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51-557: Tannin appears in the Baal Cycle as one of the servants of Yam ( lit.   ' Sea ' ) defeated by Baʿal ( lit.   ' Lord ' ) or bound by his sister, Anat . He is usually depicted as serpentine , possibly with a double tail. The tanninim ( תַּנִּינִים ) also appear in the Hebrew Bible 's Book of Genesis , Exodus , Deuteronomy , Psalms , Job , Ezekiel , Isaiah , and Jeremiah . They are explicitly listed among

102-477: A vegetation god whose death and rebirth is responsible for the Levant 's summer drought and autumn rains. However, Oldenburg argues against this, saying it instead represents "a special catastrophe of drought and infertility when the rain does not come in its season". The cycle’s elaborate details about the building of Ba'al's palace is thought to reflect rites of a forgotten Canaanite autumnal festival that involved

153-423: A , b , j , and d  —  to replace the more common terms "consonantary" and "consonantal alphabet" in describing the family of scripts classified as " West Semitic ". It is similar to other Semitic languages such as Phoenician , Hebrew and Semitic proto-alphabets: specifically, aleph , bet , gimel , dalet . In Indonesian and Malay , the term abjad is synonymous to alphabet . According to

204-534: A Northwest Semitic language , and written in a cuneiform abjad . It was discovered on a series of clay tablets found in the 1920s in the Tell of Ugarit (modern Ras Shamra ), situated on the Mediterranean coast of northern Syria , a few kilometers north of the modern city of Latakia and far ahead of the current coastline. The stories include The Myth of Baʿal Aliyan and The Death of Baʿal . A critical edition of

255-413: A court like other gods, meaning that he has to live in the dwelling of his father El and Athirat . Anat thus makes a threat against El, threatening to make his grey hair run with blood unless he allows Baʿal to have a palace. The earthquakes at her feet cause El to be exposed from his chamber. Though the text following is lost, it is clear this attempt was unsuccessful, so Baʿal dispatches Qodesh-wa-Amrur ,

306-606: A critic of Daniels and of the abjad terminology, argues that this terminology can confuse alphabets with "transcription systems", and that there is no reason to relegate the Hebrew, Aramaic or Phoenician alphabets to second-class status as an "incomplete alphabet". However, Daniels's terminology has found acceptance in the linguistic community. The first abjad to gain widespread usage was the Phoenician abjad . Unlike other contemporary scripts, such as cuneiform and Egyptian hieroglyphs ,

357-472: A feast and to acknowledge his sovereignty. In the ending, which is lost, Mot makes his reply. The final part of the Baʿal cycle is concerned with Baʿal's battle against Mot, a personification of Death . Continuing from the preceding section, Mot concludes his reply to Baʿal. His reply is that he, like a lion in the desert, hungers constantly for human flesh and blood. By inviting Mot to a meal of bread and wine, Mot

408-540: A grapheme denotes a complete syllable, that is, either a lone vowel sound or a combination of a vowel sound with one or more consonant sounds. The contrast of abjad versus alphabet has been rejected by other scholars because abjad is also used as a term for the Arabic numeral system. Also, it may be taken as suggesting that consonantal alphabets, in contrast to e.g. the Greek alphabet , were not yet true alphabets. Florian Coulmas ,

459-499: A human child, whom he dresses in his robes and offers as a gift to Mot. When the text continues, two deities, presumably Gupan and Ugar arrive at El's abode, and they announce to him that they have been searching for Baʿal, but found him dead by the bank of the river of the dead. El then descends from his throne and sits on the ground, and mourns, strewing dust on his head, wears clothes of sackcloth, shaves off his beard and beats his chest in grief. Anat too wears sackcloth when she finds

510-481: A kingdom without end, and fetches two divine clubs for Baʿal's use. He gives them magic names, and strikes Yam the first two times himself. Baʿal then drags out Yam and finishes him off. Then Athtart tells Baʿal to scatter his rival, which he does, and then he cries out that Yam is dead, and that he shall be King. A description of the palace of Baʿal follows. It begins with a description of a banquet thrown in honour of Baʿal on Mount Zephon (modern-day Jebel Aqra ). When

