Roots and Rootlessness
Roots and Rootlessness
Paleolinguistics and the Prehistory of the Jews
This chapter examines the use of etymology, the study of the origin of words, as a way to elucidate the prehistory of the Jews and thus their origins. Roots are particularly easy to recognize in Hebrew and other Semitic languages because they usually take the form of three consonants that carry the basic semantic meaning of the word. The chapter first provides an overview of the connection between etymology and genealogy before discussing the prehistory of the Hebrews. It then considers how the concept of prehistory reshaped the way scholars approached the question of Jewish origins by focusing on a group of proto-people known as the Habiru. It also explores Ferdinand de Saussure's critique of paleolinguistics and the implications of the turn from paleolinguistics as a means to investigate the prehistory of the Hebrews.
Keywords: etymology, Jews, roots, genealogy, Hebrews, prehistory, Jewish origins, Habiru, Ferdinand de Saussure, paleolinguistics
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