Maltese language: history, characteristics, and contemporary use

Maltese is the only Semitic language written with Latin letters, but it has the special characters Ċ/ċ, Ġ/ġ, Ħ/ħ and Ż/ż, as well as the digraph Għ/għ, which is also treated as a separate letter. In some Italian loanwords, the accented letters à, è, ì, ò, ù are also used in the final sound.

In pronunciation, note (IPA phonetic transcription):
': mute, occurs only at the end of the word and stands there instead of g
ħċ: [t͡ʃ], like tsch in German, occurs in Italian loan wordse
: [ɛ], like ä in Äpfel
ġ: [d͡ʒ], like dsch in Dschungelg
ħ: originally denoted a guttural sound (evolved
from Arabic ʿAin (ع) and Ghain (غ)); today it is pronounced as a vowel by most speakers, ie, it is expressed in an elongation of the preceding or following vowel or forms a diphthong with it, e.g. għi [ɛɪ̯], għu [ɔʊ̯]; at the end of the word the pronunciation resembles ħ and is there usually written simplifying '
: mute
ħ: [ħ], strongly breathed h, between German h and ch in Bach (like Arabic Ḥā' (ح))
j: [j], like German
jo: [ɔ], like o in Ortq
: [ʔ], very distinct glottal stop (as in German ver(')eisen as opposed to verreisen), traces back to Qāf (ق), weakened or muted in many Arabic varietiesr
: [r], rolled r, retroflex in many speakers and close to but not identical with English r; goes back to the dialectal pronunciation of r in North African Arabic s
: [s], always voiceless as in Grasv
: [v], as w in Wasserw
: [w], as in English w, e.g. in waterx
: [ʃ], like sh in schönz
: [t͡s], like z in tongue
ż: [z], like voiced s in rose.

Diphthongs:
aw: [ɐʊ̯], like au in Hausew
: [ɛʊ̯], a separately pronounced e-u, not like German eu; corresponds to short e as in "hell", followed by short u as in "Kuss "ie
: [ɪɛ̯, ɪː], to be pronounced separately as i-e; occasionally also just a long i with a slight tendency to e

Voiced sounds become voiceless when they are in the final sound, such as d > t and b > p.

Examples of words of Arabic origin:

The phonetic position, especially the vowelism, often corresponds not to High Arabic but to North African varieties of Arabic. The consonants have undergone a series of sound shifts: the emphatic sounds of Arabic have consistently coincided with non-emphatic ones (ṣ/s > s, ṭ/t > t, but q/k > ʾ/k; see above for details), so that most typically Semitic sounds have been lost. The Arabic gutturals ḥ and ḫ have collapsed into Maltese ħ, which in turn now sounds, much attenuated, approximately like German h, while original h has fallen silent altogether. The thus silenced h and q are nevertheless written in modern orthography. The same applies to the nowadays only vowel-realized għ, which also goes back to two different gutturals of Arabic (see above).

• belt ("place, town") < بلد balad
• ħobż ("bread") < خبز ḫubz
• id ("hand") < يد yad
• kelma ("vocabulary, word") < كلمة kalima
• kbir ("big") < كبير kabīr
• marid ("sick") < مريض marīḍ
• marsa ("port") < مرسى marsan ("anchorage")
• qamar ("moon") < قمر qamar
• raġel ("man") < رجل raǧul
• saba' ("finger") < إصبع ʾiṣbaʿ
• sema ("sky") < سماء samāʾ
• tajjeb ("good") < طيب ṭayyib
• tifla ("girl") < طفلة ṭifla ("little girl")
• tqil ("heavy") < ثقيل ṯaqīl
• wieħed ("one") < واحد wāḥid
• xahar ("month") < شهر šahr

Examples of words of Italian origin:

The vocalism of most Italian loanwords goes back to Sicilian Italian. Characteristic for this is the shift from high Italian o to u and the final high Italian e to i.

• avukat (lawyer) < avvocato, Sicilian abbucatu
• frotta ("fruit") < frutto
• gravi ("important, significant") < grave, Sicilian gravi
• griż ("grey") < grigio
• gvern ("government") < governo
• kriżi ("crisis") < crisi
• lvant ("east") < levante
• natura ("nature") < natura
• parti ("share, part") < parte, Sicilian parti
• skola ("school") < scuola, Sicilian scola

See also:

• L-Innu Malti - Maltese Anthem