The Origin of Arabic Script

 

The first stage in the development of Arabic script was the Egyptian Demotic script, which was commonly used by the public. The Egyptians had three types of writing: Hieroglyphic (used exclusively by religious leaders), Hieratic (for office workers and civil servants), and Demotic (used by the general public).

The second stage was the Phoenician script, named after a place called Phoenicia near the land of Canaan on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea, now known as Jabal Lubnan (Mount Lebanon). The Phoenicians were descendants of the Semitic people, who frequently traded and had other dealings with the Egyptians. From the Egyptians, they learned the letters for their writing. The Phoenicians then created a simple alphabet for their commercial needs. According to the archaeologist Maspero, they adopted 15 letters from the Egyptian script with slight modifications. After that, they added several new letters that later became famous in Asia and Europe due to their simplicity.

The third stage originated from the Aramean people, also called Musnad. There is a difference of opinion on this between European and Arab historians.

European Historians' Opinion

European historians concluded that the Phoenician script gave birth to four scripts:

1.      Ancient Greek script, the ancestor of all European and Coptic scripts.

2.      Ancient Hebrew script, including the Samaritan script from Samirah in Naples.

3.      Al-Musnad al-Himyari, which gave rise to the Ethiopian script.

4.      Aramean script, the ancestor of six types of writing:

o    All types of Indian scripts.

o    Ancient Persian script (Pahlavi).

o    Square Hebrew script.

o    Palmyrene script.

o    Syriac script.

o    Nabataean script.

According to Western scholars, there are two types of Arabic script: Kufic, which originated from the Syriac type (called Estrangela), and Naskh, which originated from the Nabataean script. Based on this opinion, the Al-Musnad script is not considered part of the Arabic script family.

Arab Historians' Opinion

Arab historians, both before and after Islam, believed that their Hijazi script originated from the inhabitants of Hirah and Anbar. The script reached these two groups from the Kindah Arabs and the Nabataeans, who had adopted it from Al-Musnad.

Arab historians agree that their script reached Mecca through Harb bin Umayyah bin Abdu-Syams, who learned it from several people during his travels. One of them was Bisyr bin Abdul Malik. Bisyr came to Mecca with Harb bin Umayyah, married his daughter Shahba, and taught writing to several inhabitants of Mecca before leaving.

According to a narration from Ibn Abbas, the people of Anbar learned to write from the people of Hirah. From whom did Harb bin Umayyah learn? Based on the same narration, he learned from Abdullah bin Jad'an, who learned from the people of Anbar, who learned from the people of Hirah, who learned from a traveler from the Kindah tribe in Yemen. The traveler got it from Khafaljan, the scribe of the revelation of Prophet Hud. According to Al-Mas'udi, the Bani Al-Muhshan bin Jandal (the Nabataeans) were the ones who spread the script.

According to Arab historians, the Al-Musnad script is part of the Arabic script lineage. Some Arab scholars support this opinion because:

1.      One type of Musnad script, namely Shafawi, is close to the Phoenician script. This script reached the people of Hirah and Anbar from Yemen, as well as from the Aramean people, through the Kindah and Nabataean tribes.

2.      Due to the intermingling and close proximity of the Nabataeans with the Yemenis and some Arameans, they may have learned the Musnad script from the Yemenis or Arameans.

3.      The agreement of Arab historians that the Hijazi script came from Yemen does not negate the possibility of its origin being the Aramean script, since the Yemenis could have obtained it from the Arameans.

4.      The existence of the Rawadif letters (ث خ ذ ص ظ غ) in the Al-Musnad script that are not found in the Aramean script. The absence of these letters in a specific form in the Hijazi script indicates that the Aramean script did not have them. This led the Arabs to create these letters by adding dots to existing ones.

As further evidence, Al-Hafidz Syamsuddin Adz-Dzahabi mentions that Zaid bin Tsabit, on the order of the Prophet Muhammad, learned the Jewish script. He mastered it in half a month, which indicates that what he learned was the Estrangela script, the origin of the Kufic script and a type of Syriac writing. The Kufic script is most similar to the Hiri script (from Hirah). The Hiri script is close to the Nabataean script, which originated from the Aramean script, which came from the Phoenician script, which came from the Demotic script, the script of the Egyptian people.

Writings in Madinah (Yathrib)

Historians of the Prophet's life note that when Prophet Muhammad arrived in Madinah, a Jewish man was already teaching writing to some children. A dozen or so people in the city could write, including Said bin Zurarah, Munzir bin 'Amr, Ubai bin Wahb, Zaid bin Tsabit, Rafi' bin Malik, and Aus bin Khauli. They seemed to already understand the Hijazi script that originated from the Hirah script. This does not contradict the fact that Zaid learned the Jewish script at the Prophet's command after he was in Madinah.

The Prophet Muhammad was the first person to order the general spread of the knowledge of writing after his migration to Madinah. After the Battle of Badr, 70 Quraysh captives who could read and write were taken. For the illiterate captives, the Prophet accepted a ransom of wealth, but for those who were literate, each was required to teach ten children to write as their ransom. From then on, writing gradually became popular in Madinah and the areas under Islamic rule.

The Hijazi script consists of two types:

• Naskh, used for correspondence.
• Kufic, named after the city of Kufah, because the rules of the Hijazi script were perfected there.

Researchers have found two original letters from the Prophet Muhammad that were sent to Mukaukis and Munzir bin Shawi. The letter to Mukaukis was found by a French scholar in an old Egyptian church and is now kept in the Museum of the Prophet's Relics in Astanah. This letter was then bought by Sultan Abdul Majid for a very high price. The second letter is kept in the library of Vienna, Austria.