Western Semitic Languages [ LGLOR2711 ]

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To have followed courses at Bachelor level in a Semitic language such as Akkadian, Hebrew or Aramaic.

Alternating with LGLOR 2712 (Phoenician), the course deals with the following themes:

1. An introduction to the Ugaritic script;
2. Vocabulary and the specificities of the Ugaritic grammar;
3. Translation of texts accompanied by a philological commentary

Study of the Ugaritic language.

At the end of this course, the student will be capable to read, translate and analyse texts of average difficulty. In order to achieve this goal, he will have been introduced to Ugaritic script, and will have acquired a basic vocabulary.

The evaluation of the students is continuous, but there is an oral exam at the end of the year on the reading and translation of a text seen during the year, as well as justification of grammar points.

This is not a course of lectures, the students prepare texts which are discussed during the course with the grammatical points highlighted.

Amongst the western Semitic languages, Ugaritic is placed at the end of the late Bronze age: 14th to 12th centuries B.C. The city of Ugarit, (now in Syria on the Mediterranean coast) was destroyed at the beginning of the 12th century and the majority of the texts date from the end of the history of Ugarit. The course deals with the study of several tablets taken from the manual of Bordreuil-Pardee.

- P. Bordreuil et D. Pardee, Manuel d'ougaritique, Paris, 2004.

- J. Tropper, Ugaritische Grammatik, Münster, 2000.

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