Ethiopic language

“ Wemmers, a Carmelite, has wrote a small Ethiopic dictionary in thin quarto, which, as far as it goes, has considerable merit; and I am told there are others of the same kind extant, written chiefly by Catholic priests. But by far the most copious, distinct, and best-digested work, is that of Job Ludolf, 426 a German of great learning in the Eastern languages, and who has published a grammar and dictionary of the Geez in folio. This read with attention is more than sufficient to make any person of very moderate genius a great proficient in the Ethiopic language. ”

“ A few more names of kings occur on coins, which were struck in Greek characters till about A.D. 700, after which time that language seems definitely to have been displaced in favour of Ethiopic or Geez: the condition of the script and the coins renders them all difficult to identify with the names preserved in the native lists, which are too fanciful and mutually contradictory to furnish of themselves even a vestige of history. For the period between the rise of Islam and the beginning of the modern history of Abyssinia there are a few notices in Arabic writers ”

“ Every house possesses its slaves; but those both of king and subject are permitted to work for themselves one day out of the seven. All occupation is interdicted on the Sabbath, as well as on the festivals of Gabriel, Michael, and Georgis, which are the only saints’ days observed in Susa.
The language spoken is quite distinct from that of the Galla, from the Amháric, and from the ancient Geez or Ethiopic. It possesses a written character. The houses are constructed upon a circular plan of wattle and thatch. ”

“ This third, or Arabic, branch sprang from the Arabian peninsula, where it is still spoken by a compact mass of aboriginal inhabitants. Its most ancient documents are the Himyaritic inscriptions. In very early times this Arabic branch was transplanted to Africa, where, south of Egypt and Nubia, on the coast opposite Yemen, an ancient Semitic dialect has maintained itself to the present day. This is the Ethiopic or Abyssinian, or, as it is called by the people themselves, the Gees language. ”

“ The real origin of the artistic decoration is unmistakable. It is what we call Byzantine, but ought rather to be called Ægypto-Grecian. The people of Abyssinia, who were mainly Southern Arabs or Sabæans, received their instruction in art along with their Christianity a few centuries after the beginning of the era, and they have never abandoned them. As for the writing which appears on the plate, it is in the old Geez or Ethiopic language, and descended from that of the Sabæan people whose monumental inscriptions in Himyaritic language and characters are now attracting considerable interest. ”

“ Contrary to the opinion of the Greeks, the Ethiopians appear to have derived their religion and civilization from the Egyptians. The royal inscriptions are written in the hieroglyphic character and the Egyptian language, which, however, in the opinion of experts, steadily deteriorate after the separation of Ethiopia from Egypt. ”

“ Although Amharic has been driven back by the invasions of the Galla tribes, it has already compensated itself to some extent for this loss, as the Yedju and Wollo Gallas, who penetrated into eastern Abyssinia, have adopted it as their language. With the exception, of course, of Arabic, no Semitic tongue is spoken by so large a number of human beings as Amharic. The very fact that the Agaw languages are being gradually, and, as it were, before our own eyes, absorbed by Amharic makes it appear probable that this language must be spoken chiefly by people who are not of Semitic race. ”

“ Amharic, the official language of the Ethiopian Empire, is spoken natively by perhaps six million people in a small but populous area of the country which includes the capital, Addis Ababa. A member of the Southern Semitic branch of the Afro-Asiatic family of languages, Amharic is steadily gaining importance as it picks up additional speakers through the spread of communications and education within Ethiopia. ”

“ I should myself feel much more inclined to think, that it may have derived its origin from some ancient Ethiopic or Egyptian set of letters; for where can we expect to find the alphabet of either nation with so much probability as in Abyssinia, among a people not only calling itself Ethiopic, አትዮጰያ, but exhibiting the fairest claim to that descent, and which afterwards, as is clearly pointed out in history, became mixed with settlers from Egypt. ”

“ Thick lips are frequently seen, but they are supposed to indicate intermarriage with Ethiopians. From the negro the Egyptians were far removed, nor can they be connected with any other known race. If we turn to language, a surer guide perhaps than physiology, we are again completely baffled. ”

“ He is master of all the languages which are classed under the Indo-German family—the Sanscrit and Persian, the Koordish, the Armenian, and the Georgian; he is familiar with all the members of the Semitic family, the Hebrew, Arabic, Syriac, Samaritan, Chaldee, Sabaic, and even the Chinese, which he not only reads but speaks. As regards Africa, he knows the Coptic, Ethiopic, Abyssinian, Amharic, and Angolese. ”

“ It is difficult, in my opinion, to imagine, that any society, engaged in different occupations, could subsist long without them. There seems to be less doubt, that they were invented, soon after the dispersion, long before Moses, and in common use among the Gentiles of his time.
It seems also probable, that the first alphabet was Ethiopic, first founded on hieroglyphics, and afterwards modelled into more current, and less laborious figures, for the sake of applying them to the expedition of business. ”

“ Colossal in art, profound in philosophy and religion, and in possession of the knowledge of the arts and sciences, the Ethiopian race exhibits the astounding phenomenon of an elevated civilization at a period when the other nations of the world were almost unknown. ”

“ A number of other African dialects are claimed to exhibit affinities of material and structure with the language of Egypt. They fall [7] into three groups: the Ethiopian or Abyssinian, of which the Galla is at present the most important member; the Libyan or Berber, extending over a wide region of northern Africa, from Egypt to the Atlantic ocean; and the Hottentot, embracing the dialects of the degraded tribes of Hottentots and Bushmen at the far southern extremity of the continent: these last have been but recently recognized as showing signs of probable relationship with the rest. ”

