Distinctive Features
The Canaanite languages, together with the Aramaic languages and Ugaritic, form the Northwest Semitic subgroup. Some distinctive features of Canaanite in relation to Aramaic are:
- The prefix 'h-' used as the definite article (whereas Aramaic has a postfixed -a). This seems to be an innovation of Canaanite.
- The first person pronoun being 'ʼnk' (אנכ – anok(i), versus Aramaic – ʼnʼ/ʼny) – which is similar to Akkadian, Ancient Egyptian and Berber.
- The *ā > ō vowel shift (Canaanite shift).
Read more about this topic: Canaanite Languages
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