Lecture
South Semitic Script Diversity: Principal Component Analysis and a Preliminary Model of Genetic Descent
- Date
- Tuesday 20 October 2026
- Time
- Location
-
Herta Mohr
Witte Singel 27A
2311 BG Leiden - Room
- 0.08
Abstract
The history of the South Semitic script family is poorly understood. Most accounts of its evolution have relied on ad hoc paleographic judgements. We take a sample of twelve securely described South Semitic script varieties, each of which is coded for up to 29 reconstructed proto-graphemes. This yields 118 distinct variant features, which we then subject to Principal Component Analysis. The study produces two models. The first is unweighted, where each variant is assigned the same significance no matter the complexity of variation. The second assigns greater weight to categories that differ in terms of fundamental glyph shape rather than simple alterations, such as orientation or reduction. Both models broadly agree: the South Semitic scripts cluster into smaller, related units. Based on these results, we conclude with the generation of a paleographically informed genetic tree, modelling the evolution of the South Semitic script across nearly a millennium and a half.
This lecture is organised by the From Aleph to Alpha project (Leiden University Institute for Area Studies (LIAS)).
About the speaker
Professor Ahmad Al-Jallad holds the Sofia Chair in Arabic Studies at The Ohio State University. An internationally recognized scholar of pre-Islamic Arabia, his research focuses on Arabian epigraphy, the history of the Arabic language, Semitic linguistics, and the cultures of the ancient Near East.
His latest book reconstructs the religion and rituals of Arabia’s pre-Islamic tribespeople: The Religion and Rituals of the Nomads of Pre-Islamic Arabia: A Reconstruction Based on the Safaitic Inscriptions. For more of Al-Jallad’s work, see his Academia.edu page.