561-457: A magic weapon. Yam then sends word to El, on the mount of Lel , El's abode, demanding the surrender of Baʿal and his henchmen. However, Baʿal, upon hearing this on the mount of Lel attacks the envoys, though Anat and Athtart hold him back. When the story resumes, Baʿal has already started to battle Yam, but is in despair due to the power of Yam, and the fierce sea-creatures. Kothar-wa-Khasis assures Baʿal that he will be victorious and will win

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612-420: A net into the sea so she may have provisions to entertain the guests with. He does so, and when the text continues we see Anat encouraging Baʿal as they come closer to Athirat, reminding that he will have an eternal kingdom. However, Baʿal is still anxious. They persuade Athirat of their case. She proceeds to El's abode, and makes her case. Reluctantly, he gives his assent for a house to be built for Baʿal. Baʿal

663-438: A personal name. El then proclaims that his name should be 'darling of El'. However, he informs Yam that he would have to drive his rival Baʿal from his throne and the seat of his dominion. Following this there is a banquet. When the story resumes, Kothar-wa-Khasis has arrived under the sea and tells Yam that he has risen presumptuously to his position, and that Baʿal cannot stand idly by. He threatens that Yam will be destroyed by

714-553: A secondary function as vowel markers, called matres lectionis . This practice was at first rare and limited in scope but became increasingly common and more developed in later times. In the 9th century BC the Greeks adapted the Phoenician script for use in their own language. The phonetic structure of the Greek language created too many ambiguities when vowels went unrepresented, so the script

765-599: A slightly different route. The basic consonantal symbol was considered to have an inherent "a" vowel sound. Hooks or short lines attached to various parts of the basic letter modify the vowel. In this way, the South Arabian abjad evolved into the Ge'ez abugida of Ethiopia between the 5th century BC and the 5th century AD. Similarly, the Brāhmī abugida of the Indian subcontinent developed around

816-404: A speaker, who is probably Shapash the sun-goddess, addresses Baʿal. She is advising him to find a substitute in his image, which will be sought out and slain by Mot. She then promises to bury his body, and advises him to go to the two mountains which mark the entrance of the underworld, and to move them aside. Then he is to go down into the earth and hide. He finds a heifer in the fields, and with it

867-411: A specific rite, and she will give them an important communication for Baʿal, the secret of the lightning. Together, Anat and Baʿal will search for the secret on the hill of Zephon. She replies that she would only perform the rite if Baʿal should set his thunderbolt in the sky and flash his lightning. She then joins Baʿal at Zephon. When the text resumes Baʿal complains to Anat that he hasn't a house, nor

918-500: A sword, shaking him, burning him, crushing him, then throwing his remains to the birds. When the text continues, Anat returns to El and announces that Mot is dead. El then has a dream which tells him that Baʿal lives. Shortly after that, Baʿal returns. However, soon Mot comes back to life and complains to Baʿal of the treatment he has received. He demands that Baʿal surrender one of Mot's brothers. When Mot has returned, Baʿal sends messengers telling him that he will banish him, and that if he

969-411: A torch down, the purpose of which is not known due to the damaged text, but s/he is confronted by Shapash , who tells her/him that El is to bestow royal power on Yam, and so opposition is useless. Athtar then complains that he has no place or court, and that he now fears defeat at the hands of Yam. Shapash suggests the reason to be that he has no wife, perhaps meaning he is too young. The text following

1020-489: Is a Dolphin -class submarine in commission since 2014. In modern Hebrew usage, the word tanin (תנין) means crocodile . Baal Cycle The Baal Cycle is an Ugaritic text (c. 1500–1300 BCE) about the Canaanite god Baʿal ( lit. "Owner", "Lord"), a storm god associated with fertility . The Baal Cycle consists of six tablets, itemized as KTU 1.1–1.6. Tablets one (KTU 1.1) and two (KTU 1.2) are about

1071-416: Is hungry, he may eat the servants of Baʿal. However, this fails to please Mot, and so the two gods fight on Mount Zephon until exhausted. Shapash arrives and warns Mot that fighting Baʿal is useless, and that El is now on Baʿal's side and will overturn Mot's throne. Mot is afraid, and so declares that Baʿal is king. The death of Baʿal and the reign of Mot has been regarded as a seasonal myth, marking Baʿal as

