Western Neo-Aramaic

Distribution and history[edit]

Western Neo-Aramaic is the sole surviving remnant of the once extensive Western Aramaic-speaking area, which also included the Palestine region and Lebanon in the 7th century CE.^[18] It is now spoken exclusively by the inhabitants of Maaloula and Jubb'adin, about 60 kilometres (37 mi) northeast of Damascus. The continuation of this little cluster of Aramaic in a sea of Arabic is partly due to the relative isolation of the villages and their close-knit Christian and Muslim communities.


Following the Muslim conquest of the Levant, there was a linguistic shift to Arabic for local Muslims and later for remaining Christians; Arabic displaced various Aramaic dialects, including Western Aramaic varieties, as the first language of the majority. Despite this, Western Aramaic appears to have survived for a relatively long time at least in some remote mountain villages in Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon. In fact, up until the 17th century, travelers in Lebanon still reported on several Aramaic-speaking villages.^[19]


In the last three villages, where the language still survives, the dialect of Bakhʽa appears to be the most conservative. It has been less influenced by Arabic than the other dialects and retains some vocabulary that is obsolete in other dialects. The dialect of Jubb'adin has changed the most. It is heavily influenced by Arabic and has a more developed phonology. The dialect of Maaloula is somewhere in between the two, but is closer to that of Jubb'adin. Cross-linguistic influence between Aramaic and Arabic has been mutual, as Syrian Arabic itself (and Levantine Arabic in general) retains an Aramaic substratum.^[20] Similar to the Eastern Neo-Aramaic languages, Western Neo-Aramaic is using Kurdish loanwords unlike other Western Aramaic dialects, e. g. in their negation structure:”Čū ndōmex“ meaning "I do not sleep“ in the Maalouli dialect.^[21][22] These influences might indicate an older historical connection between Western Neo-Aramaic and Eastern Aramaic speakers.^[23] Other strong linguistic influences on Western Neo-Aramaic include Akkadian during the Neo-Babylonian period, e. g. the names of the months: āšbaṯ (Akk. šabāṯu, "February"), ōḏar (Akk. ad(d)aru, "March"), iyyar (Akk. ayyaru, "May") or agricultural terms such as nīra (Akk. nīru, "yoke"), sekkṯa (Akk. sikkatu, "plowshare"), senta (Akk. sendu, "to grind") or nbūba (Akk. enbūbu, "fruit").^[24][25]


As in most of the Levant prior to the introduction of Islam in the seventh century, the three villages were originally all Christian until the 18th century. Maaloula is the only village that retains a sizeable Melkite Christian population (they belong to the Rūm Orthodox Church of Antioch and Melkite Greek Catholic Church) as most of the inhabitants of Bakhʽa and Jubb’adin converted to Islam over the generations and are now all Muslim. However, the first Muslims were not native converts, but Muslim Arab families from Homs who were settled in the three Aramean (Syriac) villages during the Ottoman era to monitor the Christian population.^[26] Maaloula glows in the pale blue wash with which houses are painted every year in honor of Mary, mother of Jesus.


Historical accounts, as documented by the French linguist Jean Parisot in 1898, suggest that the people of Maaloula and nearby areas claim to be descendants of migrants from the Sinjar region (modern Iraq). According to their oral traditions, their ancestors embarked on a substantial migration in ancient times, driven by the challenges posed by the Muslim occupation of the northern part of Mesopotamia. Seeking refuge, they crossed the Euphrates River and traversed the Palmyrene desert, eventually finding a lasting sanctuary among Western Aramaic-speaking communities in the highlands of eastern Syria.^[c][27] In Maaloula and the surrounding villages, the surname ”Sinjar“ (Aramaic:ܣܢܓܐܪ) is borne by some Christian and Muslim families.^[28]


All three remaining Western Neo-Aramaic dialects are facing critical endangerment as living languages. As with any village community in the 21st century, young residents are migrating into major cities like Damascus and Aleppo in search of better employment opportunities, thus forcing them into monolingual Arabic-speaking settings, in turn straining the opportunity to actively maintain Western Neo-Aramaic as a language of daily use. Nevertheless, the Syrian government provides support for teaching the language.^[29]


Unlike Classical Syriac, which has a rich literary tradition in Syriac-Aramaic script, Western Neo-Aramaic was solely passed down orally for generations until 2006 and was not utilized in a written form.^[30]


Since 2006, Maaloula has been home to an Aramaic Language Institute established by the Damascus University that teaches courses to keep the language alive. The institute's activities were suspended in 2010 amid concerns that the square Maalouli Aramaic alphabet, developed by the chairman of the Language Institute, George Rizkalla (Rezkallah), used in the program, closely resembled the square script of the Hebrew alphabet. Consequently, all signs featuring the square Maalouli script were taken down.^[31] The program stated that they would instead use the more distinct Syriac Aramaic alphabet, although use of the Maalouli square script has continued to some degree.^[32] Al Jazeera Arabic also broadcast a program about Western Neo-Aramaic and the villages in which it is spoken with the square script still in use.^[33]


In December 2016, during an Aramaic Singing Festival in Maaloula, a modified version of an older style of the Aramaic alphabet closer to the Phoenician alphabet was used for Western Neo-Aramaic. This script seems to be used as a true alphabet with letters to represent both consonants and vowels instead of the traditional system of the Aramaic alphabet where it is used as an abjad. A recently published book about the Maalouli Aramaic dialect also uses this script.^[34][35]


Aramaic Bible Translation (ABT) has spent over a decade translating the Bible into Western Neo-Aramaic (Maalouli dialect) and recording audio for Portrait of Jesus. Rinyo, the Syriac language organization, has published ABT's content, developed by Kanusoft.com. On their website, the Book of Psalms and Portrait of Jesus are available in Western Neo-Aramaic using the Syriac Serta script. Additionally, a translation of the New Testament into Western Neo-Aramaic was completed in 2017 and is now accessible online.^[36][37][38]


An electronic speech corpus of the Western Neo-Aramaic dialect of Maaloula has been available online since 2022.^[39][40]