamm a āt g atān u hāk addlīrah.

TEXT 2(b) EXTRACT FROM THE BANI HILĀL EPIC

bani hlāl jālihum dōrin wagt šwayya. š ā f a t bint ilamīlr

liha(5) barg šimal u xāyiltih u xāyiltih u xāyiltih u
xāyiltih balhēl hā a lbarg. azzibda (6) innihum ba aw
y īlūn yammih galat: rawwi lik 'assās. rawwi lik 'assāsin

1 In many s t r u c t u r e s of t h i s type t h e s u f f i x e s -ūn, -īn,

-in a r e omitted from t h e f i r s t v e r b .
2 alia "yes" i n r e p l y t o a n e g a t i v e q u e s t i o n .
3 m'azziba " h o s t e s s " , a common euphemism for "wife" i n Najd
4 biyirji'k "He w i l l b r i n g back t o you", from arja'.
5 For t h e l e n g t h of vowel compare BLANC (1970), p . 1 2 2 .
6 azzibda " t h e cream", thereby " t h e r e s u l t " .
109 Chapter 6 (Text 2)

yi'issih albarg hā . u hu yirćib (1) hāk al'assās youm

al'assās salf 'alēha u hi tha un minh gālat: "yā nāšdin
al'assās, lā ya kur annida, tara annida min geir eid
i h l ā š (2) gāl: "ligeit šahhāb nahhāb lalwu a mūda' 'ala
rūs ili zūm gšāš. yi idd 'alha (3) hā a ddōr. hālaw ligaw
il'išib yamm iššay illi huwwa bi a aw šismih azznāti nzalaw
'ind azznāti u hu aradhum min 'ala l'išib alia b'alya u
gālaw: "'alya mā-yxālif nabi njawwizkiyyāha mēr xalna
nar'a." u hu yijīhum uba zēd wiytill šārb azznāti wilyā
hālsih wilyā tarku alxeil 'ala l x e i l wiy al (4) a a 'ala
azznāti ujindih u bini hlāl tāli (5) addīra u tākil al'išib
u taskin fi haddīra lli mā-lih mida. u salāmtik.

TEXT 2(a) (MU AIR) TRANSLATION

The Story of Turki ibn umaid

One of these years in the days of the tribes and the days of
bedouin life Turki ibn umaid,(6) drought was upon them and
their time was (a time of) drought. It was not good and the
flocks were weakening. And Turki ibn Humaid mounted up and
with him (were) a small group of his companions (who was he
Mizyad?). From 'Utaiba. The Shaikh of 'Utaiba. And Ibn
Garmala ibn Hādi(7) (who from? (from which tribe)) from
Ghatān, the Shaikh of Ghatān, the Ruler of Najd and reserv-
ing it and no one could enter Najd except with his permis-
sion , from Ibn Garmala. Turki ibn umaid set out and with
him his small group of companions and said: "We will ask
permission from Ibn Garmala, perhaps he will let us go over
to Wādi al-Risha.(8) We will go to Wādi al-Risha." In Wādi
al-Risha there were the seven ama hāt.(9) Yes and it was
in flower with spring vegetation and they wished to graze in

1 The causative pattern from arkab or arćab.

2 hlāš from lā šay .
3 Compare Dōsiri 'alina, 'aliha with the same stress pat-
tern; see JOHNSTONE (1964), p.104.
4 wiy al compare Cl. wa yu alli
5 tāli for tawli. Initial weak verbs regularly show ā in
these dialects: yāgaf "he stands", yāsal "he arrives".
6 Ibn umaid: the leading family of the 'Utaiba. For their
more recent history see GLUBB (1960) p.199-202 and passim.
7 Ibn Hādi: the leading family of G a an.
8 Wādi al-Risha: to the west of Riyadh, about Latitude 43°.
9 ama hāt: saline plants on which camels graze.
110 Chapter 6 (Text 2)

it. He rode off with his companions and they couched their
mounts at Ibn Garmala's camp. When he approached the majlis
behold his clothes reached the ground. He was wearing robes,
wearing a jūkha,(l)wearing robes. Ibn umaid, Turki greeted
Ibn Garmala and sat down and said: "We have come to visit
you Oh Emir, we have come to visit you. We wish you to give
us permission. We wish to move to Wādi al-Risha. We wish
to graze on the spring vegetation in it (for) our flocks are
weakening." He said: "Where are your families?" He said:
"We have left them near al-Shifa."(2) He said. "What made
you come down from your dīrah?" He said: "Drought made us
come down." He said: "Why didn't you set out from your
d rah where you were camped before and come and ask my per-
mission?" (3) He said: "Well (lit. by God), we came down
(anyway) and when we had reached half-way we rode over to
visit you." He said: "We will not give you permission
unless you go back and return to your dīrah and when you
have settled in your dīrah ride over to ask my permission."
These were the words of Ibn Garmala to Ibn Humaid. He said:
"It is not so (lit. it), Oh Prince!" He said: "Yes it
(is)!" They asked him (again), (but) he didn't agree. Ibn
umaid gathered himself up and left the majlis, in anger.
And when he left behold his clothes did not reach halfway
down hi.s shins, (4) which were dragging (on the ground) be-
fore. Anger carried him off. When he left, she was watch-
ing him, his wife, the wife of Ibn Garmala. She said: "Oh
Ibn Garmala, why didn't you give permission to Ibn umaid
to graze on the spring vegetation in Najd?" He said: "Go
away, 0 harlot! You felt sorry for him." She said: "By
God, I didn't feel sorry for him but my husband, I thought
by God, oh my husband, that he "would return to attack you."
He said: "Go away, you have no knowledge (of the matter)."
Ibn umaid went back and when he reached his tribe he raised
the war banner. He collected together 'Utaiba. He said:

1 jūkhai a heavy coat worn over the bisht or cloak; called

chōkha in Iraq; see LANDBERG (1940) p.10.
2 al-Shifa: there are two localities of this name, one
east of the Madina about latitude 41°, another northeast
of Mecca about latitude 43 . This would seem to be the
second which is southwest of Wādi al-Risha within the
present 'Utaiba dīrah according to Cantineau's tribal
map. It could also be taken to have its general meaning
of "scarp", "cliff".
3 i.e. "Why didn't you come to ask permission before moving
your families?"
4 i.e. because he left at speed.
111 Chapter 6 (Text 2)

"Ibn Garmala refused to give us permission. What is your

(lit. the) opinion?" They said: "The opinion is (that we
ride) against Ibn Garmala." He collected together his raid-
ing party and attacked him at dawn, Ibn Garmala and they
fought them. And from the sunrise till when its setting was
near and the horses were galloping against each other. And
God helped them against Ibn Garmala and they defeated him.
And Ibn Garmala moved from Najd and from the time of that
defeat he did not light a fire there (i.e. did not camp
there). 'Utaiba drove him off and he camped near Wādi
G a ān and near a āt G a ān(1) and that dīrah.

TEXT 2(b) (MUTAIR) TRANSLATION

Extract from the Bani Hilāl Epic

Bani Hilāl, once there came to them a slight drought. The

Emir's daughter saw (for herself) lightning(2) in the north,
she watched it and watched it and watched it closely (lit.
hard), that lightning. The result was that they wished to
move over to it. She said: "Send for yourself a scout,
send for yourself a scout to spy out that lightning." And he
sent off that scout. When the scout came towards them and
she approached him, she said: "Oh he who enquires of the
scout, let him not mention the grass. For grass without game
is useless." He said: "I found a charging rider, plunging
down to the hollow, leaving husks(3) on the tops of the
uplands." He answered her. This time they moved off and
found grass near the thing which he had killed or what is
his name, Zanāti.(4) They stopped near Zanāti and he turned
them away from the grass except (if they would give him)
'Alya(5) and they said "Alya doesn't matter, we will marry
her to you; but let us graze." And (then) Abu Zaid came and
he stirred them up and pulled the moustache of the Zanāti and
behold he plucked it, and behold the horses charged against
the horses and God assisted (them) against the Zanāti and his
army. And Bani Hilāl took over the dīrah and fed on the
grass and lived in this dīra which has no end. Your health !

1 a āt G a ān: about lat.44°, long.23° in what is now the

G a ān dīrah. I was unable to locate Wādi G a ān on any
map.
2 The sign of rain in the desert, bringing grass.
3 In the context "husks" would seem to signify "carcasses",
i.e. those of the animals Zanāti had killed in hunting.
4 Zanāti: the traditional opponent of Bani Hilāl associated
often with the Zenāta Berbers of North Africa.
5 'Alya: the daughter of the Emir of the Bani Hilāl.
6 Abu Zaid: the hero of the Bani Hilāl.
112 Chapter 6

TEXT 3

HARB: A CONVERSATIONAL MONOLOGUE

Relating to Modern Day Life Among the Harb
arb of Hijaz

The following text is a simulated conversation between two

people performed by Hamza
amza Muzaini, a member of the Bani
Salim branch of the Harb,
arb, while he was a student at the
School of Oriental and African Studies in London. He him­ him-
self felt that it was not a faithful representation of the
dialect, but in fact, on comparison with other Najdi texts
shown, it seems to be structurally very accurate. It may
however be that in terms of vocabulary it shows the influence
of the dialect of his home town of Madina. The suffix /-in/
is conspicuously absent except in /killin/ "each one" and
/gasbin/ "by force", although in the speech of my other Harb arb
informant it occurred frequently. The dialect is best des- des­
cribed as Central Najdi with Hijazi overlay. Features of
this Hijazi stratum are pointed out in the text. The reali­ reali-
sation of jlm is /z/ and the fronted forms of kaf and qaf qāf
/Jc/ and //g/,
are palatalized but not affricated /ќ/ /, not /ć/
/c/ and
/ź/ as in the other Najdi dialects.
/z/

TEXT 3

A salam
salām 'alekum
'alēkum
B 'alekum
'alēkum issalām
issalam
A hat
hāt al'Hum
al'ilūm ya mhammad
B wallah
wa ah salamatk
salaāmatk zina
źīna wawallah
ah mn addīrah
addirah wu kan
ќān mi'na
muslah
mu la u 'abdallah
'abda ah wa nizalna ImdTnah Imdīnah u kan
ќān mi'na ba'
ba'&
albdayi'
alb ā y i ' wa ba'ad mā ma tisawwagna fassug
fassūg u bi'na alii mi'na
min 'awayiz
'awāyiz liglna ligīna s'ud
s'ūd wu 'izamna u ruhnaru na mi'ih ilbētih.
ilbetih.
wallah
wa ah mā ma gassar
ga ar arrajjal
arrajjāl dibahlina
iba lina u gaddana
addāna u tigahwina(1)
tigahwina(l)

1 tigahwina for tigahwena.

tigahwēna. A similar shortening of the
final radical vowel was noted for D5siri
Dōsiri by JOHNSTONE
(1964), p.91.
113 Chapter 6 (Text 3)

'indih wafla na wa ub ba'ad ma bitna, wa ub mišēna

wištirēna ba'a alb āyi' alii ni'tāziha wa 'awwadna wa ah
salāmatk, a ā min nā yat inna nizalna / min hiba na
lalmadīnah, lāќinna ' a na xbār addīrah wij (l)-jāha min
mutar wij-jāha min xēr ba'ad almaxāyīl alii xayyalnāk.
A wa ah nzalat/nizal xēr imn-a ah 'alēna, timallat
arriyāg lāќinn zey(2) mā t'arif aljimā'a māhum aljimā'a 11
inta txabur, waljimā'a kull wā ad ilih ā y i h . kull wā ad
yib ā - l i h šayy il ā l i h u žābaw i araktarāt u a aw i dūd
u ga i'aw issyūl 'ala mizāri' ba'a hum. wa ah muškilah
halhīna gāyimah bēnahumlaќinn almu ar wa ah innih ufa
'alēhum wu timallat irriyād killaha ga bin 'alēhum a bin
'ala ba'a hum māhu bāgi yōm inh iyga i' il idūd 'ala ba'a
jimā'tih. wa ah amma min nā yat almaškilah alii min bēn
aljimā'ah tidaxxa wa ah fīha 'bēd i irwāni wa 'abda ah
ibin šaliyyah wa allawha bēnahumlēlt al'īd. zeyy mā
t'arif kānat bēnahum / allat bēnahumalmiškilah hāi awāli
xams sinīn u ba'dīn ba at tiži fīha r āb u ba at tiži fīha
musāyib lāќinna zayy ma t'arif almisilmīn māhum biyga irũ/
(3) mā yga iru lyā araw u allaw almiškilah bēnahumwu
tisāmi aw u ti afaw u ti'āzimaw u ti ābbaw alxšum. bass
zayy mā t'arif alglūb zayy algizāz lamm-innih tikassar mā
yilli im. wa ah žāna xabar minhum. gālaw innih wā ad
minhum innih mā ru i 'an a ul alii bēnahumu gām
iytanagga wuxzīh u sabbawh annās, killin yixzi 'alēh.
killin yigūllih: "ant 'a eyt lizmatk want lāzm innak mā
tnaggu dna al īn." laќinn inšā a 'asa a yhadīh. tarāh
māhu ba'īd lyā minnih a al-lih wā ad innih yi uddih. māhu
ba'īd laќinn zeyyma t'arif hā a mažnūn u lassā' žāhil wa ah
māhu yga ir wlāhu ba'īd. bass innih zayy ma t'arif ž ā h i l .
walžahil 'ala urgat ma yži mnih wa 'asa ah yhadlh. walhin
gamaw hatta xwanih yixzun 'aleh. wiygulullih: "int mux i
wint mā lak agg ba arīga- i"(4) wa ammā min nāyat
al'beydi, wa ah ru t lih gabil awāli xams ayyām. tigahwēt
'indih m arib wa fila t wa lā ga ar wa ah, wu ligīt
'indih ba' aljimā'ah wa xarražtih 'ala lmiškilah alii bēn
arrabu1 wist a'add wa ah, mā ga ar ibn il alāl. gāl innih
biytuwažžah 'alēhum a āyif u muxlid u mi'tig u addit a ah u
yabōn yižōnahum. wa ah mā adri . . . 'a āni mow'id mādri hu
yamlāh walla mā yamlāh. laќn inša a na 'ala gadd alamal
fīh innih mā yxilfih. wamma gey , wa ah šti ā l i h siyyāra
zidīdah u gām ysāfirbaha 'ala rriyāg u lā huwwa biyxālif
yižīblih filisbū' addēn alā ah ya'ni ražžal mistirīh,
ražžal ќirīm alii zayy il u ān i l l i mā žābh i harih akalih

1 wij-jāha < wiš-jāha

2 zeyy or zey " l i k e , a s " e q u i v a l e n t t o Najdi mi i l .
3 mā bi-/ a C e n t r a l Najdi f e a t u r e . See a l s o p . 9 4 .
4 - a, C e n t r a l N a j d i . See a l s o p . 9 2 - 3 .
114 Chapter 2 (Text 3)

batnih. dāyim i ibī a m'alligah u dāyim alnijir šaġġāl

walmajlis malyān u 'asa ah y'īnih ubu s'uūd. wa amma xūh
'awwād,, wa ah innih mā adri ranh innih yimkin mā ygu 'anh
zayy mā t'arif annās yižūn min ba in wā id u yixtalfun. u
'asa ah y'awwu .

TEXT 3 ( ARB) TRANSLATION

A Greetings.
B Greetings.
A Give me t h e news, Mu ammad.
B Well, may you be h e a l t h y . We came from t h e d ī r a h and
we had with us some goods (to s e l l ) . ( 1 ) And w i t h us were
Mu l a and 'Abdallah and we came down t o al-Madina and a f t e r
we had bought p r o v i s i o n s i n t h e market and s o l d what goods
we had, we met Su'ūd and he i n v i t e d us and we went t o h i s
house. Well t h e man did n o t l e t us down (in h o s p i t a l i t y ) .
He k i l l e d a sheep f o r u s and gave us lunch and we had coffee
with him and we were s a t i s f i e d and i n t h e morning a f t e r we
had s p e n t t h e n i g h t t h e r e , and i n t h e morning we s e t off and
bought some (more) p r o v i s i o n s which we needed and came back.
Well may you be h e a l t h y ( t h a t i s ) i f you want t h e news of
our journey t o al-Madina b u t give us t h e news of t h e d ī r a
and what r a i n h a s f a l l e n t h e r e and what good f o r t u n e ( 2 ) has
come t h e r e a f t e r t h e clouds which we saw coming t o you.
A Well good f o r t u n e did come t o us from God and t h e
hollows were f i l l e d with water b u t as you know t h e people
a r e n o t as you would wish them t o b e , and each one has h i s
own opinion and each one wishes something for himself and
they b r o u g h t t r a c t o r s and p u t down boundaries and c u t off
t h e r a i n water from each o t h e r ' s f i e l d s . Well i t i s a prob
lem s t a n d i n g between them b u t t h e r a i n came down upon them
i n abundance and t h e hollows were f i l l e d with water i n s p i t e
of them, i n s p i t e of each o t h e r , each person n o t wishing
( i t ) when he l a i d down boundaries i n t h e way of o t h e r mem-
b e r s of h i s t r i b e . But as r e g a r d s t h e problem which e x i s t s
among t h e t r i b e s m e n , 'Ubaid a l - S i r w ā n i and 'Abdallah ibn
Shaliyya i n t e r c e d e d and solved t h e d i f f i c u l t y between them
on t h e day b e f o r e ' ī d . As you know t h e problem was between
them / had remained between them f o r f i v e y e a r s and a f t e r -
wards c a l a m i t i e s and r i v a l r y were going t o a r i s e i n i t . But
as you know t h e muslims do n o t f o r s a k e t h e i r f r i e n d s (and
they k e p t up t h e i r e f f o r t s ) u n t i l t h e two s i d e s came t o g e t h e r
and forgave each o t h e r and made up t h e i r d i f f e r e n c e s and i n -

1 Livestock or perhaps honey, which a r e t h e main p r o d u c t s

of t h e Harb.
2 i . e . grazing.
115 Chapter 6 (Text 3)

vited each other to their homes and kissed each other. But
as you know the hearts (of men) are like glass, once broken
they cannot be mended. We had news from them that one of
them did not agree to the peace that was made between them
and began going back on his word and the people reviled him
and insulted him. Everyone reviled him and said to him:
"You gave your word and now you must not go back on it."
And as for al-'Ubaidi, well I went to him about five days
ago and had coffee with him in the evening and was satisfied
and by God he did not let us down and I met with them some
of the tribe and led him to the subject of the problem which
is between the people and he made himself ready (to help) by
God. He did not let us down, stout fellow. He said that
Nāyif, Mukhlid and Mu'tig and Raddit Allah will confront
them and come to them. Well I don't know he made an arrange-
ment to come, but I don't know whether he will keep to the
arrangement or not. But if God wills we have enough hope in
the matter that he will not go back on it. And as for
Ghaith, well he has bought himself a new car and begun
travelling with it to Riyadh and he doesn't fail to get two
or three journeys a week. He is a relaxed and generous man
like the horse who eats whatever his back can carry. Always
he has a slaughtered sheep hanging outside his house and
always the coffee pestle is ringing and the majlis full of
people and may God assist him Abu Su'ūd. And as for his
brother 'Awwād, well I don't know about him, perhaps he is
no less than him. As you know all men come from one womb
but are all different. May God reward us.
116 Chapter 6

TEXT 4

'ANIZA: A CONVERSATION BETWEEN TWO STUDENTS

The following is a conversation between two speakers, Sayyār

Radhi al-'Anizi and Lāfi ibn Sulaimān al-'Anizi, both of the
Sba'a section of 'Aniza. Both were students of Kuwait Uni-
versity and enacted this conversation for me at the Univer-
sity in 1977. They themselves were bidialectal, speaking
their own dialect when with their relatives and a modified
form when in the University. Both had relatives who lived
the nomadic life in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, but lived
themselves in al-Jahra. The Sba'a are in the main a tribe
of the northern Euphrates, while Sayyār's particular clan,
the Muwāh b, are also found in the Western Najd. Their ori-
ginal homeland is the Harrat 'Uwairidh or Harrat al-Muwāh b
west of Madain Sālih,(1) but in recent years many have come
to Kuwait. The text is a fairly faithful rendering of the
dialect and portrays quite well the position of the younger
generation of educated bedouin in the Gulf countries who
live mainly in the towns but retain close links with their
fellow tribesmen and often marry within the tribe. In gen-
eral, also, considerable contact is maintained between the
'Aniza of Syria and those of Saudi Arabia. Nowadays Syrian
members of the tribe bring their livestock to sell in Saudi
Arabia in early summer. Traditionally the northern 'Aniza
used to return to Central Najd in certain years for the
foaling season.(2)

TEXT 4

A sabbahk alia balxēr.

B yā hala sabāh alxēr. šlōnak?

1 See DOUGHTY (1964) p.444-5 and Ch.XIV generally.

2 RASWAN (1935) p.243.
117 Chapter 6 (Text 4)

A alla ysallimk.
B 'asāk tayyib. keif hālak?
A walla bxēr ahamdillāh.(1) yā walad marreit 'aleikum
hāssbū' alii tāfat. mā ligeitkum ibbeitkum.
B yōm alxam s. ēh. tala'na lalbarr.
A tala'tu lalbarr?
B ēwallah tala'na hnāka la'māmi. bil! (2)
A šlōna.
B walla rahna lalganam hnāk u byūt ašša'ar hnāk.
mšoth nin yā walad hnāk walla, bil! u rahna lyammahum
adduhur. wusanna 'indahum adduhur. bil! u min halliban
yā' walad. širibna liban. u yōm širibna liban u natla' hnāk
išwayya ntifassah u šifna ttilyān u 'ugub jalasna šwayya
hnāk.
A tigahwētu?
B jalasna. 'awad. gāl-lina gus dah, gus dtin 'ajibatni.
A t'arif minha šay.
B bil. kitabtiha yōm innih gālha liyya. tab ni agūlha
lak.(3)
'A gilha!
B ygūl:

yā l'ēn lić balhawa laftah

mānti 'ala d n alixwāni.
balāć min wāhdin(4) šiftih
'ūdhin mnazzēn rawyāni
alkihil bal'ēn sāyiftih
aswad tigil r š girbāni
wassils battōb hāyiftih
tigil masāh b d bāni.

A māšalla. wa šlona aljuww ihnāk?

B walla tamām xūš.(5)
A hā 'ām rib '.
B al'išib wallah.
A lā, 'ām rib '.
B walla hassana mi(6) mitl al'ām.

1 ahamdillāh < alhamdillāh.

2 bil < billah "Yes, by God!"
3 lak. Both in Shammar and 'Aniza dialects the k is em­
phasized. LANDBERG (1940) writes this as lakk, p.71.
4 wāhdin for wāhditin.
5 juww, xūš for jaww and xoš. See also BLANC (1970) for
neutralization of ū and ō, p. 118.
6 mi for mā-hi.
118 Chapter 6 (Text 4)

A mā fīh xudratin halhēl.

B attili yašba'. mā dām attili yašba' albduwi mā 'alēh
say.
A lā walla, hi bass winsatha wa a taswa. tal'at
halxiyām ya'ni taswa ćitīr.
B u yōm intaha appal'at laha wjīt inta hnayya.
A jīna hnayya w dāwamna biljām'a w axa na muhādirāt.
B ayyihin ahsan? ahsan tal'atk lalbarr walla jayyatk
hnayya.
A walla stānasna balbarr hnāk ćitīr 'ind harrabu'. u
haŠŠībān, harrubāba.
B mā li'abt 'arrubāba?
A lā wallah ana mā a'arf al'ab. 'indi uxulli (1) hnāk
yijirr 'alēha. lah jarrāt.
B wa ah wuddina 'indina rubāba nasma'k.

TEXT 4 ('ANIZA) TRANSLATION

A Good morning.
B Welcome. Good morning to you. How are you?
A God keep you.
B I hope you are well. How are you?
A Well, I am well, praise be to God. I came to see you
last week, but did not find you at your house.
B On Thursday. Yes. We went out to the desert.
A You went out to the desert?
B Yes, we went out to my father's relatives. Yes!
A How was it?
B Well we went to the sheep there and the tents. Yes,
we went to them at noon. We reached them at noon. Yes, and
there was liban.(2) We drank liban. And when we had drunk
the liban and went out to walk about there a while, we saw
the young lambs and afterwards we sat for a while there.
A Did you have coffee?(3)
B Yes, we sat for a while. 'Awadh told us a gasīda, a
gasīda which pleased me.
A Do you know anything of it?
B Yes. I wrote it down when he recited it to me. Do
you want me to say it for you?
A Say it!
B He says:

1 uxulli < uxwin-li.

2 liban: yoghurt mixed with water. The first drink offered
to a guest if there is no fresh milk.
3 Coffee is served as an honour to the guest. However a
poor family may serve only tea or milk.
119 Chapter 6 (Text 4)

Oh my eye you have turned your attention towards love,

You are no longer of the religion of my brothers.
Your trouble is from one whom you have seen
Whose branches have drunk up beauty.(1)
She had marked her eyes with antimony
So that they were black as the feathers of a crow.
And she had sewn a border on to her dress
So that you would say it was the tracks of a snake
in the sand.
A Wonderful. And how was the weather there?
B It was perfect.
A Ha, then this year there is spring grass.
B Yes, by God, there is grass.
A No, it is a year of spring grass.
B Well, this year is not like the last.
A There is not that much grass.
B There is enough to satisfy the young lambs.(2) So
long as the young lamb is satisfied, the bedouin has no
trouble.
A No, by God. And it is just that the outing there is
worthwhile. Going out to those tents is worth much.
B And when your journey there had finished you came
back here.
A We came here and went back to work at the university
and took up our lectures.
B Which of them is best? Is it best to go out to the
desert or to come here?
A Well we enjoyed ourselves a lot there in the desert
among the tribesmen and the old men and the viol.
B Did you play on the viol?
A No, by God, I do not know how to play on it. I have
a brother there who plays. He has skill in playing.
B By God, I wish we had a viol here and could hear you.

