Coptic language

Formerly spoken in

• Afro-Asiatic languages Egyptian language

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Cop

Cop

The Coptic language ( from Arabic قبطي qibtī, qubti, DMG qibṭī, qubti, from Coptic kypt ( a) ios, next gyptios, from Greek Αἰγύπτιος "Egyptians ", from Mycenaean a- ku -pi- ti -jo ) is the recent form of the Egyptian, an independent branch of the Afro-Asiatic language family. She was from the 3rd to the 17th century as a spoken language in use and is partly used for religious occasions to date of Coptic Christians. Up to the decipherment of Egyptian hieroglyphs, which would not have been possible without the knowledge of Coptic, Coptic was the only known Egyptian language.

The Coptic has a synthetic and partially insulating morphology; the word order is subject-verb - object, in noun phrases is preceded by the head and there are prepositions. Nouns have the category number and gender; Verbs according to tense, aspect, type of action, mode and the opposition Affirmative - inflected negative. The vocabulary has a strong Greek influence.

• 4.4.1 nominal rate
• 4.4.2 Two-piece conjugation
• 4.4.3 Three-piece conjugation

• 6.1 grammar
• 6.2 dictionaries

History and philological position

The Coptic is the last development stage of the Egyptian language, after breakfast, alto, Central and Late Egyptian and Demotic. The Egyptian forms a separate branch of the Afro-Asiatic language family, alongside the Semitic, Berber, Cushitic, and Chadic languages ​​omotischen which are spoken in the Middle East and northern Africa.

The Coptic represents the direct continuation of the Demotic as the Egyptian language is known from about 700 BC. It has over the Demotic on some innovations that would justify a distinction between the two stages of development. The oldest Coptic texts come about from the time around 100 AD and has already been written in a derived from the Greek alphabet font; they are collectively referred to as altkoptisch. The amount of traditional altkoptischen texts is very low, the late Demotic served as a written language, although it no longer corresponded to the spoken language. As a written language, the Coptic began only in connection with the Christianization of Egypt by around the 4th century.

Remained Coptic after the Arab conquest a few centuries everyday language of Egypt, but was largely displaced between the 10th and 13th centuries due to the Arabisation and died as a lingua franca in the 17th century. In Upper Egypt it remained ad hoc and limited survived to modern times.

The Coptic was there never administrative language in Egypt. In the Christian- Byzantine period it was like since the conquest by Alexander ( Alexander the Great) Greek ( see Hellenism ), and since the advent of Islam in Arabic. Coptic was used mostly in the private and Christian ceremonies.

Coptic is still used today in the worship of Coptic Christians as a sacred language. In recent decades, the language enjoys among young Copts again increasing popularity as a sign of their special identity within the Egyptian society, so that today again more Copts have at least a rudimentary knowledge of the language. In everyday life, however, they continue to speak Arabic. By tradition the Coptic as a form of the Egyptian to modern times, the development of older stages of development of the Egyptian was only possible because significant parts of lexicon and morphology of older forms received in Coptic.

Dialects and dissemination

The Coptic was divided from the outset into different dialects, one of which had the most only regional importance. The most important dialects were the Sahidic and Bohairic the. In today's Coptology the Sahidic Coptic is considered par excellence, since it has a very regular orthography and so as from beginners easier to learn applies. However, centuries long (about 700-1300 AD) had the Bohairic the status of "classic" Coptic held.

The main dialects of Coptic are the following:

They all have a larger amount of material überliefertem and served in ancient times, at least temporarily for national communications. But there are a lot of regional and temporary dialects, of which only small fragments - Papyri ( residues ) and others - Have survived. Outside of Egypt's Coptic served in Christian Nubia as a written language.

Font

The Coptic is in a - written about thirty -character font - depending on the dialect. Most of the Coptic alphabet is derived from the Greek alphabet, some characters go back to the demotic writing. In contrast to the systems, the hieroglyphic and Demotic previously applied for the textualization of the Egyptian, Coptic writing the vowels and consonants is a phonetic spelling, equally.

As a rule represents a letter of the Coptic writing a phoneme dar. There are some exceptions:

• ⲑ th, ⲫ ph, kh ⲭ, ⲝ ks, ⲯ ps and ϯ ti are in most dialects monograms, each representing a sequence of two phonemes.
• Conversely, / y / plene as ⲉ ⲓ and / w / as written ⲟ ⲩ.
• For phoneme / ʔ / there is no corresponding letters.

