999 Pounds

Žḥá yətəmə́nna s-ġar rə́bbi a-yəfk-ís əlf zní

'Žḥá wished of god to give him 1.000 Libyan pounds'

• yətəmə́nna 'to wish' 3sg.m.pf. < Ar. tamannā 'to desire, wish'
• s-ġar rə́bbi 'from god'
• a-yəfk-ís 'to give' aor.3sg.m. + 3sg. indirect object
• əlf 'thousand' < Ar. ʔalf 'id. '
• zní 'pound' < Ar. žunaih 'id.' but obviously the dialectal pronunciation, not the MSA pronunciation. MSA changed it to look/sound more classical. [Lameen:] From the British coin Guinea

u yəqqím iṭə́lləb u itənn-ís: Ya rắbbi undú yənqíṣa iwínan a-uġə́x-tenet-ká!

'and he started requesting/begging and saying: 'O god! If even one is lacking, I will not take them!'

• yəqqím inchoative 3sg.m.pf.
• iṭə́lləb 3sg.m.impf. 'to request' <Ar. ṭalaba 'to look, search; to request etc.'
• Ya rắbbi  'o god!' with an Arabic vocative particle ya instead of a/ay that we've seen so far.
• undú 'if'
• yənqíṣa 'to be lacking' 3sg.m.pf. < Ar. naqaṣa 'to decrease, become less, diminish, be diminished, be reduced'
• iwínan 'one'
• a-uġə́x-tenet-ká aor.1sg. 'to take' + 3pl.f. direct object suffix + negative.

Baʕadén yəslí-t əlhúdi aringí-nnəs

'Then his Jewish neighbour heard him'

• Baʕadén
• yəslí-t 'to hear' 3sg.mp
• əlhúdi 'Jew'. Clearly from Arabic, but my MSA dictionary wasn't of much help. I could find al-hūd 'Jewry' and yahūdiy 'jewish'. This word seems to be a mix between these two.
• aringí-nnəs 'his neighbour'. This final í is remarkable. In Paradisi's wordlist we find arîng,  anîrg pl. ringîn, nirgîn 'neighbour' (notice the interesting metathesized forms). The í is written with a short accented í, which you never really see, so this seems to actually be the schwa of the suffix, but I'm not sure what motivated it to be colored to an i-like sound for Paradisi to transcribe it as í.

Baʕadén in-ís lhúdi y-imán-nəs wăllahi qáma a-ḥdəfá-s tə́səʕa míyət id təsəʕa u təsʕín žní w-a-ggulə́x-t a-yuġí-tənət naġ wə́la

'Then the Jew said to himself: I swear, now, I will throw him 999 Libyan pounds and I'll see (if) he takes them or not.'

• in-ís 'he said'
• y-imán-nəs 'to himself'
• wăllahi 'by god'  means 'I swear to god'
• qáma 'now'
• a-ḥdəfá-s 'I will throw to him' 1sg.aor. This should be from Arabic, but I can't find the word in Wehr. Apparently Siwi has ʕadef with the same meaning.
• tə́səʕa míyət id təsəʕa u təsʕín 999 litt: nine hundred with nine and ninety.
• žní 'pound' Notice that this time the word has the expected ž
• w-a-ggulə́x-t 'and I will see him' 1sg.aor.
• a-yuġí-tənət  'he takes them' 3sg.m.aor.
• naġ 'or'
• wə́la < Ar. wa-lā 'nor, neither', a bit of an odd construction 'or nor' for 'or not'. Dialectal use of wa-lā? [Lameen:] cp. Siwi ula "no" (and discussion of its origins in my thesis...)

w-igi-tə́nət arəqúṭ-i u yəḥdəf-tə́nət dit nə Žḥá s-ar ərróšən.

