Paleo-Arabic

Paleo-Arabic (or Palaeo-Arabic, previously called pre-Islamic Arabic or Old Arabic^[1][2]) is a pre-Islamic script used to write Arabic. Used between the fifth and seventh centuries, it evolved out of the Nabataeo-Arabic script, and was superseded by the standardized Arabic that developed in the Islamic era.^[3][4][5] The word "Paleo-Arabic" was first coined by Christian Robin using the French expression "paléo-arabe".^[6]

Paleo-Arabic was first documented in inscriptions in Syria and Jordan, but has since been found in Western Arabia (the Hejaz),^[7][8] where over fifty Paleo-Arabic inscriptions have now been found,^[9] and in South Arabia.^[10] The only god mentioned in these inscriptions is Allah. These inscriptions are always Christian when more detailed religious information is available, a finding that is considered informative for understanding the religious history of late pre-Islamic Arabia.^[11]

Paleo-Arabic inscriptions are publicly uploaded to the DiCoNab database.^[12][13]

Paleo-Arabic refers to the Arabic script in the centuries prior to the standardization Arabic underwent in the Islamic era. According to Ahmad Al-Jallad and Hythem Sidky, Paleo-Arabic can be distinguished from the script that occurs in later periods by a number of orthographic features, including:^[14]

• Wawation (the addition of a seemingly superfluous waw (و) to the end of nouns)^[15]
• Use of Arameograms, i.e. fossilized Aramaic forms of Arabic words such as Aramaic br for Arabic bn ('son') or Aramaic ’nh for Arabic ’na ('I; me')
• Absence of ʾalif ( ا ) to represent the long ā
• Occasional phonetic spelling of the definite article, i.e. eye spelling of al (ال) to match assimilated sun letters instead of retaining the lam.
• Occasional use of dots to distinguish the dāl (د) from rē (ر) as a relic from the Syriac script

Known Paleo-Arabic inscriptions fall into one of three categories:^[7]

• simple signatures with no confessional statements
• monotheist invocations
• specifically Christian texts

The present corpus of Paleo-Arabic inscriptions attests the following introductory formulae:^[16]

• b-sm-k rb-nʾ / In your name, our lord
• brk-[k]m rb-nʾ / May our lord bless you
• b-sm-k ʾllhm / In your name, O God

Paleo-Arabic inscriptions most commonly refer to "God" as al-ʾilāh or by its orthographic variant illāh, though the term Rabb for "Lord" also appears as is seen in the Abd Shams inscription, Jabal Dabub inscription, and the Ri al-Zallalah inscription.^[7]

Christian authors wrote Paleo-Arabic inscriptions found in Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and South Arabia.^[17][18] According to Ahmad Al-Jallad and Hythem Sidky, all known Paleo-Arabic inscriptions are monotheistic (that is, they all only mention the one, same God) and, when it is possible to specify further, Christian.^[19] As such, they reflect the dominance attained by the spread of monotheism in pre-Islamic Arabia from the fourth to sixth centuries in the pre-Islamic period.^[7]

The Bostran era is used, whose starting point is equal to 106 AD in the Gregorian calendar, is used in the Dumat al-Jandal inscription, the Jebel Usays inscription, and the Hima Paleo-Arabic inscriptions. The Seleucid era is used in the Zabad inscription.

The current list of known Paleo-Arabic texts and inscriptions is given in a table and appendix of a paper jointly written by Ahmad Al-Jallad and Hythem Sidky.^[7]