1 The girl is compared to a supple young tree.

2 The phrase "the young lamb is satisfied" is traditionally
expressive of the minimum possible amount of grass for
comfortable existence. This understatement of the
quality of grass and weather is customary among bedouins.
See GLUBB (1960) p.236 for other criteria for the qual-
ity of pasture.
120 Chapter 6

TEXT 5

'AWĀZIM: A CONVERSATION WITH THE POET SĀLIM AL-DAWWĀY

This is the text of an interview with the poet Sālim ibn

Twaim al-Dawwāy (Abu Jum'ān) at his home in Kuwait. The
poet was speaking in the beginning on the history of the
'Awāzim in Kuwait, and the first, second and last passages
address this issue and are traditional poems of the 'Awāzim.
The rest are Ibn Twaim's own verses and page references are
given to the Dīwān al-Shā 'ir Sālim al-Dawwāy. Verse is al-
ternated with the explanations of the poet. The dialect is
basically Central Najdi, showing however / - i k / rather than
/ - k / (2nd m.s.) and / - a h / rather than / - i h / (3rd m.s.),
which links it with the Gulf dialects (see pages
The Rashayida informants seemed to have basically the same
type of dialect, as is shown in this text. The text also
shows / - a m / for / - a w / in a number of cases, i.e. / āram/
"they have become", which is again shared with the Rashāyida.
My thanks are due to Abdallah Dōsiri of Kuwait for help in
the translation of parts of these poems.

TEXT 5

mihtimī n addār min yōm bindagna f i t ī l

jannbūha j i ' i l tafdūnha ' i y y ī - b h a
ćam s u b i y y i n f i nahāna ' a l a r ā s a h n i m ī l
y i ' t i l b i n d a g u hu gabul mā yasxī -bha
f a l ' a w ā y i d nadbah a š š ē x walgibba l a s ī l
l ē n x a l l ē n a l j a n ā y i z ykayyif ībha

i š š i ' i r hā a bēnna whēn, masādim a l ' a š ā y i r b ē n ā t n a . gabul

kān min hannō' hā a mi i l gibī l a h thādd g i b ī l a h ' i n d
hidūdha. u hāda yōm a l j a h a l g a b u l . walyōm āram
bhamdillāh killahum š a ' a b wāhid u k i l l a h u m n a f s wāhda.
l ā k i n hā a min imin mā ygūl š a ' a r ā g i b ī l a t al'awāzim
w i l b i n d i g i l f i t ī l kānat g a b u l . gabul h a l a š y a hā i mnawwal
121 Chapter 6 (Text 5)

b i n d i g f i t ī l y h u t t ū n - b i h r a s ā s u b ā r ū d , r a s ā s a wihda u šayy
1h b ā r ū d , hā a hu. waddār y a ' n i h i a l i i s i k a n n a , wutanna
a l i i hinna f ī h mi i l l i k w e i t . mū hu k i l l a l ' a š a y i r yhamdūn
h a l a š y a a l ' ā l i m hu h a š š i k i l . wiygūl b a ' a d :

y a l l a h i n n i d ā x i l i k 'an mahā īf algusa

lā t w a r r ī n a n n a k ā y i r whinna misilmīn
cān n i ' t i min t a r a f h a wnanwi bassaxa
u nikirmah i l m i s k ī n h a d d i t a gubr assnīrn.

y a ' n i l o jāna wāhid ma kūka a l i i h a d d i t a gubr a s s n ī n n i ' t ī h

min h a l ā y i l n a . hā a min n ō ' mā ygūl. falyōm a š š i ' i r muhūb
i š š i ' r i l a w w a l . gām yta ayyar alwa i ' w a l ' a š a y i r i l l i gabul
saram k i l l a h u m wāhid. k i l l dōla b š a ' b h a mi i l mā t a k i r fa
hāda lli ntimanna mna a. wagūl f i wāhdin m n a l ' i y ā l :

yabūk wallah gāyt a l g a l b wimnāh

t i s ī r sam'atkum ma' annās zēnah
walla t a r a mā kān hayyin ibdinyāh
y'īš l ē n a l ' u m u r t a g i i s n ī n a h
a l b ā r h a z i r n a mhammad u šifnāh
l a h wagt dūn imwājhi h ā j r ī n a h
min 'ugub īk a l f a x f a x a walm'āyāh
m i t i l i l g ' ū d a l i i halah 'āsfīnah
yabūk i x i min wāldik ' H i m wousāh
wsāt min wa a s i w a t i ( l ) j i n ī n a h
t a r a lwalad ma yi i h r a h ger yimnāh
'azmin u jazmin t i s ī r ćabdah mitīnah
yā(2) waffigah j a z l a l ' a t ā y a w maššāh
n a l a l ' i l a f i himmitah min yimīnah
wassidg bēn annās mā l i h mlādāh
wiykammil a r r a j j ā l yā(2) t ā b dīnah
t š ū f k i l l a l i i hawālēh t a d r ā h
hišmah u t a q d ī r i n u r a b b i h y ' ī n a h u s a l ā m t i k

wagūl b a ' a d f i u x ū l l i ( 3 ) mitwaffi u l i k t ū l t a l ' u m u r .

ź i z a t ' ē n i whārabt a r r g ā d i
u malleit almajālis walga'ādi
a ' a d d i min tuwīlah f i tuwīlah
wahabbibha lyā habb a l b a r ā d i
wafa i x ā t r i n mā dallahanna
' a h ' a l i i y i m t i n i k i r adduwādi
a šūf almargad a l b ā r i d w a ' ī f a h
m n a l l i s ā r f i j ō f alfwādi

1 s i w ā t compare h a s s u w a .
2 yā "if", hassuwa "thus".
3 u x ū l l i < u x w i n - l i "a brother of mine".
122 Chapter 6 (Text 5)

'aleik a ah wakbar yā zimāni

ja'al fi āmri mi l aććidādi
ćidād a ulb ya hamyat simūmah
w'an 'irźah tara l idrān ādi
bidat f h aššhubah ćinn rūsah
maxār zin mnalma dad idādi
'al-alli mā hasal-li rufgatillah
uhu šafyi u hu āyat mrādi
rif ź a b ma mud assijāya
uw l albāl fi sā'at i'nādi
ilyā min āg bāli zān bāl ah
uyir lni bharjah barrakadi
wilyā min zall gēdi i't šōrah
tiba'tah mi il mu wa'in ygādi
lajal 'indi xabar fi māgufillah
ilyā callat ma āflr ijtitiādi
ilyā minni š i k e t al imil šalah
u ga albadd 'anni wišdadi

i l y ā 'ajizt 'anh ya'ni yarfa' a em 'anni

yiji lal imil wasmin fi mtūnah

wana amra ma' garāh d al imādi
'ala aggin i'yūni lo bićanna
isnādi kill mā gāl istinādi
yi illinn al'abayir min nu ri
walo f hin mida laddam' zādi
ygūlūn al'arab gabli u 'ugbi
tawār xin 'at ź ā t i n ijdādi
fa la tabći ddumū' alla lināfi'
ag gah gā d inneišān ādi

ya'ni ma tabći lia 'ala lli yanfa'ik. alli y urrik mā

tabći alēh.

asāl a ah ywaffig kill ayyib

mnahl albarr walli filblādi
lajal fi kill ayyib nō ' š mah
ayan falwajh u ć'āmin m'ādi
wafa il min nu ū in binna lha
i l y ā š i w i r y'allim bilwkādi
wa lō hu ma y ibb imšāwr nah
yij lah 'an unun issū' ādi
yi iddinnah š ' ū r i n fi im rah
u yiršid add jihdah barrašādi

ya'ni lo istašartni yā stād wana ma a ibbik, axaf imna ah

a'allmik bassah h. 'adil? lo inni mā ahibbik a'allmik
ba ah h. imlri y'allmik. lajal min šāwarik daxal fi
immitik. min istišārik, gāl: "wištigūl yā flān?" wa lō k
123 Chapter 6 (Text 5)

mā t ibbah, yājab t'allmah. gult: "wa afa il min

ni ū in binna a". ya'ni illi yaxlu u yan ih, ilyā š l w i r
y'allim bilwukādi, bi a . ya'ni mā yigdar yac ib lajal
a am r jayyid mi il al ākim al'adil wal akim alli yim l .
wa ad wa ad. f n ā i yim l u yijhif uf h ā i 'adil.
annās māhum bwā id. 'adil? wišinhu(l) l adi? alhādi alli
thutt lil āra walla lizzari' la yakilh addibaš. h
salāmtik.

y a rāćbin min fōg sittin ham māt

nij ybin sib āh x ā l i ź i warha
idgag miźdim wimgaffa jil lat
man ūft a ir'ān fijjin na arha
f hin imnarr ma alaya wšibhāt
allin(2) wi dathin ti adib aharha.

hādōli l j e i š ilhijin. alibil(3) f ha nāgab. uf ha

mwa a a w f ha ilūl. a ilūl halli 'aliha halwa fāt:
hurrah, i'māniyya u ba niyya wa āyif mi il taw f
assayyārāt kadlak u šafar u byūk. hāh mitil hannō'.

migdimna dgāg u mwaxxarha jabal

mi il mā tigūl 'alya min bini hlāl:

aba zēd dawwir faššta samir'iyya

u falge dawwir mnikbār a££imāyil
azāliyt almigdim jamāliyt aigufa
1
aleikum - ibha yā rāćbin arra āyil

wtigūl ba'ad:

abāzēd low inn annisa tarkab annida

lifētik 'ala wajnin mnalhijin ayil
laćinn irlx alkôr adri u fōha
ir x algu a min ma kumāt ilguwāyil

gāyilha yur ti ir(4) mna uma.

1 wišinhu. This may be the effect of Kuwaiti. In gēner-

ai, bédouin dialects show the particle wiš- for "what".
See p.87 . However the dialect of the 'Awāzim is, as
stated earlier, closer to the Gulf type than are the
other bedouin dialects of the area.
2 allin < alla in "except that".
3 Note alibil not albil as in Central Najd.
4 ti ir < ti irr.
124 Chapter 6 (Text 5)

ya ah yalli dibirt annās b deh

ma ērk a din nirtijlh u nisālah
jazl al'a a lli ma yx b imtarajj h
'allāmin barra ma 'a imin jalālah
ji'il likweit mbaććir alwasm yisg h
fi isibt alxams n miźdim liyālah
dārin rubēna f h wamwātna f h
alla wlā nargab blādin bidālah
dārin lya jāha Ifa ir imtanna lh
ya'ni l ālah a' f
yā lētni fi afilt al' d mā j t
u saddēt 'an nazlat ha ōla wa ō āk(l)
(ya'ni hnāk fir g u hināk fir g. killihum kān jannabt. mu
a san-li? lajil yom rā ilha ō a, z'alam 'alēh hadp āk.
win rā ilha ō āk z'alam ha o a. wal ibb ma'ha ō a al ibb..)
walla ba'ad ma f k lai'ēn laddeit
addēt 'an yimmat yumumik u mamšāk
māni bnasin waguftik bayman albeit
youm int tarfa'li salāmin byimnāk.
wiš fiyy ya sJd arra'āb b sawweit
allah lā minni bala sān yajzāk
yalli 'alašānik 'an il'irs 'ayyeit.
(ya'ni mā ab atizawwaj a ad ail ant.)
arji ji llin mink wa bir ibrajwāk
yā šift zōlik dūn erik tahanneit,
il'ēn ti'jibha ma ayil alayak.
zid bah lyā j t ib adam wista'addeit
waradt tarād alhawa hō aladrāk
yā šiftni finnazil yā gbalt wagfeit
mā li tara āja wgur ān lou lāk
anw k baljayya wilyā gbalt addeit
min xō ftin ba' almaxāllź tašnāk
wagti adāni 'ank mā 'ank sajjeit
willa 'ala wirdik awāmi hallāk.
dārin lina f ha mhallin u minzāl
min yō mha s fin xa a min yirūdah?
(ya'ni min hum alli yrūdūnha min hum ahalha ya'ni inćānkum
tafhamūn kalāmi...)

1 ha ō a, the is characteristic of the 'Aniza also; see

also'cANTINEAU (1936) p.107.
125 Chapter 6 (Text 5)

ya ma ca'amna dunha kill min 'āl,

yā xān xatw im'āhdin min 'hudah.
yā mā hafa fiha min alxel wa rijāl,
rāhat dahāya lilikweit wihdūdah.
ra' alwatan mā gērah kill 'addāl
algalb mā yraxxis masākin jidudah.
giltah wana gabli min annās min gāl,
killin yiji habbah 'ala badir 'ūdah.

TEXT 5 ('AWAZIM) TRANSLATION

We have protected the homeland from the time of the

matchlock rifle,
Defend it and may you be sacrificed for it, the land
which has been fought for [so long].
How many young men in the face of our charge against them
Have surrendered their rifles, although previously
they were not so generous.
And it is our custom to kill the shaikh [of the enemy]
and the pure bred stallion
So as to leave healthy corpses to satisfy the woIves.(1)

This poem is between us and ... in the battles of the tribes

between us. Previously it was like this; it is as when one
tribe borders on another, on their borders. And this was in
the days of ignorance previously; and now they have become
one people, thanks be to God, and as one soul. But this is
something of what the poets of the 'Awazim tribe have said.
And the matchlock gun was in the former times, before these
things that we know now. Previously there was the match-
lock in which they put powder and shot, one shot and some-
thing. Yes, powder! That is it. And the homeland means
this which we are living in; our homeland which we are in,
I mean Kuwait. For in fact all the tribes praise these
things. The world is like this. And he says also:

Oh God I seek refuge with you from the evils of hardship

Do not show us the course of wretchedness, for we are
muslims
We should give of the best we have and be of generous
intent
And be kind to the unfortunate man whom evil times
have restricted.

1 Part of the poem of Mubarak al-Him on the occasion of

the battle of Muraikh between the 'Awazim and the
'Ajman at the beginning of the century. 'UBAYYID (1971)
p.59, 131.
126 Chapter 6 (Text 5)

This means that if someone comes to us who is in hardship and

whom evil times have put in a difficult position, we will
give him of what we have. This is the sort of thing which
[the poets] say. And today is not like the early poetry.
The situation has begun to change, and the former tribes have
all become one, every nation with its people as you mention
and this is what we wish from God. And I have said [the
following poem] for one of my children.(1)

Oh my son,(2) by God, the ambition and wish of my heart

is that your reputation will be good among the people
For whatever creature is alive in his world
lives until his life completes its span of years
Last night we visited Muhammad and saw him
For some time they have kept him from my sight(3)
After his past pride and stubbornness
he has become like a young camel whose people have
bridled him
Oh my son take from your father knowledge and advice
the advice of one who advised his son like me
For nothing supports a young man except his right hand
[he should be] strong and resolute with a strong heart
If the Benevolent One makes him fortunate and moves him
forward,
still he acquires greatness in his endeavours by his
own hand
And truthfulness has no substitute among men
and makes a man complete if he is of good faith
And you see that all around him treat him well,
with respect and consideration and God assists him.

And I have also said [the following] about one of my brothers

who died; may you live long!

My eye remained awake and I avoided sleep,(4)

nor could I find comfort if I rose from bed,
Walking from hill to hill,
walking briskly when the wind blew cold.

1 This poem, which is given in full in AL-DAWWAY (1976) p.

75, is of the type known as nasīha or "advice" to the
young.
2 yābuk. Such expressions are common? also by the mother
to her son or daughter yumma. See YASSIN (1977).
3 The poet brings in the example of a relative or friend
who has suffered a fall from grace for some reason.
4 AL-DAWWAY (1976) p.94-96.
127 Chapter 6 (Text 5)

And I tried to pour out my thoughts

which they could not distract.
I see the cold bed and forsake it,
because of the pain which lies in the depth of my being.
May God save me from you, Oh my fate
which has left in my soul something like a thorn(1)
A hard thorn, such as when the Simūm wind has become hot
and the moist soil of the rain pools is far from its
roots
And greyness has appeared in it as though its tips
were needles(2) made of hard iron, and sharp
Because of the one whose companionship I cannot retain
although he was my comfort and most beloved friend
The good friend of praiseworthy qualities
patient when I was stubborn
When I was in ill humour, he was of good cheer
and slowly made me content with his words
And when my anger ceased, I followed his advice
I followed him like a trained camel being led
Because I knew of his attitude towards me
when my store of energy was exhausted;
When I complained of a burden, he took it from me
and threw off the saddle and the ... (3)

When I became tired of it, he took the oppression from me.

He came to the burden, with the brand of the ropes in

his shoulder
while I rested with the gazelles of the steppe
If my eyes weep for him, they have the right,
my support whenever I needed help.
The tears flow from my eyes
and if there is a limit to crying, they exceed it.
The Arabs before and after me have said it
and it is recorded of old and in recent times
Tears do not fall except for those who bring support
a truth which aims at the mark and strikes it.

I mean you do not cry except for one who helps you. You do
not cry for the one who harms you.

1 ćdād or ctād a thorny bush of the area.

2 mixrāz, the large needle used for sewing leather.
3 Similies comparing man's burdens to that of a camel are
common. Compare the stanza: xatw alwalad mi l ilblēhi
ila tār; zoudin 'ala himlih yšīl tiiml ilīfih, "And some
young men are like the Bulaihi (pack camel) when it
stands up; and lifts the burden of its companion as well
as its own". The word badd was not known to my inform­
ants .
128 Chapter 6 (Text 5)

I ask God to give success to all good men;

those of the desert and those in the cities.
Because in all good men there is a type of honour
a modesty in the face, and resistance to the enemy.
And I prefer as a counsellor
he who, if he is consulted, gives true counsel,
Even though he does not like those who ask his advice
a barrier comes between him and evil thoughts;
The feelings of his conscience stop him;
and he guides correctly to the extent of his ability.

I mean if you ask my advice ustād, and I do not like you, I

fear God and tell you the truth. Correct? Even if I do not
like you, I tell you the truth. My conscience speaks to you.
Because he who asks your advice, enters into your protection.
Whoever asks your advice and says: "What do you think?" even
if you do not like him, you must tell him. I said: I prefer
as a counsellor he who, if he is consulted, gives true
counsil." I mean the one who is sincere and gives advice.
I mean he cannot lie because his conscience is good, like the
good judge and the judge who veers from the truth. They are
each different. There is the judge who veers from the truth
and acts wrongly, and there is the honest judge. People are
not all the same. Correct? And what is the hādi? It is the
thing which you put around fish traps or fields so that the
flocks will not eat them. Yes. Your health!

Oh they(l) who ride on six hastening steeds,

well-bred camels, how beautifully God has created them
Slim in the forequarters and broad along the back
slim in the forelegs and broad in the chest
With some of the qualities of the gazelle
except that each one of them has a humped back.

These are the war camels, the thoroughbred camels. Camels

include racing camels, ordinary camels and leading camels.
The leading camel is the one which is of the following types:
Hurrah (freeborn), 'Omāniyya and Bātiniyya(2) types, like
different types of car, Cadillac, Chevrolet and Buick. Hah
of this type.

1 This is taking rāćbin as poetic license; singular for

plural. However, perhaps more accurately, "Oh rider in a
troup of six hastening camels". AL-DAWWĀY (1976) p.155-6.
2 See DICKSON (1949) p.412. The Hurra is from the northern
tribes, 'Omāniyya from the Trucial Coast, and Bātiniyya
from the Bātin coast of 'Oman.
129 Chapter 6 (Text 5)

Slim in the forequarters and like a mountain behind

Or, in the words of 'Alya of the Bani Hilāl:

Abu Zaid, find in winter a slim camel,

and in summer find one of the largest around the wells
Like a gazelle in front and like a camel behind,
they are for you, oh riders of the swift mounts.
And she said also:

Abu Zaid, if women were to ride the swift camels,

I would come to you on a dappled pure bred, riding fast
As though the creaking of the saddle under me and above it
were the cry of bird in the heat of the afternoon.

He compares it to the screeching of birds.

Oh God, who has the deliberations of man in his hands,(1)

there is no one but you from whom we hope for success
and pray to.
The generous one who does not disappoint his supplicants
of familiar mercy and great glory.
May Kuwait have an early spring rain to water it,
of fifty days duration beginning some evening soon.
The home land in which we grew up and in which we die,
and to which we would prefer no other land
The land to which, if a poor man comes in refuge

I mean someone who is in a poor situation

I wish that I had never come to the 'Īd celebration(2)

and had refrained from visiting these and those people.

I mean here there is one group and here another. I should

have avoided both of them. Wouldn't it have been better for
me? Because when he went to these, those others were angry
with him, and if he went to those, the first group were
angry and his love for these was like his love ...

I was troubled by seeing you

and turned away from where you were and where you
walked.
I have not forgotten you standing to the right of the
house,
when you lifted up a greeting to me with your right
hand.

1 AL-DAWWĀY (1976) p.83.

2 Ibid., p.142-3.
130 Chapter 6 (Text 5)

What have you done to me, Oh best of the slim-waisted

girls?
The one for whose sake I have renounced marriage.

I mean I do not want to marry any one but you.

I wait for a favour from you, and am patient in waiting

If I see your figure in the distance in place of some
other I am happy
The eye is pleased by such as your beauty
Let me see you more and if I come to a place and wait
I came to the well — unclear ...
If you see me in the camp, if I approach then go away,
You know that I have no need or ambition except you.
I hope to come to you, but when I approach, I turn away
in fear of some people who may be angry with you.
My fate has kept me from you, I did not avoid you,
while in fact my thirst to approach you is killing me.

A homeland in which we have a place and a settlement.(1)

From the time when it was an empty coastline, who used
to protect it?(2)

I mean who were they that used to protect it, who were its
people. I mean, if you understand my words...

How often have we repelled all who came to attack us,

when they betrayed us in some treaty.
How many men and horses have died in it,
gone as martyrs to Kuwait and its borders.
He is the leader of the homeland; there is no other
defender.
The heart does not count cheap the dwellings of the
ancestors.
I say it and many before me have said the same:
Each person's flower blooms on the pattern of the
seed of his line.

Al-DAWWĀY (1976) p.35, a poem in praise of the Amīr

'Abdallah al-Sālim al-Subāh.
The 'Awāzim claim to be the oldest of the present bedouin
groups in the Kuwait region.
131 Chapter 6

TEXT 6

SHAMMAR: THE STORY OF THE SHILGAN RAID

This text was given to me by my main Shammari informant

'Uraifij al-Shilaži, one of the attendants of the Amlr
Muhammad al-Sudairi on his estate near the Wādi Turmus.
His home was the settlement of Shu'aibat (Shu'aiba^) north-
east of Hail on the edge of the Nafud. This was settled
fifty years ago after the fall of the Rashld dynasty and was
an entirely Shammar village and served as a camp for the
Sinjara during the summer months. North of Shu'aibat was
al-Bag'a, another Shammar settlement of a similar type, and
to the southwest al-Ajfar. Informants felt that all the
Najd Shammar, whether settled or nomadic, spoke a very simi­
lar dialect with the exception of the *Abda who spoke a dia-
lect similar to the Dhaflr, their neighbours to the east.
I hadf however, no opportunity to confirm this.

TEXT 6

hadoļa tai 'umrak isšilgān faģpļa ģazwin 'ala hwetay u ba'ad

ma xadaw albil nhajaw ilhwētat 'ala xeil u xadoham. xadoham
ya'ni 'ugub ma'raktin tuwilih. u yom inn hum xadohum yā
tuwil il'umur u fassuxaw hitta hdumaham. ma xallaw 'aleham
hidum. hāda xawiyyam bin axīham jld arrubu' iksumoh ilhwetāy
iksumoh mi' rijalu mi' fax&du u gal: "ya xawali ruhu ana
rajjalin abamut wintam ruhu lahalkam." rahaw 'ala 'yūnu
wattigoublaham(l) hazim. ygū~l 'ād: "hah la waļļah rāhaw,
rahaw xallonan la waļļa rāhaw." u yirzib hu rijelu hu
mintatrih ya'ni ļdamah rja'aw 'alēh u g'alaw: "ibšir bummak
ibsir bummak" jaw ya'ni mitil, mitil slimi albil 'aleh, ya'ni

1 For this particle peculiar to the Shammar dialect -bla-

signifying -1-, see also CANTINEAU (1937) p.209. He also
gives 'andelu < 'and+lu.
132 Chapter 6 (Text 6)

mgirin 'alēh gārēih" "yā hanuwwak bummak yā hanuwwak

brab'ak." u zuxxūh(l) yā tuwīl al'umur u hattaw na'aš mi il
na'aš ilmeit luh u mwišaw ya'ni g mat xamsat 'ašar lēlih aw
sab'at 'ašar lēlih u ham / ham allēl wannahār yamšūn. ma'ham
hdēb aššām abaćli alii hu 'aźīdaham, abaćli bin fālih
āššilāźi. abaćli yā minnaham gayyilaw xa āw tāl 'umrak
'ugbitēn yšīlu tāl 'umrak 'ugbitēn ya' ni sammōh bi'ugbitēn
mi il yā yš lūnu hādōli jimī', hu yā minnaham istarāhaw ja
u xa a rrajjāl 'ugbitin ānyih ya'ni rāh, ēh, marritēn yšīlu
u ham sgār ya'ni ham gīmat i'māraham ya'ni sgār bhalwagt
ha āk mā haw kbār. killaham jid'ān. yā innu tāl 'umrak
ya harin mahāšm u ya harin źibālaham. u ydill y af uf rūhu
w mā yabi ham yšūfūnu balhēl mā 'alēham hdūm, killaham mā
'alēham u yhibbu ahadēham yhibb xusyānu ydill yištakk yōm
ygūl "xūy, yā / wiš ismu / yā. mjeida' yā xūy hinna mit lak
šuf xusyānna killaham ma ālīx, ya'ni mā 'alēna šay . lā
tistihi !" murta innaham rāhaw tāl 'umrak u yōm innaham
instahlikaw mātaw mnal'atš tabbōblaham nigrat(2) u gayyilaw
ya'ni bhaššijrat (3) moutā(4) yabūn ymūtūn mnal'atš. rayyib
di līlah rayyib ibin 'ayźih rāh minham yōm innaham šāfaham
nāmaw u hu yrūh lixabran yxabr innahu / yōm inn. ya'ni gabul
yōm ilmagāzi. u yōm ja lxabra yamma hi malyānih u yōm innu
tabb 'ala lxabra. w ytubb ma'u lu šinag bargan 'alyah u šāf
alma u yarja' ma' i aru naks. mā āgah lillah abadl ! u yōm
ja nimar 'ala ga'datham gāl: "ibširu barri!" u ham yfūhūn
farah: "wēni?" gāl: "īh,bhāda(5) grayyib." u ham yamšūn
yšiddūn nfūsaham u yanglūn xawiyyaham alii hu / ilyā mā jaw
alxabra, lamman jaw alxabra gāl: "usbru šufu tari, lā
thasbūnni ya'ni inni raht 'āyifkam, ilyāmni(6) širibt u
tifattant likam šufu itari. hāda tari tar inni mā igtah
šufu itari!" bi'dēn yōm innaham dibahham aljū', mā min /
iddyār xluww. mā bah āhad. aldyār qtū' mā ba ahad mnannās.
sādōlaham jarbū' u šuwōh walkill y'ayy h innu mā yji ahad mā
yji ya'ni lugmwitin balfum. dallaw yta'ādōn walkill: "uxdu
yā flān." ham yi'tūnu wgeidin ma'ham yigāl-lu(7) tāl 'umrak,
yigāl-lu šahhād ibin mxeimir. šahhād ibin mxeimir laffuh
bir mu abad hu asgar ham laffu bbirīmu. 'ugub mā jaw
ahalham wistirāhaw 'ād-/ya'ni wzāru ya'ni bir m ya'ni
mwihzam mi il ihzām/, hāh laffu balhizam lamman jaw ahalham

1 Narrative imperative.
2 -at. For retention of the -t see p.70.
3 Ditto.
4 moutā. In Arabian dialects the masculine plural of some
adjectives hās the ending -a, noumā "asleep".
5 bhāda "here", see p.98-9.
6 mni North Najdi, more normally minni .
7 yigāl internal passive, see p.41.
133 Chapter 6 (Text 6)

g ā l : "yā š i l g ā n l ā t h a s b ō n n i . k a l e i t a l j a r b ū ' i l l i antam

' a t e i t ū n i l u mwiddat ' a š a r t ayyām hā a l j a r b ū ' i l l antam /
yōm 'ād jaw ahalham wistarāhaw / hā a l j a r b ū 1 i l antam
txabrūn mā i g t u . " šufu šīmat a r r i j ā l u šhāmiyyatham u
ygūlūn t ā l 'umrak innaham gazaw ' a l a j e i š m a r r a t i n t ā n y i h
innaham ygayyilūn ' a l a maźīlaham wiygaddūn ' a l a mgaddāham u
y ' a š š ū n ' a l a m'aššāham h i j r a t na f a l g ā ' ygūlūn y a ' n i mā gad
y i n w i s i l almamšah mašya hāk alwagt ha ā k . y a ' n i hā a gi a t
i š š i l g ā n u h i murtah ā l 'umrak ga l d t a h b a s s mā ' a r i f .