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1122-399: Is in danger of passing to Mot. He then sends messengers to Sheger and Ithm, who are responsible for Cattle and Sheep, and asks them to provide animals for a feast, to which he will invite Mot. When the texts continue, a messenger from Mot arrives in the divine assembly, demanding to know where Baʿal is. They both go up to El's house where El asks what has been happening. When the text continues,

1173-505: Is limited, attained by difficult single combat and with the help of other gods, and his overcoming of his enemies is not permanent. The beginning of the story of the battle between Baʿal and Yam is lost, but we first hear of Kothar-wa-Khasis , the craftsman of the gods being summoned to El , who resides at the confluence of the rivers and the two oceans. El tells him to build a palace for Yam, and to do so quickly in case Yam should take hostile action. When Athtar hears of this, s/he takes

1224-443: Is lost, but resumes with El sitting in his banquet hall. Here he is addressed by the other deities, who complain that Yam is being put to shame, though the damaged text makes the reason unclear, it is clear the reason is connected to his palace. The gods threaten that unless this situation is resolved they will wreak destruction. El gives them curdled milk , apparently a mark of esteem. El calls that his son's name hitherto has been Yaw,

1275-460: Is not tall enough, confirming El's suspicion that he is too weak for the position. When the text recontinues, Anat is searching in the netherworld for the shade of her brother. She demands that Mot restores him to her. However, Mot answers that he had searched for him over the earth, where he found him at the entrance of his domain, and then he simply ate him. Anat continues her search, until she loses patience, and she seizes Mot, and attacks him with

1326-431: Is offended, and threatens to cause the heavens to wilt and collapse, breaking Baʿal into pieces. Mot then will eat him piece by piece. When the text continues, Baʿal, or a speaker on his behalf admits his fear and dread of Mot. The speaker then tells Gupan and Ugar to go back to Mot and tell him that Baʿal will be eternally his slave, news to which Mot rejoices. When the text continues Baʿal complains to El that his dominion

1377-460: Is optional and not the dominant (or literate) form. Abugidas mark all vowels (other than the "inherent" vowel ) with a diacritic , a minor attachment to the letter, a standalone glyph , or (in Canadian Aboriginal syllabics ) by rotation of the letter. Some abugidas use a special symbol to suppress the inherent vowel so that the consonant alone can be properly represented. In a syllabary ,

1428-721: Is then instructed to collect cedar-wood, bricks and precious metals in order to build his house. Kothar-wa-Khasis builds him a palace, but Baʿal insists that it is built without windows, in case that his daughters may escape, or that Yam may come again and trouble him. The work is completed and Baʿal rejoices. When the text resumes, Baʿal recalls his triumph over Yam, and then marches out taking many cities his own. He then consents to having windows to his Palace, and does so by thundering them out. While sitting in his palace he asks himself whether anybody would resist his power, and if anybody should, he should send word to Mot, god of death, to deal with them. He sends two messengers to Mot inviting him to

1479-521: The Book of Job ( Job 7:12 ) the protagonist questions God "Am I the sea or the sea dragon that you have set a guard over me?" The name has subsequently been given to three submarines in the Israeli Navy : the first, an S-class submarine formerly known as HMS Springer , was in commission from 1958 until 1972. The second, a Gal -class submarine , was in commission from 1977 until 2002. The third INS Tanin

1530-612: The 3rd century BC (from the Aramaic abjad , it has been hypothesized). The other major family of abugidas, Canadian Aboriginal syllabics , was initially developed in the 1840s by missionary and linguist James Evans for the Cree and Ojibwe languages. Evans used features of Devanagari script and Pitman shorthand to create his initial abugida. Later in the 19th century, other missionaries adapted Evans's system to other Canadian aboriginal languages. Canadian syllabics differ from other abugidas in that

1581-559: The Arabic root ك‌ت‌ب K-T-B (to write) can be derived the forms كَتَبَ kataba (he wrote), كَتَبْتَ katabta (you (masculine singular) wrote), يَكْتُبُ⁩ yaktubu (he writes), and مَكْتَبَة⁩ maktabah (library). In most cases, the absence of full glyphs for vowels makes the common root clearer, allowing readers to guess the meaning of unfamiliar words from familiar roots (especially in conjunction with context clues) and improving word recognition while reading for practiced readers. By contrast,

