Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae
Volume/Issue:
Volume 76: Issue 4
Some Remarks on the Proto-Middle Persian Inscription Persis 2 and the Oblique Case
Author:
Marco Fattori Dipartimento di Lettere e Culture Moderne, ‘Sapienza’ University of Rome, Rome, Italy

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Pages:
511–527
Online Publication Date:
23 Nov 2023
Publication Date:
20 Dec 2023
Article Category:
Research Article
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1556/062.2023.00371
Keywords:
Persis 2; Middle Persian; Pahlavi; Oblique Case; Final y; Heterography
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This article deals with a pre-Sasanian inscription written in Middle Persian script recently published by N. Sims-Williams, who named it ‘Persis 2’. First, some observations on the reading and interpretation of the text are proposed. Then, it is argued that the instances of final -y in this inscription could correspond to a phonetic notation of the oblique singular ending -ē, hitherto only reconstructed for proto-Middle Persian. Finally, a discussion on the origin of heterographic writing with respect to the graphical representation of Iranian morphological endings is proposed, in the attempt to explain why a final -y for the ending -ē is not regularly noted in all the comparable documents from the middle Arsacid period.

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Cover Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae
Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae
Print ISSN:
0001-6446
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Dr. Gábor Kósa
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Institute of East Asian Studies
Eötvös Loránd University
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Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae
Language English
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