• Namara inscription
• Old Arabic
• Safaitic

• Al-Jallad, Ahmad; Sidky, Hythem (2021). "A Paleo-Arabic inscription on a route north of Ṭāʾif". Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy. 33 (1): 202–215. doi:10.1111/aae.12203.
• Al-Jallad, Ahmad; Sidky, Hythem (2024). "A Paleo-Arabic Inscription of a Companion of Muhammad?". Journal of Near Eastern Studies. 83 (1): 1–14. doi:10.1086/729531.
• Al-Jallad, Ahmad; Al-Manaser, Ali; Fisher, Greg (2026). "A Dated Paleo‐Arabic Inscription Mentioning Al‐Mundhir (ʾmndr) the King". Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy: 1–14.
• al-Shdaifat, Younis; Al-Jallad, Ahmad; al-Salameen, Zeyad; Harahsheh, Rafe (2017). "An early Christian Arabic graffito mentioning 'Yazīd the king'". Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy. 28 (2): 315–324. doi:10.1111/aae.12105.
• Alhatlani, Abdullah Saad; Al-Otibi, Ajab Mohammad (2023). "A Palaeo-Arabic inscription from the Ḥismā Desert (Tabūk region)". Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy. 34 (1): 183–193. doi:10.1111/aae.12235.
• Alhatlani, Abdullah Saad; Al-Manaser, Ali (2024). "From Nabataeo-Arabic to Palaeo-Arabic: Two new pre-Islamic graffiti from the Jordanian Ḥarrah". Palestinian Exploration Quarterly: 1–10. doi:10.1080/00310328.2024.2363676.
• Fiema, Zbigniew; Al-Jallad, Ahmad; MacDonald, Michael C.A.; Nehmé, Laila (2015). "Provincia Arabia: Nabataea, the Emergence of Arabic as a Written Language, and Graeco-Arabica". In Fisher, Greg (ed.). Arabs and Empires Before Islam. Oxford University Press. pp. 373–433. doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199654529.003.0008. ISBN 978-0-19-965452-9.
• Fisher, Greg (2020). Rome, Persia, and Arabia: shaping the Middle East from Pompey to Muhammad. Taylor & Francis. ISBN 978-1-000-74090-5.
• Lindstedt, Ilkka (2023). Muhammad and His Followers in Context: The Religious Map of Late Antique Arabia. Brill.
• Lindstedt, Ilkka (2026). "The Religious Groups of Mecca and Medina in the Sixth and Seventh Centuries CE". Abdou Filali-Ansary Occasional Paper Series. 11: 1–31.
• Nehmé, Laila (2010). "A glimpse of the development of the Nabataean script into Arabic based on old and new epigraphic material". In MacDonald, Michael C.A. (ed.). The development of Arabic as a written language: Papers from the special session of the Seminar for Arabian Studies held on 24 July, 2009. Archaeopress. pp. 47–88.
• Nehmé, Laila (2017). "New dated inscriptions (Nabataean and pre-Islamic Arabic) from a site near al-Jawf, ancient Dūmah, Saudi Arabia". Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy. 3: 121‒164.
• Nehmé, Laila; Briquel-Chatonnet, Françoise; Desreumaux, Alain Jacques Paul; Al-Ghabban, Ali I; MacDonald, Michael; Villeneuve, François F. (2018). The Darb al-Bakrah. A Caravan Route in North-West Arabia Discovered by Ali I. al-Ghabban. Catalogue of the Inscriptions. Series of Archaeological Refereed Studies. Vol. 50. Saudi Commission for Tourism and National Heritage.
• Nehmé, Laila (2020). "The religious landscape of Northwest Arabia as reflected in the Nabataean, Nabataeo-Arabic, and pre-Islamic Arabic inscriptions". Semitica et Classica. 13: 127–154. doi:10.1484/J.SEC.5.122984.
• Reynolds, Gabriel Said (2025). Christianity and the Qur'an: The Rise of Islam in Christian Arabia. Yale University Press.
• Robin, Christian; al-Ghabbān, ʿAlī Ibrāhīm; al-Saʿīd, Saʿīd Fāyiz (2014). "Inscriptions antiques de la région de Najran (Arabie Séoudite meridionale): nouveaux jalons pour l'histoire de l'écriture, de la langue et du calendrier Arabes". Comptes rendus de l'Académie des Inscriptions & Belles-Lettres. 158 (3): 1033–1128. doi:10.3406/crai.2014.94960.

• DiCoNab: The Digital Corpus of the Nabataean and Developing Arabic Inscriptions