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1632-579: The Baal Cycle (Baal's victory over the Sea god Yam, his heavenly enthronement in his palace, and his battles against Mot, the underworld god). Abjad An abjad ( / ˈ æ b dʒ æ d / , Arabic : أبجد , Hebrew : אבגד), also abgad , is a writing system in which only consonants are represented, leaving the vowel sounds to be inferred by the reader. This contrasts with alphabets , which provide graphemes for both consonants and vowels. The term

1683-472: The Baal Cycle was published by Virolleaud in 1938. Recently, a fragment of the Baal Cycle has been discovered in pre-Islamic Arabia . The Baʿal Cycle series of stories are summarized as: The main characters of the Baal Cycle are as follows: Though Baal attains kingship, he is not to be compared to the exalted status gods of other narratives like Marduk from the Enuma Elish or Yahweh . His kingship

1734-469: The Phoenician script consisted of only a few dozen symbols. This made the script easy to learn, and seafaring Phoenician merchants took the script throughout the then-known world. The Phoenician abjad was a radical simplification of phonetic writing, since hieroglyphics required the writer to pick a hieroglyph starting with the same sound that the writer wanted to write in order to write phonetically, much as man'yōgana ( kanji used solely for phonetic use)

1785-454: The attendant of Athirat, to deliver a message to Kothar-wa-Khasis, whose home is in Egypt. When the text continues, Qodesh-wa-Amrur delivers Baʿal's message, which is that Kothar-wa-Khasis should fashion gifts for Athirat, presumably so she will support Baʿal's bid for a palace. He enters his forge, and produces magnificent pieces of furniture, a pair of sandals, and a decorated table and bowl. When

1836-509: The building of booths representing Ba'al's palace (perhaps a precursor to the Jewish holiday of Sukkot ), and a Canaanite belief that building them precisely was imperative to renewal of the rains. The Ugaritic Baal Cycle is one of several ancient near eastern narratives that record a cosmic battle between a sea and a storm god. Such narratives are also known from ancient Israel and Judah , Babylonia , Ancient Egypt , and Anatolia . In particular,

1887-551: The cosmic battle between the storm-god Baal and the sea god Yam , where the former attains victory. The next two tablets (KTU 1.3–1.4) describe the construction of Baal's palace that marks his cosmic kingship. The last two tablets (KTU 1.5–1.6) describe Baal's struggles against Mot , the god of the underworld. The text identifies Baal as the god Hadad , the Northwest Semitic form of Adad . The stories are written in Ugaritic ,

1938-607: The creatures created by God on the fifth day of the Genesis creation narrative , translated in the King James Version as "great whales ". The tannin is listed in the apocalypse of Isaiah as among the sea beasts to be slain by Yahweh "on that day" , translated in the King James Version as "the dragon ". In Judaism , tannin is the term used for sea monsters such as Leviathan and Rahab . Along with Rahab, "Tannin"

1989-412: The fake dead body. Shapash aids Anat in burying Baʿal upon Mount Zephon, and Anat slaughters large numbers of oxen, sheep, goats, and asses as a memorial. Anat returns to El, and tells Athirat and her family (many of whom were on the side of Mot) that they can rejoice since Baʿal was dead. El asks Athirat who can he appoint in Baʿal's place, and she suggests Athtar. Athtar seats himself on Baʿal's throne but

2040-399: The formulations of Peter T. Daniels , abjads differ from alphabets in that only consonants, not vowels, are represented among the basic graphemes . Abjads differ from abugidas , another category defined by Daniels, in that in abjads, the vowel sound is implied by phonology , and where vowel marks exist for the system, such as nikkud for Hebrew and ḥarakāt for Arabic , their use

2091-522: The genre of Sumerian and Akkadian disputation poems. Some have contended that the contest between Baʿal and Yam is a prototype for the vision recorded in the 7th chapter of the Biblical Book of Daniel . Others have related the sequence of eschatological events in Revelation 21 :1–4 (death of the Sea, coming of the city of heaven to earth, and the final defeat of Death) to the narrative progression of

