Niqqud

See also: Tiberian vocalization, Babylonian vocalization, and Palestinian vocalization
"Samaritan pointing" redirects here. Not to be confused with Samaritan vocalization.
Niqqud
Other diacritics cantillation, geresh,
gershayim
Example
Gen. 1:9, "And God said,
Let the waters be collected".
Letters in black, niqqud in red,
cantillation in blue[1]
Niqqud articles
Shva · Hiriq · Zeire · Segol · Patach · Kamatz · Holam · Dagesh · Mappiq · Shuruk · Kubutz · Rafe · Sin/Shin dot

In Hebrew orthography, niqqud or nikud (Hebrew: נִקּוּד, Modern: nikúd, Tiberian: niqqūḏ, "dotting, pointing" or Hebrew: נְקֻדּוֹת, Modern: nekudót, Tiberian: nəquddōṯ, "dots") is a system of diacritical signs used to represent vowels or distinguish between alternative pronunciations of letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Several such diacritical systems were developed in the Early Middle Ages. The most widespread system, and the only one still used to a significant degree today, was created by the Masoretes of Tiberias in the second half of the first millennium AD in the Land of Israel (see Masoretic Text, Tiberian Hebrew). Text written with niqqud is called ktiv menuqad.

Niqqud marks are small compared to the letters, so they can be added without retranscribing texts whose writers did not anticipate them.

In modern Israeli orthography, niqqud is mainly used in specialised texts such as dictionaries, poetry, or texts for children or new immigrants to Israel.[2] For purposes of disambiguation, a system of spelling without niqqud, known in Hebrew as ktiv maleh (כְּתִיב מָלֵא, literally "full spelling") had developed before the introduction of niqqud. This was formally standardised in the Rules for Spelling without Niqqud (כְּלָלֵי הַכְּתִיב חֲסַר הַנִּקּוּד) enacted by the Academy of the Hebrew Language in 1996,[3] and updated in 2017.[4] Nevertheless, niqqud is still used occasionally in texts to prevent ambiguity and mispronunciation of specific words.

One reason for the lesser use of niqqud is that it no longer reflects the current pronunciation. In modern Hebrew, tzere is pronounced the same as segol, although they were distinct in Tiberian Hebrew, and pataḥ the same as qamatz. To the younger generation of native Hebrew speakers, these distinctions seem arbitrary and meaningless; on the other hand, Hebrew language purists have rejected out of hand the idea of changing the basics of niqqud and fitting them to the current pronunciation – with the result that in practice niqqud is increasingly going out of use.[5]

According to Ghil'ad Zuckermann, the lack of niqqud in what he calls "Israeli" (Modern Hebrew) often results in "mispronunciations".[6]: 49  For example, the Israeli lexical item מתאבנים is often pronounced as mitabním (literally "becoming fossilized (masculine plural)") instead of metaavním "appetizers", the latter deriving from תאבון teavón "appetite", the former deriving from אבן éven "stone".[6]: 49  Another example is the toponym מעלה אדומים, which is often pronounced as maalé edomím instead of maalé adumím, the latter appearing in the Hebrew Bible (Joshua 15:7 and 18:17).[6]: 49  The hypercorrect yotvetá is used instead of yotváta for the toponym יטבתה, mentioned in Deuteronomy 10:7.[6]: 49  The surname of American actress Farrah Fawcett (פארה פוסט) is often pronounced fost instead of fóset by many Israelis.[6]: 49 

  1. ^ Cantillation
  2. ^ Amir Aharoni (2013). Khan, Geoffrey (ed.). Encyclopedia of Hebrew language and linguistics. Vol. 3. Leiden: Brill. p. 947. ISBN 978-90-04-17642-3. The notable exception is the newspaper [שער למתחיל] Error: {{Lang}}: invalid parameter: |ltr= (help) Sha'ar LaMatchil 'Gate for the Beginner', intended for children and students of Hebrew, which is printed in 'easy Hebrew' with a limited vocabulary and partial vocalization applied to scriptio plena.
  3. ^ "כללי הכתיב חסר הניקוד" [Missing spelling rules] (in Hebrew). Archived from the original on 27 February 2009. Retrieved 12 October 2019.
  4. ^ "כללי הכתיב החדשים" [New spelling] (in Hebrew). Retrieved 12 October 2019.
  5. ^ Galili, Ze'ev (31 December 2004). "בני פלד כ" כנעני"" [Benny Peled as "Canaanite"]. Retrieved 12 October 2019. Supposedly, the teachers who taught my generation knew Hebrew perfectly. They had a thorough knowledge of all the Hebrew classics as well as of modern Hebrew literature. But Hebrew was not their natural language. They had gained their knowledge of Hebrew from books, by tremendous effort. But they did not dream nor curse and did not read in Hebrew. And they subjected us, who grew up with Hebrew as our mother tongue, to a terrible torture. They demanded that we master perfectly all the niceties and nuances of a language purism which meant nothing to us. I remember when I was asked to write words with nikkud on the blackboard and made a hash of it, the teacher said "You are a total ignoramus".
  6. ^ a b c d e Zuckermann, Ghil'ad (2020). Revivalistics: From the Genesis of Israeli to Language Reclamation in Australia and Beyond. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780199812790.