BES15_MS 161

GLW/GLY – If this reading is correct, then this is the first attestation of this root in the Safaitic corpus. The root glw is quite common in other Arabic corpora with a number of seemingly unrelated meanings, among them “to be manifest, clear” as well as “to emigrate (because of drought, fear, etc.)” (Lane 446). The root is attested with similar semantics in Hebrew gālā, Aramaic glā, Ugaritic gly, and Akkadian galū with the meaning “to go into exile” (HALOT §1777). The overlap in unrelated semantics is probably due to the convergence of two originally distinct roots, gly and glw, which merged owing to the shift of III-w verbs to III-y typical of most Arabic varieties. The meaning “to leave, emigrate,” or possibly “to go into exile,” fits the context of this inscription well.