Several years back I floated Mario Kozah's Qaṭrâyîth here, a language of greater-Qatar reported by Syriac-writing Nestorians. The main message I garnered from Kozah is that Qaṭrâyîth's forty-word lexicon was highly Semitic but that the language overall was not Aramaic. But I didn't buy his book or even read it. I pondered some holdover from Hasaitic because, whatever, blog: I can just say stuff here. The indefatiguable Ahmad al-Jallad has read that book for me.
Meanwhile for Arabic-proper in this region, al-Jallad endorses Holes 2018 doi 10.1093/oso/9780198701378.003.0005 over whatever Chaim Rabin did in 1951. 'Abd-Qaysan, our 'Abd al-Qays, had moved thither by AD 500, along with others. Kozah, so al-Jallad reports, thought Qaṭrâyîth was one of these. Al-Jallad observes that these words are simply not baseline Arabic. The Aramaeans, having lived with Arabic as long as they have, were certainly able to tell as much at the time.
That 12% 5/40 "unknown" is not Sumerian; al-Jallad knows Akkadian well-enough to tell Sumerian, and finds only two words of Akkadian. Al-Jallad footnotes various Semitic and Iranian etymologies whence to start. For my part I wonder where we should involve Khuzi / Elamite, and if so at what stage.
BACKDATE 4/10
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