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2142-495: The text continues we see Athirat performing her woman's work by the seashore, when she then sees Baʿal and Anat approaching. She wonders whether he has come to kill all her sons and kinsfolk, perhaps a reference to the Hittite myth of Elkunirsa where the storm-god boasts of having killed the many sons of Athirat. However, her anger subsides when she sees the gifts, and so supports Baʿal in his bid, and she calls upon Qodesh-wa-Amrur to cast

2193-538: The text resumes, we see Anat closing the door of her mansion and meeting her servants in a valley where there are two cities, which possibly represent Ugarit and its port. She kills the guards and warriors, and then drives away the townspeople. She then slaughters the guards and warriors in her palace, ending with a peace-offering. When the text resumes again, Baʿal is addressing his messengers, picturing his sister Anat sitting with her lyre and singing of her affection for him and his daughters. The messengers are told to perform

2244-475: The version of this sea/storm god battle in the Baal Cycle more closely groups with other versions found from Egypt and Anatolia (which may be termed "Version A"), whereas the Israelite and Babylonian versions group with each other (which may be termed "Version B"). The ancestral version of the two versions has the following general sequence: Version B is distinguished with its placement of a creation narrative after

2295-497: The victory of the storm god. Version A on the other hand (including the Baal Cycle) has additional elements between (1) and (2), where the sea god seeks to exact tribute from the other gods, followed by an attempt from the grain goddess to appease the storm god, finally followed by the grain goddess attempting to seduce the storm god. The closing hymn of the Baal Cycle, on the sixth and final tablet, has been related by Ayali-Darshan to

2346-545: The vowel is indicated by rotation of the consonantal symbol, with each vowel having a consistent orientation. The abjad form of writing is well-adapted to the morphological structure of the Semitic languages it was developed to write. This is because words in Semitic languages are formed from a root consisting of (usually) three consonants , the vowels being used to indicate inflectional or derived forms. For instance, according to Classical Arabic and Modern Standard Arabic , from

2397-415: The vowel phonemes, although the said non-diacritic vowel letters are also used to write certain consonants, particularly approximants that sound similar to long vowels. A "pure" abjad is exemplified (perhaps) by very early forms of ancient Phoenician , though at some point (at least by the 9th century BC) it and most of the contemporary Semitic abjads had begun to overload a few of the consonant symbols with

2448-654: Was a name applied to ancient Egypt after the Exodus to Canaan . The word Tannin is used in the Hebrew Bible fourteen times. Aaron 's staff becomes Tannin in the Book of Exodus (Exodus 7:9-12), it is used in the meaning "snake" in the Book of Deuteronomy (Deut 32:33) and Psalms (Psalm 91:13). It represents Nebuchadnezzar II (the king of Babylon ) in Jeremiah (Jeremiah 51:34) and Pharaoh in Ezekiel (Ezekiel 29:3, 32:2). In

2499-535: Was introduced in 1990 by Peter T. Daniels . Other terms for the same concept include partial phonemic script , segmentally linear defective phonographic script , consonantary , consonant writing , and consonantal alphabet . Impure abjads represent vowels with either optional diacritics , a limited number of distinct vowel glyphs, or both. The name abjad is based on the Arabic alphabet 's first (in its original order ) four letters —  corresponding to

2550-651: Was modified. They did not need letters for the guttural sounds represented by aleph , he , heth or ayin , so these symbols were assigned vocalic values. The letters waw and yod were also adapted into vowel signs; along with he , these were already used as matres lectionis in Phoenician. The major innovation of Greek was to dedicate these symbols exclusively and unambiguously to vowel sounds that could be combined arbitrarily with consonants (as opposed to syllabaries such as Linear B which usually have vowel symbols but cannot combine them with consonants to form arbitrary syllables). Abugidas developed along

2601-705: Was used to represent Japanese phonetically before the invention of kana . Phoenician gave rise to a number of new writing systems, including the widely used Aramaic abjad and the Greek alphabet . The Greek alphabet evolved into the modern western alphabets, such as Latin and Cyrillic , while Aramaic became the ancestor of many modern abjads and abugidas of Asia. Impure abjads have characters for some vowels, optional vowel diacritics, or both. The term pure abjad refers to scripts entirely lacking in vowel indicators. However, most modern abjads, such as Arabic , Hebrew , Aramaic , and Pahlavi , are "impure" abjads – that is, they also contain symbols for some of

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