The History of the Arabic Alphabet

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The history of the Arabic alphabet shows that its alphabet has passed periods of growth since its inception. And the belief that it originated from Nebty language (and perhaps one of the branches of Syriac) coming from the Aramaic of the Phoenician alphabet and has emerged from the Hebrew alphabet and the Greek alphabet, and Greek emerged Syriac, Roman and other alphabets. There is also the South Arabian alphabet or the Mesnad line, which was used extensively in the south of the Arabian Peninsula and appeared on the Hymeric inscriptions and the Sabbatian inscriptions in Yemen. It is also believed to have disappeared with the beginning of the Nabatean alphabet. (2)

The foundation

In the south of the Arabian Peninsula in Yemen, the Arabic script known as the Mesnad line appeared with the appearance of the Kingdom of Saba before the tenth century BC, and the use of this line ceased in the seventh century AD. The advent of the Islamic era had a great impact on drawing attention to the Arabic script written in Quraysh, Dotted with some points and distinct movements. Another belief is that the Arabic alphabet may have evolved from Nabatiyeh or Syriac, which is the weakest perception. The following table shows developments under the character form from Aramaic origin to Nabataean and Syriac forms. The Arabic language has been developed in the middle to clarify and not to refer to the evolution of time.

Between the 6th and 5th centuries AD, the Semitic tribes migrated to the north and established a kingdom centered around Petra, currently in Jordan. These people are called Nabataeans in relation to the name of their tribe (Nabato) and are believed to speak some form of Arabic.

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In the second century AD, the first forms of the Nabataean alphabet written in the Aramaic language (which was the language of communication and commerce) were recorded, but they had some characteristics of the Arabic language: Nabataean do not write the language they speak. They are written in Aramaic alphabet, which is the stage of evolution. It was divided into two parts: one of them was prepared for the inscriptions on the monumental Nabataean monument, and the other for smooth, connected and fast writing letters on papyrus. This smooth writing influenced the massive writing gradually until it gradually became the Arabic alphabet.

Pre-Islamic Arabic inscriptions(4)

The first recorded text in the Arabic alphabet was written in 512. It is a trilingual dedication in Greek, Syriac and Arabic found at Zabad in Syria. The version of the Arabic alphabet used includes only 22 letters, of which only 15 are different, being used to note 28 phonemes:

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Many myriads of pre-Classical Arabic inscriptions are attested, in alphabets borrowed from Epigraphic South Arabian alphabets (however, Safaitic and Hismaic are not strictly Arabic, but Ancient North Arabian dialects, and written Nabataean is an Aramaic dialect):

• Safaitic (over 13,000; almost all graffiti)
• Hismaic in the southern parts of central Arabia
• Preclassical Arabic inscriptions dating to the 1st century BC from Qaryat Al-Faw
• Nabataean inscriptions in Aramaic, written in the Nabataean alphabet
• Pre-Islamic Arabic inscriptions in the Arabic alphabet are very few, with only 5 known for certain. They mostly use no dots, making them sometimes difficult to interpret, as many letters are the same shape as other letters (they are written with rasm only)

Petroglyphs in Wadi Rum (6)

The Arabic alphabet has been confirmed in its current form since the beginning of the seventh century, ie the beginning of the first Hijri century (twenty-two Hijri).  This was the oldest manuscript in the current Arabic language.

The early Muslims realized the importance of reading and writing the Qur'an in a clear and precise manner. Therefore, at the beginning of the first Hijri century - the seventh century AD - there was a need to resolve the difference in reading the Koran because of the similarity of letters.

The Nabataean and Syriac scripts have multiple examples of punctuation to distinguish between identical characters, for example, the left image. By analogy, the punctuation system has been added to Arabic characters to provide enough audios for the 28 different Arabic letters. The dotted characters are then placed after the original characters in alphabetical order, and sometimes those characters precede them.

(A copy of the Quranic script at Birmingham University before the emergence of punctuation, where the Arabic language was read in bold and written without punctuation.)(7)
Dotting for Arabic letters by Abi Al Aswad (8)

The Arabic Letters Dotting by Abi al-Aswad differed in their portrayal of the movements today. They were painted in red ink and were in the form of dots. We have reached what Abu al-Aswad told his writer to do and indicates on each letter the dotting system for the whole Koran. 

"And took the dictates carefully and the writer writes until he reached the end of the Koran. Abu al-Aswad was checking every paper once the writer had finished. Abu Al-Aswad did not put a sign of silence when he saw that the neglect of the movement was a sign of silence. And spread the method of Abu Black but did not deal only in the Koran.

References 

(1) http://arabetics.com/public/html/more/History%20of%20the%20Arabic%20Script_article_Arabic.htm

(2) https://ar.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D8%A3%D8%A8%D8%AC%D8%AF%D9%8A%D8%A9_%D8%B9%D8%B1%D8%A8%D9%8A%D8%A9

(3) https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/71/Panel_Almaqah_Louvre_DAO18.jpg/800px-Panel_Almaqah_Louvre_DAO18.jpg

(4) https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=History_of_the_Arabic_alphabet&action=edit&section=2

(5) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Aram_nabat_arab_syriac.png

(6) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:WadiRumPetroglyphs.jpg

(7) https://ar.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D9%85%D9%84%D9%81:Birmingham_Quran_manuscript.jpg

(8) https://ar.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D8%A3%D8%A8%D8%AC%D8%AF%D9%8A%D8%A9_%D8%B9%D8%B1%D8%A8%D9%8A%D8%A9