É. Apor , I. Ormos (ed.): Goldziher Memorial Conference, June 21–22, 2000, Budapest.

HOPKINS, Simon: The Language Studies of Ignaz Goldziher

THE LANGUAGE STUDIES OF IGNAZ GOLDZIHER Landberg and Socin. This feature has a very wide attestation from the early period of Islam down to modern dialeets; it was Goldziher who first showed, here and elsewhere, the extent of its occurrence in Judaeo-Arabic. And typical of Goldziher's concern for technical terminology are his valuable remarks on Maimonides's use of fiqh and its derivatives,

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4'' given as an aside in his review of Sefer ha-miswot, WZKM 3 (1889), 81-82 = GS II 348-349. Goldziher is not best known today in the world of Arabic studies at large for his linguistic writings, least of all for those in the somewhat recondite field of the Arabic literature of the Jews.'

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0 He was, however, among the founders, and perhaps even the principle founder, of the linguistic and textual study of mediaeval Judaeo-Arabic. d) Modem Arabic Since the name of Goldziher is not much associated with the study of modern Arabic, it may be of interest to mention here some details of his activity in this area, especially in the domain of the spoken language. Goldziher did not much care for the renascent literary Arabic of the emerging Arabic press and periodical literature. Any youthful thoughts he may have had of investigating this subject had evaporated entirely by 1898, when he writes disparagingly to Hartmann of the bad, artificial Arabic and "Sprachverderbniß" characteristic of average journalistic style, comparing the performance of the modern translators of the press very unfavourably with that of their mediaeval counterparts,

1"' an opinion which lie had expressed shortly before in a brief review of Washington-Serruys, L 'arabe moderne étudié dans les journaux et les pieces officielles (Beirut 1897) published in DLZ 19 (1898), 504-506. He was much more interested in the genuine colloquial language. Here Goldziher recognized the importance of research into the modern dialects, for their own sake as well as for the light they throw on earlier Arabic usage.

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5" One can imagine that had it not been for the limitations imposed by lack of written sources, vernacular Arabic might have played a more central role in Goldziher's studies. As it was, this was not a field to which he devoted particular energy. When, however, written sources were available, his interest was kindled. The Goldziher Nachlass in Budapest contains three large pages entitled: II. Beitrüge zur Kenntniss der arabischen Volksdialekte aus der arab. Reiseliteratur.

1'' Goldziher here adduces two interesting passages 14

9 This is neither the first nor the last time Goldziher discussed this word; see e.g. History of Grammar 50 and his entry [ftkh ' in the Encyclopaedia of Islam. 11

1 It is to be regretted that most of Goldziher's magisterial reviews in this and other fields have been omitted from GS. 15

1 Hanisch, Briefwechsel 97-98. 15

2 See, for instance, his remarks in DLZ 23 (1902), 1245 reviewing Dalman's Palästinischer Diwan. I 1 1