Structure

The following sections provide a general overview of the basic structures of the Coptic grammar. The grammatical system follows, in particular the representation of Layton 2000. For a detailed overview of the grammar of the Sahidic see the article Sahidic.

Phonology

The Coptic dialects have slightly more than twenty phonemes. Five of them, namely, / a /, / e /, / ē /, / o /, / ō /, can only syllabic occur, the remaining are both syllabic and non - syllabic. Thus enters / n / in the syllable / mn / [ Mn] syllabic in / men / [men ] on the other hand nichtsilbisch. Of these phonemes are only seven voiced ( / b / [ β ], / y /, / l /, / m /, / n /, / r /, / w / ), further voiced phonemes ( / g /, / d /, / z / ) occur only in Greek loanwords; Mark Coptic words originally in the corresponding characters do not own phonemes, but allophones of the voiceless counterparts. In all dialects, there are five plosive phonemes / k /, / p /, / t /, / k ʲ /, / ʔ /, an affricate / č / (ie [TS ] ) and some fricatives, which includes at least / s /, / š /, / f /, / h / are; / ḫ / ( graphically ϧ, ⳉ, Ϧ ) occurs in certain dialects. In Bohairic have / p /, / k /, / t /, aspirated allophones. Very striking is the almost complete abandonment of the phoneme / r / in Fayyumischen that there instead as / l / appears.

The transcription used in this Article of the Coptic distinguishes the graphemes of the Coptic font regardless of allographs. Accordingly, for example, both ⲧ ⲓ as well as ϯ ti reproduced. In contrast, allophones, as far as they are distinguished by the Coptic script, separated; consequently here / nō / [ nu ] described as nu. In addition, the syllabic and non- syllabic allophones of / y / and / f / distinguished.

Noun Phrase

Morphological Categories Coptic noun

The Coptic nominal system has the genera masculine and feminine and the singular and plural Numbers. In contrast to earlier forms of the Egyptian these categories will be tagged in Coptic itself on nouns. For the Coptic has its own category of determination or indetermination, which is mainly marked by various articles and demonstrative pronouns that are inflected according to gender and number.

Determinacy and indeterminacy

Indeterminacy (w -, plural singular hen- ) or a series of sometimes adjectival, substantival Indefinitpronomina partly indicated by the indefinite article. To mark indeterminate noun phrases is a formal group of closely related morphemes, where the elements p ( masculine singular ), t ( feminine singular) and n ( plural) are common. It is described as follows forms which are usually in front of the core of the noun phrase ( the aspirated allophones of the Bohairic shall be disregarded and the examples are - unless otherwise indicated - Sahidic ):

Determined noun phrases that are not nominal, but pronominal be formed with the following morphemes:

Pronouns

Personal pronouns

Occur depending on the position and syntactic function personal pronouns in different forms. It can be independent ( absolute ) differ -dependent ( proclitic ) and suffixed forms. The latter occur in numerous allomorphs. As is typical of Afro-Asiatic languages ​​, the genus is distinguished from the personal pronouns only in the 2nd and 3rd person singular. The following table lists the corresponding morphology of the Sahidic dialect on:

Absolute personal pronouns are a few exceptions at the beginning of a sentence and have many uses in concrete action. You can stand in the nominal rate and in three-part Konjugationsmustern; as the subject of two-part Konjugationsmustern sets the Coptic one the proklitischen pronouns. Suffixpronomina are always suffixed to a reference word. They are used in particular in the Verbalkonjugation as subject and object and as an object of prepositions. In possessive using possessive pronouns and possessive they are behind and behind a small group of nouns. Nouns, and infinitives, and prepositions make Suffixpronomina a special morphological form, pronominalis status.

Verbal morphology

Whereas the old Egyptian had a complex synthetic verbal morphology, conjugation of most Coptic verbs requires only two forms: the infinitive and the High. The infinitive expresses predominantly of a process and can occur both as a predicate as well as the head of a noun phrase. In contrast, expresses a state of High and is limited to the function of a predicate. Infinitive of a verb and High have essentially the same consonant inventory but different vowels: "To be built " kot "build" ( infinitive ), KET ( Qualitative).