TEXT 6 (SHAMMAR) TRANSLATION

There were, God give you long life, the Shilgān(l) and they
were a raiding party against the Huwaitāt.(2) And after they
had captured the camels, the uwaitāt attacked them on horses
(3) and captured them after a long battle. And when they
captured them, o long of life, they stripped them even of
their clothes, they didn't leave clothes on them. This was
their companion, their cousin Jīd al-Rubū', the Huwaitāt
maimed him, in his leg, in his thigh and he said: "Oh my
uncles,(4) go! I am a man who is going to die so you all go
to your families." They went from his sight and were hidden
by a hill and he said: "Hah, no by God, they've gone and
left me. No, by God, they've gone." And he bound up his
leg, it was broken, I mean the bone of it. They returned to
him and said: "Rejoice for your mother. Rejoice for your
mother." They came like a herd of camels to him, I mean
running to him at the gallop (saying): "Rejoice for your
mother, rejoice for your companions." And they picked him
up, 0 long of life, and brought a stretcher, like the bier
of a corpse, for him and they walked about fifteen nights or
seventeen nights and they were walking night and day. With
them was Hudaib al-Shām 'Abaćli. He was their leader, 'Abaćli
ibn Fālih the Shilāźi.(5) 'Aba li, when they had rested in
the afternoon, carried him, O long of life, two turns, he
carried him for two turns, I mean, they call it two turns,
for instance when they had carried him, all of them (once),
he, after they had rested, came and took the man a second
turn. I mean, he went, yes and carried him twice. And they

1 The Shilgān, a branch of the Sinjāra Shammar.

2 Huwaitāt, a tribe of southern Jordan.
3 Long range raiding was by camel, but the raided camp could
counterattack after the raid on horses, which were faster
over a short distance.
4 Relatives on the mother's side, in general.
5 Of the Shilgān; see also PHILBY (1922) p.257 vol.1, who
mentions him although he gives'the name as Abaqili.
134 Chapter 6 (Text 6)

were young, I mean they were about, I mean, young, at that

time. They were not old. They were all youths and when,
God give you life, their loins were exposed and he began
trying to cover himself he didn't want them to see him at
all, they had no clothes on them. All of them had no
clothes and he covered his loins, covered his nakedness and
was embarrassed. And he said, "Oh my brother / O / what was
his name / O Mujaida', O my brother, we are like you, look
at our nakedness. All of them were naked. "I mean we have
nothing on, do not be shy!" The result of it was that they
went and, God give you long life, when they were dying of
thirst, perishing of thirst, they came to a well and rested
in the afternoon at this tree, dying on the point of death
from thirst. Ghrayyib, the guide, Ghrayyib ibn 'Aiźah, went
from them, when he saw that they had gone to sleep he went to
a hollow that he knew of / when he I mean before the time of
the raid. And when he came to the hollow, near it, it was
full and when he came in to the hollow and he came to it,
there was a slope with fine sand on it and he saw the water
and went back on his tracks returning. He didn't taste it,
by God, at all! And when he came and burst on to the place
where they were sitting, he said: "Rejoice in the quenching
of thirst!" and they leapt in joy. "Where is it?" He said:
"Yes, here quite near." And they walked, pushing themselves
on and carrying their companion who/when they came to the
hollow, he said: "Wait, see my tracks, do not think that I
went, leaving you and when I had drunk, I remembered you.
See my tracks. There are my tracks. You see that I didn't
taste it. See my tracks!" Afterwards when hunger had al-
most killed them, there were no / the lands were deserted,
there was no one there. The lands were deserted, there was
no one there, no people. They caught a jerboa for themselves
and roasted it and all of them refused it, no one came.
There wasn't a morsel for the mouth. They began competing
with one another: "Take it O fulān." They gave it to a
young boy with them who was called, May you live long, who
was called Shahhād ibn Mukhaimir. Shahhād ibn Mukhaimir hid
it in his loincloth. Not at all, he was the smallest of
them. He hid it in his loincloth. When they had got to
their families and rested, then / I mean his loincloth, I
mean his belt, like a belt/ Hah, he hid it in his belt and
when they came to their families, he said "Oh Shilgān do
not think that I ate the jerboa, which you gave me, ten days
ago. This is the jerboa which you / they when they came to
their families and rested / this is the jerboa which you
know of, I haven't tasted it." See the honour and pride of
the men. And they say, May your life be long, that they
went off on another raid by camels a second time. And they
rested where they rested, and had lunch where they had lunch
135 Chapter 6 (Text 6)

and dined where they dined.(1) Our journey by foot, they

say that that journey is not possible, the journey of that
time. I mean this is the story of the Shilgān and the point
of it is the gas da, Long life to you, but I do not remember
it.

1 The meaning of this is unclear. It seems to mean that

they left immediately.
136 Chapter 6

TEXT 7

RUFAI': POEMS AND SENTENCES ABOUT NOMAD LIFE

The first part of this text was recorded, the rest dictated.
It was obtained from an encampment of the Rufai' at the
Hollandi Canal, northeast of Nasiriyya. The Rufai' had just
come in from the desert after the end of spring and were
encamped in groups of four or five tents at a number of
places in the vicinity. This particular group were encamped
near a village of Sūdān marsh dwellers where they had the
use of a well for their camels, which also grazed on the
hamadhāt in the vicinity. The dialect of the Rufai' showed
features of the North Arabian type but also some of the
characteristics of the periphery area. This was consistent
with their position as bedouins of original Najdi origin
with a long history of contact with Iraq and Shi'ite in
religion. The text shows a great similarity to the dialect
of the Ahl al-Shimāl (Text 9) with the important exception
that it shows the characteristic North Arabian form of the
feminine suffix /-ih/, while the Ahl al-Shimāl text shows
/-ah/. The form /-ih/ is consistent with the tribe's
Shammari connections. Shammari informants regarded the
Rufai1 and the related Humaid, Sā'da and Bu'aij tribes as
members of the Sāyih group, Shammar tribes who had gone over
to Iraq in the past and taken the Shi'ite faith
(tišayyi'aw).

TEXT 7

abārha(l) činna 'ala yāl mallih

abāsir hinafsi čēf attadābīr
' a r r ā r birru s ā b i j i fi mahallah
birru sūsa yā ' a š ī r almašāyīr

1 abārha < albārha .

137 Chapter 6 (Text 7)

dann a i l ū l u mus'ab azzamil xallah

uhutt arrisan bissifīfa čima ēr
od alma'ādi āzim nišillah
nišdi 'an maghōra u nigfu ibyillah
u k i l l mā dabbar abāri(l) gilna xēr.

yā bint yā sāyim 'alīč alia lannič t i j ī f ī n

lawman nigūl ibniyyat alxēr rūhi
'a rōbbha ilhalha lyi bahūn alba'ārīn
ilnijrin tawāli l l i e l hissu ibūhi
amma linhēdi mi i l tal'a lbasātīn
walla tafāfīhin 'ala yāl mūni. (2)

Sentences to do with nomadic life:

1 almu ar mutar iššimāl, w i l f i ' l f i ' l iryāl, walšēl šēl

iymāl.
2 iddinya sāhi walā bah ēm, wilsār igbār nsammlh 'ayy.
3 srahat alabā'ir, lo yāb iššamis raww hat. lo sār
inšarat, issubuh.
4 itla'aw lilbarr irja'aw liddirih. baššita ni har.
wāhid yrawwid ' i š b yifla' arrawwād. lo sār mā liga yi ul.
(3) iddinya mahal u gahat mā-buh š i . iddīrih mihīlih.
5 rabbu'at iddinya. nirwi māy gadīr. māy šurba.
nwarrid. "šīlu rabī ' ibširu balxēr."
6 "ibširu balxēr. ibširu barrabī ' u š ī l u wintaklu."
7 "abašširkum bah xēr u bah 'išbin lā ytūl."
8 irja'aw liddīrih. haddaraw ša ilfarāt. inzalaw
halna banaw ilbyūt. "ibnan ibsā' gita'na l j ū ' nrīd ačil u
čāy." (4) iydigg ighawih wiyyūn almasāyīr yišurbūn ighawih
"hayyuh, hayyuhum! alia balxēr antum!"

TEXT 7 (RUFAI') TRANSLATION

Last night I was on a hill of trouble,(5)

Thinking to myself what plans to make.
'Arrār,(6) feed my mare where she stands
Feed Sūsa(7) 0 friend of the wayfarer.
Bring forth the swift riding camel and leave the
untrained difficult camels,

1 abāri < albāri

2 Compare timūh "it flows".
3 yi ūl < yi ull
4 Mesopotamian; šāhi in Najd.
5 mallih literally "būrning heat".
6 'Arrār, a man's name.
7 Sūsa, the name of the horse.
138 Chapter 6 (Text 7)

And put on the head-stall with the tassels resembling

[the feathers of] a bird.
We must carry off the herds of the enemy
We leave the small camels and take the best
And whatever the Lord brings we accept.

o pious girl, why by God do you wait?

When we say with good intention, go!
Her only failing(1) is her family who slaughter camels
[for the guest]
And the coffee pestle which rings late at night.
As for her breasts they are like the buds of a garden,
Or like apples on a well-watered hillside.

Sentences to do with nomadic life:

1 The rain is the rain of the north,(2) the deed the

deed of men and the carrying, the carrying of camels.(3)
2 The weather is clear and there is no cloud. If there
is dust we call it 'ayy.
3 The camels have gone out to pasture. If it is in the
evening, we say rawwihat,(4) if we say nšarat(4) that is in
the morning.
4 They have gone out to the desert. In the winter we go
out. One person goes out to scout for pasture. He, the
scout, goes out. If it happens that he finds nothing, he
stays [until he does find something]. The land is dry and
in drought, there is nothing there. The d ra is in drought.
5 The land is covered in grass. We drink water from the
pools, drinking water. We bring the flock down to drink.
"Move camp! It is spring, rejoice in the good fortune."
6 "Rejoice in the spring. Rejoice in the good fortune.
Move camp and trust [in God]!"
7 "I bring you good news. There is good fortune and
there is grass which is not far off."(5)
8 They have come back to the camping ground. They have
come down to the river Euphrates. Our families have dis-
mounted and pitched the tents. "Pitch the tents quickly (o
women!) Hunger has broken us. We want food and tea!" He
pounds coffee and the wayfarers come in and drink coffee.
"Greeting to him! Greeting to them.(6) God keep you well."
1 'a rōb "a failing" here used ironically to mean virtue,
as the poet then lists various signs of generosity.
2 The best rain is thought to be brought by the north wind.
3 Carrying of the camp equipment which is loaded on camels.
4 Different verbs denoting movement of flocks.
5 Or perhaps "which will not last long".
6 In greetings formulae the person addressed is often re-
ferred to in the third person. See also INGHAM (1976)
p.75.
139 Chapter 6

TEXT 8

SHAMMAR (MAS'ŪD): GASĪDA FROM THE BANI HILĀL EPIC

The following gasīda was recorded from Shaikh Ahmad al-

'Allawi of the Mas'ūd. The Mas'ūd are descended from the
Aslam branch of Shammar settled around Karbala. The gasīda
is part of the Bani Hilāl epic, but shows the main features
of the dialect, namely the Shammari suffixes of the third
person singular /-uh/(m.), /-ah/(f.). Elsewhere on the tape
the suffix /-an/ for /-ni/ (1st s.) occurs. However the
other main North Arabian characteristics did not occur in
this dialect. It constitutes a form similar to that of the
other Euphrates bedouin, but more clearly assimilated to the
Mesopotamian type. My thanks are due to Sahib 'Ali of
Hilla for obtaining this tape for me.

TEXT 8

gāl:
ijena ' ala rās ilwa'ad hinna whimyar.
hinna talātīn mā nzūd zōd zāyid.
u humma a 1 a miyya kāmlīn ili'dādi
u'aširtin min rab'i talligaw rūs xēlahum (širdaw)
u 'aširtin min rab'i hāfdin iššahāyid.

(wugfaw 'al hiyād dōla)

u 'aširtin min rab'i xallaw izzān bisdūr il'ida

ahašlm ilwujāyid.
wuhgin ta'anni wana mšlh ilgēruh
u xalla ddiri' fjambi bijāyid.
xayyāl himyar u bismu lāni 'ārfuh
yinxūn wen wuhig wēnu bil'awāyid.
wuhgin ta'anni wana mšlh ilgēruh
u gāmat ilxa ra tijūlip b'idditah 'alayy.
140 Chapter 6 (Text 8)

(ilxa ra frusuh)
u xallatni ašann 'ajūzin 'ala lgā' bāyid.

(aššann ajjirba 1'atīga)

fazzēt wilyā xayyālin yinha lxēl 'anni.

yinhāh ima sēlin tinhāh innifāyid.
'afya bin ixiyyin ana 'ind xāluh
atāri mirta gāydin ibn gāyid.
(sūr ibin gāyid hāda min bini hlāl)

TEXT 8 (SHAMMAR MAS'ŪD) TRANSLATION

He said:

We came to the appointed place, ourselves and Himyar.(l)

We were thirty men or not many more.
And they were three hundred or not less.
Ten of my companions had loosed the reins of their
horses.
(they had fled)

And ten of my companions had held their council

(they stood aside, in neutrality)

And ten of my companions left their lances in the breasts

of the enemy [which shattered] with the brittleness of
burnt twigs [as on a fire].
One called Wuhig struck me while I was engaged with
another,
and left my coat of mail ripped in shreds on my side.
[He was] a horseman of Himyar whom I did not know by name.
While the enemy called out "Where is Wuhig, where is
the hero!"(2)
Wuhig struck me while I was engaged with another.
And Khadhra was tumbled over on me with her trappings.

(Khadhra was his mare)

1 The ancient tribe of southern Arabia, the enemies of the

Bani Hilal before their exodus to North Africa.
2 The custom was to call out the name of a hero in a battle
as a rallying cry naxwa, hence yinxūn; 'awāyid "heroic
qualities".
141 Chapter 6 (Text 8)

And left me like an old woman's water skin deserted on

the ground.

(a "shann" is an old water skin)

When I recovered, lo! a horseman was turning the horses

away from me,
Turning them away as a sand dune separates a flood.
Bravo for a nephew of mine who turned back to save his
uncle.
I saw that it was a descendant of Gāyid son of Gāyid. (1)

(that is Sūr ibn Gāyid of the Bani Hilāl)

1 Gāyid ibn Fāyid ibn 'Āmir, the grandfather of Abu Zaid,

MUKHLIS (1964) p.141.
142 Chapter 6

TEXT 9

AHL AL-SHIMĀL: THE STORY OF IBN JASH'AM AND IBN 'ARAI'IR

This text was recorded from a family of bedouin encamped at

Umm al-'Aish, a well to the north of Kuwait town. They
would not tell us what tribe they were from but only that
that were Ahl al-Shimāl "people of the north". Their speech
identified them as nomads of the southern Euphrates area and
was very similar to the idalect of the Humaid and Rufai'
interviewed later in the area of Nāsiriyya in Iraq (Text 7).
In the same area were also families of Shammar and Bani
Khālid, altogether about twenty tents in all. These were all
sheep herders. One Najdi informant from Midhnab in Qasīm, on
hearing this text, said it was the speech of shūyān "sheep
herders" from the north. However the Dhafīri informant re-
garded them as mintifij "bedouin" of the north. This is
illustrative of the vague nature of the designation "bedouin"
as applicable to these northern nomads.

TEXT 9

yubu gānim, yigullak ibin imhēd lu indu luh'abd wal'abd

timallak ibxa ra u tunis huwwa ššex sār bxa ra wal'abd
wakkiluh btūnis u youm innihum wakkiluh yā tuwīl al'umur,
istašhal aššex ugām yāxid ibīha w mirīha. wastašyaxa šēx.
ibin i'rē'ir yā tuwīl il'umur, hāk aljas'am yintīh xaryiyya
(1) kill sinah min āl jaš'am. youm in rāh-lu yā tuwīl
il'umur atāri yintīh 'isrīn lēra, ibin imhēd kill sanah.(2)
u yannab(3) ibin imhēd iššēx u rāh lil'abd u sayyar 'alal
'abd u liga l'abd šaglitu muxrita nās ti bah, nās titbax,

1 xaryiyya for xarjiyya.

2 sanah "year". Three lines above the form is sinah, this
is variation between North and Central Arabian forms, com-
pare Shammar sinah, DhafTri sanah, Shammar sinag, Sudair
šanag "side".
3 yannab for jannab.
143 Chapter 6 (Text 9)

nās tinfax u 'atīt-allah. xa a ala t ayyām yā tuwīl

al'umur, akrumu hāl rabd. akrumu lxamsīn lērah u čisāh u
hallā-bu u rāh ilhalu. marr 'ala ššēx 'amm al-'abd. youm
inn yarrah(l) hā ssahan, sahan ihin i'rē'ir yā tuwīl al'umur
u galat addīra u glitaw ham(2) ma'zūmīn, galat aljaš'am hu
wiyyāhum. u gāl luh ibn i ' r ē 'ir: "yā bin jaš'am ham šift
wāhid akram minni?" gāl "ībillah lā tilhag lā i l i wa lā
rub' min 'abdak." gāl: "minu hnā'?"(3) lā walla hādrīn
il'abīd. gāl "tiggūh balhadīd?" baljaš'am, arbutaw ajjaš'am,
hattōh balmudīf. ēh! gāl: "hinna yo inn xaryiyyak(4) mrabba'
'alēna, alxaryiyya yo(5) nwaxxir rāsak." irkubaw hirwitah
tamanīn xayyāl. al'abd ilā nigal iddalla mā yintāha
balyisār, alfinyāl, alia balyamīn. u youm inn yā tuwīl
al'umur hawwalaw 'indu, lā wallah sawālf aljaš'ami killhin
wkād. hāda ibin i'rē'ir sahab assēf yabi/yirīd(6) yi bah
hāl'abd. jā'id wara ddlāl. nās tidigg u nās ti bah u nās
tinfax. hāda yā tuwīl al'umur ishab assēf u huttu jiddāmak,
(7) wa ddīwān ja'din 'indu. gāl yā tuwīl al 'umur "ana arīd
minnak gasīdtēn, u rāsi 'alēk halāl." 'indu walad ismu klēb.
mā sammāh gēr dāk al yōm u hu rajjāl. gāl: "yā klēb yā
wlidi. 'atni rrubbāba!" intāh arrubbāba yā tuwīl al'umur
u gām yašhat-bah al'abd. gāl:

"nattēt rēs imgayyir u šift azzuwā l u jilīb šēx sayyār.

miyat hala baššex hu walmasāyīr
albunn yitbax walbalašt imhayyal
wassīx yir'af i nu balgarājīr
lu šawrin(8) bah čīs mā hu m'ayyar
maydā' jiddām annišama a'āmīr
ana lo 'ayyirōni b'amāmi māni m'ayyar
li xawāl u li ydūd mašāhīr.

šiddak ra'ani warāk(9) mā gilit(lO) ya klēb

u lē gilit šubb annār yā mūjid addalla

1 yarrah for jarrah.

2 ham "also" Mesopotamian.
3 hnā Mesopotamian.
4 xaryiyyak < xaryiyyatk. One would expect xaryiytak.
This may be the influence of neighbouring Central Najd
dialects.
5 yo "either ... or". The normal Mesopotamian is lo,
Arabian yā. This represents a synthesis.
6 yirīd/yabi "he wants". Here first the Mesopotamian then
the Arabian lexemes are used.
7 ishab a s s ē f u huttu jiddāmak "draw the sword and put it
in front of you!" Narrative imperative.
8 šāwrin nunation.
9 wara used in negative questions for "why".
10 gilit < gilt. The Mesopotamian anaptyctic vowel.
See p.60-1.
144 Chapter 6 (Text 9)

yā m'ayyiš alyitmān hum walmahādīd

yā walad min sār al'asa tāl illah
tičfi mahālīb u tij'id mahālīb
u čabdin tyabbisah u čabdin tibillah
māni nihētak yā jilīl il'a ārīb
lo tistihi mānt hāwi attīb killah"
'āf 'innuh u akrumu hāddīrah. tislam u t i ' ī š yubu gānim.

TEXT 9 (AHL AL-SHIMĀL) TRANSLATION

Oh Abu Ghānim(l) he says to you(2) that Ibn Muhaid(3) had a

slave and the slave... He [ibn Muhaid] took possession of
Khadra(4) and Tūnis. He became the Shaikh at Khadra and he
entrusted the slave with Tunis. And when he entrusted him
with it, Oh long of life, the Shaikh [i.e. the slave] became
powerful and began taking Dhabīha and Manīha.(5) Ibn
'Arai'ir...,(6) Oh long of life, the Jash'ami [Ibn Muhaid]
used to give him a stipend every year from the Al Jash'am.
(7) You see he used to give him twenty liras, that is Ibn
Muhaid, every year. He [Ibn 'Arai'ir] avoided Ibn Muhaid,

1 The story was addressed to a member of the audience.

2 "He says to you" a conventional way of beginning a
narrative or story.
3 Ibn Muhaid is cast here as the Shaikh of the Jash'am
(Qash'am) see p. 20. The clan of Ibn Muhaid are however
shaikhs of the Fad ān of 'Aniza. See GLUBB (1978) p.155
for a further story of Ibn Muhaid. Hereafter the name is
dropped in the narrative.
4 Khadra and Tūnis. The narrator uses these as purely myth-
ical names. In fact Khadra is an epithet of Tūnis, Tūnis
al-Khadra, "Tūnis the fertile". He has imported these
names from the Bani Hilāl stories and uses them to symbol-
ize the great extent of the power of the Jash'am.
5 Dhablha and Manīha, a system of tribute in kind and hospi-
tality exacted by powerful shaikhs of the Euphrates area;
see DICKSON (1949) p.443-4.
6 Ibn 'Arai'ir, the shaikhly house of the Bani Khālid, pre-
vious rulers of Kuwait and al-Hasa; see also p.65f above
for the dialect of the Bani Khālid.
7 Al Jash'am (Qash'am), an important confederation of the
middle Euphrates comprising the tribes Qash'am, Humaid,
Rufai', Bu'aij and Sā'da and sometimes referred to as the
Ghizya. In the 18th century they controlled the grazing
lands west of the Euphrates between Hit and Samāwa. Later
in the 19th century under pressure from the Shammar and
later the 'Aniza they moved south and the Humaid and
Rufai'joined the Muntafiq. OPPENHEIM (1952) 1-2,p.408-13;
AZZĀWI (1956) IV, p.52.
145 Chapter 6 (Text 9)

the shaikh, and went to the slave and he called on the slave.
He found the slave enjoying himself. Some people were
slaughtering [sheep] and others cooking and others pounding
[coffee beans] and the gift of God!(1) he took [stayed] three
days. He took three days, o long of life, and the slave gave
him a gift of fifty liras and gave him a gift of clothing
and made him welcome and he went back to his family. [On the
way] he visited the Shaikh the uncle [i.e. master] of the
slave. And when he took it away, the food, the food of Ibn
,
Arai,ir(2) [i.e. after eating] and they went in to the town
... and they also went in as his guests - the Jash'am went in
with him - Ibn 'Arai'ir said to him "Oh Ibn Jash'am, and have
you seen anyone more generous than me?" He said, "Yes, by
God, you do not reach a third or even a quarter [in generos-
ity] of your slave". He said "Who is here?" No, by God,
the slaves were all present. He said "Chain him up, the
Jash'ami". They chained the J ash1 ami and imprisoned him
in the guest-house. Yes. He said "Either we will multiply
your stipend four-fold, or we will remove your head." They
mounted up, approximately, eighty riders. The slave, when
he takes round the coffee-pot, doesn't pour coffee from the
people on the left, but starts from the people on the right.
(3) And when they came up to them, No, by God, [they saw
that] the story of the Jash'ami was all true. Ibn 'Arai'ir
drew his sword wishing to kill the slave. He was sitting by
the coffee-pots and people were pounding coffee and others
cooking and others blowing on the fire. He, 0 long of life,
drew the sword and put it in front of him, and all the dlwan
were sitting in front of him. He [the slave] said, 0 long
of life, "I want from you [to let me recite] two gasldahs,
and then my head is lawful for you [if you still want to re-
move it]." He had a son named Kulaib, whom he had not
called [in public] other than on that day, although he was a
man. He said "o Kulaib, my son, give me the Rabāba [viol]!"
He gave him the Rabāba, o long of life, and the slave began
to play on it. He recited:

"I came over the hill at Mugayyir and saw the figures in the
distance and the well of Shaikh Sayyār.
A hundred welcomes to the Shaikh, him and the guests.