“ There were tribes among the Ethiopians which were of a low grade of civilization, just as in the most civilized countries of the present times, there are peoples of a very low grade, not only in civilization but in intelligence. But, there existed a highly cultured and civilized Ethiopian people, who dwelt in cities, erected temples and other edifices, and who had good government and humane laws. Moreover, their fame and progress in knowledge and their social arts spread in the earliest ages over a considerable part of the earth. ”

“ The Béga language of the race of the Bishareen who are widely scattered between the Red Sea and the Nubian Nile. This appears to be a most important branch of the original Asiatic-Caucasian family of languages, and deserves our attention so much the more since it seems that it can be historically proved to be the present form of the ancient Egyptian language of Meroë. I have also found in those countries, and in the pyramids of Meroë, a great number of old Ethiopian inscriptions, which are recorded in an alphabetical writing until now entirely unknown. ”

“ On the contrary, there is an old law in this country, handed down by tradition only, that whoever should attempt to translate the holy scripture into Amharic, or any other language, his throat should be cut after the manner in which they kill sheep, his family sold to slavery, and his house razed to the ground ”

“ If we are "Negroes" we are by the same dictionary also, "Niggers." The moment we realize, however, that we are "Ethiopians," we can see the beams from the lamps of Ethiopian culture lighting a pathway down the shadowy ages, and the fires of ambition are rekindled in our hearts, because we know that we came from the builders of temples and founders of civilization. ”

“ I hope that by the study of the native inscriptions, and the yet living languages, some important results may be obtained. The name Ethiopian with the ancients comprehended much of very various import. The ancient population of the whole Nile valley to Chartûm, and perhaps along the Blue River, as also the tribes in the desert east of the Nile, and the Abyssinians, then probably were more broadly distinguished from the negroes than at present, and belonged to the Caucasian race ”

“ The last fact at once severs Egypt from India, and destroys every presumption of affinity that may arise from the presence in both countries of caste, of animal worship, and of a religion derivable from a primitive adoration of the powers of nature. The hypothesis of an Ethiopian origin sprang from the notion, natural but untrue, that population would follow the course of the descending river. ”

“ This supposition is confirmed by a study of the language itself. Amharic has diverged from the ancient-Semitic type to a far greater extent than any of the dialects which we have hitherto enumerated. Many of the old formations preserved in Geez are completely modified in Amharic. Of the feminine forms there remain but a few traces; and that is the case also with the ancient plural of the noun. The strangest innovations occur in the personal pronouns. And certainly not more than half the vocabulary can without improbability be made to correspond with that of the other Semitic languages. ”

“ The records show that Mizraim found the Nile in possession of the Ethiopians, who were spread thence through the African desert; a people of rich, fantastic genius, wholly given to the worship of nature. The Poetic Persian sacrificed to the sun, as the completest image of Ormuzd, his God; the devout children of the far East carved their deities out of wood and ivory; but the Ethiopian, without writing, without books, without mechanical faculty of any kind, quieted his soul by the worship of animals, birds, and insects, holding the cat sacred to Re, the bull to Isis, the beetle to Pthah. ”

“ Thus converted at an early period of the Christian age, Ethiopia spread her new religion deep into the recesses of heathen Africa. Extending her wide empire on every side, the praise of the Redeemer soon arose from the wildest valleys and the most secluded mountains. From the great river Gochob to the frontiers of Nubia, the crutch and the cowl pervaded the land. Churches were erected in every convenient spot; and the blue badge of nominal Christianity encircled the necks of an ignorant multitude. ”

“ And when the faint gleam of tradition and fable gives way to the clear light of history, the luster of the Ethiopians is not diminished. They still continue the object of curiosity and admiration; and the pens of cautious, clear-sighted historians often place them in the highest rank of knowledge and civilization."
Of these facts most modern historians know but little and Negroes in general almost nothing. ”

“ Ethiopia is a country with her own culture and mores. These, our cultures and customs, more than being the legacy of our historical past, are characteristics of our Ethiopianness. We do not want our legacies and traditions to be lost. our wish and desire is that education develop, enrich, and modify them. ”

“ That, in the earliest periods of history, the Ethiopians had attained a high degree of civilization, there is every reason to believe; and that to the learning and science derived from them we must ascribe those wonderful monuments which still exist to attest the power and skill of the ancient Egyptians. ”

“ The highlands included betwixt Abyssinia and the equator are unquestionably among the most interesting regions in Africa, whether viewed with reference to their climate, their soil, their productions, or their population. When the Ethiopic empire extended its sway over the greater part of the eastern horn, they doubtless supplied myrrh and frankincense to the civilised portions of the globe, together with the “sweet cane,” mentioned by the prophets Isaiah and Jeremiah, as being brought “from a far country.” The slave caravan still affords a limited outlet to their rich produce ”

“ Anciently, all the interior parts of Africa, lying south of Egypt, were called Ethiopia, and comprised those countries now called Nubia and Abyssinia. The black race who inhabited Ethiopia, were then called Ethiopeans; and every book we open, which treats of the Ethiopean or black Race; is involved in acknowledged obscurity. We find the great mass of the Race, in its own country, in a state of heathenism and barbarism ”

“ In deciphering the demotic-Ethiopian inscriptions little assistance is to be looked for from the Ethiopian-hieroglyphic as, whatever strange variations these may contain, they correspond almost entirely to the Egyptian, in form as well as in the language which underlies them. Like our own Latin inscriptions, they are composed in the writing and language of an alien people. As we shall see, Lepsius afterwards became convinced that the key to the Ethiopian-demotic inscriptions of which we{156} speak was not to be sought in the Nubian, but in the Cushite Bischariba language. ”