News & Articles
Entfenate: Tigre Translation of the Book Aynfelale
By Selam Seyoum
Jul 16, 2008, 3:02am
So much is written about Eritrea in the 70s and 80s, and some other books about
the 40s. The book entitled Aynfelale is one of those discussing the Eritrean
political movement during the 40s.
Hidri Publishers and Awget Bookstores launched the Tigre translation of
Aynfelale on Friday July 11, 2008 at Embasoira Hotel Asmara.
The word Aynfelale (let us not separate) was the slogan of the newspaper Hanti
Eritrea in the late 40s with a picture of a Muslim and a Christian holding
hands. Aynfelale, in the context of the book is about the mothers and fathers
who sacrificed a lot for the honor of the struggle and Eritrean unity.
Aynfelale originally written in Tigrigna by Alemseged Tesfay is translated by
Adem Saleh Abuharish, Umer Mehamed Ali and Mehamed Idris Mehamed into Tigre,
entitled Entfenate.
During the launching ceremony, one of the translators said that using a group
rather than an individual to translate a book is preferable when it comes to a
book dealing with history. He said that one should be cautious not to give wrong
information to the reader, especially when dealing with political issues.
Entfenate, the 574 pages translated book is published after being revised for
more than twice.
Aynfelale is a 626 pages Tigrigna book and was formerly translated into Arabic.
The book discusses the political movement of Eritreans from 1941 to 1950.
Similarly, a symposium was held on March 30, 2008 by Eritrean Embassy and
Ministry of Culture in Cairo on the Arabic translation of Aynfelale. The
objective of the symposium was to evaluate the book translated from Tigragna
into Arabic for the first time.
During the occasion, Mr. Mussa Aaron commented that Tigrigna and Tigre languages
are similar that a word might have the same alphabet and sound but different
meanings.
Mr. Mussa said that the two languages can develop borrowing words from each
other instead of looking for foreign languages.
Excerpt -
page 7:
"... are one of the three subdivisions of the Bet Asgede
people of Eritrea
and Ethiopia. In the nineteenth century, they adopted the Muslim religion and
the Tigre*
language of the Tigrepeople, over whom they presided as feudal ..."
Languages and Ethnography XVI, edited by Morimichi
Tomikawa, Institute for the Study of Languages and
Cultures of Asia and Africa (ILCAA)
Tigre Grammar And Texts
Shlomo Raz, 1983
Undena Publications
P.O. Box 97
Malibu, CA 90265
The Morphology of The Tigre Noun
F.R. Palmer, 1962,
London, Oxford University Press
A
grammar and vocabulary of the Tigre language (as spoken by the Beni Amer).
Khartoum: Publications Bureau. Beaton, A.C. & A. Paul (1954).
Tigre
of Habab:Short Grammar and Texts from the Rigbat People. Ph.D
dissertation. Harvard University. Elias, D.L. (2005).
Leslau, W. (1945)
Short
Grammar of Tigré.
Publications of the American Oriental Society, Offprint Series, No. 18. New
Haven: American Oriental Society.
"The
Verb in Tigré", in: Journal of the American Oriental Society 65/1, pp.
1-26. Leslau, W. (1945),
"Grammatical Sketches in Tigré (North Ethiopic): Dialect of Mensa", in:
Journal of the American Oriental Society 65/3, pp. 164-203. Leslau, W.
(1945),
"Supplementary
observations on Tigré grammar", in: Journal of the American Oriental
Society 68/3, pp. 127-139. Leslau, W. (1948),
"Die Pronomina in
Tigré", in: Zeitschrift für Assyriologie 12, pp. 188-230, 291-316.
Littmann, E.1897),
"Das Verbum der
Tigre-Sprache", in: Zeitschrift für Assyrologie 13, pp. 133-178; 14, pp.
1-102. Littmann, E. (1898),
Publications of the Princeton expedition to Abyssinia, 4 vols. in 4,
Leyden. Littmann, E. (1910-15).
Wörterbuch der
Tigrē-Sprache: Tigrē-Deutsch-Englisch. Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner Verlag.
Littmann, E. and Höfner, M. (1962)
A
Vocabulary of Beni Amer Dialect of Tigre. Tokyo: Institute for the Study
of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa Nakano, Aki'o & Yoichi Tsuge
(1982)..
"'Openness'
in Tigre: a problem in prosodic statement", in: Bulletin of the School
of Oriental and African Studies 18/3, pp. 561-577 Palmer, F.R. (1956)..
"Relative clauses in Tigre", in: Word 17/1, pp. 23-33. Palmer, F.R.
(1961).
The
morphology of the Tigre noun. London: Oxford University Press. Palmer,
F.R. (1962).
"Tigre
syntax and Semitic Ethiopian", in: Bulletin of the School of Oriental
and African Studies 43/2, pp. 235-250. Raz, Sh. (1980).
"The
morphology of the Tigre verb (Mansaʿ dialect)", in: Journal of Semitic
Studies 25/1, pp. 66-84; 25/2, pp. 205-238. Raz, Sh. (1980).
"Some
Tigre texts", in: Le Monde Orientale 8, pp. 1-15. Sundström, R. (1914).
Hidri Publishers Launches a Book in Tigre
Demsas Tsegay, Nov 19, 2007
In
November, 16, 2007 Hidri Publishers launched a book ‘Emenini’ (Trust me) in
Tigre language that tells about the role of Eritrean women in the armed struggle
and the cultural challenges that faced them.
Written by Mr. Mohammed Ali Ibrahim, the book narrates a story of a woman that
joined the freedom fighters after seeing atrocities committed by the colonizers.
In the fight for independence the woman was held captive and at last escapes
from the enemy and joins the freedom fighters again.
Mr. Mohammed Ali, the author, said that we Eritrean have much unwritten
histories. So we do not have to wonder what to write about, we have just to look
at our rich history.
Mr. Adem Ali presented a short review of the book. He said that Tigre was first
written in the 19th century but, almost no book was written in the language for
the last 140 years (until 2005). “Mr. Mohammed’s initiative is an encouraging
step for developing the language,” he added.
He further said that even though it has some problems in the flow of ideas and
some characters are lost in the middle without the reader knowing their
sufficient explanation. However, it has excellent usage of language and gives
graphic explanation of the places in the struggle.
The ceremony was attended by people who have interest in the Tigre Language and
invited guests from different walks of life.
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2008-08-08 00:30
