Or 17059

Fragments of drafts of Hakham Ezra Reuben Dangoor's work on Hebrew grammar (a complete draft of which is contained in Or 17057).

Or 17059 (1):

[Note: it is unclear whether folio 1 is part of the same original unit as folios 2 and 3.]

Folio 1v. Contains a corrected fair copy of Exercise (literally: sample; Hebrew dugma / דוגמא) no. 1, an earlier, edited version of which is preserved in manuscript Or 17058, after the section on 'vowels' = ha-tenu'ot / התנועות.

Folio 2r: Item no. 8, entitled havarah / הברה = 'syllable', with an exercise. (This item is not in the earlier versions [manuscripts Or 17057 and Or 17058], where Item numbered 8 labels the section on 'vowels'.)

Folio 2v: Items 9 & 10, entitled sheṿa / שוא = 'schwa', an expanded version of Items 9 & 10 in the earlier versions.

Folio 3r: Item (14?) with exercise, entitled sheṿa murkav / שוא מרכב = 'composite schwa'. Expanded version of one point treated in Item 12 of the earlier versions.

Folio 3v: Item 15, with exercise, entitled naḥ nir’e - naḥ nistar / נח נראה - נח נסתר ‘quiescent noticed – quiescent hidden’. The first (nir’eh / נראה / noticed) indicates a consonant that is pronounced at end of a ‘closed syllable’: at the end of a consonant-vowel-consonant sequence, this consonant is not followed by its own vowel, but is nevertheless sounded, via the preceding vowel. The second (nistar / נסתר / hidden) indicates an unpronounced letter coming after a consonant and a vowel.

Or 17059 (2).

This fragment, written in purple ink, seems to be earlier than manuscripts Or 17057 and Or 17058, as indicated by editorial changes in this fragment that are part the main text in Or 17057 and Or 17058. In this fragment, the items are not numbered; and they are in a different order than they are in Or 17057. Also, this fragment contains advanced / detailed items that are not in Or 17057. The order of items here, where applicable coordinating with the item numbers of Or 17057, is as follows:

Folio 1r: [fragment begins in the middle of the section on ‘interchange, lack, and surplus of the letters Alef, H, Ṿ, Y [‘aHaṾiY]’] (= mid Item 16 of Or 17057);

Folios 1v to top 2r: ‘interchange, lack, and surplus of the letter nun’ and ‘Furtive pataḥ’ (= Items 17 & 18 of Or 17057);

Folio 2r-v: ‘Dagesh / דגש = the placement of a dot into a consonant, containing two types: dagesh ḥazaḳ / דגש חזק = ‘strong dot’ (Latin: dagesh forte); and dagesh ḳal / דגש קל = ‘light [i.e. weak] dot’ (Latin: dagesh lene)’; details of the “strong dot / dagesh forte”’ (= Items 13 & 14 of Or 17057);

Folio 3r: fourteen phenomena that the presence of a dagesh forte may indicate;

Folios 3v – 4r: BGD KPT / בגד כפת rules (cf. Item 19 of Or 17057);

Folio bottom 4r – mid 4v: Additional rules / exceptions of BGD KPT / בגד כפת (cf. Item 20 of Or 17057);

Folios bottom 4v – top 5r: Ḳamats/Ḳamets ḥaṭaf/ḥaṭuf / קמץ חטף, literally a ‘grabbed ḳamats’ viz. one that functions as a short o-vowel rather than a long-a vowel (= Item 21 of Or 17057);

Folio 5r-v: rules of the cantillation notes;

Folio bottom 5v: root letters.

Or 17059 (3).

[Contains two fragments, A and B, in a single handwriting and ink-type, and possibly coming from the top and bottom of a single sheet of paper.]

Some of the special applications of BGD KPT / בגד כפת rules.

Fragment A contains the first two of the following cases, whereas Fragment B contains all three. (Cf. Item 19, subsections 3 – 5, of Or 17057.)

The bottom of Fragment A, just after case [b], contains the attribution, ‘The wording of Rabbi Simḥa Calimani [of sainted memory] / ר’ שמחה קלימאני זצ”ל (Venice, 1699 – 1784), copied from another work’.

The three cases: [a] daḥiḳ / דחיק = ‘squeezed’, viz. do not aspirate the BGD KPT / בגד כפת letter that begins the second word in a word-pair, when the first word in the pair is short (= monosyllabic) with a short vowel, the final letter of which is an H / ה (used as a vowel letter, not a consonant), and which is attached to the second word with a maḳḳef / מקף i.e. a ‘binder’; [b] the same applies in the more complex case labelled ’ate marḥiḳ / אתי מרחיק = letters of distance; and [c] when the letters Ṭ-S Sh-Ḳ-Tz N-Ṿ-Z-L-Y-M / (mnemonic: ṬaS SheḲeTz NOZLIM) / ט”ס ש”קץ נוז”לים begin the second word in a closely connected word-pair, they will contain a dagesh / דגש = dot, as will the BGD KPT / בגד כפת letters.

[End]