The Pisidian language is a member of the extinct Anatolian branch of the Indo-European language family spoken in Pisidia, a region of ancient Asia Minor. Known from some fifty short inscriptions from the first to second centuries CE, it appears to be closely related to Lycian, Milyan, and Sidetic.
Pisidian | |
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Region | Pisidia, ancient southwestern Anatolia |
Extinct | after the second century CE |
Language family | Indo-European
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Writing system | Pisidian script |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 | xps |
Linguist List | xps |
Glottolog | pisi1234 |
Pisidian is known from about fifty funeral inscriptions, most of them from Sofular (classical Tymbrias). The first were discovered in 1890; five years later sixteen of them were published and analyzed by Scottish archaeologist William Mitchell Ramsay.[1] The texts are basically of a genealogical character (strings of names) and are usually accompanied by a relief picturing the deceased. Recently inscriptions have also been found at Selge, Kesme (near Yeşilbağ), and Deḡirmenözü.[2] Four inscriptions from the Kesme region seem to offer regular text, not merely names. By far the longest of them consists of thirteen lines.[3]
Pisidian is written left to right in a script that closely resembles the Greek alphabet. A few letters are missing (phi, chi, psi, and possibly theta), and two others were added (characters F and И, both denoting a /w/- or /v/-sound). In recently discovered inscriptions two new signs 𐋌 and ╪ have turned up; they are rare and it is not clear whether they are variants of other signs or entirely different characters (maybe rare sibilants).[4] Texts are written without word dividers.
A typical example (the accompanying relief shows two men and a veiled woman):
Alternatively, the end of the line may (with a different word division) be read as Δωταριε Νεισ, with dative Dotarie, meaning (...) to Dotari [the son] of Nei. In addition, Ειη may also be a dative (= Ειε-ε). The whole line would then mean:
Due to the one-sided character of the inscriptions, little is known about the grammar. Two cases are assured: nominative and genitive; the presence of a dative is disputed:
case | ending | example | meaning | |
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Nominative | -Ø | ΔΩΤΑΡΙ | Dotari | (Dotari is a man's name) |
Dative | -e (??) | ΔΩΤΑΡΙΕ (?) | to Dotari | |
Genitive | -s | ΔΩΤΑΡΙΣ | Dotari's |
About the verb nothing can be said: Pisidian verbal forms have not yet been found.
Pisidian personal name Δωτάρι Dotari may reflect the Indo-European root for "daughter".[5] However, as Dotari is documented as a man's name this etymology is not assured.[6]
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