OCIANA
Online Corpus of the Inscriptions of Ancient North Arabia

U 069

Siglum
U 069
Alternative Sigla
Stiehl D 06; Al-Qudrah 1993: 26, no. 39; AH 058; D 130
Transliteration
ʿmrn/bn/bn{t} w/md/bnt/ẓbyh ʾẓllw/h- ẓll/b- khl bʿd/ṯbrt -hmy/b- ḏ– ṯʿʿl/f [r]ḍy -hmy/w s¹– ʿd -hmy
Translation
ʿmrn son of {Bnt} and Md daughter of Ẓbyh performed the ẓll-ceremony at Khl for the sake of both their grain at Ḏ– ṯʿʿl and so {may he [the god] favour} them both and may he help them both

Interpretation

Apparatus Criticus
TEXT Line 1. Stiehl followed by Al-Qudrah and Farès-Drappeau does not read the first personal name, and nor the last letter of the personal name Bnt; Sima: ʿgrn rather than ʿmrn; Abū l-Ḥasan: ʿmr rather than ʿmrn, even though he has ʿmrn in his copy. Line 2. Abū l-Ḥasan: ṣbyh for ẓbyh. Line 3. Abū l-Ḥasan: ʾṭllw h- ṭll for ʾẓllw h- ẓll. Line 4. Stiehl followed by Al-Qudrah and Farès-Drappeau: ṯmrt -hmy for ṯbrt -hmy. TRANSLATION Line 3. ʾẓllw h- ẓll, Stiehl: '(they) took care of the awning'; Al-Qudrah: '(they) constructed the awning'; Sima: '(they) covered the subterranean water-channel'; Farès-Drappeau: '(they) offered the sacrifice'; b- khl, Stiehl followed by Sima: 'by their abilities', Al-Qudrah: 'professionally'; Abū l-Ḥasan: 'in the month Khl'; Line 4. ṯbrt -hmy, Abū l-Ḥasan: 'their agricultural field'; bʿd ṯbrt -hmy, Sima: 'in the direction of their fallow fields'; Farès-Drappeau: 'on behalf of their harvest of fruits'. DISCUSSION Déroche 1987: 236, 239. Hidalgo-Chacón Díez 2014: 19–22, for the place names Ḏṯʿʿl and Khl. Macdonald 2004: 506, 507, 526
Commentary
The lines are not aligned on the left side. Line 3. Note the use of the plural verb, ʾẓllw, with two subjects, but the use of the dual pronominal suffix -hmy in the following lines. Line 4. We follow Farès-Drappeau (2005: 206, D 121) in taking ṯbrt as possibly cognate with Hebrew šeber "grain". Though this is by no means certain it fits the context well. See also the discussion in Sima (1999: 104). Line 5. The carver omitted the r of rḍy.

Provenance
Al-ʿUḏayb (Jabal ʿIkmah). The inscription is chiselled on a rock inside the gorge
Original Reading Credit
OCIANA
Original Translation Credit
OCIANA

Technique
Incised

Associated Inscriptions
It is to the left of U 068

  • Abū ʾl-Ḥasan, Ḥ.ʿA.D. Qirāʾah li-kitābāt liḥyāniyyah min ǧabal ʿakmah bi-minṭaqat al-ʿulā. Al-Riyāḍ: Maktabat al-malik fahd al-waṭaniyyah, 1997. pp 175–177 Plate 8
  • Farès-Drappeau, S. Dédan et Liḥyān. Histoire des Arabes aux confins des pouvoirs perse et hellénistique (IVe–IIe s. avant l'ère chrétienne). (Travaux de la maison de l'Orient, 42). Lyon: Maison de l'Orient et de la Méditerranée — Jean Pouilloux, 2005. pp 210
  • Sima, A. Die lihyanischen Inschriften von al-ʿUḏayb (Saudi-Arabien). (Epigraphische Forschungen auf der Arabischen Halbinsel, 1). Rahden/Westf.: Leidorf, 1999. pp 22–23 Plate 16b
  • Stiehl, R. Neue liḥyānische Inschriften aus al-ʿUḏaib I mit einem Nachtrag M. Höfners. Pages 3-40, 565-566, 569-594, pl. 1-45 in F. Altheim and R. Stiehl (eds), Christentum am Roten Meer. 1. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1971. pp 33 Plate 39, 40
  • Al-Qudrah, Ḥ.M. Dirāsah muʿǧamiyyah li-ʾlfāẓ al-nuqūš al-liḥyāniyyah fī iṭār al-luġāt al-sāmiyyah al-ǧanūbiyyah. Unpublished MA Thesis, Epigraphy Section, Institute of Archaeology and Anthropology, Yarmouk University, Irbid. 1993.
  • Macdonald, M.C.A. Ancient North Arabian. Pages 488-533 in R.D. Woodard (ed.), The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the World's Ancient Languages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004.
  • Déroche, F. Recherches sur l'oasis de Dedan / al-Ula. Thèse de Doctorat: Études arabo-islamiques, Paris IV, 1987. [Unpublished], 1987.
  • Hidalgo-Chacón Díez, M. del C. Place names in the Dadanitic inscriptions of al-ʿUḏayb. Adumatu 30, 2014: 15-30
Site
The oasis of al-ʿUlā, Al-Madīnah Province, Saudi Arabia
Current Location
In situ
Subjects
Agriculture, Genealogy, Isolated Prayer, Place-name, Religion, Women
Script
Dadanitic
Old OCIANA ID
#0037653
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