Babyloniaca, études de philologie assyro-babylonienne.

FR. BHL: Die Sprache der Amarnabriefe, mit besonderer
Berilcksichtigung der Kanaanismen. Leipzig 1909. (Leipz.
Sern. Stud. V 2), reviewed by O. E. RAVN.
The Amarna-Letters have proved to be invaluable for different
branches of Semitic study: They form first-rate sources for our knowledge of Asiatic politics in the 16th century B. C., and light of special
value has been thrown on the condition of Palestine in the period
just before the invasion of the country by the Israelites.
The fact that Babylonian was the accepted language of diplomacy
in Western Asia is sufficient to demonstrate how far-reaching was the
influence exercised by Babylonian culture upon the small states of the
neighbourhood and at how early a time this influence took place.
Short discussions concerning the value of the letters for Semitic
linguistics have been published by BEZOLD, MiULLER, ZIMMERN and
KNUDTZON; now, as the standart edition by Mr. KNUDTZON is out, it
has been possible for Dr. Fr. BOHL to compile a complete grammar
of the language of the Amarna-Letters.
It can hardly be said that the grammar of genuine Babylonian will
be modified by the material now before us. We obtain some light on
the curious Babylonian dative of suffixes (~ 15 d); one cannot fail to
see a combination of an[a] and the acc.-suffixes in the interesting
forms -anni, -a'ku, -agu; - forms like tamnhar, with no case-ending
(~ 22 c), have to be put on a rank with other similar forms, that
prove the very early disappearance of the case-endings in Babylonian'.
These texts show, to what degree Babylonian - even when used
as an official means of communication in other countries — has been
influenced by foreign idioms.
The Mitanni and Hittites seem to have lost the faculty of distin1. Cf. 0. E. RAVN, Om nominernes bojning i babylonisk-assyrisk (Nominal
Infiexion in Babylonian and Assyrian) Copenhagen 1909 (with French resume),
pp. 34 ss., 79 Ss.