OCIANA
Online Corpus of the Inscriptions of Ancient North Arabia

U 059

Siglum
U 059
Alternative Sigla
Stiehl D 01; Al-Qudrah 1993: 24, no. 34; AH 018; D 125
Transliteration
mqḥ/s¹lḥ ḏ{ġ}bt/ʾẓll/b- khl ʿly-/m- kn/l- -h/b- ḏ– ṯʿʿl/mn/dṯʾ/w ḫrf f rḍ -h/w ʾṯb -h
Translation
Mqḥ priest of {Ḏġbt} performed the ẓll-ceremony at Khl for that which belongs to him in Ḏ– ṯʿʿl of the crops of the season of the later and the season of the first rains and so favour him and reward him

Interpretation

Apparatus Criticus
TEXT Line 1. Stiehl followed by Farès-Drappeau: ----ḥ rather than mqḥ; Al-Qudra: ----h for mqḥ; Abū l-Ḥasan: mqḥn for mqḥ. Line 2. Abū l-Ḥasan: ʾṭll for ʾẓll. TRANSLATION Line 1. Sima does not translate the word s¹lḥ. Line 2. ʾẓll, Stiehl: '(he) took care of the awning'; Al-Qudrah: '(he) constructed (the awning)'; Sima: 'he covered by his abilities (the subterranean water-channel)'; Farès-Drappeau: '(he) offered (the sacrifice)'. Line 2. b-khl, Stiehl followed by Sima: 'by his abilities'; Al-Qudrah: 'professionally'; Abū l-Ḥasan: 'in the month Khl'. Line 4. dṯʿ w ḫrf, Stiehl followed by Al-Qudrah, Abū l-Ḥasan and Farès-Drappeau: 'the spring and the autumn harvest'; Sima: 'in a spring and an autumn field'. DISCUSSION Déroche 1987: 108, 238, 239. Macdonald 1992: 2–4, 7 for dṯʾ and ḫrf. Macdonald 2004: 508. Macdonald (in press): 25, note 34. Hidalgo-Chacón Díez 2014: 19–22, for the place names Ḏṯʿʿl and Khl. Hidalgo-Chacón Díez 2016: 128, for the divine name Ḏġbt.
Commentary
Line 2. The mason apparently began the ġ of ḏġbt and then started again producing a strange approximation to the letter. Due to a pre-existing crack in the rock face, the first line is shorter than those below it. The lines are not aligned on the left side. The verb ʾẓll means "he performed the ẓll-ceremony", the exact nature of which we do not know. Usually, but not always, this verb is followed by the noun h-ẓll meaning "the ẓll-ceremony". Thus, ʾẓll and ʾẓll h-ẓll both mean "he performed the ẓll-ceremony".

Provenance
Al-ʿUḏayb (Jabal ʿIkmah). The inscription is chiselled on a rock inside the gorge
Original Reading Credit
Sima 1999:
Original Translation Credit
OCIANA

Technique
Incised

Associated Inscriptions
It is above U 059.1

  • 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 95–96 Plate 3
  • 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 207–208
  • Sima, A. Die lihyanischen Inschriften von al-ʿUḏayb (Saudi-Arabien). (Epigraphische Forschungen auf der Arabischen Halbinsel, 1). Rahden/Westf.: Leidorf, 1999. pp 21 Plate 15a, 15b
  • 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 30–31 Plate 34
  • Macdonald, M.C.A. The Seasons and Transhumance in the Safaitic Inscriptions. Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland 3rd. series, 2, 1992: 1-11.
  • 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.
  • Macdonald, M.C.A. Towards a reassessment of the Ancient North Arabian alphabets used in the oasis of al-ʿUlā. Pages 1–19 in M.C.A. Macdonald (ed.), Languages, scripts and their uses in ancient North Arabia. (Supplement to volume 48 of the Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies). Oxford: Archaeopress, 2018.
  • 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
  • Hidalgo-Chacón Díez. M. del C. The divine names at Dadan: a philological approach. Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies 46, 2016: 125–136
Site
The oasis of al-ʿUlā, Al-Madīnah Province, Saudi Arabia
Current Location
In situ
Subjects
Agriculture, Deity, Genealogy, Isolated Prayer, Place-name, Religion, Season
Script
Dadanitic
Old OCIANA ID
#0037658
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