'And he put them in rags and he threw them in front of Zha from the window'

• w-igi-tə́nət 'and he did/put them'
• arəqúṭ-i 'in rags'. For some reason this word was ringing a bell. Not sure why.
• u yəḥdəf-tə́nət 'and he threw them'
• dit nə Žḥá 'in front of Žḥá'
• s-ar ərróšən 'from the window' <Ar. rawšan 'skylight, scuttle; peep-window, peep-hole, spy-hole'

 U yətuár arăqúṭ u yəḥsəb-tə́nət yufi-tə́nət ənqəṣníta iwínan u baʕadén in-ís:

'And he opened the rags and he counted them and found them to be missing one (pound) and then he said:'

• yətuár 'to open, to be opened' 3sg.m.pf. Actually a passive of yar/ar 'to open', but can have an active meaning as well.
• yəḥsəb-tə́nət 'he counted them'
• yufi-tə́nət 'found them'
• ənqəṣníta 'to be lacking' 3pl.f.pf.

wa yəfki-díka lʕə́lla a-yəfki-dík iwínan

'He who gave me many (pounds), may he give me one (more pound)'

• wa yəfki-díka 'he who gave me'
• lʕə́lla 'much, many'
• a-yəfki-dík 'may he give me', Aorist used to express a wish here.

baʕadén igi-tə́nət ṣṣundúq-i u nəttín yəfríḥa

'Then he put them in a box and he was happy'

• igi-tə́nət 'he put them'
• ṣṣundúq-i 'in a box' < Ar. ṣundūq ‘crate, box; chest’. Here a short u is retained from Arabic. It seems that, the q-dialect Aujila loaned from retained the opposition of u and i, and Aujila simply took it over. This makes the short vowel system in Aujila oddly versatile considering that only one short vowel is present in the Berber lexicon.
• u nəttín 'and he'
• yəfríḥa 'he was happy, satisfied'

baʕadén yəškí əlhúdi w-in-ís yə-Žḥá: aġíd əlbarat-ənnúk.

'Then the Jew cam out and said to Žḥá: bring (me) my money!'

• yəškí 'to come out'
• aġíd Imperative 'bring'

In-ís Žḥá: rə́bbi yəfki-díka albəṣírət u ku tġallít a-ttuġát-tət s-ġár-i?

'Žḥá said: god gave it to me willingly and you want to take it away from me?'

• albəṣírət < Ar. baṣīra(t) 'insight, penetration, discernemnent, understanding' but the phrase ʕan baṣīra(t) means 'deliberately, willingly', which makes more sense to be the meaning here. Does dialect arabic drop the ʕan?
• u ku 'and you'
• tġallít 'to want' 2sg.pf.
• a-ttuġát-tət 'to take' 2sg.aor. + 3sg.f. DO
• s-ġár-i 'from me'

In-ís əlhúdi: nək wa əḥdəx-títa i-kú dax a-gguláx-ku a-ttuġa(t)-tə́net ənqəṣníta naġ wə́la

'The Jew said: I was the one who threw it to you in order to see (if) you would take them with (one pound) missing or not.'

• nək wa əḥdəx-títa 'I'm the one who threw it'
• i-kú 'to you' [Lameen:] All Berber languages, as far as I know, use the full forms of pronouns after i, not the prepositional ones.
• dax 'so, in order to'
• a-gguláx-ku 'to see you'
• a-ttuġa(t)-tə́net 'you would take them'

yəlġóm a-yəfki-tə́net y-əlhúdi

'he refused to give them (back) to the Jew'

• yəlġóm 'to refuse' 3sg.m.pf.
• a-yəfki-tə́net 'to give them' 3sg.m.aor.

Baʕadén in-ís əlhúdi: nək a-nṭárəx-ku-ká ir a-nnaʕádd nək-ídd-ək ar əlqə́ḍi.

'Then the Jew said: I will not let you go until me and you have gone to the Qadi'

• a-nṭárəx-ku-ká 'I will not let you go' 1sg.aor. with 2sg. object. + negative. An Arabic word must lie at it's origin but naṭara means 'to watch, to guard', which seems like the exact opposite of the word that I'd expect.
• ir 'until'
• a-nnaʕádd 'to go' 1pl.aor.
• nək-ídd-ək I with-you
• ar əlqə́ḍi 'to the qadi'

In-ís Žḥá: nək ʕəyyánəx u zmərx-ká a-ʕaddə́x af šərin-núk w-ərwə́ḥa s-ġar šmuṭ u ġar-i-ká təlába

'Žḥá said: I am sick and I am unable to go by foot(?) and I am afraid of the cold and I don't have a Barracan'

