maljada

Hapax in a bilingual Greek-Sidetic inscription from Side, c. 2^nd c. BC (Nollé 1993a:277).

[Zs.S.]

nom./acc. pl. c.

maljadaś

S 1, 2

The attestation follows Pérez Orozco 2007a:137, checked against the photographs in Paribeni & Romanelli 1914a:cols. 129f. Fig. 25 and Nollé 1988a:Taf. I. On the lack of further segmentation and on the grammatical definition see under Meaning.

[Zs.S.]

On the reading of the fourth sign (N7) as ‹j› instead of ‹w› as previously assumed see the discussion s.v. iśtratageja. On the conventional transcription ‹ś› (without any phonetic implication) for the last sign (N14) see s.v. ośad and Simon 2021a:380 why the (re-)introduction of its transcription with ‹z› by Pérez Orozco 2020a is not supported.

[Zs.S.]

The meanings proposed for maljadaś differ widely:

(1) It has been long observed that maljadaś corresponds to χαριστήρια ‘thank-offerings’ of the Greek section (Bossert 1950b:10; Brandenstein 1958a:85; Woudhuizen 1984-1985a:122; Neumann 1978b:80, Neumann 1992a:157; Nollé 2001a:633, 646; [12141]Pérez Orozco 2020a:167 [for his previous views see below]), although it was translated rarely in that way (Woudhuizen 1984-1985a:121f.; Neumann 1992a; Nollé 2001a:632f., 646). Also Eichner 1988b:48 n. 15 entertained this possibility, but he rather expected a nom.-acc. pl. n. form in this case instead of a commune form, which is obviously not a compelling argument.

(2) Instead, Eichner 1985a:10, 13f., Eichner 1988b:48f. proposed to segment it further (in his then appropriate reading) as malwa daś and to translate it as “als Dankesgeschenk gegeben (??)” (followed by Zinko & Zinko 2019a:420, who translated “das” as ‘widmete’, without referring to Eichner or any of the alternatives).

(3) Schürr 1997c:138, Schürr 1999a:167 n. 6 and Pérez Orozco 2003a:106f., Pérez Orozco 2007a:127, 137 (but see above) did not segment it, but assumed a papponym based on the theonym Malja-, an Anatolian goddess compared to Athena (followed by Lebrun 2012b:357 and Oreshko 2021b:133 n. 6 [although he calls these texts “Pisidian”]; cf. already Ševoroškin 1975a:162f.; Rizza 2019a:543 claims that Pérez Orozco 2003a suggested “the designation of the place of origin”, which is not the case).

(4) Melchert apud Pérez Orozco 2007a:127 did not segment it and suggested a priestly rank.

(5) Rizza 2019a:543f. segmented it as “maly/wa das” and translated as “placed/dedicated (this) to Malya (Athena)” (and compared the alleged verb da- with Lyc. ñta- <ñta ta- ‘hineinlegen’), followed by Warbinek & Giusfredi 2023a:144.

Rizza’s translation is improbable, since the inscription already starts with the dedication to Athena (deaθono, Rizza does not accept this translation, see the discussion s.v. de), and while it cannot be excluded that also the (alleged) Sidetic name of the goddess could be mentioned, this would be quite unusual and is contradicted by the parallel structure of the Greek and Sidetic sections (that make χαριστήρια the equivalent of maljadaś). The idea of the papponym cannot be excluded either, but the Greek part of the inscription (for its most recent edition see Rizza 2019a:537‒539) does not mention the grandfather as admitted already by Schürr 1997c:138 (this proposal was excluded by Nollé 2001a:633 exactly on this ground and because in the Sidetic-Greek bilinguals the Sidetic parts do not contain more information than the Greek section). Also this proposal is contradicted by the parallel structure of the Greek and Sidetic sections (Rizza 2019a:543, who adds his doubts on the reading of the letter ‹y›). The proposal of a priestly rank is even less probable due to the same reasons.

More fitting are the translations ‘thank-offering’ and ‘placed/dedicated as thank offering’ from a general contextual point of view as well as from the point of the view of the Greek section, since, as mentioned above, it makes χαριστήρια ‘thank-offerings’ the equivalent of maljadaś (neither the outdated reading of Eichner nor the existence of papponymic formulae in Sidetic are counter-arguments, contra Rizza 2019a:543). Since the inscription does not contain any verb (see below), both an acc. and a nom. case is possible in theory (with Pérez Orozco 2020a:159).

From a formal point of view there are two circumstances that argue against the analysis of maljadaś as a combination of a substantive with a verb (Rizza 2019a:543 prefers this segmentation because it explains more parts of Sidetic morphology and because it keeps “the textual parallelism between the two sections”, which is, however, not the case): First, maljadaś is written in one word (see already Neumann 1992a:158f.; the counter-argument of Rizza 2019a:543 that the Greek part is inconsistent from the point of view of scriptio continua is not decisive, because we are dealing with the Sidetic part). Although it is not impossible that the verb is phonologically clitic in Sidetic (as suggested by Eichner 1988b:49) or that the nominal part became clitic in a set phrase, this is obviously the less probable possibility. Second, the ending °ś is certainly attested until now only as acc. pl. c. However, it has not been confirmed yet as a verbal ending, since the alleged cases are rather substantives (see the discussions s.v. iśtratageja and ew). Furthermore, if maljadaś means only ‘thank-offerings’, then the Greek and Sidetic parts are not only parallel but also perfectly mirror each other (as far as the preserved parts of the Greek section allow to judge it). All in all, the more probable form and translation of maljadaś are acc. (or perhaps nom.) pl. c. ‘thank-offerings’ with Neumann 1992a.

[Zs.S.]