1 An expression of wonder at generosity or plentifulness.

2 At this point the narrator corrects the names of the char-
acters in the story. It is Ibn 'Arai'ir, not Ibn Muhaid,
who is the owner of the slave and Ibn Jash'am the dependent.
3 The correct way to pour coffee is starting with the guests
on the left of the host. The significance of it here is
not plain.
146 Chapter 6 (Text 9)

The coffee beans are roasting and the coffee pot has
been prepared with cardamon.
And the edge of the roasting iron rings against the
hearth-stones(1)
He has a tobacco box(2) with a tobacco pouch in endless
supply
Thrown down in front of the heroes for them to replenish
their pipes.
If anyone insults me by my forebears, I am not insulted.
I have marriage-relatives and ancestors of great renown.
Bear up, why didn't you tell me 0 Kulaib,
Why didn't you say to light the fire, 0 bringer of
the coffee-pot.
Oh he who provides for orphans and prisoners,
0 son of he for whom his staff is a third(3)
You knock over one milk bowl and set up another(4)
And you make the heart (5) of one man dry and moisten
the next.
I did not forbid you, 0 blameless one.
If you are shy, you will not attain all virtue."
[generosity]

He [Ibn 'Arai'ir] forgave him and gave him that whole country
as a gift. Live in health, 0 Abu Ghānim.

1 The word garājīr was not known to my informants, but

the sense seemed to be as above.
2 Tobacco and coffee were in the old days the great luxuries
of the desert and always in short supply.
3 The meaning is obscure. One suggestion was that he had
only one son and that he, the son and his staff were three.
4 A sign of generosity.
5 Literally "liver". The phrase signifies taking care of
the needs of guests.
147 Chapter 6

TEXT 10

KAWAWILA (AHWAZ): EXTRACT FROM THE BANI HILĀL EPIC

This text was recorded in 1972 from the Mulla Thāni Kawāwila
(Gypsies) of Ahwaz. Two similar texts were also recorded in
Ahwaz and at Chawādir just outside Basra (in 1969 and 1974
respectively). All of these were of substantially the same
dialect type, namely South Mesopotamian of a highly nomadic
type as regards syllabication. This is exemplified by the
forms /sma'at/ "she heard", /tfurat/ "she jumped", /ndiha/
"he awoke him" in this text. The texts were all stories from
the Bani Hilāl epic except for one which was about local
tribal affairs. The text was delivered at great speed and
interspersed by sections of music on the rabāba or viol.
This may explain the occasional confusion of the names of the
characters in the story. However the main course of the
action remains clear nonetheless. At certain points also
although the words are clear the implications of the actions
of the characters are not. It may be that in these cases the
stories are so well known in the society that a degree of
vagueness is acceptable. The translation given here is based
on work done with an informant in this country, Mrs. Sājda
Hasan of Ba'gūba in Iraq. Ethnographically the text is an
interesting example of an old orally transmitted tradition
(perhaps in some places now re-interpreted) with occasional
introductions of aspects of modern life.

TEXT 10

tubba' 'ajīdhum š i b ī b . lamīr hasan u šibīb ittubba' tiā ōla

bilgabul 'adāw. šibīb kital ubu bāzied gāmaw 'alie u a aw
bjisir āsarōhum. min ba'dan alān ma al wa a w iyya 'ala
ma alan gal ihlāli y ubb u yi 'ad fōg ilyisir. a la
arba'īn faras. hādōl nuwātiīr y i'dūn 'alie l'adāw, mi il
marrat zilma ysīh "lihlāli halakum tardūnhal" aku jisir.
 148 Chapter 6 (Text 10)

il'alya, ixt bāzied 'āšiktih, šibīb. 'ašikt šibīb il'alya u

middahna wyā u dōla sār-ilhum dōm. ši māti(l) 'ala Ši.
'adāw. min ba'dan šibīb, 'idhum yawwāl hāša l u ūr tuwaffa
lyawwāl ali 'inda urma il ma sūn. galla: " abīb xūyl"
šibīb galla, "hādi l i e š mā tāxi ha hāy umm ilifrūx, ham
'ēnha šab'ānih(2) u ham 'idha halāl wāyid w inta 'alie u
rāyi ." galla "mu middāynin 'aliena šlōn iysīr," galla,
"īh mā yxālif ixi hi!" gām 'aliena wxa āha 'arras 'aliehi,
(3) xa āha. sma'at il'alya bi'ann šibīb m'arris. gālat
"wa ah a lub rayyit ilmi ān." ta'annat ilamīr asan.
gāl: "labbieć!" gātla: "tara ilak inta ibin 'ammi." gālna:
"tfa li, ahlan wa sahlan!" gām 'aliena u 'arras 'aliena.
yābōha l ama w zaffōha. gallōla gāltla "ta'āl agillak inta
lyōm šiex w inta b'iris / winta mā ysīr t'arris 'alayya
bhalliela hādi wizzilim mdawwīn u hāy" gātla "... bilginīs
nirūh wyāk lilbarr." šaddaw xēl huwwa wyāha 'algā'.
'attilāl u bilbarr. gālha: "yā bit 'ammi. halyōm ba'ad
māku a ad bieni w bienič." gātla "lā yamīr asan. ilyōm
inta šiex. winta lyōm malik. winta minnā w minnā w mā y īr
i na n'arris bhaććōl w ina 'a šānīn. kūn n'arris ibša
izza āmi." gālilha: "ta'āy agillić. ilyōm ša izza āmi
man ūr. wi na w ōla ittubba', wmā ysīr i na." gātla
"bkiefak" galla "ća bkiefić. ana bxidimtić. ana kūn arūh
lišša ligissamma, hā īn bī 'abid nātūr. sār a tti ī
yāxi minha nāga. wsār a tti la', yāxi minha nāga."
gātla: "lā, lā yāba yā šibīb, lā tbūg ilmāy bōga. kūn tāx a
bissief." mi il ma yšuf innūgi kāttāt, gātla: " āk irrā'i".
gāl: "ard a ibb ibsalāma 'ala hā a imi ī' ilmu mis balkit
a a huwwa š i j ā ' . " lamman kattilha lfaras 'alie, liga
1'abid nāyim. gāl "ni'mat ubūy wiydādii" gāl: "mā a'arif.
mā akitlanna, illa atnāda wayyā, wāxi ilmāy minna bissief."
ndiha. tubāraz wyā lamīr asan. tubāraz wyā iba ill abid.
bhīn mā ibah ii'abid, a ma 'aliehum. kattatan ilarbāš
ćayytat bišša , hiyya mālt 'alya, tuwannisaw. u tammumaw
b āk išša u hāy. gālha: "yā rūhi, bit 'ammi, ta'āl ihnā
n'arris!" gātla "lā ta'āl agillak, ilyōm Šibīb inta ma luūb-
ilhum w-axāf yōmiyya yfugdūn išša . i na agillak ykūn
ii'iris 'idd ahalna." šibīb almān bu ēf. ilim.
wilhilim a'āda 'ala xūh. galla: "xūya ana mā agdarla.
irkab i ānak i ayyār winrū lišša . halbat tilgālak
rā'i min bani hlāl, huwwa yfassir ilāmak attan n īr
'iyāl"

1 More normally nāti or min ifrom ni a " t o g i v e " .

2 -ih as a feminine s u f f i x resembling t h e N.Arabian t y p e .
3 -hi for -ha occurs o c c a s i o n a l l y i n t h i s t e x t . This
a l s o occurs i n t h e d i a l e c t of t h e Negev bedouin; BLANC
(1970) p . 1 2 4 .
149 Chapter 6 (Text 10)

"ana almān, ana almān bu ēf ćan gasid ibsiefi,

wana almān yā 'ammi ćān š ā r i b min bīr dammi.
wana almān ćann nār iltihab min(l) ayammak lie ayammi."

tigill:
"ćannak almān, ćān gā id ibsiefak.
hā a 'abdak ć i t i l ibša izza āmi
waridd:
ćannak almān ćan š ā r i b min bīr dammak.
hiāda zād ilyitāma 'aliek arām wi im arāmi.
waridd:
ćannak halmān nār iltihab min hayammak lie ayammi
gōmi 'ala gōmak mi il hadm i i . . .
yā šibīb ilkital 'abdi u ga a hagbiti
(2)lajazzi i alāl ma' il arāmi."(3)

galla:
"kitanna 'abdak u nil ag sayyda
u rawwa' iddinya l arub hāy."

ćaffat i ayyār 'aliehum. gāl: "ta'ā agillkum" gallatla

hiyya: "lābis hdūmak jāy!?" huwwa lābis čōxa amra.
gallatla: "lo lubak inta, inta ttalāga wyā. alā lubak
wyāna, ntalāga wyā wgu ēna." galla: "a lub minkum fad wāhid
atlāga wyā, wā id wā id. intum nafarēn wana wā id." galla:
"gūl!" galla:' "a lub āk ubu ččōxt(4) il amra." gātla:
"ba'ad minnak wayyāh." galla: "in ub!" š i b ī b ggilla. galla:
"yahu minkum? inta lo ani!" galla: "bkēfak." ni ab š i b ī b ,
š i b ī b tubba' in ab u hā a yāba yna''im 'alie, lamma at'aba
killiš, dās birrumu u čāka āni. irrumu fāt b ahr
issayyid hā a wiltāf adir ba n ilfaras winšičax birričāb.
galla: "ya a inta in ub innōb 'alamīr hasan!" ni ab
'alamīr asan š i b ī b , u āk yna''im 'alie, i ayyār u hā a
nā ibla. gabul ma y ī , ufar. š i r a d minna. širad jiddāma.
mā hāša. gām iyyība minnā wiy u a minnā. gām y ill u
yšīlhum. hiyya rāčba kumur ān, bitt ilxara. huwwa rākib
i ayyār. ilkumur ān kūn y īr akrab min li ān i ayyār.
ibn xaryān lamman fakkatta(5) iddiri', tā 'an nhiedātha,
hālkubur. "'alya ma' alasaf, wič inti lihnā jieti!" gām
'alieha minnā w minnā yrīd yku ha, mā gli ga ili ān.

1 hayammak f o r yammak. The i n t r o d u c t i o n of t h e s y l l a b l e

a- i s common as e v o c a t i v e of g r i e f or emotion.
2 la-, t h e j u r a t i v e la- used i n o a t h s .
3 harāmi for arām for t h e rhyme.
4 Note t h e r e t e n t i o n of t h e - t of t h e feminine s u f f i x .
5 -atta doubling of t h e - t of t h e feminine - a t i n p o s i t i o n s
b e f o r e a vowel i n i t i a l s u f f i x i s common t o t h e Sha al-
'Arab a r e a .
150 Chapter 6 (Text 10)

sadīxtih(l) gallatla: "xāyib yā lamīr asan yahaw lšaf marta

yku ūn bīha wiy ādun bīha jiddāmak winta xāyif?" čanna
huwwa a la huwwa inti ab irrumu id'a(2) rrumu bī la
a ābi'. birrumu sāba. ti awwab u 'ād laf ' ali ān. b īn
ma 'ād lāf, iya lie'ind i āyfa: "m awwab hā a lamīr asan
yah "(3) yā lie'ind i āyfa:"yā hali.

lāgāni šibīb yā 'ammi, lāgāni šibīb bkubr ilba ar wakbar.

talaggieta mi il ša izza āmi.
lāgāni šibīb bkubr ilyibal wakbar
talaggieta mi il ibn izza āmi.
lāgāni šibīb bkubr ilbalad wakbar
talaggieta mi il farx ilig āy.
čān ayyib u bwidda ayyib
yjazzīni l alāl ma' il arāmi.
ri īl yā halna r īl
wlā tubga 'alazzarga mugām."

talaggata l'alya tigilla:

"yā amīrna wamīr gōmna
'idna la āmi w 'idhum la āmi."(4)

bāzied nāyim mgaffā yi la' barra. xa a brīj u taxalla

w alla wyā. a librīj 'algā' u šal čākieta wi'gāla
w a hin 'alie. galla: "ahlan wsahlan!" gāl: "mnien
yietak?" galla: "wa a yieti min dīrāt tubba'" gāl: "xōš,
tubba' šinu aškalha? š'idhum axbār a'lām gēr?" gāl: "wa a
mā agillak a a killši axbār mā 'idhum. fu al bass šibīb
m awwab. talāga hu walamīr asan u araw majāfi. u ydawwir
bass i abīb." galla: "ča fi amāllā nsallim 'aliek." u
a īdie wšaddaw . . . u marr ba'dien bjindal(5) māl gi ab
imašla gabba minha. ga a sīm y u bīha šrār u ġēr u
hāy ār abīb. abb sūg yūnis. tirasla šan at rummān u
niemu lyadd ijjihāl. hā a gabul mā yō al lijjisir/ kā īn
ijjisir / lifrūx šabhavr, yard y ī ūn: "la'ad hā a hlāli!"
gabul ma yard y ī unf abb lirmana whalniemu jiddāma.
lifrūx čallavf 'ala išsay hādi. gām yimurr min bien rūshum.
lwa da ydigg ijjisir. larba'īn killhum gi a'hum u dās
'ajjisir. ā : "hlāli, hlāli hā a! māku gamma ad!" abb
iddīra, ā : " abīb, abīb, abīb!" illi āyfa(6)

1 adīxtih for adīqtih.

2 id'a, only used i n t h e i m p e r a t i v e . Here t h e n a r r a t i v e
i m p e r a t i v e . Also occurs i n t h e d i a l e c t of S u d a i r , da'ih
"leave him, i t ! "
3 yah, an exclamation of s u r p r i s e .
4 latāmi " b r e a s t b e a t i n g , bereavement".
5 jindal from P e r s i a n jangal "wood j u n g l e " .
6 āyif + a "passing him" n o t āyfa " t r i b e " .
151 Chapter 6 (Text 10)

wyistaxbur ilšibib lim awwab, yrū yi i lxabar liššiex,

yintlhum an'ām. iššiex mtaččilla wiyhiffūn 'alie zilim,
šibib. galla: "yā 'ammi, hā a abīb." gai: "jlbu!" ja
lšibīb mfarra', liga fad aswad uwll m abbug rū a, m ayyir
nafsa. galla: "hā šinu hā a?" "wa a abīb ana 'ammi."
galla: "ya a ya a imši! 'idna šibīb m awwab widdāwī!"
galla: "'ammi, alla y awwil 'umrak ana fad fagīr, a b
ifrēxāt sa b i'yāl. ana wēni u mwaddlni li'id(l) šibib.
hāda bass yšufni ygui: "hāda bāzied!" u yāxid rāsi." gai:
"la ana ajibak. šlon hāda? lieš? ihna ma 'idna min iswāb?"
galla: "imši, imši!" galla: "'ammi! hā a bass yšufni ygūi
"hā a bāzied." intum šitsawwūn bl? walaw ana abJb ba'ad.
huwwa mwadda' flna. huwwa mtaččal iššiex." ba'dien sallam
'aliehum. gāl: "ahlan. ahlan!" 'ala bāb ilxēma gāl: "ha!
mā gittilkum 'ammi?" galla: "ta'āl jāy. fa al. ta'āl
ig'id yammi!" šib b ygilla. gāl: "hā ma gittilkum!? šinu
hāy msōdan hā a bāzied." gāl: "hā a abīb?! šiftu intum?
hā a rah yim ini." galla: "yahū! (2) inta msōdan inta
mibtili bi wābak." gāl: "wilkum! -bāzied! ana mitlāji wiyyā
wša či? nōba nōbtien sawwa 'alayya tara lla." gām 'ala
wān a o. aggat čiela 'ind i āyfa rād minhum. 'ālaj
minhum. gāl: "xāyb n. na'al iššie ān. wilkum! bāzied!"
tara hāda jāy 'ala būzi u ba'ad sa'a yāxi rāsi!" mā ri aw
bjawāba. galhum: "tara yā jamā'a asallim 'aliekum. agilkum
ana hisbūni mū šilčān(3) ba'ad." šāld hapt'd bilxēma w dašš
'alie. galla: "ta'āl ana mintlk tubba' sab' isnin, ma'āk
ilak. wayyāk tāxid rāsi." ygilla: "'If 'anni!" galla:
"rayyāl ayyib!" galla: "wilak inta bāzied ma a'urfannak(4)
ana?!

dibči(5) yā rūhi dibči

dibči 'ala rūhi yibči!
lo allaftak bilkitbi mānta bāzied?" šibib ygūl.
"lā ti lam baxtak winta bayy.
ana abīb iššām i l ilbi
ana lāni abīb yā 'ammi
wa lā šibib y b
ana mit'anni 'ala rāsak yā šb b."

1 lie'ind > li'id.

2 yahū an exclamation of surprise and disbelief; not yahu
"who?"
3 mū ši i l čān "not a thing which ever existed".
4 a'urfann-. For the suffix -an(n), see p.83.
5 The prefix d(i)- is an emphatic particle often occuring
with imperatives in the Mesopotamian type. It does not
however normally occur in the South Mesopotamian area,
and is here a feature of the poem.
152 Chapter 6 (Text 10)

dašš ' a l i e wdiba a wgām ' a l a ba na wšaggha. u a l l a ' i d d i r i '

u a a b a an u yāba l i t āyfa wgam ' a l i e u l a f l a f a wxallā".
lamman šāf i a an b l wu l a m n i d d i r i ' agg i l h a l ā h i l . gāl:
" t a ' ā l agilkum ilyōm š i b i b gayba r ū a wla t r ū ūn ' a l i e h a s s a !
x a l l ū šwayya wya a t r ū ūn ' a l i e ! " g a l l a : "'ammi hab b .
l i k r ā w ' i n d i fad urma g ā l a t l i an ēta dū w t i n t i n i ibūbi.
wxallaw adāy lamma arūh hnā wa a l l i . " g ā l : "ha! ča šlōn?
ygūlūn hā a b ā z i e d . " ablb ygūl. 'inda b i e t . M e t naxal.
i s s ā t r a a , ā inha b r a s i j j i s i r duwwēna. mak na tsawwi
a n a . hā a n ma y ' ū d d i g r i : ( 1 ) "luwēn?" g ā l : "hā 'ammi
bwa dak?" g ā l : " i t l a ' ! " g ā l : "wa a ' i n d i ha a / hā anni
i ' d ū l a 'ām w i d d a š š i š y y ā h i n . " u ha a g ā ' i d l a b a l g i l b ā b .
ha a b i n ma iyaw, ligaw š i b i b r a s a maf ū a wba na mšaguga.
w i l l a ( 2 ) ā a t i uwāyi : "yabahātkum i l x e r xērkum t a r a
šibib idir."(3) ab b ibgufa ayyār u l i g a f irrumu b d a ,
yā l i l y i s i r ufra!(4) l i e ' i d d i l y ū n i : " l y ū n i ! " g ā l : "hā
'ammi?" g ā l : "wilak ma ma'āk z i l i m ? " g a l l a : "yā 'ammi
b a ' a d ' ē n i . marr 'alayya zilma āk huwwa ma a d r i šiysawwi
l u s . g a l l a : " š l ō n ? " g a l l a : "hā a 'ammi š ' i n d a mā ' i n d a mā
a d r i š b ā y i g . " g ā l : "wilak k i s s ummak t a ' ā l , t a ' ā l ! " g ā l :
"hā! t a ' ā l ' a l i ā n ! " g a l l a : "'ammi axāf min l i ā n . axāf
y i ' u n i . " g a l l a : "man'ūl(5) i l w a l d i e n ( h ā a Ihudūr) t a ' ā l
ku a ) " g a l l a : "ča šu ma huwwa šinsawwi?" g ā l : "wilak k i t a l
š i b i b hāda." b n ma dašš ab b u hā a a l a ' māku b da a n
u b i l i ān ka ' a l i e g a l l a : " ab b ! " g a l l a : "hā!" g a l l a :
" t a r a a n i b ā z i e d t f a a l hā a rāskum wana mxall k i h da
l i l ' a r a b . " g a l l a : ' " a l i e k i l ' ā f y a , 'awāfi" (bgalba). g a l l a :
"ana māxi minna š ū r . " g a l l a : "ča s a l l i m ' a l i e k ! ma'
i s s a l ā m a . " b ā z i e d l i g a l ' a r a b gā i h a i l a m i r asan u ma
m x a l l i b i e t ma māxid i l ' a r a b b i s s i e r w i s s i r d u čān b a s s
ya ya wmaryam awïād i x t a . g ā l i l h u m : " t ā n ū n i ! " humma w
'ummhum wyāhum. lamma y g u l a : "hā x ā l i . " g ā l : "wa a mtān k
xā i wilam r hasan ilyom xada l ' ā r w i n k i s a r wi na b a s s
tān n a k . " mišaw b i ur g ' i š a w . g ā l : "wa a xā i čanna
' asna wmā ' i d n a māy wilmāy i n g i a ' ' a l i é n a . " g a l l a : " x ā l i
a n d a l l fad b r y i n g ā l l a b r zaru min zamān mas i u ma ad
š ā r i b minna.

1 d i g r i "straight away, straight ahead". This is unusual.

The normal local form is gubal o r , on the Shatt al-'Araby
s da.
2 w i l l a "behold, loi"/ équivalent to classical wa i ā b i - .
3 i d i r internai passive of i d a r "to deceive"
4 ufra "jump it" imperative for past action in narrative.
5 man' ūl for mal'ūn is common in the whole area.
153 Chapter 6 (Text 10)

lamman yiena i l b i r zarwa min x i l i f 'ašwa

mashi u ma r i min i s n n i l ' a d ā m i .
wēn i l y i r w na wyirwi rčābna
w i y x a l l i lmāy fōg min i l b r ā m i . "

u f a r m i r ' i l i l b r nia y ubba ē r a

"larwlkum. (1) warwi rcābkum
w a x a l l i lmāy fōg i m n i l b r āmi
m i r ' i l f ā y i t ā t i awāmi."

g a l l a : "yā xāli a d i r ' a l i e k w i l f ō r ' a l a y y . " b i n ma n a z z a l

i r r i š a wdašš m i r ' i , ā s s aku i r b d b i l b r . awwal ma d a š š ,
i n g i t a f gām y a k i l b min h a d i r i l i r b d u h ā a y i z l i g . lamma
āf ilmāy 'aliehum wiygūl b ā z i e d : "yā x ā i , asma' i s s
i x t i b ā ā t , l a ' a l l a k yā xā i mnilb r s ā m i ' . " g a l l a : s ā m i ' u
lāni sālim. i r a b n i w i d ' a r r i a mnldi w xa ā - m n i . " (2)galla:
yā xā i i wi r r i š a w t a ' ā l l i y y a wjawwi 'azmak yā j i ī l l
i l ' a z ā m i . " g a l l a : "halfān larw kum warwi rčābkum warwi
gazāi b i l b a r r āmi. l ā k i n y ā xā i ū s l k t a w s i y y a , u gabri
fōg naxla uwll h a l b a t yimurrūn ' i y ā l l i h l ā l i wyi wūn
'alayya 'alāmi." f u r a t umma g ā t l a : "yā m i r ' i h ā a b ā z i e d
ilma r ā f j a r i f j u radda s ā l i m . " z a ' a l ' a l i e h a ya ya
w iirabha abra wlā a t f i i r r i l h a d ā m i . gāmaw ' a l i e lamma
t a l a ' imnilb r tuwaffa gburo w a ō b i r r i š ā n ( 3 ) ' ā l i w
tammumaw u hā i w mišaw u idaw ' a l ' a r a b māx nhum b i s s r
w i s s i r d 'alam r a s a n . w i r t ā a t i l ' a r a b . wil agg 'aliehum
u a athum w i t ' š i n t a s ā l i m .