• ʕəyyánəx 'I am sick'. Arabic must underly this, I could not find the word. [Lameen:] < Ar. ʕayyān "exhausted, tired, ill".
• zmərx-ká 'I am not able' The form looks like a Perfect, but that is not the tense I would expect, I'd rather expect an Imperfect.
• a-ʕaddə́x 'to go' 1sg.aor.
• af šərin-núk 'on my legs'?? translation by Paradisi as 'a piedi', I can't find the word that this represents. Is it Arabic?
• w-ərwə́ḥa 'and I am afraid' I think this, again, is a Perfect, while I'd expect an Imperfect here. Am I thinking of Perfect too much as a past tense? Or am I not regarding Imperfect enough as a way to express habitual action?
• s-ġar šmuṭ  'of the cold'
• u ġar-i-ká təlába 'and I don't have a barracan' Litt: and to me is not a barracan'

In-ís əlhúdi: afká-k aẓíṭ id təlába ġar ʕádd ídd-i ar əlqə́ḍi

'The Jew said: I will give you a donkey and a Barracan but you must go with me to the Qadi'

• afká-k 'I will give you' 1sg.aor.+2sg.DO
• aẓíṭ id təlába 'donkey and barracan'
• ġar 'but'
• ʕádd 'go' imperative singular
• ídd-i 'with me'

Baʕád uṣə́llən ar əlqə́ḍi išərw-ís ləhúdi s-alá ṣarána.

'Later they arrive at the Qadi, the Jew tells him about what happened'

• Baʕád 'later'
• uṣə́llən 'to arrive' 3pl.pf. I think this is from Arabic waṣala 'to join, unite', possibly form II.
• išərw-ís 'to tell' 3sg.m.pf. + 3sg.IO.
• s-alá s- 'from' but also apparently 'about' + alá 'that wich', a sort of relative pronoun.
• ṣarána 'to happen' 3pl.m. < Ar. ṣāra 'to happen'

In-ís əlqə́ḍi i-Žḥá: ṣəḥíḥ žlan-íya?

'The Qadi says to Žḥá: Trutful is this story? (The force, you must use!)'

• ṣəḥíḥ 'truthful, healthy'
• žlan-íya 'this story', I'm a bit surprised by the Yoda-like flipping of the word order from what I would expect. Is ṣaḥíḥ being used as a stative verb? That would not require endings, but I'm a bit surprised that Arabic adjectives can be employed like that.

Baʕadén in-ís: lhúdi iqə́lləz fəll-íwi u nək rwíḥḥa a-yə́qləz w-a-in-ís ḥə́tta tlaba-nnúk ta tənní fəll-íwi t-tá-nnəs nəttín id aẓiṭ-ənnúk a-in-ís d-wá-nnəs nəttín.

'Then he said: The Jew is lying about me! And I am afraid that he will lie and say that even my Barracan that I'm wearing is his and that he will say that my donkey is his!'

• iqə́lləz 'to lie' 3sg.m.impf.
• fəll-íwi 'on me' to mean 'about me'
• rwíḥḥa 'to be afraid' 1sg.pf. (once again a, unexpected to me, Perfect. It seems like I really can't get my head around this use of the Perfect, isn't he currently in the state of being afraid, thus not having finished it?)
• a-yə́qləz 'to lie' 3sg.m.aor.
• w-a-in-ís 'and he will say'
• ḥə́tta 'even' < Ar. ?
• ta tənní fəll-íwi 'that is on me' Pronoun + 'to be, exist' 3sg.f.pf. + on-me
• t-tá-nnəs nəttín assimilation of d- 'copula' + tá-nnəs 'that of his', nəttín 'he' apparently placed after it to emphasize the possesive relationship. 'He will even says that this Baraccan is his'
• a-in-ís d-wá-nnəs nəttín. 'he will say is his!' once again with extra pronoun 'he'.

Baʕadén iʕáyəṭ əlhúdi w-in-ís y-əlqə́ḍi: wălláhi t-ti-nnúk

'Then the Jew scremead and said to the Qadi: I swear they are mine!'

• iʕáyəṭ 'to scream' 3sg.m.pf., now that I have confirmed what the perfect looks like, I can be sure that the form in the previous text was indeed an imperfect.
• t-ti-nnúk copula d- + fem plural pronoun ti-nnúk 'those of mine'

In-ís əlqə́ḍi: ku təqəllət ṣəḥíḥ ʕádd ʕádd rə́waḥ

'The Qadi said: You really are lying! Go! Go! Go home!'

