1,720,967 research outputs found
M.Gaudiello, P.A.Yule (eds.) Mifsas Baḥri: A Late Aksumite Frontier Community in the Mountains of Southern Tigray. Surveys, Excavation and Analysis, 2013-16 (BAR International Series 2839)
No full textThe possible link between Meroitic and Nara: Achievement and Perspectives
No full textThe aim of this paper is to describe the state of affairs on the studies of the Nara language, one of the modern languages of the North Eastern Sudanic branch (NES), and what support it might offer in the study of Meroitic. The second part of the title of the paper derives from an observation of Claude Rilly , the main specialist of Meroitic, who highlighted the importance of the Nara language for the comprehension of Meroitic. Although the linguistic affiliation has been ascertained, Meroitic and Nara are two chronologically distant languages. Therefore, the reconstruction of the linguistic history of Nara could improve comparisons with other NES languages and Meroitic. Unfortunately, as shown in this paper, few scholars are engaged in the study of Nara, and progress is very slow. Obviously, the comparison between Meroitic and proto-forms of Nara still appears to be a long way off. However, interdisciplinary studies aimed at the reconstruction of the proto-NES language, which also include the study of Nara, could produce interesting results supporting the study of Meroitic
A Study of the Meroitic Inscription REM1141
No full textThis paper presents some preliminary results of the study of the meroitic inscription REM1141 also known as Amanishakheto’s stele which I examined in the holdings of the British Museum. The stele was discovered in 1974 at Qasr Ibrim, being reused as part of the pavement of the Cathedral. The first transcription and analysis of the text was published by D. Edwards and C. Rilly in The Meroitic temple complex at Qasr Ibrim edited by P. Rose.
The text of the stele is considered as one of the meroitic royal inscriptions. These form a very huge group which includes all inscriptions with a royal names. In general, royal texts focus on the role of the royal persons and their deeds, like the napatan royal inscriptions. In the classification of this meroitic group there is a certain number of texts that, for some aspects, cannot be described as royal even though present royal names.
If the texts and their vocabulary are compared, it is possible to appreciate some differences among them. In particular, some elements in REM1141 might lead one to suggest that this text may be related to religious offerings. The inception of the text, with the name of “Isis of Abaton to Meroe”, and the use of some verbal roots, which are also encountered in Benediction Formula, may support this idea.
The elements supporting the fact that the text of REM1141 may have had a religious meaning are discussed in this paper
3D Reconstruction of the Lion Temple at Musawwarat es Sufra: 3D Model and Domain Ontologies
No full textThe management of huge amount of data requires new methods, particularly in the field of
information technologies. This paper describes the 3D reconstruction of the Lion Temple at
Musawwarat es Sufra in Sudan. The monument was erected in the third century B.C.
A 3D reconstruction of the temple has already been made in the 1990s starting from the
excavation data. Our project is addressed at testing a new approach based on the integration of
the open source software BLENDER for the processing of 3D data, with the GML for the
management of geographical data, and the CIDOC-CRM for the ontological description of the
monument. In order to manage and organize the architectonic, iconographical and geographical
data we used an ontological formalization for the sharing of our archive.
While the georeferentiation of the 3D model, through a spatial coordinate reference system
assigned in the GML project, allows to import and make readable the reconstruction in any GIS
system, the use of the CIDOC-CRM ontology allow to describe the monument according to
international standards for cultural heritage documentation. So it is possible on the one hand to
visualize the 3D model and all information, and the other hand to perform any possible queries on
geographical and descriptive data.
The standardization of the software and its interoperability could guarantee the fruition and
exchange of data among different users; in this way it will be possible check and update the
reconstruction
Potential Old Nubian Cognates for Meroitic aleqese
No full textIn this article we will analyse three potential Old Nubian cognates of the Meroitic word aleqese, taking up a prior suggestion of Claude Rilly. After providing an overview of the linguistic relationship between Meroitic and Old Nubian and the extant analyses of aleqese in the extant literature, we will inspect the Old Nubian conditional clause marker ⲁⲗⲉⲥⲛ̄, as well as the words ⲁⲗⲕⲁⲥⲛ̄ and ⲁⲗⲓⲕⲟⲧⲛ̄, both with an unknown, but seemingly adverbial function. It will be our claim that ⲁⲗⲉⲥⲛ̄, which is frequently used in Old Nubian literary texts, is a true cognate, a word supposedly deriving from the same potentially reconstructable root. The existence of this cognate relationship, which follows the sound correspondences that have so far been proposed by Claude Rilly, further substantiates the claim that Meroitic is a Nilo-Saharan, and, more precisely, a Northern East Sudanic language. We will suggest that, by contrast, ⲁⲗⲕⲁⲥⲛ̄ and ⲁⲗⲓⲕⲟⲧⲛ̄ are loanwords from Meroitic, which give us further evidence concerning the pronunciation, phonetic variation, and orthography of Meroitic
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