A predominantly loud historically conditioned, no longer productive category of the infinitive is the status. If an infinitive free, it has absolutus status; Infinitives in front of a Suffixpronomen nominal object finally be in status pronominalis and before a directly connected nominalism in the state:

• Absolutus status kot "build"

• " build a house, building a house " ket w -ei

• Kot = f " build it "

Only part of the infinitives can make all three states; they are referred to as " variable infinitive " hereinafter.

A particular use of the infinitive is the causative infinitive, the ( tre Sahidic, Bohairisch t ʰ re / t ʰ ro, Achmimisch te) from the infinitive in combination with an additional morpheme is formed. The causative infinitive allowed in contrast to the normal infinitive an indication of its subject, which then stands between tre, t ʰ re / t ʰ ro, te and the infinitive, cf

Especially as a predicate, the causative infinitive, which goes back historically to a periphrastic causative construction, actually causative meaning:

Conjugation and sentence patterns

Nominal rate

The nominal set a number of sentence patterns are called, whose predicate is not verbal, but is formed by a noun phrase. In most sentence patterns of this type is also an inflected according to gender and number morpheme is used that resembles a copula ( masculine singular, pe, te feminine, plural ne ) and is formally and etymologically with different Determinationsmarkern in conjunction. The negation is performed with ( n ) ... at / s. As a pronominal subject of the 1st and 2nd person nowhere else applied enttonten forms of absolute pronouns are used in certain dialects. Choice and position of morphemes has this effect on pragmatic aspects of the sentence:

Two-piece conjugation

Two-piece conjugation consist only of a subject and a predicate. The subject may be a determined noun to act a proklitisches pronoun or an expression wn indeterminate noun. The predicate is formed by an infinitive, a High or adverbial phrase; to express the future tense is facing an infinitive predicate position in the morpheme na ( Fayyumisch ne ); the negation is done by trailing on / s, which is supplemented in most dialects imagined by n.

Three-piece conjugation

Three-piece conjugation consist of a Konjugationsbasis, following a subject and the predicate. The Konjugationsbasis is characteristic of tense, mood, aspect, type of action and the syntactic function of the sentence ( main clause, Time clauses, etc.). Pronominal subjects are expressed by certain allomorphs of suffixed pronouns; in the predicate must be an infinitive. In all dialects, there are almost the same Konjugationsbasen, which usually differ only in phonological terms. The following forms are in the Sahidic in main clauses possible:

Another set of molds is used in the embedded blocks. Its negation is done with only one morpheme ( Sahidic, Achmimisch, Subachmimisch tm; Bohairisch, Fayyumisch STEM), compare n = f SOTM " and he hears " ( Sahidic ) with negated n = f - tm- SotM " and he does not hear ." The Nebensatzkonjugationsbasen the Sahidic are:

Objects and adverbials

Objects follow the verb Verbs that have a variable infinitive, a direct object can either be suffixed to the infinitive, or be connected with a preposition. Undetermined objects are always suffixed, objects with marked determination or indetermination are always connected in two-part Konjugationsmustern with preposition, in three-part Konjugationsmustern both constructions are possible. Verbs that only have absolutus status, always include the direct object of a preposition. Examples from the Sahidic:

• Two-part conjugation: pčois me nn - dikaios "the Lord loves the righteous "
• Tripartite conjugation: a = f = s COO " he said it "

If no object is suffixed, then follows an indirect always a direct object; pronominal objects are, however, always before nominal. Adverbs and prepositional phrases are usually behind the objects. Examples:

Transpositions

Independent sets can be transposed by certain standing at the beginning of a sentence set converters in syntactic or semantic terms. The shapes of the rate converter depend on the type of transposition and of semantics and syntax of the transposed sentence. Thus, the Sahidic set se- SotM " hear " are transposed into the following four sentences or phrases:

• Substantively: e -w- SotM " they hear "
• Relatively: et -u- SOTM mmo = f " the one they hear "
• Adverbial: e -w- SotM " by listening "
• Präterital: ne -w- SotM " they heard "

Vocabulary

In the Coptic vocabulary can be divided into two major groups differ historical terms. Several thousand words are inherited from earlier phases of the Egyptian; however, a substantial proportion comes from the Greek. This includes both religious or technical terms ( anastasis < Greek ἀνάστασις "Resurrection" ) as well as ordinary words like de, nde < Greek δέ "but". In contrast to other languages, the morphology was not borrowed from foreign words, but adapted to the Coptic. Some words have been borrowed from other languages ​​or have no known etymology, among these there are also some elements of basic vocabulary.