TEXT 10 (KAWĀWILA) TRANSLATION

Tubba1, their leader was Shab b.(4) Am r asan and Shab b

the Tubba' they were, in previous times, enemies. Shab b
had killed the father of Bāzaid. They rose against him and
encamped at a bridge, they surrounded them. Afterwards,
now, for instance, he gave orders [that] if for instance

1 l a - a r w kum. The jurative particle l a - used with the

first person singular in oaths.
2 xa ā-mni reminiscent of the Shammari type of structure
mni "from me", mnak "from you", mnu "from him". This
does not occur elsewhere in the texts. Hère it serves to
fit the rhyme. Similarly the verb i d ' a "take!" occurs in
these texts but is not a common Mesopotamian lexical item.
3 Perhaps rōšan "alcōve, window".
4 Shab b al-Tubba*, the king of Damascus in the legend.
He is said to hāve been the ruler of the area of Ma'ān
in Jordan in fact. MUKHLI (1964) p.170.
154 Chapter 6 (Text 10)

anyone said "The Hilāli [is coming]!" ne should go in and

mount the bridge. He put there in waiting for him forty
horses. These were watchmen, which the enemy could corne on
to the bridge upon. For instance if a man passed by, he
would call "The Hilāli, up and at him!" There was a bridge.
(1) Al'Alya, the sister of Bāzaid, was in love with him, in
love with Shab b, Al'Alya, and was having an affair with him,
and they had been like this for a long time. One thing had
led to another. They were enemies. Afterwards Shab b / they
had a herdsman. May it be far from you!(2) The herdsman
died and there remained his wife who was a beautiful woman.
He said to him: " ab b my brother," Shab said to him, "why
don't you marry her, the mother of the children? She is a
contented woman and also she has much property [i.e. flocks]
and you will be in a good position." He said "But aren't we
at war with them. How could it be possible?" He said, "Yes,
but it doesn't matter. Marry her!" So he married her.
Al'Alya heard that Shabib had got married. She said "Well
I will ask the opinion of an oracle." She went to Am r
asan. He said "I am at your service." She said to him "I
am yours my cousin." He said "And welcome!" He rose and
married her. The men of the family brought her in the bridai
procession. They said to him / she said to him: "Corne I tell
you. Today you are a sheikh and you / in the wedding / and
it is impossible for you to consummate our marriage with me
on this night, while the men are celebrating and everything."
She said to him: " (3) on the hunt, I will go with you to
the dēsert." They saddled up their horses, he with her, and
left across country, on the hills, in the dēsert. He said
to her: "Oh my cousin, today there is no longer anyone. It
is between me and you." She said to him: "No, Am r asan.
Today you are a shaikh, and today you are a king and you h ve
business here and there and we cannot consummate our marriage
here in this wasteland, in a state of thirst. We must marry
at Sha al-Za āmi." He said: "Corne, let me tell you. Today
Sha al-Zahāmi is under guard, and we and those people the
Tubba1 [are at war] and it is impossible for us..." She said
to him: "It is up to you." He said "No, it is up to you.
I am at your service. I must go to river [sha ] which you
h v e mentioned [lit. which is named], they h v e put a slave
there on guard. From every herdswoman who goes down to the
river, he takes a camel and from every herdswoman who cornes

1 The exact course of the action of this part of the text is

rather obscure. However in generai the burden of the
story is that a trap is laid for Bāzaid at a bridge.
2 An expression used when mentioning a lowly occupation
such as herdsman.
3 The tape is unclear t this point.
155 Chapter 6 (Text 10)

up he also takes a camel." She said to him: "No, no O

Shab b, do not take the river by stealth. You must take it
with the sword." When he saw the camels crowding together,
she said to him "That herdsman [is the one]." He said: "I am
going to go and give my greeting to that accursed fellow,
perhaps he will prove to be a brave man." When he chargea
the horse up to him he found the slave asleep. He said "By
the luck of my father and ancestors, I do not know, but I
will not kill him except in fair fight and take the river
from him by the sword." He woke him up and fought with him.
Amīr asan fought with him and killed the slave. When he
overcame the slave. They [the companions of the slave]
fainted in fear. Suddenly the men charged the river, those
followers of 'Alya. Then they enjoyed themselves and fin-
ished everything at the river. He said to her: "Corne on, my
cousin, here we will be wed." She said: "No, corne let me
tell you. Today Shabīb, you are wanted by them and I am
afraid that every day they will search the river. We must
h v e our wedding with our people." Shabīb had had a dream
and he related the dream to his brother. He [the brother]
said to him: "My brother I cannot interpret it. Mount your
flying horse and we will go to the river. Perhaps you will
find for yourself a shepherd from the Bani Hilāl, who will
explain your dream so that we may remain friends."

[sung by Shab b]
"I had a dream, I had a dream that he attacked with my
sword,
and I dreamt, 0 my uncle, that he drunk from the well of
my blood.
And I dreamt, it was as though a fire had flared up from
me to you."

She said to him [interpreting the dream]:

"It seems that you dreamt that he attacked with your
sword.
This is your slave who was killed at Sha al-Zahmi.
And I repeat:
It seems that you dreamt that he drunk from the well of
your blood.
This is the food of the orphans which is forbidden to you
And I repeat:
It seems that you dreamt that a fire flared up from me
to you.
[this means]
My people against your people like a great destruction.

0 Shabīb,(1) you who killed my slave and humiliated me,

1 The personalities are somewhat confused at this point,

156 Chapter 6 (Text 10)

I will repay the lawful with the forbidden."

He said to him:
"We killed your slave and we will pursue his master.
And the world will be astounded by this war."

He charged up to them on the flying horse. He said "Corne let

me tell you." She said to him: "I see that you h v e corne
wearing your wedding clothes!?" He was wearing a red cloak.
With them it was the custom that a bridegroom wore a red
cloak. She said to him: "If he challenges you along with
us, we will fight with him and finish him off." He said to
him: "I challenge one of you to corne out and fight one to
one. There are two of you and I am only one." He said to
him: "Say [which one you want]!" He said: "I challenge that
one with the red cloak." She said: "Now it is up to you."
He said "Attack!", Shabîb said to him. He said to him:
"Which one of you, you or me?" He said: "As you wish."
Shabîb attacked, Shabîb of Tubba1, and the other, O my
father, began to flail at him. When he had tired him out,
he thrust with the lance. The lance came out of the back of
the man,turned once under the stomach of the horse and stuck
into the saddle. He said to him: "Go on, you attack this
time against Am r asan." Shabîb charged Am r asan and the
other began striking at the flying horse while he was attack-
ing. Before he [the horse] fell, he jumped clear and ran,
ran off in front of him. He did not catch him. He began to
attack from this side and that. It became a rout.(1) She
was riding a rhinocēros, the clever one.(2) He was riding
a flying horse. A rhinocēros is of course more terrible
than a flying horse. The blaggard, when she opened her coat
of chain mail, it fell away revealing her breasts(3) which
were this big. [He said]: "'Alya I regret that you have
been brought so low." He began grabbing at her from this
side and that side, but the horse would not reach her. His
friend said to him: "Oh you wretch Am r asan who would
stand by and watch his wife being chased and harassed here
and there in front of him and remain afraid?" At this it
was as though he took heart. He took up the three-pronged

but it becornes obvious that it was in fact Amir asan who

killed the slave of Shabib, and Shabib who had the dream.
1 Lit. "He began untying them and carrying them off" (like
a man carrying off loot or plunder).
2 Lit. "daughter of excrement".
3 Reminiscent of the custom of Arab girls baring their
breasts and loosing their hair in order to encourage
their men in battle. In this case however it seems
that she did it to distract her enemy.
157 Chapter 6 (Text 10)

lance and struck him with the lance. He was wounded and
wheeled around and retreated on horseback. When he retreated
he came up to the tribe. [The cry went up] "Am r asan is
wounded." He came to the tribe [and said]: "Oh my tribe

Shabîb met me in battle even greater than the sea

I drove him off like the River of Za ālmi
Shab b met me in battle even greater than the mountains
I drove him off like the son of Za āmi
Shab b met me in battle even greater than the land
I drove him off as though he was a young partridge
He was a good man and desired the good
and repaid the lawful with the forbidden
Away my people away!
There is no more staying for us at the blue water."

'Alya met him and said:

"Oh our prince and prince of our people
We h v e lost men and they h v e also lost men in battle."

Bāzaid was lying in a crouching position. He stretched then

took up his sword and the water pitcher and set out. He
took the pitcher and washed and prayed and came. He put the
pitcher on the ground and took off his headrope and put them
on top of it.(1) [A passer-by came up] he said to him: "God
keep you, fellow. Where are you going, 0 wayfarer?" He
answered: "Welcome!" He said: "Where are you coming from?"
He said: "Well I am coming from the d ra of Tubba'." He
said: "Good, and how is their situation, what news is there
of them?" He said: "Well I cannot tell you anything good,
there is no good news. All that there is, is that Shab b
is wounded. He met in battle with Am r asan and they re-
treated and now they are looking everywhere for a doctor."
He said "Goodbye, we greet you" and set his hands to the
horse and they sped away... And after that he passed by a
clump of reeds and pulled out a handful of them. He then
eut some wire and put on it mētal pieces etc. and became
like a doctor.(2) He entered the village of Sūg Yūnis and

1 Perhaps in order to make a dummy to act as his companion

so that he would not be taken as a lone traveller. As
elsewhere in these stories Bāzaid is attributed magical
powers. This section of the story was, however, not
clear to my informants.
2 I.e. he fashioned a stēthoscope from these components.
As elsewhere in these stories the narrator introduces
aspects of modem life to the legend, whether through
ignorance or for my benefit, I do not know.
158 Chapter 6 (Text 10)

filled a bag with pomegranates and limes for the children on

the way. Before he reached the bridge (as you know they had
captured the bridge) the children recognised him. They
wanted to call out: "Then this is the Hillli." But before
they could call out, he threw the pomegranates and limes
before him. The children leapt forward to gather them up,
and he began passing between their heads [while they were
scrabbling on the ground]. On his own he struck the bridge.
Ail forty of the guards he eut down and stepped onto the
bridge, calling out: "I am the Hilli, the Hilāli and there
is no one with me!" He entered the village and called out:
"[I am] a doctor, a doctorl" Whoever passed by, he asked
about the wounded Shabīb and he in turn would go and give
the news to the Shaikh [of the village] who would give him a
reward [for the news]. He was a client of the Shaikh with
men protecting him, Shabīb that is. He said to him "My
uncle, there is a doctor!" He said: "Bring him!" He came
to Shab b(1) with his head bare [wearing no head cloth], and
they saw a big tall black man as he had dyed himself and was
in disguise. He said: "Hah, what is this?" "Well, my uncle,
I am a doctor." [He said] "Quickly, let's go! Shab b is
lying wounded with us and you must treat him!" He said
"Uncle, God give you long life, I am a poor man and have a
family and children, what h v e I got to do with Shab b? As
soon as he sees me he will say, 'This is Bazaid!' and will
h v e my head off." He said: "No, I will take you. How
could this be? Why do you not think that we h v e any hon-
our?" He said to him: "Let's go, let's go!" He said to
him: "Uncle. As soon as he sees me, he will say: 'This is
Bzaid.' What will you be able to do with him? Although I
am really a doctor. He is an honoured guest among us, a
client of the Shaikh." They he [Bāzaid] greeted them and
said: "Greetings, greetings!" at the door of the tent. He
[Shab b] said: "Didn't I tell you, uncle?" He said: "Corne
over here. Sit beside me, please!" Shab b said to him:
"Didn't I tell you?! What is this? Are you mad? This is
Bāzaid. Is this a doctor!? Can't you see? He will annihil-
ate me." He [the Shaikh] said to him: "You are mad! You
are raving because of your wound." He said: "Look. He is
Bzaid. I have met him before, so what shall I say? Once
or twice before he has played tricks on me." He got up and
went to the tent and they laid him down. [it was as though]
a shot had been fired among the tribe [i.e. the news broke
suddenly]. He pleaded with them, begged with them,
"Wretches, he has corne for my life and in a moment he will
take off my head!" They did not believe him. He said: "0
people, I bid you farewell. I am telling you, consider me
already gone." They took him off and laid him in the tent

1 In fact to the Shaikh, not Shab b.

159 Chapter 6 (Text 10)

and he came in to him. He said: "Corne. I will give you the

[leadership of the] tribe of Tubba' for seven years, yours
to be with you, but woe on you if you take my head." He
said: "Leave me alone!" He [the Shaikh] said: "He is a good
man." [Shabīb] said "But this is Bzaid, don't I know him?!

Cry 0 my soul, cry

Cry for my soūl who cries!
If I adjure you by the Holy Book, are you not Bāzaid?"

said Shab b. [Bāzaid]:

"Do not destroy your fortune while you are still young
I am the Syrian doctor from Aleppo
I am no doctor
and nor will Shab b recover.
I h v e corne for your head O Shab b."

He came in and killed him, then he eut open his stomach. He

took out his heart(l) and put it on a plate and brought it
to the tribe and wrapped it up and left it. When he [the
sheikh perhaps] saw the piece of the heart on the plate the
crying broke out [in the tribe]. He said: "Corne I will tell
you. Today Shab b is unconscious, so don't go to him now!
Leave him for a while and then go to see him!" He said to
him: "Uncle, ab b,I h v e a woman patient whom I gave medi-
cine to and who told me to give her some more pills. So
leave my lunch for me until I go there, then pray [and then
return]." He said: "How can that be? They say this is
Bzaid," that is ab b said this [the brother of Shab b ] .
He had a house built of palm trunks [from which came] the
noise of a mill-stone, which they had put at the head of the
bridge grinding away, a machine, that is, which makes flour.
When he returned directly [he said]: "Where to?" The other
answered: "What, uncle are you alone?" He said "Corne out!"
He said: "Well l've got this/these baskets of food so please
take them in for me." The other man was sitting there at
the doorway. As soon as they came they found Shab b with
his head split open and his stomach eut open and then the
cry went up: "0 people you remāin fortunate, but Shabīb has
been betrayed." ab b was immediately on the flying horse
and snatched up his lance and came to the bridge and leapt

1 This seems to be the intention of the speaker, although

the word diri' in fact signifies originally "a coat of
chain mail". It may be that the narrator in transmitting
this text has re-interpreted it as "heart" since "chain
mail" is no longer a live concept, while the act of cut-
ting out the heart or liver of an enemy is not unknown in
traditional stories.
160 Chapter 6 (Text 10)

straight across it to Al-Yūni(l) [and called]: "Al-Yūni!"

"What?" he answered. "Is there anyone with you?" "Well
uncle" [said Al-Yūni] "there was a man who passed by here,
that odd fellow but I don't know what he was doing." He
said: "How so?" He said: "That one, uncle, I don't know
what he has with him, or what mischief ne's up to." He
said: "Corne on! Corne on! Jump onto the horse!" He said:
"Uncle, I'm afraid of the horse, it might bite me." He
said: "O man of accursed parentage (may the mention of it
be far from you) corne and take it!" He said to him: "But
what is it, what are we going to do?" He said: "That man
killed Shabib." When ab b went in [to the house] and the
other one came out and had no flour in his hands and he
caught hold of him on the horse and said "abb " . He said
"Yes." He said "You see now that I am Bāzaid. Here you
are, this is the head of your leader, and I h v e leaving
you as a witness to the arabs." He said to him: "Good
health to you". (Secretly in his heart) he said to him:
"I seek advice from you." He said "Greetings, I bid you
farewell." Bzaid found that the Am r asan had gone
through the length and breadth of ail the arabs and had not
left a single tent in which the story had not run through
them like wildfire. There were only Yahya and Maryam his
cousins. He said to them and their mother "Wait for me!"
When they arrived [he said]: "Yes, uncle!" He [Ya ya] said:
"We are waiting for you, uncle. Today Amīr asan has taken
away the shame from us and he [Shab b ] has been defeated and
we were only waiting for you." They set off. On the way
they became thirsty. He said: "Well uncle, it seems that we
are becoming thirsty and we haven't got any water and we
h v e no access to water." He said to him: "Uncle, I know of
a well, called B r Zarw(2) which has been blocked up for a
long time and no one has drunk from it. [sung]

When we came to the well of Zarwa, in the late evening

It was blocked and long forgotten since years
immemorial
Who will quench our thirst and that of our mounts
and bring the water pouring out over the lip of the
well."

1 Al-Yūni, this character is not mentioned elsewhere or in

other versions. There is, however, Mūnis ibn Ya ya,
leader of the Bani Hilāl invasions of North Africa,
MUKHLI (1964) p.182.
2 In the western version of the legend the name of the
well is b r nagwa. Zarw is reminiscent of Bilād Sarw wa
'Ubāda, the home of the Bani Hilāl in the south of
Arabia, MUKHLI (1964) p.363.
161 Chapter 6 (Text 10)

Mur'i leapt down into the well, no one but him would enter
it [saying]:

"I will quench your thirst and that of your mounts

and bring the water pouring out over the lip of the well
[I am] Mur'i whose days are numbered."

He Bāzaid said to him: "Oh my uncle the going down is your

job, and the filling of the cistern [above] is mine." When
he let down the rope and Mur'i entered [the well] he felt
that there was a great serpent in the well. As soon as he
entered, he was caught and the serpent began eating him up
from below, while he was gradually slipping down until the
water came up and flowed around them.(1) Bzaid called:
"Oh my uncle, I hear sounds of movement in the well, perhaps
you also can hear them." He answered: "I hear and I am mor-
tally wounded and it [the serpent] has struck me and
snatched the rope from my hand and taken it." He said: "Oh
my uncle throw up the rope and corne up to me and strengthen
your rēsolve, Oh man of high ambitions." He answered: "I
h v e sworn to quench your thirst and quench the thirst of
your mounts and that of the gazelle bounding in the dēsert.
But, my uncle, I make one dying request. Put my grave high
up in a palm tree, so that perchance the companions of the
Hilāli come past and tie marks upon my tomb.(2) His mother
leapt forward and said to him: "Oh Mur'i this is Bāzaid
whose companions never return alive."(3) Ya ya became en-
raged against her and hit her a blow and she fell senseless.
They went to his aid and when he came up out of the well he
died. They buried him and put him on a ledge high up. They
then completed everything and set off and sung the song of
these deeds to the arabs and the story of Am r asan took
them like wildfire. After this the arabs became calm and
this news made them calmer and the right of the matter was
against them [sic]. May you live in health.

1 Perhaps a mistake for "him", i.e. Mur'i down in the well.

2 Reminiscent of the Shi'a practice of tying strips of
material to the metal grille of a saint's tomb.
3 Bāzaid, although possessed of magical qualities, often
brought ill luck to his companions.
162 Chapter 6

TEXT 11

'AMĀRA: THE STORY OF MUGHDĀD

The following is the text of a story recorded from an Ālbu

Mu ammad informant in Basra in 1971. His dialect, however,
is not completely typical of the 'Amāra area. It can be
classed as rural southern Mesopotamian and is quite similar
to the dialect of the Kūt Sayyid 'Anāya informant. It con-
tains some examples of the nomadic syllabication type, i.e.
/ g l u b ō / , / t u b ā a z / , / t a ā r a b / , /ga a b / , etc., also / x a l l a /
rather than / x a l l / for "let him'. " The text shows hesita-
tion between / y / and / j / as the reflex of / j m/ although
one would expect /ž/. The occurrence of / y a h u / "who", / č a /
"what!" and / d a š š / "to enter" mark it as "southern" as
defined in this study. The story is an example of a fairly
widespread type of narrative common both in Iran and Iraq
among both Persians and Arabs and contains reference to
various legendary figures including Am r amza, Aswad al-
Kindi, ha k, and Kisra (Khosrow) the Emperor of
Achaemenid Iran. These stories, which are common to urban
and rural populations, are often told by wandering story-
tellers and Derwishes, and are also available in book form.
They represent a stage of removal from the sphere of nomadic
existence into the more gênerai Middle Eastern sedentary
society. The narrative however ends with the theme common
also in the Bani Hilāl stories, / aššaw bukānhum u mišaw
gēr mukān/ "They spread over that land and moved on to
another place," harking back to the nomadic way of life.

TEXT 11

sālfa y a ' n i māl ilmu ād waswad i l k i n d i ' a l a mūd b i t t a /

hassa a či? / aku fad wā i d isma j ā b i r i ahh k j ā b i r
i a k ' i n d a bnayya a s n a , b i l i s i n kāmila tamām. ākin
l i ma ad yizzawwajha. i l l i yizzawajha i l l i yi lubha
b i l arub ya a t rub hiyya wyā. alā alabha hiyya
163 Chapter 6 (Text 11)

tizzawwija. ba'dien tiji 'alieha I'ālam min b' d min

ilajānib min kill bukān ijūn 'alieha i l l i ygulbūnha.
millieš? hiyya hasna hasna killiš. alā iyyi 'alieha hāy
ilmlie a l l i y rba witkaššif wujihha, min isinha iy ih.
yi iddišš 'alie wiy h hiyya d ulba. all aku 'idhum
ibin 'amha isma ilmu dād. ilmu dād huwwa rā'i bil anam
yisra iybāwi' iyšūf il'ālam hāya. yahu lyiji 'alieha
d ulba. ba'dien r lamma galha "ā yumma ana ar dič ti ni
fard i n arū a rib bitt 'ammi ilmayāsa walla arū
āxi ha liyya mara azzawwajha." gātla umma. "inta wēnak u
wēnha? hāy id ulbak wi ur ak witkitlak." galha: "lā inti
mā 'alieč. ana a lubha." rā lubūha. galla: "yā jābir
ar d bittak ana a ārubha. walā a lubha ana āxi ha." galla:
"rū !" 'alma rā 'alie wu ra wiyyāha wil'ālam itfarraj
'aliehum minnā wminhā bil-ālāf bissugūf yitfarrajūn hā a
alabha. min alabha, nabb abūha hāda jābir. gāl: "ana mā
a kiyyaha." "yāba išsabab m n ha? l i e š mū ana
labitha?" gāl: "ana mā a kiyyha alla ty bilha adā .
adā idy bilha."(1) "yāba šinu adgha?" galla: "ar d
arba' n / arba' miyt nāga. arba' miyt jimal mmlaswad.
arba' miyt jimal mnil abya . war d mhammilāt kilha min
snāyi' mu ir, t ammilhin. 'war d ittāj māl čisra." gāl:
"mā yxlif ana aj bhin." hy wēn iy a ilhin? b' d iddarub
'alie. galla: "bass tā inni fur a, middat šahrēn ana
aj bhin." hāda rā , liga hā anni innūg ' id fad w id, y a'ni
fāris kāmil / ēh / wism ilfaris 'ali ilfāris i ni ilwayyāh
isma l amza. galhum: "xallu hy illa i 'idkum wilju
barwā kum la tmūtūn. amawwitkum'." gālōla: "inta
tmawwitna?" gāmaw gālaw: "šlōn itmawwitna-nta? wilak(2)
i na nmawwitak." galhum: "lā māku, ča ana wyākumil arub."
ta arab wiyyāhum. min ta ārab uyāhum, ba'dien huwwa glubō /
ulō.(3) tāli gālaw: "inta minu waddāk 'aliēna?" gāl:
"wa a ana ma ad mwadd ni 'aliekum lākin ana jiet 'ala
mūd(4) sadā ilbint 'ammi ilmayāsa. wal albatni "
gālaw: " 'āyš imn iyy lak, xi hini" axa hin ba'dien yirū
yiji 'al ittāj. yrū iyy b ittāj māl kisra wiyji 'alie.
yimši ym yōmēn la ayyām mā wu al. biddarub liga fad
wā id u isma abu lxamsa, mčattifa fad wā id štāf(5) u bitta
yamma. yr d yikitla wyxid bitta. hā a ija 'alie, galla:
"inta lies imčattif hā a witr d tāxid bitta wtikitla?" gāl:
"inta yā māltak b ? ana ard akitla wāxid bitta." ta arab

1 ty lbilha-dy bilha again hēsitation between sedentary and

nomadic types, the sedentary type dy bilha shows assimil-
ation of the prefix t- to the following y.
2 wilak, wilič, etc. exclamatory particle.
3 Hesitation between nomadic and sedentary types; see
p.51-3.
4 'ala mūd "because of", a Mesopotamian characteristic.
5 štāf for čtāf.
164 Chapter 6 (Text 11)

huwwa wyāh. tubaraz huwwa wyāh bilbarāz. qutil(l) /ēh/

qutil dāk. fakk hā a mnilhad d. galla: "ya a, xi bittak
inta wrūh'." galla: "bass inta wēn rāyi ?" galla: "ana
rāyih aj b ittāj māl kisra." rā wu al ilwlāya mal kisra.
galla: "šinu inta tr d." galla: "ar d ittāj." galla: "inta
ma" a k ittāj. inta bwahdak a k ittāj lō wiyyāk 'askar?"
galla: "lā bass ana : ana wyākum ilharub." jarraw 'alie
'asākir. yahaw liywaddūn 'alie ykitla: "yāba i ūh ittāj!"
a ōh ittāj, attoh-ilha. min yāb ittāj wija, aku 'idhum
sabi' ma būs b ad qa. issabi' hā a min yxallū 'alie, ykitla.
nabb 'alie Iwaz r. galla: "issabi', l i e š mā thaddi ssabi'
'alie wkitala? lo hāddin 'alie ssabi' wkātla ahsan willā
tt h ittāj." gāl: "hiddū ssabi'!" haddaw issabi' 'alie.
tiba'a ssabi' tubāraz wiyā ssabi' u ubra(2) bissief. māt
issabi'. ēh mawwata. galla: "ta'āll" galla: "hāh?"
galla: "inta mawwatt issabi'.?" galla: "ēhl" galla: "hāda
i uč mū mnissabi'. i uč min ilwaz r." gāl: "hallu 'alie
balkit itkitlai" jāb hāy wija 'ala bitt 'amma. liga bitt
'amma mzawwijha abūha l ēr wā id. galla: "yāba inta šlon
zawwajitha l ēr wā id? mū inta gilit j bilha adā u
xidha'." galla: "ēh inta bu ēt u ma jiet u zawwajitha lgēr
wāhid." iyyi āka ba'adha mā m'arsa. ēh. mzawwija lākin
ba'ad ma m'arsa. ba'ad fad yōmēn t'arris. gallōdla: "wiyyāk
ilharub. yalla nt kiyyaha." tahārab wiyya abūha kital
abūha. ēh. 'arras 'alieha. ārat marata xallaf minha jhāl
i nien. uba'dien hā ōla aššaw bukānhum u mišaw lgēr mukān.

TEXT 11 ('AMĀRA) TRANSLATION

A story, I mean of Mughdād and Aswad al-Kindi(3) about his

daughter / shall I speak now? There was once a man called
Jābir al- ha āk(4) who had a beautiful daughter, perfect in
beauty. But nobody could marry her. Only he who could
defeat her in battle could marry her. If he fought with her
and if he beat her, she would marry him. Then all the world
came from afar, from other nations, from everywhere, they
came for her, those who sought to defeat her... Why?
Because she was beautiful. Very beautiful. Whoever faced
her, this beautiful one and wished to fight her, she just
uncovered her face, and he would fall unconscious from her

1 qutil, Classical borrowing.