• təqə́llət 'you are lying' 2sg.impf.
• ṣəḥíḥ 'truthfull, healthy' used as an adverb here. I like how nicely it translates to English.
• rə́waḥ 'go home' imperative singular.

U yəʕádd Žḥá yəfríḥa yəḥəṣṣíla ədbúš id aẓíṭ id əlbarát

'And Žḥá went (away) happy, having obtained clothes, a donkey and money'

• yəḥəṣṣíla 'to obtain' 3sg.m.pf. < Ar. ḥaṣṣala 'id.'
• ədbúš 'clothes'
• əlbarát 'money'

Comments

[Glen Gordon]

Um... Did I detect anti-Jewish prejudice in this story? I think an added social commentary would be beneficial here about what's going on behind it. It gives me the uneasy impression of a storyteller that sees Jews as "demons" and the judge as the divine instrument of Allah. Ethnologically fascinating, humanistically disturbing.

[PhoeniX]

I'm not really sure what to make of it Glen.

This story could have happened just as well with any other character. But they've specifically chosen for a Jew.

Were I to indulge in a common prejudice towards Jews, I'd say they chose a Jew as a character because he's supposed to have a lot of money (999 Pounds should be an absurd amount around 1960).

But I have no idea if such prejudices were in place in the 1960 in Libya.

I think the actual story here is just a Sly main character who cons his way into getting away with theft + getting rewarded for it too. That's not much different from the European Reynard the Fox.

I should've maybe translated Qadi simply as 'judge' here, Qadi is such a religiously heavy word, which seems to bring forth the Jew vs Islam pattern, which I don't think is present at all.

I wish I could add social commentary, but I'm really in no position to say anything about Judaism in Libya around 1960.

Judaism has been part of North-Africa for a very long time, and Jews and Muslims have coexisted quite peacefully as far as I know.

If you want to read any Anti-semitism in this story, maybe we can recall that Libya was a colony of Italy shortly before that, maybe some of Mussolini's twisted world-view rubbed off on Libyan society?

Some information on that is to be found on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_Libya#Italian_colonization_and_World_War_II

But, I'd feel much more comfortable if someone with more knowledge of Libyan society could say something about this.

[kato]

No, I don't think there is any anti-Jewish prejudice to be detected in this story, and a jews 'demon's vs muslim judge 'good' is reading way too much into it. This story isn't about Jews, it's about a wily character (which, by the way, has been a theme in Arabic folklore and epics since they're first attested) who gets the better of someone who was trying to get the better of him first.

Back when there were Jews in Libya, they would have had their own judges, and a Muslim would presumably have gone to a qadi. But here I don't think it's being portrayed as that, because Awjili probably didn't distinguish between Jewish and Muslim judges as there historically weren't Jews in Awjila (at least not in recent times in Libya).

Jews lived in east and west Libya, in cities as well as very small rural villages, up until about the 1940s, when they started leaving. You can read all about that in other sources. I'm not sure that the Jewish exodus from Libya would have affected Awjila all that much. Perhaps at one point Jewish merchants traded with the oasis, perhaps the Jew in the story is a character typical of folklore in that area.

[Lameen]

žunaih: yeah, it's a loan from English guinea via Egyptian Arabic.

aringí: no, the Tuareg cognate is anarag, so this really is i. It's short because it's followed by a consonant cluster.

wə́la: cp. Siwi ula "no" (and discussion of its origins in my thesis...)

i-kú 'to you': all Berber languages, as far as I know, use the full forms of pronouns after i, not the prepositional ones.

ʕayyánax: < ʕayyān "exhausted, tired, ill".

''isn't he currently in the state of being afraid, thus not having finished it?'': probably the imperfect means "become afraid".

[PhoeniX]

"aringí: no, the Tuareg cognate is anarag, so this really is i. It's short because it's followed by a consonant cluster."

I don't see how the Tuareg cognate shows that this is an i? This does seem like an example of Proto-Berber *a shifting to Aujila i though, again in front of r,l,m,n... It seems like this sound law might actually work out.

(and discussion of its origins in my thesis...) <-- I should really sit down and read that.

"i-kú 'to you': all Berber languages, as far as I know, use the full forms of pronouns after i, not the prepositional ones."

