ግዕዝ Ethiopic (Ge'ez)
Ge’ez is a classical Semitic language of the Horn of Africa, central to Ethiopian and Eritrean liturgical and literary traditions. It’s an excellent choice for readers interested in late antique and medieval Africa and Semitic philology.
Family: AfroasiaticBranch: SemiticPeriod: c. 300 CE → present (classical corpus + liturgical use)
Region: Horn of Africa (Ethiopia/Eritrea)
c. 300 CE → present (classical corpus + liturgical use)
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Typing help
Ge’ez (Ethiopic) characters are easiest to input with an Ethiopic keyboard layout or by copy/paste for occasional use.
Dictionaries
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- Notes: An Ethiopic-Latin dictionary. A very large download, but a good resource to have.
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Dictionary of the Amharic Language
- Format: PDF
- Notes: A single PDF.
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- Notes: Runs online; gives transliterations.
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- Notes: Online as well, with transliterations.
Grammars
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- Format: PDF
- Notes: Text-searchable; this download is a PDF of about 16 MB.
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- Notes: With paradigms, literature, and a chrestomathy.
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- Notes: Published around the same time.
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- Notes: Ethiopic grammar written in French.
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- Notes: A very useful website featuring explanations of many grammar principles. See the post list on the right of the site to navigate.
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- Notes: In a variety of formats, including audio.
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- Notes: From the Foreign Service Institute.
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- Format: Video
- Notes: An entire Youtube channel.
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- Format: Video
- Notes: Hosted on Youtube. Check out the other videos on this channel as well.
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- Notes: This site sells childrens’ DVDs for learning the Amharic alphabet and some other basics. If you’ve tried these, let us know!
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- Notes: It seems like you can’t have enough help trying to learn all the characters.
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- Notes: Another useful explanation with a small .gif file that you can easily download.
Charts & Aids
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- Format: PDF
- Notes: They’re real, and they’re spectacular!
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- Format: PDF
- Notes: Doesn’t have the real Ethiopic abugida.
Texts
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- Notes: All laid out and ready to go.
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- Notes: Lots of different texts, NT and others.
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- Format: PDF
- Notes: PDF is about 21.1 MB.
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- Notes: Appears to be the same texts as above, in various volumes. The link goes to volume one.
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- Notes: Bible texts online in many languages with parallel viewing.
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- Notes: Pretty easy to navigate around, and a useful resource overall.
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- Notes: Many different texts, organized by topic.
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- Format: PDF
- Notes: Old and New Testaments; pretty nice PDF files.
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- Notes: Interlinear translations, plus other books, and plenty of RasTafari stuff
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- Format: PDF
- Notes: A PDF of about 6 MB, contains many Ethiopic texts.
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- Notes: In Ethiopic with an English translation.
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- Format: PDF
- Notes: 14.7 MB PDF file.
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- Notes: Seems to be the same as above, only this one is edited by Dillmann, so how could you say no?
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- Notes: Not for the faint of heart, either.
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- Notes: With a translation in Portuguese.
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- Notes: With a translation in Portuguese as well.
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History of the Martyrs of Nagran
- Notes: Same as above, with Portuguese translation.
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- Notes: Includes Arabic and Italian text, plus some very nice hands in the first few scans.
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- Notes: Includes Arabic and Italian text, plus some very nice hands in the first few scans.
Other Resources
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Various Ethiopic Reference Books
- Notes: All very old, but some good materials here. Click the title and then the book’s image to access the texts.
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- Notes: Capitalized because it’s awesome! What isn’t awesome is that not very much of it is available online.
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