2 Imperative for narrative past.
3 Aswad al-Kindi, who does not in fact appear in the story.
Kinda was an Arab kingdom of Central Najd before the time
of Muhammad.
4 Jābir al- ha āk is borrowed from the Persian pre-Islamic
legends. Zahhāk Mārdūsh (serpent-backed) was one of the
enemies of Rustahm. The name Mughdād is also Old Persian
signifying "Given by the Magi".
165 Chapter 6 (Text 11)

beauty. He would fall and she would corne in and conquer him.
There remained only her cousin, whose name was Mughdād.
Mughdād was a shepherd working with the sheep. He watched
and saw all this multitude of people, whoever came was con-
quered. Then he went to his mother and said: "Mother, I
want you to give me a horse, so that I can fight my cousin
Mayāsa, and I will take her as my wife and marry her." His
mother said to him: "Who are you to think of your cousin.
She will overcome you and throw you down and kill you." He
said to her, "No, do not concern yourself. I will beat her."
He went to her father and said to him: "Oh Jābir, I want
[to marry]your daughter. I will fight her and if I beat
her I will marry her." He said: "Go then!" When he went to
her and wrestled with her, with the crowds watching in their
thousands hère and there and on the roofs of the houses, he
beat her. When he beat her, her father Jābir jumped up and
said: "I will not let you marry her." "Why [exclaimed
Mughdād] Haven't I beaten her?!" He said: "I will not give
her to you unless you bring her a dowry." "Well what is her
dowry?" He said: "I want forty, no four hundred female
camels of the black, four hundred white and ail of them
carrying goods of Egyptian manufacture. And also I want the
crown of Kisra." He said: "Ail right, I will bring them."
Where was he going to find thèse things? The road was far,
but he said: "Just give me two months time, and I will bring
them." He went and found these female camels with a man who
was an experienced and valiant warrior. Yes, whose name was
'Ali.(1) And the name of the second warrior who was with
him was al- amza.(2) He said to them: "Leave those things
which are with you and look to yourselves unless you die,
for I will kill you!" They said to him: "You will kill
us!?" They rose and said: "How will you kill us? We will
kill you." He said to them: "No, this will not happen, now
let us fight." He fought with them. When he fought with
them, they beat him. Then they said: "Who sent you against
us?" He said: "Well, no one sent me against you. But I
came for the dowry of my cousin Mayāsa. And ... ."(3)
They said "Long live whoever meets you, here take them!"
He took them and then went to get the crown. He went to
bring the crown of Kisra and corne to him. He travelled for
one day, two days, three days. Still he did not arrive.

1 'Ali the son-in-law and nephew of the Prophet and Hamza

his uncle were champions of the faith in the early days
of Islam and were later adopted into the mythology of
the Iranian people under Arab domination. This later
became part of the folklore of the Shi'a populations of
Iran and Iraq.
2 See fn.1 above.
3 The tape is unclear at this point.
166 Chapter 6 (Text 11)

On the way he met a man called Abu 1-Khamsa, who had been
tied up by another man and whose daughter was beside him.
The other man was going to kill him and carry off his
daughter. He said to him: "Why hāve you tied up this man
and why do you wish to kill him and carry off his daughter?"
He said: "What has it got to do with you. I am going to kill
him and carry off his daughter." He said: "Leave him and
corne and fight with me!" He fought with him. He fought a
duel with him. He was killed. Yes. That other one was
killed. He untied the chains of the captured man and said:
"Go on. Take your daughter and go!" He said: "But where
are you going?" He said: "I'm going to get the crown of
Kisra." He went and reached the land of Kisra. He said to
him: "What do you want?" He said: "I want the crown." He
said: "I won't give it to you. Should I give it to you while
you are on your own or if you had an army with you?!" He
said: "No, there is just me alone! And there is war between
us." They brought their soldiers against him, but whoever
they brought against him, he killed. The King said:
"Quickly give him the crown!" They gave him the crown. They
gave it to him and he came away. There was a lion kept cap­
tive in a garden. This lion killed anyone he was set on to.
The wazir(l) jumped up and said: "The lion! Why don't you
set the lion on to him so that he kills him." Is it better
if you set the lion on him and he kills him or that you give
him the crown." He said: "Loose the lion!"(2) They loosed.
the lion on to him. The lion followed him and he fought
with the lion and dealt him a blow with the sword. The lion
died. Yes, he killed him. He [the King] said to him:
"Corne!" He said: "Ha, what?" He said: "Did you kill the
lion?" He said: "Yes!" He said: "The fault is not with the
lion, but with the wazir." He said: "Go to him and perchance
you will kill him." He brought this one [the King] with him
and came back to his cousin. He found that his uncle had
married his cousin to another. He said to him: "How did you
marry her to another. Didn't you say, 'Bring for her a dowry
and take her!1" He said: "Yes, but you were away a long time
and didn't corne so I married her to another." That other one
[the groom] came and [they found that] she was married, but
the wedding was not yet consummated. They were to marry in
two days time. They said to him: "Corne and fight and then
we will give her to you." He fought with her father and
killed him. Yes! He married her. She became his wife and
he had two sons by her. And afterwards those people spread
all over that country and then moved on to another place.

1 Notice the character of the wazir or "minister", com-

pletely absent in the bedouin texts and in the Kawāwila
story.
2 lit. "Loose him, the lion!"
167 Chapter 6

TEXT 12

KUT SAYYID 'ANAYA: LIFE IN KUT SAYYID 'ANAYA

This text was part of a taped conversation with a young boy

called Sa'dūn who worked at the University of Jundi Shāpūr
in Ahwaz. His home village was near Kūt Sayyid 'Anāya above
Ahwaz on the Kārūn. He was from the Zuhairiyya, the majority
of whom live near Nāsiriyya and are counted as part of the
Budūr. His dialect and that of his elder brother was typical
of the northern areas of Khuzistan and resembled that of the
Bani uruf informants. This is shown in the text by the
occurrence of /a/ rather than / i/ in open syllables in such
forms as /išta al/, /xa a/, /banēna/, /garēt/ rather than
/išti al/, /xi a/, /binēna/, /girēt/. The occurrence of / j /
rather than /g/ in /tij'id/ "you stay", /jir b/ "near" is
also characteristic of the northern area and contrasts with
the dialect of the Shatt al-'Arab. The North Najdi type of
second masculine plural forms /intam, -kam/ also occurred
elsewhere in this dialect. A high degree of Persian vocabu-
lary is used in connection with government institutions.
Interesting in connection with the Ahwaz-Nā iriyya link is
the following poetic fragment:

ila' , ūla ilu rāhi hawāzi

gitla "mnien" gāl: "hawāzi"
gitla: "la il mnien". gāl: "mninnā iriyya".

"He came forwardr a man of good appearance and height with

the look of an Ahwāzi. I asked him: 'Where from?' He ans-
wered, 'an Ahwāzi'. I asked him: 'Where are your roots?'
He said, 'In Nā iriyya.'" This was given to me by my Mu ūr
informant (see Text 16) who did not however know its origin.
168 Chapter 6 (Text 12)

TEXT 12

lifa maktūb šawwašni

lifa maktūb šawwašni min ahlāy
garēta w abb dama' 'ēni
yā diny-anti l aramtini min ahlāy
ana arlb u sāčn ilgurba

ana twuladit ibkūt sayyid 'anaya. ana č i n t farax 'idd(l)

uxūy. uxuy akbar min 'iddi. uxūy iya hna štagal
biddānišgāh(2) šta al ija lilahwāz, išta al ihnā
biddānišgāh. il ā il galli: "wākūn tiyi 'iddi." hu čān
'idda mara ba'ad hu mū m'arris iya bilhawāz. (3) gāl: "wākūn
tij'id tigra daris." agilla: "ma ayi", u hāy u allēt abči.
č i n t i glr il ā il ma" ridit ayi innōb bzūr,(4) bzūr yābni.
yābni lahwāz u a ni bilmidirsa u hāy milliklā (5) ilawwal.
u garēt atta ka ēt š l š u m . (6) ka ēt šlšum irt abūl(7)
ka et ti dlg aïa'it min ilmidirsa. min ala'it ištaglēt
hinā biddānišgāh. išta lēt. čān hinā yomiyti sittln igrān
hassa. iddlra jir b. il firsixāt fōg milhawāz. iššu ul,
šu ulhum zirā'a un a š' r rajji lū a, xōb naxal lai nōš
'idhum. 'idhum anam 'idhum xūl. ā ilhum ilu. d ra
zh riyya(8) u xōb ham issina iya xa āna zzōd u hāy. āyi
ibyūthum. ēh min izzōd činna a in 'ala šša . ma aggna
zzōd sanna ā an. ā an šinna minnāk. šinna xōb iddoula
sawwa kumak(9) u hāy. šinna a ēna 'a afāt bassina
a ēna 'a afāt hassa banēna bgēr makān. šinna. h jir b
lišša 'iddi ummi wuxūy 'iddi il xuwāt u 'iddi ham uxūy
all ihnāka bil'arab.

1 'idd < 'ind

2 dāniōšgāh. Persian dānešgāh "university".
3 hawāz dialect form for ahwāz, which also occurs.
4 bzūr. Persian bezūr "by force".
5 Persian kelās "class".
6 Persian š šum "sixth grade".
7 Persian abūl šudam "I passed (was accepted)".
8 Note the incidence of for ē in zh riyya. Common in
N.Khuzistan and 'Amāra; see also p.80.
9 Persian kumak "help".
169 Chapter 6 (Text 12)

A letter arrived which troubled me.

A letter arrived which troubled me, from my family.
I read it and the tears flowed from my eyes.
0 my world, you who have separated me from my people.
I am a stranger dwelling among strange people.

I was born at Kūt Sayyid 'Anāya. I was a child there with my

brother, my brother who is older than me. My brother came
hère and worked at the University. Anyway in the end he said
to me: "You must corne to stay with me." He was married
[although] when he came to Ahwaz he was not married. He
said: "You must stay and study." I said: "I am not coming"
and all that and I kept crying. I was only a child. In the
end I didn't want to corne, then he brought me by force. He
brought me to Ahwaz and sent me to school from the lst grade
and I studied until I got to the 6th grade and passed and
got my certificate. I left the school. When I left I began
to work here at the University. My pay here was sixty Qrāhs
a day.
The village [that I came from] is quite close. Three
farsangs above Ahwaz. The work, their work there is the
growing of wheat and barley, watermelon. Date palms? No,
there are none. They have flocks; they hāve sheep and
goats. Their harvest is good. It is a village of the
Zuhairiyya, and well this year the flood came and our
houses(l) collapsed. Yes, because of the flood. We were
encamped near the river and when the flood came our houses
collapsed. They collapsed and we moved away from there.
We moved away and well we encamped on the open ground.
This year we hāve encamped on the open ground. Now we hāve
built houses in another place. We moved off. Yes, near to
the river. My mother and my father are now with me and
three sisters, but I hāve also a brother who has stayed with
the arabs [i.e. out in the country].

1 Probably reed-huts, which are easier to rebuild.

170 Chapter 6

TEXT 13

GACHSARAN: A CONVERSATION WITH AN OLD SAYYID

This is the text of an interview with a lone Sayyid in a ham-

let in the hills above Gachsārān. The inhabitants of neigh-
bouring villages were Qashqāi Turks and Lurs and so he was
living outside the Arabic language area, although Bani uruf
buffalo herders were also in the vicinity up-country from the
main centres of their area. The Sayyid illustrated the story
of his life with the words of a popular song. The use of the
form /hāna/ "here" is characteristic of bādiya speech in
Khuzistan, contrasting with /hnā/, the form of the Riverine
Arabs. The text shows a number of examples of / / for /ē/
as in Texts 12 and 14.

TEXT 13

lā mā a'rif hā a 11 anta tgūlha i na ngūl a'rid ibxidimtak.

ngūl ništi il nig i nizra' š ' r. inta šissawwi? ē na'am
anta tišta al bijjām'a. ana 'ayšti šu li azra', akrub,
a id, alimm un a, a išš hardi, a arri a išš gi ab abī'
ay b aštiri awaddi ay b. ēh tigzar.(1) mālti ana tigzar.
hā a su li ana. winnōba a'ri ibxadimtak ygūl:

"yā mkawwira(2) wēn itr d

arrat nazinna
1 irrida mā yin ūn
kuffār ahanna."

1 tigzar Persian gozar "to pass".

2 cf. kwār "pad used by women when carrying loads on the
head". The pad, made of palm fibre, is put on the head
then the load is carried above it. Therefore mkawwira
signifies a woman with the kwār on her head.
171 Chapter 6 (Text 13)

tiftahim? hāda farid wāhid 'āšigf 'āšig farid mara. yāt u

ba'ad lā huwwa yrū u lā" hiyya tiyi. arrat, iyat arrat
bilfir j . ya'ni i na ngūl fir j . 'ajami ygūl ābādi walo
ammā 'arabi ygūl fir j yāt arrat bilfir j . ā ibha šāfha
šadd 'aliha bīt. gāl: "imkawwira wēn tr d tarrat nazilna
lirr da ma yin ūn kuffār hanna" tisma'? ēh. "u bieni la
bien ihwāy itwahhamiet u yiet š i y r i d d n i rdūd." ya'ni 'ūd min
ilma al ala'it. ala'it u yiet. ri it yiet bilfari hāna.
tuwahhamit u mā agdar ariddan. mā agdar aridd ana warū an
lihali. hāna ba'ad balašit. balašit wa ba'ad mā biya urū an.
tuwahhamit mā biyya aridd rdūd warū lihali.

Interviewer: u māku 'arab ērak ihnā?

lā bass ana. ana farid mara 'indi māl / -ham kirdiyya

'ijmiyya ana ahli māl zietān māl am r almu'min n yāy zāyir
millā āžāriyya u yiet hāna mara xa ēt min ahil iš t.
ahalhum hāna čānaw bkumbul. yiet hāna. ba'ad balaš it hāna.
ba'ad mā rihit. lallēt. h allēt fard uwkāt išš ūf arū an
ihnāk amurran 'alilahal ayi hāna.

TEXT 13 (GACHSāRāN) TRANSLATION

No, I do not know this thing which you are saying. We say,
I submit to you, we say that we work. We pass the time, sow
seeds, barley. What do you do? Ah, yes, you work in the
University. Myself, my work and life is that I sow seeds,
hoe the ground, reap the harvest, collect the corn, cut
rushes, winnow the corn, cut reeds. I sell, bring, buy,
carry, take. Yes, it passes. My life passes. This is my
life. And then I say to you, he [the poet] says:

"0 girl carrying a load on your head, where are you

going?
She passes through our settlement.
The girl I want, they will not give to me,
because my family are unbelievers."(1)

Do you understand? There was a man who was in love, in love

with a woman. She came away and then he wouldn't go [to see
her] and she wouldn't corne [to see him]. She passed by, she
came, she passed through the village. I mean we say "fir j "
[village]. The Persians say "ābādi" [village], but as for
the arab he says "fir j " . Her lover saw her and composed a

1 "Unbelievers" perhaps signifies Kawāwila (gypsies),

with whom the Arabs will not intermarry.
172 Chapter 6 (Text 13)

verse for her. He said:

"O girl carrying a load on your head, where are you going?
She passed through our village.
The girl I want they will not give to me
Because my family are unbelievers."

Do you hear? Yes.

"And between me and my love

I hāve got involved and corne away and what can take me
back?"

I mean, you see, from the place, I have corne away and corne
[here]. I went and came for instance here. I became in-
volved and cannot return. I cannot return and go to my
family. Here then I have become involved. I cannot go
back.

Interviewer: "Aren't there any other Arabs except you here?"

No, just me. I hāve got a wife from / Kurdish, Persian.

My family are from Zaitān, belonging to the Commander of
the Faithful.(l) I came as a visitor from Āghājāri and
came here and took a wife from the people of Shu ai .(2)
The people were here at Kumbul. I came here and got involved
here. After that I didn't go. I stayed. Yes, I stayed.
Sometimes, you see, I go there and drop in on the family and
corne back here.

1 Signifying Sayyid ancestry, or perhaps "from Māl Am r

(al-Mu'min n)" which is often used to mean the area of
Zaitān, the eastern part of the former Ka'b realm.
STOCQUELER (1832) p.91.
2 Shu ai , a tributary of the Kārūn in the northeast.
173 Chapter 6

TEXT 14

BANI URUF: AN ACCOUNT OF THE TRIBES, DIALECTS AND

OCCUPATIONS OF THE REGION OF UWAIZA

This text was recorded in 'Abbādāh in 1969. The main

speaker, Ya'gūb urufi (YT), is a Shaikh of the Bait- ayyā
of the Bani uruf, of the region of Khafāyiyya, now renamed
Sūsangard. He was in 'Abbādān as the guest of another
urufi (T2) at whose house the recording was made. Also
there was āhir Fā hili (TF) of the Bāwiya. The speech of
these informants was regarded as 'arab, i.e. "nomadic type"
by my a har informant, although the only feature apparent
as the text is transcribed is the use of l ād/ "over there"
which is markedly "rural". In the final section Ya'gūb
Turufi imitātes Mi'dān speech with some success, the main
distinguishing feature being the use of the negative parti-
cle /'ēb/. As befits his shaikhly status, Ya'gūb uses a
number of classicisms in his speech, namely /alladi/ "which"
and / ālik/ "that" in place of the more colloquial /illi/
and / āk/; also /min et/ "because" alongside the more normal
/min araf/. My own promptings hāve for the most part been
omitted since the text makes perfectly good sense without
them.

TEXT 14

YT ismi ya'gūb ana min bani uruf. bani turuf issina

zara'hum k i l l i š zien u ya'ni zirā'athum 'āyd issina killiš
'āyid kāfi. ma ūlhum? la'l un a wši' r u š i l i b . lakin
issina ē ki ar ilmāy 'al hum čit r ar, ār zira'hum šilib
ya'ni timman. min hēt u yān ilmāy ma ār un a wši' r
'idhum faqat timman ār. yzir'ūna bili wēza isimha. gabul
isimha lxafājiyya lākin hassa sammōha sūsangard. na'am
'ala š ū , ša u aku nahrān iqasmun minna 'ala l'arādi.
hiyya tin i l'arā i māy. u ba'ad ālik i ā qall ilmāy
174 Chapter 6 (Text 14)

ysiddūn hā a šša mā yxallūn māy yrū lilhōr. ysiddūna

wiyxallūna 'ala š š i l i b yisgi iššilib. lākin ibqillat ilmāy.
i ā lmāy qal l ysawwūn unta wši' r. hā a 'ala makāyin.
na'am iddawla n athum makāyin. ilhor wāqi' bēn il-/
bilhidūd sāyir bien il'arāq wa ran, išša hiya āyi
bilhōr štū ran bilhōr āyrāt wiš ū il'arāq ham bilhōr.
ib arafēn āyrāt hā a wa a'iyyat zirā'at bini uruf. wa
ammā zirā'at xazray w ičnāna ōlāk ād bijjibāl č i af a
hā lōl ma 'idhum š i l i b faqa un a wši' īr yzir'ūh. ād aku
jabal ād min nahr ilkarxa. lākin zara'hum un a wši' r
š i l i b mā 'idhum. iššilib bass 'idna i na. fi daštm šān
wili'māra. 'ašāyir ili'māra ilim āddidīn ilhor ham fi'lan
killa š i l i b zār'in. lākin i na ni'matna zāyda xu ū an bini
uruf ni'matna wāyid zāyda min araf iddawla wāyid sā'datna
wāyid an atna, makāyin an atna. wšilibna utimmanna 'idna
wši' r wāyid ya'ni ilmann sitta twāmin ilmann i mānya
warba' n č l l u bisitta twāmin. i ā trū hināk arāwikiyyā.
ilmilla tištiri ddawla tištiri itbā'(1) išši tbi' 'ala ši.
tijjār yištirūna wiyxiznūna wba'ad ālik iyy būn iyb 'ūna.
na'am anāb r.(2) yāx ūn ilawādim kilman 'inda yb ' u tāli
noba yqasmūna ybl 'ūna wēn mā yr dūn. madāris wāyid 'idna
xu usan hnāka ya'ni iddihāt(3) illa i a lan čānat ilmadāris
mā y'arfūnilha kill d ra b ha madrasa. kill dihāt b ha
farid madāris i nien imxall ha b ha ddawla m'allm n ham
mxall ha wa āyil wāyid mrattiba. sipāh dāniš(4) mxall ha
sipāh tarw j (5) ham aku hnāk. ma alan jinābak i ā" š a r r a f i t
ru it ildaštm šān tšūf awwal nrāw k sūsangard min ba'ad
bustān min ba'ad issuwāri hāy la rāf a l l a i hiyya
bdaštm šān ...
T2 n āč k 'an bini uruf 'an illa i nidri bša na hnāk.
wa illā i na hnā šuwā l . šuwā l i na biššarika. šēx
ya'gūb w ana ya'ni illa i āhir fā ili yixussna kāmilan u
ad na hāda ta r ban xamsa w'išr n sina u lā n sina
kāmilan la i yxu na
YT lākin bzaman šēx xaz'al. ta'rif jinābak šēx xaz'al
gām ylaggu wēn mā zēnin. min kill 'aš ra ylaggu hum wēn
ma 'aš ra b ha wā id zēn ya'ni š i j ā ' ufāhim. šēx xaz'al
yča irha binni'ma wiyjirrha ila. hā ōl iyjurrhum min 'idna
šēx xaz'al u axa hum bilma'rūf. u āraw mn ahl ihnā hassa.
lākin mnēn, i na lli ba'ad 'irfaw 'amāmhum hā i siyāsathum
alingl z hāy. wammā llisān kamā 'idna, bani uruf hā ōl

1 tbā' perhaps t h e C l a s s p a s s i v e tubā'. This i s t h e only

example of t h e i n t e r n a i p a s s i v e recorded and may be a
classicism.
2 P e r s i a n anbār " s t o r e h o u s e " .
3 P e r s i a n dehāt " v i l l a g e s " .
4 P e r s i a n sepāhe dāneš "Education core".
5 P e r s i a n sepāhe tarv j "Progress core".
175 Chapter 6 (Text 14)

i l f ō g ygūlūn "y ba". dōlāk illa i brāyg ilhor ygūlūn "ž ba".
kamā xazray u čināna ygūlūn "y ba". yxall ha šwayy. suwāri
u ayādir u sawā'id hā ōli māl rān hādōli sākint ilhōr
hā ōli ygūlūn "žiba" bilhōr 'idhum duwāb
T2 ta'āl ij'id ibbukāni!
TF ya'gūb inta hnāk bilhōr šinu jjini māla i či m'ēdi
killiš!
YT jin na duwāb. duwāb nijla'. duwāb 'idna ni libhin
wi na m' šatna 'al hin(l) lākin issina b ē i ala mālhin
'ēb(2) yi la' minnā w minnā mi ti rāt billbyūt 'indi
ta riban xamis šiš (3) žāmūsāt(4) wa iššilhin aš š mnilhōr
u'ēb y il'an barra, b hin willid alā a wilbājiāt šuwwal
'ēb b hin dām min ka rat il'alaf mā y il'an barra, mā
'idhin dilla yrū an win iššilhin aš š mnilhōr ny bilhin
algōr ša af lākin 'ēb ysirhan. gēr i l h a š š mā ilhin 'ilāj
māku bass hā a l aš š. kill wakit marbū āt bilbiet.
TF mā thiddūnhin
YT lā 'ēb nhiddhin
TF lā mā yigdar ykammilha m'ēdi tamām lā.

TEXT 14 (BANI URUF) TRANSLATION

YT My name is Ya'gūb, from the Bani uruf. This year

the harvest of the Bani Turuf was very good, I mean the crop
this year was good and sufficient.
Interviewer: Do you hāve date palms there?
YT Their crop? No! Wheat and barley and rice. But
this year because there was too much water, it became too
much, their crop was rice, I mean rice.(5) Because of the
floods, there was no wheat or barley among them, only rice.
They sow it at al- uwaiza (Dasht M shān). That is Sūsan-
gard, its name is al-Khafājiyya. Before its name was
Khafājiyya, but now they hāve named it Sūsangard. Yes,
along the rivers, a river. And there are irrigation chan-
nels by which they distribute [water] from it to the land
plots. They bring water to the land. And then if the water
is not enough, they dam up the river and do not let water go
to the Haur. They dam it up and let the water go to the
rice fields to irrigate the rice fields. But with the
scarcity of water, if there is not much water they make
wheat and barley. That is by use of agricultural machines.
The government has given them machines. The Haur is

1 'aï hin for 'aliehin characteristic of 'Amāra and N.

Khuzistan.
2 'ēb negative particle used in Mi'dān speech.
3 Persian š š "six".
4 žāmūsāt "buffaloes"; note the use of ž for y.
5 š i l i b "the rice plant", timman "rice as a foodstuff"
176 Chapter 6 (Text 14)

situated between -/ on the borders between Iraq and Iran.(1)

The river flows into the Haur. The rivers of Iran flow into
the Haur and the rivers of Iraq are also into the Haur. They
are on both sides. This is the state of the Bani Turuf's
agriculture. But as regards the agriculture of the Khazraj
and Chināna,(2) they are over there in the mountains, on that
side. They hāve no rice just wheat and barley. Over there
there are mountains on the other side of the river Karkha.
But their crop is wheat and barley; they hāve no rice. The
rice is only hère at Daht Mîshān and al-'Amāra. The tribes
of al-'Amāra who border on the Haur, they also of course ail
sow rice. But hère our luck is good. Especially the Bani
Turuf, our luck is very good because the government has
helped us a lot and given us much. It has given us machines.
And we hāve our rice and much barley, I mean at six toumans
to the mann.(3) The mann is forty-eight kilos, at six
toumans. If you go there I will show you. People buy it,
the government buys it. It is sold. One thing is sold for
another. Merchants buy it and store it and after that they
bring it and sell it. Yes [in] store houses. People bring
it. Whoever has some seIls it and then they divide it up
and sell it, whenever they like. We hāve many schools,
especially there, I mean, villages which did not even know
what a school was, every village has a school. Every vil­
lage has one or two schools which the government has put
there, and hāve also put teachers and very good facilities.
They hāve sent the Education core and also there, there is
the Development core. For instance if you went to Dasht
Mîshān you would first see / we would show you Sùsangard
and then Bustān and then al-Suwàri, there outlying areas
around. Dasht Mîshān...
T2 We are telling you about the Bani Turuf about what
we know of our river there. But otherwise we hère are em­
ployées, employées of the [oil] company. Myself and Shaikh
Ya'gūb I mean, whom Tahir Fadhili looks after very well. He
is our friend and has been looking after us for twenty-five
or thirty years.
YT But in the time of Shaikh Khaz'al. Do you know
Shaikh Khaz'al? He began picking out people wherever there
were good men. From every tribe he took them, wherever
there was someone good, I mean a brave or intelligent man.
He would load them with gifts and pull them over to him.
Thèse people Shaikh Khaz'al took from us and counted them
as his own. And now they hāve becorne part of the people of

1 Haur al-Huwaiza.
2 Tribes to the north of the Bani Turuf beyond the Karkha
River.
3 mann, a Persian unit of weight measurement for agricul-
tural produce.
177 Chapter 6 (Text 14)

this region. But, from where? We are the people who know
who their ancestors are. This is their policy, the English.
(1) But as to the language as we hāve it, the Bani Turuf
those who are up-country say "yTba" [bring it!]. Those who
are on the edge of the Haur say "zJJba!" As also Khazraj and
Chināna say "yibal" They draw it out a little. Suwāri and
Hayadir and Sawā'id, those who belong to Iran and live in
the Haur, they say "zljba". In the Haur, possessing buffalos.
T2 Corne and sit over hère in my place! [to a guest
arriving].
TF Ya'gūb, you [when you are there] in the Haur, what
is the livelihood there? Talk like a Mi'aidi completely!
YT Our livelihood is buffaloes. We graze buffaloes.
We hāve buffaloes, we get milk from them and our livelihood
dépends on them. But this year because of their thala [a
disease of livestock] they do not go out hère and there.
They stay at home confined in the reed houses and I eut
fodder for them from the Haur and they do not go out. There
are among them three bearing young and the rest... They
hāve no , because there is so much fodder they do not go
out. There is no sheltered place for them to go to so we
eut fodder for them from the Haur and bring it for them on
boats in baies, but they do not go out and graze. There is
no cure for it except grass. They are tied up ail the time
in the house.
TF You don't let them loose?
YT No., we do not let them loose.
TF No, he can't do it completely [to speak] Mi'aidi
completely, no!