Really? I think that's actually news to me. I guess it's just because they're usually IO suffixes anyway.

[Glen Gordon]

Kato: "This story isn't about Jews, it's about a wily character [...]"

Suuuure.

Anyways, all cultures have some form of prejudice to grapple with in their society. What makes the study of modern cultures harder in some respects to historical study is that the prejudice can be closer to home. It's easy to wave away the Roman prejudice against Ancient Egyptians as silly because we're buffered by a large span of time. A proper ethnologist puts moral judgment aside while still acknowledging common attitudes within the studied culture. We seek too to find the reasons behind these views, no matter what we personally feel about them or how irrational we may think they are. It's not the ethnologist's place to be moral judge. Yet it is the ethnologist's purpose to document all relevant cultural phenomena and to avoid sweeping "less desirable" things under the rug either. All must be noted without judgment.

The Wikipedia link makes it abundantly clear that a long-term, negative attitude towards the Jewish minority in Libya has pervaded and this must be noted. It adds further dimension and social context to this story which helps us learn more about this culture, all its beauty and its ugliness together. Just like humans, no culture is perfect.

[kato]

Glen: I didn't say anything about historical attitudes towards Jews in Libya. I'm saying that I don't think you can detect that in this story, which is obviously a folktale rather than an anecdote. It might not even be Libyan in origin. Or it might be, we don't know. Žḥá is the main character, not the Jew, and with the other stories we've seen here, it's about what happens to him in the end, not about some larger societal dynamic.

[PhoeniX]

"Suuuure."

It's not necessary to reply in such a sarcastic manner. "I don't really believe that" would have sufficed.

Either way, I'll admit that the info on Jews in Libya as found on Wikipedia doesn't speak in favor of 'no prejudice about Jews'.

However, a more in-depth study of the Jew in Aujila (or maybe Libyan in general ) storytelling should give us more insight of the position of the Jew in stories. Sadly, we don't have more data in Aujila Berber about Jews to study their position.

We can't really see how old this story is, and whether it has always had a Jew as the dupe. If it did, and it has for hundreds of years, it would be hard to uphold that this is due to an Anti-Jewish sentiment.

"Jews lived in east and west Libya, in cities as well as very small rural villages, up until about the 1940s, when they started leaving. You can read all about that in other sources. I'm not sure that the Jewish exodus from Libya would have affected Awjila all that much."

This is also an important point. The fact that a Jew appears in this story at all is both strange and maybe somewhat anachronistic. I'm not sure when exactly the texts were written up, but it was published in 1960. In that time there were next to no Jews left in Libya, let alone in Aujila. The chance that any of the inhabitants of Aujila had ever seen a Jew in their life at the time is rather small. After all, Aujila is quite a secluded Oasis which I imagine was far from modernized in 1960, so what are the odds that in previous years anyone had even seen or known what a Jew looked like, let alone settle on establishing any of the prejudices about them were?

There's simply too little data to conclude whether an anti-Jewish sentiment has something to do with the Jewish character in this story.

[Lameen]

I haven't the faintest idea what Awjili attitudes towards Jews were in 1960, but reflexively focusing on the other character's Jewish identity misses the point. This story is closely parallel to the one in "Count it!", with a scholar instead of a Jew, and to many other Juha stories from outside Awjila (like the one about the European Juha who comes to try to outsmart the Arab Juha, and ends up getting fooled by the latter into propping up a wall). The common theme is: an outsider (whether Jew or Christian or Muslim) who thinks he's smart tries to make a fool of Juha, and Juha instead makes a fool of him.

[Glen Gordon]

Lameen: "This story is closely parallel to the one in "Count it!", with a scholar instead of a Jew, and to many other Juha stories from outside Awjila (like the one about the European Juha who comes to try to outsmart the Arab Juha, and ends up getting fooled by the latter into propping up a wall)."

Ah, eureka. Your point is so subtle I almost missed it had I not investigated further.

The Juha stories are mentioned in English Wikipedia under Nasreddin: "He appears in thousands of stories, sometimes witty, sometimes wise, but often, too, a fool or the butt of a joke." And alas, I fear the tables have turned and Nasreddin has made an ass of me!

Anyways, I guess this is what I was looking for when I said that "an added social commentary would be beneficial here". Thanks.