/ada-/, ara/i
‘food’
- Language
- Hieroglyphic Luwian
- Grammar
- subst
- ID
- 1019
1. Individual Anatolian Languages
1.1 Hieroglyphic Luwian
/ada-/, ara/i
‘food’1.1.1Transmission
This lexeme is a hapax legomenon, attested once in an inscription from Aleppo and dated to the late 10th or early 9th century.
[AH.B.]
1.1.2Forms
| nom./acc. pl. or coll. | /ada/ | ara/i-a | BABYLON 1, §15 (Aleppo) |
1.1.3Graphic Features
1.1.3.1Phonological Interpretation
With only one attestation, the phonological interpretation of the lexeme hinges on whether or not its etymological connection is correct (see discussion on meaning below). If /ara/ is – as seems highly likely – indeed a neuter abstract noun to the root verb /ad-/, then the lexeme is to be interpreted as /ada/ with the expected rhotacism.
[AH.B.]
1.1.4Meaning
The meaning of this lexeme has long eluded scholars, because the context itself, a curse formula, has long been unclear for its somewhat unusual ending involving an infinitive after the finite verb. However, a new analysis sees it in relation to the verb /ad-(ti)/, and thus its meaning is clarified. For the curse formula in this text passage, Yakubovich 2016a:88-90 (with acknowledgement to Melchert) suggests that ara/i-a resumes, in the shape of a noun, the verb ‘to eat’ from a few clauses earlier within the same text, where it occurs as /azza-/ ‘to begin to eat (vel sim.)’. In both contexts, the forms relating to /ad-/, i.e. noun and verb respectively, are paired with similar forms relating to the verb /pa-/ ‘to drink’, /pazza-/ ‘to begin to drink (?)’ and /patta/ ‘drink (?)’. Such double mention of both roots would complete the curse formula, and it therefore appears to be the most suitable interpretation.
[AH.B.]
1.1.5Stem
The lexeme is a thematic neuter abstract noun to the verbal root /ad-/ ‘to eat’ (Yakubovich 2016a:89), although plurale tantum would be expected based on the semantics.
[AH.B.]
For the lemma head see HLuw. /ad-(ti)/.