1 This remark was a humourous attack on the Muhaisin league

of Khorramshahr, a confédération of mixed tribal élé­
ments. Their leader Shaikh Khaz'al was an ally of the
British at the turn of the century. The Bani Turuf
harried him unsubdued from the north. Part of the humour
was, of course, directed against me as an Englishman.
See WILSON (1911) passim.
178 Chapter 6

TEXT 15

KA'B: THE HISTORY OF THE KA'B IN KHUZISTAN

The following is part of a long recording of a meeting with
a number of the Ka'b shaikhs at the Mudhîf of Shaikh Muhi of
the āl Bu Ghubaish section in Shādigàn in 1969. The main
speaker (B) is Shaikh Muhi himself, who gives a spirited
account of the history of the Bani Ka'b and their arrivai
in Iran. Speaker (C) is the author. The dialect is basic-
ally of the Shatt al-'Arab type, differing slightly however
from the dialect of the Mutūr informant in a higher inci­
dence of /g/ rather than /g/ or /g/ as a reflex of /qāf/ in
elevated vocabulary, i.e. /'irāg or 'arāg/ "Iraq",
/gaāiyya/ "matter", /yifriq/ "it is different", /tagriban/
"approximately". The tape reveals a considérable amount of
Persian vocabulary within the larger Arabie macrostructure
and makes interesting allusions to the relationship of the
Ka'b with the Persian nomadic tribes to the north.
Shādigàn is the new Persian name for Fallāhiyya, the tradi-
tional capital of the Ka'b, before they were eclipsed by
the Muhaisin under Shaikh Khaz'al.

TEXT 15

A na'am yiji min jarrāhi, killa sār makāyin karxānāt(l)

killman hamma yāxid haqqa 'abà~ra(2) min ilmayy bilkarxāna
mālta wgà'-iyzir'ūn killa zirāyi' makāyin. là xēr hassa hi
māku. māku sidud. ēh min he£ ilmayy qalll hassa. hā&a
ilāatt iljayy min jarrāhi mittisil minnāk yāy, min safihtēn
min tara f en aku makāyin pampāt māy...
B walla ddawla nitana halmakāyin wkillha la zir'a
waràhin wa la si gēr attalāyib wassēha. là 9amal warāhin

1 karxāna Persian "factory, machine".

2 'aJbāra "approximately", also used in Kuwaiti.
179 Chapter 6 (Text 15)

wa la ysir 'amal... dabut sot?(1) ya'ni yi&but sōtna?

ihna nihci killsi 'anna. ana idā cān addāyig min haddabut
sot yā hayātak! amman n'id 'ala lmas'ala. timsār X.
min yēūfni min b'Id ayi, idā saf issyūx ytūr min ihnāk. min
kilumitrēn ytūr 'ala ssyūx. amma hāda, ma la xilig. xalli
ykudda! la kudda, xāyif?! smālkum(2) txāfūn. walla ana
gāyil ibrūha X. wgēra, amma lmuwāmlr likbar, asraf. killhum
awadim. A&ā tta'9ibna! la hiyya mū gagiyat sisma, hāga yāy
yit'allam billuga. il'umda 'ala lluga', 'ala llahya wmin
jimlat hāda si*al 'arrufāha...
B ihna lhukūma rāgin minha. là rādln u fidāyln
dowlatna kullis sarbāz,(3) amma dāk abulfarax linsān
ilxayyir, la!
C hā&a farid si kitabha wāhid min zumalā^i 'ala lluga
bllbya... aylbha matalan...
B inta msān-ēs sāyil hadduwal il'arabiyya 'alena? ihna
wēn n'arif hāda lhaci?! ēh hāda:
"ma tinfa' al}adab bil'ilm walhija
wa sāhibuhā 'inda lkamāl yamūtu?"
ihna wēn n'arif hāda lhaci?
C Çab'an illuga walwataniyya yifrug.
B ēh hāda llisān hāda mahalli wa illā milliyatna ihna
Irāniyya. hādi lugatna-hna, 'idna luga xāssa. wilihwēza
lugatha gēr lugatna-hna. bāwiya lugatha gēr lugatna-hna.
alJān matalan xurramsahr wilimhēsin kullis laha luga xāssa.
ihna walxanāfra yifrug. 'asākira jiddan yifrug. hassikil!
'ala llahja, la'ad yig'ad 'idna mudda, 'indak mudda wāyid
yit'allam. hatta min ilxanāfira yit'allam wmin hādōli
Ibarhān. walla hassa wakit balābil issyām sāhla: "ho~,
tiggha tāhat ihnāka wukda!"(4) hāy lugatna-hna.
A la wādih halhaci huttai min jumlat zien u sien.
B lo yriïh wiyyāhum lilbarr yitwannas, nisma' sēhathum.
hāda hi. hassa blrān hassa, ihna hāçla lugatna... lākin
hādpla llur ma y'arfūn luga. farid marra ana wiyya
lmarhūm sēx masāyix ibtahrān. 'inda amlr hu min blrjird
yom min ayyām il'asāyir ilbaxtyāriyya. cān yindall
bicānhum u hāçlōla 'araft-ilhum. gāl: "ana ahibban(5) hāda
llibās whāda lmizwiya," wsāyif ana wahci, wafribb ahci ana
lurri wiyya hādōli 11i cānaw yjūn. hāda ma y'arif. hāda
lur, hassa hu ma y'arif luga sawā^an an ma y'arif 'arabi.
hassa 'idna hēci ubkill mukān hēci. lākin ihna irāniyya,
muxx asil Iran ihna. yā hayātak! ihna yāna hāda lhijāz

1 dabut sot, P e r s i a n zabte sout "tape r e c o r d e r " .

2 smāl, a p a r t i c l e c h a r a c t e r i s t i c of t h e S h a t t a l - ' A r a b
a r e a , as i n smālak "What i s wrong with you?"
3 P e r s i a n sarbāz " s o l d i e r " .
4 wukda < w-kudda.
5 ahibban, s u f f i x -an, see p . 8 3 .
180 Chapter 6 (Text 15)

ilsabbāna wtaradna, 'ārakna wyiena wil'irāg 'ārakna-wiyyā. (1)

wyiena minnā rhēl lihna. yiena hnā bilguban ba'ad mā-lna
bgadiyat gubān. ga'adna hnā. sabi' miyat sina ihna hnā.
hassa sādigān arba' miyat sina hassa tagrlban ihna sikanna
bsādigān. wa illā hādi l'umūr hādi bilguban, bilihmieli,
bili'māra. hāda killa 'idna arik wiyya lxawārij wili'rāg
wilhijāz. 'arik wiyya tturkiyya. ihna ma nihmilhum - uhma.
yiena hnā sirna b'Irān Irāni lhamdillā rufa' 'aliéna ssāh
btahrān wihna hnā. hammal il'irag iya limhammara. cānat
ilimhammara ba'ad sārat mard.(2) iya dāk lilimhammara wihna
ca'ab wara ca'ab, wugfaw jiddāmhum. 'ārak u radd il'irag.
yaw minnā yaw minnā". ihna sarbāz Iran, u gabul ma cān
halwasāyil wlā halgudra walā hamma... gufāna ham min
gufāna wba'ad ma 'idna kill gufa. ihna lo inkitalna nisrid
ila hāy ilbaxtyāriyya. lo fitahna nwaddlhum min halbāb
minihnā. ihna gabul mahhad ... / hāda xurramsahr, gusba,
bahmansir, fieliyya, kārūn, sādigān hadd ma bandar mahsUr
hāda killa tahat himāyat ca'ab. ca'ab farmandāriyya(3)
xuzistān cān bhassādigān. biet nāsir āl ka'biyya, āl nāsir
hādpli za'amā gabilat ka'ab. hāy hatta miluk ilbāwiya min
ilahwāz iyyïîn lihnā. nāyib minna yrūh min sādigān yirūh
lilahwaz hākim. lākin hāy māliyātna nwaddi 1 il Iran, sēx
ca'ab illidi sāyid ywaddi lhukūmat Iran māliyāt. hassa
ihna ssawwēna ma sawwēna ilā sibāgan 'ala fad wusla, ihna
nās Irāniyya whāda llisān ba'ad mahalli 'idna. bamrlka aku
hassikil bangaltata hassikil ubkill mukān. uhāda ssatt hā&a
cān ihna. cinna bhāda Igusba wxurramsahr ubahmansir ihna
blha ca'biyya. ammā hāda sātirna sādigān min gazw
ilxawārij. matalan iyyūn min itturkiyya, 'arāg fulān iyyūn.
hāy jazlrat sādigān. hāda bātlāg(4) killa min bahmansir ilā
bandarsāpūr ilā min itrūh minnā numra arba'a Imālih ilā
lahwāz ilā hidūd lahwāz, hāda bātlāg ilā an tiji rdūd ilā
bahmansir. hāy ijjazlra. hāy sādigān. sawwēna kūtf ilā
hassa mowjūd farid ātār minna mowjūd na'am hāda yimkin
'alēha taïātln xayyāl yisiffūn dōm, 'alyōm biflūs. sawwēna
hāda ilman? ilyaw hijmaw 'alēna mnidduwal ilxawārij,
kitannāhum. u ma hagg iydurtūn. 'ad ihna ndāfi' sarbāz
ihnā byIrān. ilmuluk haf'adnā, sār iya lpahlawi sallamna.
gabul nāsir iddln u fatah 'ali sa issēx 'idna hnā yslr
yinti māliyāt ilna killhum. sārat ilixtilāf bēnna. xarrab
sēx xaz'al. sawwa xarāb bēnātna ixtilafna hna wizza'amā
mālinna. sār xarāb. sēx xaz'al hatt iddowla, willā hāda
lmuluk mulukna wihna ndāfi' 'anna wmahhad ydāfi' 'anna wma
cān hattawāyif hāda.

1 sabbāna for sabbna, see p. 39.

2 mard Persian mard "man".
3 farmandāriyya Persian farmāndāri "governorship"•
4 Persian bktïāq "marsh".
181 Chapter 6 (Text 15)

TEXT 15 (KA'B) TRANSLATION

A Yes, it [the water] cornes from Jarrāhi.(l) Ail of it

is now by machines and powerhouses. Each person also takes
his share approximately of the water at his own machine and
they are ail farming. Ail of it is mechanised farming. No,
now there aren't any, there are no dams. Yes, because there
is very little water. This river which cornes from Jarrāhi
uninterruptedly coming from over there, there are on both
sides of it water pumps...
B By God, the government gave us thèse machines, but
there is no use from them for agriculture or anyting except
moral indebtedness and propaganda. There is no work from
them nor is any work possible... A tape recorder? You mean
he is recording us. Well, we will say everything about it.
If I was to be upset by a tape recorder... By your life!
But we will return to the subject. When General X sees me
coming in the distance, if he sees any of the shaikhs coming
he stands up to greet us from a long way off. From two
kilomètres distance he stands up for the shaikhs. But as
for the other one, he has no breeding! No, let him record
it! No, record itl Are you afraid? Why are you afraid?
By God, I hāve said the same to X and others. As for the
higher officiais, they are honourable men. Ail of them are
human beings.
A Don't bore us [with this talk]! No, it is not a mat-
ter of that. He has corne to study the language. The main
point is the language, the dialect; and as a part of this
he asked about the standard of living...
B We are quite satisfied with our government. No, we
are content and stand behind our government absolutely like
soldiers; but as for that person, the father of the child-
ren, the good man,(2) no!
C This is something which one of my colleagues wrote,
about the [arabic] language in Libya... I hāve brought it
as an example...
B Why hāve you brought ail this about the Arab states
to bother us with? What do we know of thèse matters?! Yes,
this is what is meant by the proverb:
"What use is éducation in science and writing
when the learner will die on completion of his work?"
What do we know about thèse matters?
C Naturally there is a différence between nationality
and language.
B Yes. This language is a local thing, but otherwise
we are of Iranian nationality. This is our language, our
own language. And the language of al-Huwaiza is différent ,

1 Jarrahi, to the east of Shadigān.

2 Sarcastically.
182 Chapter 6 (Text 15)

from ours. The language of the Bawiya is différent from

ours. Now, for example, Khurramshahr and the Muhaisin
hāve their own absolutely différent dialect. The Khanāfira
are différent from us. The "Asākira are completely différ­
ent. It's like that! About the dialect, so he should stay
with us a while and stay with you a while and he would learn
a lot. He might even learn something from the Khanāfira and
from those others, the Barhān.(1) Then by God at the time
of hunting the wild birds he would shout: "Ho, shoot at it
and it falls to earth over there and run and get it!" This
is our language.
A No. That is obvious. Leave the matter! [He asks
about] in gēnerai the good and the bad.
B If he goes with them to the désert to enjoy himself,
then we would hear an outcry from them.(2) This is the
point. Now in Iran now, this is our language... But those
others, the Lurs,(3) do not know the [Persian] language.
Once I was with the late head shaikh in Tehran. With him
was an Emir from Borūjerd one day in the days of the
Bakhtiari influence. He knew where they lived. And there
I found out about them. He [the Lur] said: "I like thèse
[arab] clothes and this mizwiya [the cloak worn by the
arabs]," and I was watching [and understood what he intended]
and speaking. I wanted to speak the Lur language with those
people who were coming in to the house. He did not know
[Persian]. He was a Lur. Now he did not know the Persian
language as well as the fact that he did not know Arabie.
Now it is like this with us and the same everywhere else.
But we are Iranian citizens, the core and basis of Iran.
By your life! The people of Hijaz(4) came to us, those who
insulted us and wished to drive us out. We feught them and
came away. We fought also with the peple of Iraq and came
on a long migration to hère. We came hère to al-Qubān.(5)
1 'Asakira and Si bu Ghubaish with the āl Nasir form the
Dirîs section of the Ka'b. The other sections such as
the Khanāfira and Barhān are regarded as tawayif
"ascinded tribes". See LORIMER (1908) p.960.
2 i.e. the Iranian security service.
3 The Lur tribes of Fars and northern Khuzistan, the
northern tribal neighbours of the Arabs.
4 The people of Hijaz, hère perhaps intending the Arabian
peninsula in gēnerai. The name Najd is not well known
in Khuzistan. Hère référence is made to the tradition
of the early cause of the migration of the Ka'b from
the Arabian peninsula.
5 Qubān, the first settlement of the Ka'b in Khuzistan,
abandoned in 1747; situated at the head of the Khaur
Musa.
183 Chapter 6 (Text 15)

We are not concerned however with the matter of al-Qubān.

We settled hère. For seven hundred years we hāve been hère.
Now it is four hundred years we hāve been hère. Now it is
four hundred years that we hāve been at Shādigān. But other-
wise thèse other matters were at al-Qubān, at Humaili, at
al-'Amāra. Ail this time we were at war with the foreigners
(1) and with Iraq and the Hijaz, at war with Turkey.(2) We
paid no heed to any of them. We came hère and settled in
Iran, praise be to God. The Shah in Tehran relieved us of
our problems and we stayed hère. Iraq invaded al-Muhammara.
Muhammara had become a force to be reckoned with. They came
to Muhammara and we were Ka'b behind Ka'b [in rows] standing
before them. Iraq came, fought and went back. They came
[enemies] from hère. They came from there. We were the
soldiers of Iran. Formerly there were not the transport
facilities and power [of today] and also... our only de-
fence was ourselves and after that we had no defence. If we
were defeated we would hāve to flee ail the way back to the
Bakhtiāri. If we won we would send them [the enemy] out
from this doorway hère. Formerly wef there was no one... /
Ail of this Khorramshahr, Qusba, Bahmanshïrf Failiyya,
Kārūn, Shādigān as far as Bandar Mahshūr, ail this was under
the tutelage of the Ka'b. Ka'b were the governors of
Khuzistan at Shādigān. Bait Nāsir of the Al Ka'biyya; those,
the āl Nāsir, were the leaders of the Ka'b tribe. Even the
kings of the Bawiya from Ahwaz used to corne hère to us and a
deputy would go from us hère in Shādigān to Ahwaz as a gover-
nor. But we used to send our taxes to Iran. The shaikh of
the Ka'b who was in ascendance would send taxes to the Iran-
ian government. Now whatever we hāve done or not done pre-
viously in one word, we are now part of the Iranian state
and this is our local language. In America it is the same,
in England the same and everywhere. And this river(3) was
hère, and we were hère. We were hère at al-Qusba and
Khorramshahr and Bahmanshïr, we were hère the Ka'b realm.
But this Shādigān was our shield from the attacks of the
foreigners. For instance they came from Turkey, Iraq or
whatever, this was the island of Shādigān. Ail this was a
marsh from Bahmanshïr to Bandar Shāpūr up till where you

1 Probably hère the war of the Ka'b with the Portuguese

is referred to, in the 17th century.
2 The Ka'b also repelled a number of Anglo-Turkish attempts
to invade Khuzistan in the 1760s. LORIMER (1908) II, 2,
p.1627-41.
3 Perhaps "canal" is a better translation. In Khuzistan
many of the rivers are wholly or partly man-made and
therefore stand as a witness of the possession of the
people settled there.
184 Chapter 6 (Text 15)

go from hère to the salty [well] number four to Ahwaz, to

the borders of Ahwaz. This was a marsh until you came back
to Bahmanshïr. This was the island. This was Shādigān. We
built a fort, a historical monument from us existing still.
Yes'. On this thirty horsemen could parade continuously,
daily receiving regular pay. What did we make this for?
For whoever of the foreign states came and attacked us,
so that we could beat them off. And they did not even hāve
the right to make a sound. Then we were defending the
country hère as soldiers in Iran. We protected the kingdom
until the Pahlavi régime came/ then we delivered it safe to
them. Before Nasir al-Dïn and Fath 'Ali Shihr(l) ail of
them [the people of Khuzistan] would give taxes to us. Then
there came the difficulties between us. Shaikh Khaz'al made
problems/ made things difficult between us. We quarreled
with our leaders. Things went wrong. Shaikh Khaz'al formed
a state, but otherwise this realm was ours and we used to
défend it and no one defended us, and thèse [other] tribes
(2) were not hère.

1 The Shahs of the Qājār régime.

2 Referring to the Muhaisin league which was formed more
recently.
185 Chapter 6

TEXT 16

MHIRZI: PALM CULTIVATION ON THE KARUN

This text was recorded for me by Sālim Fādhili of the Mutūr

section of the Muhaisin of Khuzistan. Mhirzi is the centre
of the Mutūr and is situated on the left bank of the Kirun
just above Khorramshahr. The dialect is typical of the
Shatt al-'Arab région and similar types were recorded for
Basra and 'Abbādān Island, also for both banks of the Shatt
al-'Arab at Sïba, Abu 1-Khasïb, Fao and Qusba. This type
of dialect was regarded in the area as being typical of the
hadhar or settled population and distinguishable from
bādiya speech. It is characterised by heavy phonological
and morphological réduction of the type outlined in Chapter
3, in particular also by universality of the occurrence of
/i/ rather than /a/ in open syllables in verbal forms, in
contrast to the bādiya type which retains /a/ in some phono­
logical environments, i.e. /xida/ vs /xada/ "ne took",
/kila/ vs /kala/ "ne ate'\

TEXT 16

innaxla yzir'unha ysammūnha farax naxal. tāli hannōba

yzir'unha ttawwil 'abāra(l) m'addil cam sina lamman ma dgum
tihmal, ysammūnha tihmal. hassa huwwa nnaxal anwā'. 'indak
naxal birhi, xudrāwi, sa'amrān, firsi u guntār u ba'dan
anwa' wagsām mō adri bihin ana. amman aktar liyzir'ūnha
hnāka ijjamā'a huwa sa'amrān min jihat hāy issa'amrānf
awwalan ysaddirūn min 'inda wāyid lilxārij. hannoba hatta
yistaglūn bihin bcirdāg wiysaffūna wiyfassigūna. tāli noba
ysaddiruna wilbāji dāka ybl'ūna, hatta ya'ni kill yom awādi™
yistirūna yāklUna, bass dāka laktar māla ysaddiruna
lilxārij. hannōba naxal aku illi yihmal u tāli dāka

1 See also Ka'b text, p. 178.

186 Chapter 6 (Text 16)

ilfahal. ilfahal kill gā' itsūf biha miya mltien naxla,

biha fahal wāhid, dikar. hāda ygum, 'ugub ma innaxal ygūm
ytalli', yxallūna ytalli', tāli nōba wāhid iyyi ylaggih,
ysammuna laggāhci.(1) rayyāl Ih! hada yhutt ilfarwand(2)
māla yis'ad 'alilfahal, ygussla cam tal'a. tāli hannōba
iyylbhin ygassimhin 'ala gisma, gisma. hannōba yis'ad
innaxal wihda wihda wiygūm ylaggih. hàda ylaggih slōn?
ittal'a mafsūga hiyya swayya yhutta bwastathin. wihda min
hādi lyabha mnilfahal, gisma, willi māhi tāl'a yifsigha
ihwa(3) bida. innōba ydull hatta mjiht(4) ilhawa kūn ysir
hārr. winnaxal ma yitla' wilhawa bārid. kūn iyslr harr.
hannōba 'ugub ma yitla' hada, awwal ma yitla' ittal'a
nsammlha / swayya titla' itsir xadar wizgār / hādi nsamml
habābōk. ma ysammlha tamur, awwal ma yitla', ba'ad ma
ylaggihha yitalli' iswayya y&ull hēc cam mudda ssir
habābōk. killis izgār u murr swayya. sikla xadar. tāli
hannōba yikbar lamman ma ysir cimri. cimri ham'sikl
ilhabābōk amman swayya akbar. hannōba iccimri swayya tāli
ysir ysaffur iyslr asfar ysammūnha hambūs. min ba'ad hāy
iddaraja tāli killa hā&i lxagar iScimri yiswi ysir asfar
lamman ma ysir asfar ysammūnha xlāl hannōba hādi lasfar
nussa nuss ilixlāl mà~ ssir tamur, halli ysammuna rutab ygūm
yrattib hāda nuss ixlāl u nuss tamur. hannōba lamman ma
ysir killis/killa tamur ba'ad ygūmūn/iyyi hāda ddumāni wāhid
dammān yidmun ilgā'. tāli hannōba ygūmūn ygussuna ygussūna
hāda ttamur killa. bilwāhid ysammuna 'itig. ittamur killa
a'ni. ittamur ihwa mcallib wihda mnittānya ysammuna sarmūx.
hāda 1'itig māla mcallib ibfarid si ysammūnha 'isga.
liycallib il'itig binnaxla hāda 'isga. hannōba nnaxla, min
ba'ad ma titla', biha sa'fa. hāy issa'fa mitl irrisa malt
itter amman swayya akbar u biha xiïs farid wihda xūsa. hāda
ssa'af māla, innaxla yā ma tikbar, 'alilhadir māla mitil
issa'af ysir yebas. ygūm wāhid ygūm ygussa msān hutab. gab-
il là agūl 'alissa'fa ngūl minjiht innaxla ilha / ma hwa
bass wāhid yistifid imnilmahsūl mālha. yimkin tistifid min
kill 'ilij binnaxla. kill jizP mal innaxla ila jimi'
istifādā't. wāhid yigdar yistifid min 'inda. matalan
ittamur ba'ad ma dguss ittamur ywaddūna liccardāg
yfassigūna, ytul'ūn ilfusma, ttamra ysiddūnha ywaddūnha
lilxārij ma adri siysawwūn biha hannōba ilfusma wil'inig
huwa lli mcallib bittamra, ccallib ittamra bissarmūx, hāda
1'inig wilfusam lawādim yistirūna yittūna lilhayawānāt

1 -ci the Turkish occupātional suffix common in the whole

area.
2 farwand, probably Persian {ka)marband "belt".
3 ihwa, the Shatt al-'Arab form of the pronounf also
ihya, ihma, ihna.
4 min jihat "because" in the Shatt al-'Arab area.
187 Chapter 6 (Text 16)

yāklanna, lilhawāyiš. ba'ad awādim yituhnūna, mā adri

šiysawwūn b , mā adri šinhou ilhāsil. hāy innōba ittamur
hamma tigdar, gabul lā yfišgūna w hāya, yhuttūna bfarid mukān
ysammūna mdibsa. tāli idā šwayya yihtarr ygūm yitla' min
'inda dibis. tāli hannōba issa'fa min tēbas iygussūnha čam
gisma. kill gisma iss r taraf. hāda ltaraf liyidrūn yista'
milūna mšān nār mšān xubiz lo ytubxūn lo killši. ilxūs
ygussūna ygidrūn yšawwūn min 'inda, ysuffūn b ballalo zb l
lo sufra lo mhatta. (1) hannōba issa'fa bkuburha ygidrūn,
gabul lā tēbas ygussūnha bass yxallūn brāsha šwayyat xūs.
hāda ysammūnha niššāša, yniššūn b ha bazzūna dyāya killši
ttiyi. hannōba llimčallib issa'fa binnaxla ihya kurba.
issa'fa ddull min ba'ad sina lo aktar min tēbas wāhid yitla'
yrūh ykarrub b'akfa yguss ilkurba. ilkurba hamma mšān hutab
ytubxūn b ha wmirihalhači. hannōba bien innaxla wilkurba aku
I fa. hāy ill fa wāhid min isti' mālātha ysawwūna mitil
imxadda ysammūnha iskāra. ēh mšān ilbustān. tamāta wxyār
mniyzir'ūn hatta ykuddūn ilmāy, min hāda lmašrūb iddāk
ilmašrūb. hāy iskāra. yiena innōba lil'isga hādi
limčalliba l'itig binnaxla il'isga ygidrūn ykin'ūnha bilmāy
wiygussūnha yšalxūnha 'ala wusla wusla ysawwūn min 'idha
tubag lo guffa šwayya ilā ččiffa hēči ys r xōš sabstityūt
liss niyya. hāda tubag. ilguffa šwayya azgar. innōba
ilyid'a hāy idā mā tr dha lo sslr čib ra wāyid ittayyihha,
ham b ha isti'māl.

