The Development of the Arabic Scripts: From the Nabatean Era to the First Islamic Century According to Dated Texts

As an early contribution to the neglected field of Arabic paleography, assembles all published, dated Arabic texts from the first century AH (622-719 CE), arranges them in chronological order, and uses that list to explore the evolution of the written script. The evidence include texts in Nabatean (which Gruendler accepts as the immediate precursor to Arabic), pre-Islamic Arabic inscriptions, epigraphic texts, and Arabic papyri. The discussion includes the development of individual graphemes, monumental versus cursive affiliations, homogenization, and other topics. No index. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR THE DEVELOPMENT OF THEARABIC SCRIPTS: From the Nabatean Era to the First Islamic Century According to Dated Texts 4 Table of Contents 8 List of Abbreviations 9 Short List of Texts 10 CHAPTER ONE 12 Introduction 12 Nabatean or Syriac Origin? 12 The Purpose of this Study 14 Selection of the Material 14 Nabatean 15 Arabic 15 CHAPTER TWO 18 Description of Texts and References 18 Nabatean Texts 18 Pre-Islamic Arabic Inscriptions 24 Arabic Epigraphic Texts 26 Arabic Papyri 33 CHAPTER THREE 40 The Development of the Individual Graphemes 40 The Charts 40 ʾAlif 43 Bāʾ 47 Tāʾ/Thāʾ 51 Jīm 55 Ḥāʾ/Khāʾ 59 Dāl/Dhāl 63 Rāʾ 67 Zāy 71 Sīn/Šīn 75 Ṣād/Ḍād 79 Ṭāʾ/Ẓāʾ 83 ͑Ain/Ghain 87 Fāʾ 91 Qāf 95 Kāf 99 Lām 103 Mīm 107 Nūn 111 Hāʾ 115 Wāw 119 Yāʾ 123 Sāmeḵ 127 Lām-ʾAlif 129 CHAPTER FOUR 134 Discussion: From Nabatean to Arabic 134 Finding the Birth Date of Arabic Script. Monumental or Cursive Affiliation 138 Importance of the Nessana Texts (N21) 139 CHAPTER FIVE 142 Outlook: The Arabic Development 142 Homogenization 142 Emergence of Scripts 143 General Bibliography 154 Illustrations 162