TEXT 16 (MHIRZI) TRANSLATION

They plant the palm tree and it is called a palm sapling.

So they plant it and it takes about on average a number of
years before it begins to bear fruit, they say it bears
fruit. Now the palm is of many kinds: you hāve the Birhi,
the Khudhrāwi, Sa'amrān, Firsi and Guntār and also many
other types which I do not know about. But the type which
the people there plant mostly is the Sa'amrān because
firstly they export much of it abroad. Firstly they work
on them in a hut, cleaning them and opening them. Then
they export them and the rest they sell [in the area], every
day people come and buy them and eat them. But most of it
they export abroad. Now there is the type of palm which
bears fruit and then there is also the male palm. In every
plot of land in which you see a hundred or two hundred
palms, there is one male palm. Now when the palm begins to
bring out buds, they let it bring out buds, then someone
comes to pollinate them. He is called a laggāhchi. A man,
yes! He puts on his climbing belt and climbs up the palm.
He cuts off a number of buds. Then he brings them and

1 Also mhaffa.
188 Chapter 6 (Text 16)

divides them up into parts. Then he climbs up the palm

trees one by one and begins to pollinate them. How does he
do this? The [female] bud is split open. He puts a little
of it in the middle of it, that which he has brought from
the male tree, a piece of it. And those which hāve not
sprouted, he splits open by hand. Then it stays like that
until the weather becomes warm, since the palm will not
sprout if the weather is cold. Now when it begins to sprout,
the bud as we call it / at first it sprouts a little and is
green and small / this we call the habābōk. We do not yet
call it a date [tamur]. When it sprouts first, after it has
been pollinated, it sprouts a little and stays like that for
a while and is called habābōk. Very small and slightly
bitter and green in appearance. Next it grows until it be-
comes the chimri. This chimri is also like the habābōk but
rather larger. Next the chimri begins to turn yellow. It
becomes yellow and then they call it the hambūsh. After this
stage all of this green thing ripens and becomes yellow.
When it is all yellow it is called khlāl. Now this yellow
thing, when half of it, half of the khlāl has become tamur
[i.e. brown in colour], this is what is called rutab, when
it becomes moist [ y r a t t i b ] . This is half khlāl and half
date [tamur]. Now when it has all become like a date, then
they bring an assessor. This man assesses the plantation.
Then they begin to cut it down. They cut down all of the
dates. Each bunch is called an 'ithig. I mean the date
bunch altogether. Each stalk with dates on it is called
sharmūkh, which joins the dates to each other. Then the
'ithig [the bunch of stalks] is joined to something called
the 'isga. The thing that joins the 'ithig to the palm
trunk is called 'isga. Now when the palm grows, it has on
it fronds. This frond is like the feathers of a bird, but
larger and it consists of individual leaves called khūs,
in the singular khūsa. Now the fronds, as the palm tree
grows, the lower fronds begin to dry up. Then they can be
cut off for firewood. Before I tell you about the palm
fronds, let me say that as regards the palm tree, it is not
that one can only make use of its fruit. One can use every
member of the palm tree. Each part of the palm has many
uses, and one can use it. For instance, as regards the date
itself, after they hāve cut it down and taken it to the
working shelter and hāve opened up the dates, then they take
out the date pips. Now the dates are closed up again and
sent abroad or whatever happens to them, but the pips and
the 'inig, the stalk joining the date to the sharmūkh, these
are bought by people who give them as feed to their animais.
And some people also grind them up for something, but I do
not know what the resuit of this is. Or else, before they
split open the dates they can put it into a place called a
mdibsa [vat]. Here it ferments and date syrup is produced.
189 Chapter 6 (Text 16)

Now to return to the fronds, as they dry up, they cut them up
into pieces. Each piece is called a taraf. This taraf,
those who know about it, use it for firewood for baking or
cooking or anything else. The palm fronds they cut and can
weave them into mats or baskets or cloths [for eating off]
or fans. Now the fronds, depending on their size, they can
cut them off before they dry up and cut off all the leaves
except those at the very tip. This is called a nishshāsha
[switch] and can be used for shooing off cats or chickens or
anything which comes near. Now the thing which joins the
frond to the palm tree is the kurba [frond base]. The higher
fronds stay on the palm. Then after a year or more when they
hāve dried up someone goes up and prunes them off with a
machete ['akfa]. He cuts off the frond base. These also are
used for firewood and such uses. Now between the frond base
and the palm trunk is the l fa [a fibrous substance]. One of
the uses of this is that they make from it something like a
cushion, called skāra. Yes, for the garden. When they plant
tomatoes or cucumber they use it to block the water in one
channel and lead it to the next, they use this skāra. Now we
come to the 'isga, the thing which joins the stalk bunch to
the palm trunk. This they can soak in water and cut it and
plait it together piece by piece and thenthey can make from
this trays or bowls. If you bend it slightly like this it
becomes a good substitute for a china tray, that is a tubag
[tray]. The guffa [bowl] is slightly smaller. Now the
trunk, if you do not want it, or if it gets too big, you can
cut it down, and it also has uses.
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Index

This index is designed to supplement the contents page and

lists references to names of persons, localities and tribes
occurring in the text. It also lists linguistic topics not
included in the contents.

-à (pl. suffix), 132 'Amārāt, 11, 30, 48, 68, 74

'Abaćli ibn Fālih, 133 'Amr, Bani, 77, 106
'Abbādān, 22, 173, 185 -an (suffix, in Classical),
'Abda, 70, 86, 131 53, 55, 56
Abu al-Khas b, 19, 185 -an (suffix, = -ni), 68, 71,
'Abūda, 25 74, 139
active, 41-53 -an (suffix, = ana), 68, 83,
Afghanistan, 3 151, 178
'agāl, 23, 24, 66 'Anaiza, 45
-ah (3rd m.s. suffix), 120 analogical change, 63, 74-6
-ah (fem. suffix), 67, 71, anaptyctic vowels, 56-62, 143
139 anhār (sing.: nahr), 19
Ahl Gibly, 12 'Aniza, 9, 11, 14, 16, 30,
Ahl al-Shimāl, 12, 60-62, 65, 46, 48, 56, 61, 63, 66,
67-69, 73, 77, 80, 82, 68-9, 72-4, 76, 79, 80,
85-87, 89, 92-93, 136, 83, 86-8, 91-101, 102,
142-6 116-19, 144
Ahwaz, 22, 66, 68, 80, 82, 'Arai'ir, Āl, ibn- (more
147, 167, 169, 183, 184 accurately 'Urai'ir) , 65,
Aja, 9 142-6
al-Ajfar, 131 al-'Āridh, 15, 22, 23, 73,
'Ajmān (more accurately 106
'Ujmān), 12, 15, 31, 65, 'Arma plateau, 65
88-9, 96, 98, 103-6, 125 Asad, Bani, 25
'Ajmi (see 'Ajmān) 'Asākira, 182
Ajwad, 65 •As r (dialect), 45
'Alya, 111, 129, 154-8 Aslam, 139
-am (suffix), 76, 120 -at (suffix), 70, 132
'Amāra, 17, 19, 22, 66, 80, 'Awāja, 48, 55, 61, 69,
84, 92, 93, 162-6, 176, 88-9, 91, 94
183
196
197 Index

'Awāzim, 12, 31,59, 60-1, conservatism, linguistic, 35

73, 76-7, 88-9, 91-6, consonant clusters, 56,
98, 99, 101, 120-30 59-62
-āy (f.pi. suffix), 69, 70, "core" dialects, 26-9
71, 75-6
Az rij, 19 -da, di (démonstrative pro-
noun), 92-3, 104, 113
bādiya, 15, 20, 33, 51-2, d(i) (verbal prefix), 151
72, 80, 97, 170, 185 Dam r al-'Āyid, 84
al-Bag'a, 131 Dammām, 22
Baghdad, 17, 38, 51, 80 Darb Zubaida, 63, 72
Ba'gūba, 17, 147 Dasht M shān, 175, 176
Bahārna, 23-5, 31 Dawāsir, 12, 14-16, 58,
Bahrain, 19, 24-5, 31, 34, 88-9, 92-3, 96, 98-100,
38-9, 51, 96 103, 109
Bakhtiari, 182 Dhab ha and Man ha, 144
Bandar Mahshūr, 183 Dhaf r, 8, 11-13, 16, 20-2,
Bandar Shāpūr, 183 30, 48, 52, 56, 59, 61,
Barhān, 182 63, 65-9, 73-4, 76, 79,
Basra, 12, 17, 22, 25, 27, 81, 84, 87-9, 91-100,
38, 72, 147, 185 101, 131, 142
Batha, 21, 26, 35 Dhahrān, 22, 84
Bātin, 30 dhow, 19
Bāwiya, 173, 182, 183 dialect area, 27, 28, 77
Bāzaid (see Zaid, Abu) d ra (tribal area), 9, 12,
"bedouin" speech character- 63, 73, 100, 110, 114,
istics, 31, 61, 69 138
Birkat Bghadād, 19 D wāniyya, 80
-bl- (particle), 131 Dōsiri (see Dawāsir)
border dialects, 27 dress, 24, 66
Borujerd, 182 duwāb, 20
Bu'aij (more accurately
Bu'aiy), 136 -ē- (infix), 39
Budūr, 8, 21, 49, 69, 77, ē~ contrast, 80, 168, 170,
80, 82-7, 92, 167 175
Buraida, 16 Eastern Region, 15
burgu', 88 'ēb (negative particle),
Butaira, 80 173, 175
Butūn, 21 -eih (form of fem. suffix),
69, 75-6
causative verb type, 39-40, emigration (from Najd), 11,
53, 109 13, 15
chaffiyya, 23 Euphrates, 9, 10, 17, 19,
Chawādir, 147 20-3, 26, 30, 35, 63,
Chibāyish, 19, 80 65-6, 72, 74, 80, 83,
cisterns, water, 72 142, 144
Classical Arabic, 42-3, Euphrates bedouin, 20-2, 52,
53-4, 56 56, 62, 65, 67-9, 73-4,
communication structure, 29 77, 79, 80, 82, 84, 88,
complexity, linguistic, 63 92-3, 95-6, 99, 101, 139
198 Index

fad/farid, 56 al-Hauta, 35
Fad'ān, 144 hauz, 19
faidhāt, 8 Hauz 'Abd al-'Az z al-
Failaka (or Failiča), 29, 89 Rāshid, 19
Failiyya, 183 Hebrew, 75
family tree (Stammbaum) -hi for -ha, 148
theory, 30 Hiblān, 88
Fao, 19, 83, 185 Hijaz, Hijazi, 44, 66, 72-4,
fellāh, 16 77, 88-9, 92, 95, 102,
fringe dialects, 65, 66 182, 183
fronting of kāf and qāf, Hilāl, Bani (literature),
95-6, 112 11, 111, 129, 139-41,
Fuhūd, 19, 80 147, 162
Hilla, 17, 26-7, 49, 139
Gachsārān, 170-2 Himyar, 140
gas da, 2, 135, 139 Huchaim, Bani, 30
Gāyid, ibn, 141 Hufūf, 22
Ghatān (see also Qahtān), Humaid, 8, 20-1, 49-50,
io9-ll 59-60, 62, 65, 82, 83,
Ghatān, Hasāt, 111 85, 87, 89, 136, 142
Ghizya (see Jash'am) Humaid, ibn, 11, 90, 109-11
Ghubaish, Āl bu, 178 Huwaitāt, 133
ghutra, 23, 66 Huwaiza, 80, 173, 175, 181
glottal stop, xv
grazing, 9, 13-15 i/a contrast (in open syl-
Gulf dialects, 49, 50, 52, lables), 47, 142, 167,
77, 82, 88, 95-6, 98, 100 185
Gurna, 80 idiosyncratic type, 63
-ih for -ah (fem. suffix),
hadhar, 52, 185 69, 136, 148
hadra, 10 impersonal verbs, 47
Hafar al-Bātin, 8, 9, 12, -in (suffix, tanw n, nuna-
102 tion), 34-5, 53-6, 112,
Hail, 16, 45, 65, 69, 72, 118, 121, 143
88, 131 internal passive, 33, 39,
Haj road, 72 41, 81-2, 132, 152, 174
Hajara, 63 internai vowel morphology
Hājiri, 90, 93 (of the verb), 33, 39-43
Hakar, 21 interrogative sentences, 79
Halfāya, 19 intransitive verb type,
hamdh (hamadhāt) , 21, 109 39-41, 53
Harb, 8, 59, 60, 66-7, 70, Iran, 34, 176, 177, 183, 184
73, 76-7, 83, 88-9, 91-6, Iraq, 20, 22, 24, 176, 182,
98-9, 101, 102, 107, 183
112-15 ' sa, Āl, 20
al-Hasa, 15, 19, 22, 24-5, isogloss, 26-7, 77-9, 87
31, 34-5, 38, 49, 65, 72,
98, 105, 144 j>y sound change, 26, 30-1,
Haur al-Hammār, 9, 20, 35 142, 143, 162, 177
Haur al-Huwaiza, 20, 35, Jabal Shammar, 9, 15, 16, 22,
176, 177 23, 63, 72-4, 88
199 Index

Jabal Tuwaiq, 72 Kurds, 17, 172

Jahra, 9 Kūt, 17, 19, 26, 35, 66, 68
Jarba, 65, 72, 74 Kūt Sayyid 'Anāya, 81, 83,
Jarrāhi, 17, 22, 181 167-9
Jash'ām, 20, 142-6 Kuwait, 15, 19, 23-5, 30-1,
al-Jauf, 66 38, 49-50, 61, 65, 72-3,
Jawāsim (or Źawāsim), 20 84, 86, 93-4, 100, 116,
Jaz ra, 63, 72 120, 130, 144
Jūkha, 110 Kwida, 21

-k and -ć (suffixes), 31, 74, la- (prefix), 149, 153

96-8, 120 Lām, Bani, 14
Ka'b, 19, 23-4, 172, 178-84, lexical distinctions, 77,
185 86-7, 91, 100-1
-kam, -ham (suffixes), 68-9, L na, 63
71, 74-6, 167 linguistic change, 63
Karbala, 19, 20 liquid consonants, 57
Karkha, 176 Lurs, 170, 182
Kārūn, 17, 22, 92, 172, 183,
185 ma' or mi' (meaning "in"),
Kath r, Āl, 65 85, 93, 131
Kawāwila (gypsies), 49-52, Maarib dam, 13
81, 86-7, 90, 100, Madāin Sālih, 116
147-61, 166, 171 Madina,30, 73, 112, 114
Khafāya, 19 majhūr, 58
Khafājiyya (more accurately Manādhra, 76
Khafāyiyya), 173, 175 marshdwellers (see also
Khaibar, 14 Mi'dan), 136
Khālid, Bani, 8, 15, 49-50, marshland, 79
65-8, 73, 79, 87-8, 92, Mas'ūd, Shammar, 139-41, 102
95, 142, 144 Mawāli, 87
Khal fa, Āl, 24 Māy'a, 19
Kham siyya, 9 Mecca, 14, 72-3
Khamseh, 17 Mecca, dialect of, 35, 37-8
Khanāfira, 182 merger (phonological), 36-7,
Khaur Bahmansh r, 19, 183, 63
184 Mesopotamia(n), 17, 40, 44,
Khaur Mūsa, 182 59, 77, 97-8, 83
Khaz'al, Shaikh, 176, 177, Mhirzi, 185-9
178, 184 Mi'dān (also Mi'aidi), 11,
Khazraj and Chināna, 176, 177 19-20, 30, 61, 80, 83,
Khorramshahr, 19, 22, 80, 173, 175, 177
177, 182, 185 Midhnab, 40, 45-6, 79, 142
Khrusa, 86 Mintifij (see Muntafiq)
khuffiyyāt, 8 mobilisation, 34
Khuzistan, 17, 20, 22-4, morphological distinctions,
34-5, 38-9, 51, 80, 88, 79
90, 92-3, 167, 168, 170, Mubārak al-H m, 125
175, 178, 182, 183, 184 Muhaisin, 19, 177, 178, 182,
Koiné, 2 l85
200 Index

Muhammad, Āl bu, 19, 118 phonological distinctions,

Muhammara (Khorramshahr), 183 77-9
Muntafiq (see also Euphrates poetry, 49, 61
bedouin), 30, 65, 142, 144 population movement, 11, 12,
Muraikh, battle of, 125 13-17, 73, 77
Murra, Āl, 12, 15 Portuguese, 183
musabila, 10
Musayyab, 17 Qahtān (see also Ghatān),
Mutair, 8, 12-6, 30-1, 56, 14, 15
60-l, 65-6, 69, 73-4, Qarāmita, 24
76-7, 81-2, 88-90, 92-9, Qash'am (see Jash'am)
101, 107-11, 167 Qas m, 14-15, 22-3, 40-1, 56,
Mutūr, 178, 185 '65, 67-9, 72-3, 77, 81-2,
Muwāhib, 116 84, 88-9, 92-9, 101
Qatar, 24
Nafūd, 9, 15, 22, 63, 73, Qatari, 58, 93
131 Qat f, 22
Najaf, 10, 11, 19, 26, 30, Qubān, 182, 183
63, 72, 80 Qusba, 183, 185
Najd, 16, 17, 37-8, 40, 83 Qusmān, 65
Najd, Western, 30, 73
Najdi/bedouin identity, Rashāyida, 12, 31, 61, 73,
45, 54 76-7, 88-9, 92, 95-9, 120
Najrān, 15, 103 Rash d, house of, 131
-nan (suffix), 68, 71, 74 Rash d, Ibn, 10, 16-17, 65
narrative imperative, 132, Raudhatain, 8, 107
143, 164 reductional change, 33-62,
Nāsir, Āl, 182, 183 95
Nāsiriyya, 8, 11, 17, 19, redundant feature, 33-4
20-2, 30, 69, 80, 136, relic area, 65
142, 167 Riyadh, 77, 89, 92-6,
negative construction with 98-100, 109
bi-, 94, 113 riyādh, 8, 113
Negev bedouin, 80, 82, 87, routes, 72
92-3, 98, 107, 148 Rub' al-Khāli, 15, 22
neogrammarians, 26 Rufai', 8, 20-1, 49, 50, 59,
nomads, 7-11, 13 62, 65, 80, 82-7, 89, 93,
non-territorial distribu­ 136-8, 142
tion, 77 Ruwala, 59, 66, 69, 74, 76,
82
Old Arabic, 39-40
Oman, 88 -š (negative suffix), 30
Ottomans (see also Turks), Sā'da, 136
24 Safwān, 16
Saif, Āl, 15
passive (see internai Sājir al-Rfidi, 46
passive) Salām, 19
Persian (race), 34, 172 Sakhar, Bani, 66-7, 73
Persian (vocabulary), 99, Sālih, Āl bu, 8, 19, 20
167, 168, 170, 174, 178, Sālim, Bani, 77
179, 180, 186
201 Index

Salma, 9 Subāh, Āl, 24, 130

Samāwa, 11, 21, 30, 63, 80, Subai', 15, 105, 106
144 Sudair, 15-16, 45-6, 54-6,
Sannā', 10 61, 70, 77, 79, 82, 84-5,
Sardiyya, 35, 66, 73 89, 92, 94-9, 101, 103,
Sa'ūd, house of, 12, 17 150
Sāyih, 136 Sudair, Āl, 15, 22
Sayyāh, Bait, 173 Sūdān, 136
Sba'a, 30, 46, 48, 52, 59, Sufairi, 8, 12
69, 74, 76, 79, 81-3, Sugūr, 69, 88-90, 93
88-91, 93, 97, 99, 116 Sunni, 25, 30
Shādigān (Fallāhiyya), 19, Sūq al-Gharrāf, 19, 20
80, 178, 181, 183, 184 Sūq al-Shuyūkh, 80
Shammar, 8, 10-12, 16, 21, Sūsangard (Khafāyiyya),
30, 45-6, 52, 55-6, 58, 173, 175, 176
60-3, 65-6, 69-70, 72-4, syllable structure, 34, 44,
76, 80-1, 84, 86, 88-99, 58
101, 131-5, 136, 139-41, syntactic distinctions, 79
142, 144 Syria, 44, 72-4, 116
Sha ra, 19 Syria, Lebanon, Palestine,
Sha al-'Arab, 17, 19, Jordan (dialects of), 66
22-5, 34, 39-40, 42, 51, Syrian desert, 3, 33-5, 48,
72, 80, 92, 100, 149, 61, 63, 65-6, 68, 72-4,
178, 185, 186 76, 80-1, 83, 93, 96
Sha al-Gharrāf, 9
Shawāya (see Shāwiya) Taima, 63
Shāwiya, 21, 30, 142 ta'ti'ōh, 24
shepherd tribes (see also al-Tayyār, Kan'ān, 11
Shāwiya), 21, 30, 52, 62 Thāni, Āl, 24
shewa, 58 Tigris, 17, 22, 26, 35, 65,
Shi'a (also Shi'ite), 21-2, 80
24-5, 30, 35, 37-9, 51, transitional dialects, 28-9
96, 136 transitivity system, 33,
Shibića, 12 39-53
Shilgān, 12, 131, 133-5 Tūmān, 11
shmāgh, 23 al-Tumār, 19
Shu'aibāt (Shu'aibāy), 8, 131 Turks, Turkey, Turkish, 17,
Shutait, 172 105, 170, 183, 186
Shūyān (see Shāwiya) Turuf, Bani, 167, 170, 173-7
Sība, 19, 185 Tuwāl al-Dhaflr, 9
Sibila, 16 Tuwāl Mutair, 9
simplification (of syllabic
structure), 44 ū~ō contrast, 117
Sinjāra, 8, 12, 133 -u(h) (3rd per. suffix), 31,
slave population, 34-5 66-7, 71, 74-6, 98, 139
mida, 16, 21 Umm al-'Aish, 8, 142
sociosymbolic, 54 'Utnūr, Slūt, Sirhān, 66-8,
sound shifts (phonology), xv 73, 76, 83, 87
standard dialect, 34 'Utaiba, 12, 14-15, 58, 70,
stress, 58, 60 72, 76, 79, 88-9, 96-8,
109-11
202 Index

'Uwairi h, arrat, 116 -ž for j, 30, 112, 162, 175,

'Uzair, l9 177
Zaid, Abu (also Bāzaid), 111,
verbal measures, 40, 42, 82, 129, 153-4, 157-61
103-4 Zaitān, 172
vocalic transition, 58-9 Zanāti (Khalīfa), 111
vowel shortening, 103-4, 112 Zayyād, 21, 79, 80, 83
zone of communication, 22
Wādi a l - R i s h a , 1 3 6 , 109-10 Zubair, 9, 11, 19, 27, 30,
Wādi Turmus, 8 , 7 7 , 131 38, 72, 82-4, 87, 89,
Washm, 22 92-4
wave theory, 30 Zuhairiyya, 82, 167, 169
Wild 'Ali, 74, 93
Wild Sulaimān, 74, 88

Yaman, 1, 13, 72
yō for ya, 143
Glossary of technical terms

accusative
active
addressee
adverbial
affirmative
affrication
anaptyctic
assimilation (phonological)
assimilation (non-linguistic)

case system
causative
cleavage
clinal
cluster (final)
cognate
complex
conjugation
conservative
consonant
core area

defining characteristic
deictic function

203
204 Glossary

demonstrative
derivational phonology
dialect area
diphthong
dissimilation
distributional equivalent
dummy object

eclipse (functional)
elide
elicitation
elision
enclave
enclitic
environment
existential verb

Family tree theory

Finally weak verbs
form classes
fringe dialects
fronting
fusion

gemination
gender
gliding vowel
gutteral

Hollow verb
hypercorrection

idiosyncratic
indefinite
205 Glossary

indefinite marker
instability
instrumental preposition
interrogative
interrogative complex
interlocutor
internal (to the stem)
internal passive
internal vowelling
intransitive
inventory
isogloss

juncture
jurative

levelling
lexeme
lexical derivation
lexical usage
linguistic change
liquid
locative preposition

marking
Measures of the verb
merger
morpheme
multivalency

negative particle
non-conditioning environment
non-obligatory
non-structural
206 Glossary

non-territorial distribution

object suffix

paradigm

parameter
participle
particle
passive
patient

pausal position
perfective
periphery
phonological conditioning
phonology
preposition
prestige marking feature
pronoun suffix
pure vowel

qualifying element

radical
realisation
reduction
reductional change
redundant feature
reflex
reflexive
regularising
release of a consonant
relic area
retaining system
retention
207 Glossary

sandhi
scatter
semantic
shewa
sociolinguistic
sole constituent
sonorant
sound shift
split
sporadic
stem
stress
stressed
Strong verb
structural pressure
subject affix
suffix
surface derivation
syllabication
syllable
syllable structure
syntactic

transcription
transitional area
transitive
transitivity system
transliteration
triconsonantal cluster

underlying phonology
unmarked
unstressed
208 Glossary

valency
variable
verbal inflection
vocalic transition
vocalisation
voiced plosive
voiceless

Wave theory (Wellentheorie)

 Expressions

\V
 non-Reductional

Pronoun Suffixes (

Linguistic Phenomena 4

Isogloss

Natural Distribution

Communication Areas

Traditional Dialectology

Questionnaires Interviews

u
 Family-Tree Theory

Phonology

Morphological Patterns Phonemes

reductional

Phonogogical Changes
Merger

Aspect
Stems
Transitive
Passive Intransitive
Causative Derived

Peripheries
Reduction

Simplification Change
Morphology Syllables
Doubling

^
 The Neogrammarians

Linguistic Zones Areas

Isogloss
Linguistic Zone
Isoglosses

Dialect
Zones Periphery 4 Core
Wave Theory
Features Schmidt

Features Schleicher

\l
 Zone

Dialect Areas

Linguistic Distribution linguistic Map

Extra-Linguistic

Innovating Conservative

Isogloss

\r