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  #16  
Old 25-11-16, 07:57 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Eddie Parks View Post
In a way that only increases the mystery as Queen Saida (Sayyida)is a semi-legendry figure from Moroccan 16th century history, aka the Pirate Queen.

Or a modern Facebook member!!!https://www.facebook.com/people/Said...00006294255103

Could you ask your Saudi friend exactly how he reads the Arabic - either in MSA script or transliterated?

Eddie
Yes, certainly; hoping to see him in person on Tuesday.

Just to clarify, Eddie: you're asking if the script is modern Arabic, and if it's not, has my colleague 'translated'/interpreted using corresponding letters of a different alphabet? Is that correct?

Regards,

JT
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  #17  
Old 26-11-16, 10:34 AM
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Hi,
Not really, I am asking him to write out what he sees in Modern Standard Arabic and/or transliterate it into phonetic English script.

Thanks Eddie
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  #18  
Old 26-11-16, 12:08 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Eddie Parks View Post
Hi,
Not really, I am asking him to write out what he sees in Modern Standard Arabic and/or transliterate it into phonetic English script.

Thanks Eddie
I'm more than happy to ask him, but just for my understanding, could you elaborate upon why the word-for-word translation above does not quite tick all the boxes?

JT
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  #19  
Old 26-11-16, 02:57 PM
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Because I would like to see the Arabic either as written Arabic or as transliterated Arabic because I don't understand how two native Arabic speakers get such a different reading and - much less significantly - why I can't see the words he does. I am a little surprised I can't read the inscription and I do like to learn what I can when I can.
Eddie

PS - I've just had a letter from a senior officer in the Royal Army of Oman giving an interpretation of an Omani shoulder title which is, frankly, gibberish and is just simply totally wrong. Part of the problem is that Arabic is such a very diverse language that what means one thing to, for example, a Moroccan may mean soothing quite different to an Omani.

Last edited by Eddie Parks; 26-11-16 at 03:03 PM.
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  #20  
Old 27-11-16, 11:27 AM
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First of all, thank you very much for all your efforts.

Just now I was trying to find another unidentified button, possibly hunt, and to my surprise I found the button from this thread in Neil McShane's book "Hunt Buttons".
It is on page 287, "a selection of foreign hunt buttons" and it is listed as
Harrthiyah (Iraq).
This is very close to the "Harithy" brought up by Eddie.

So far I found that Al Harthiyah is an area of Bagdad: http://wikimapia.org/5371386/Al-Harthiyah
Could it be one of many English hunts abroad?
To be continued ...

Last edited by btns; 27-11-16 at 11:35 AM. Reason: bagdad update
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  #21  
Old 27-11-16, 03:54 PM
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"So far I found that Al Harthiyah is an area of Bagdad: http://wikimapia.org/5371386/Al-Harthiyah
Could it be one of many English hunts abroad?"

Irrelebvant to the button, but Kipling published "Little Foxes" in 1909, a very funny story of the introduction of foix hunting to the Sudan by its British governor, who uses bribes to persuade the locals to train his 'ho-wends' and preserve the local foxes for his emi-annual visits. Hunts were common in India - jackals instead of foxes, I think - and undoubtedly other parts of the vast Empire east of Suez.
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  #22  
Old 27-11-16, 07:11 PM
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A specialist collector sent me two pages from Baily's Hunting Directory 1949/50.

The Royal Harrthiya Hunt's Patron was H.R.H. the Amir Abdul Illah, Regent of Iraq. Foxhounds arrived from England in July 1946. The majority of meets were within 15 miles radius of Bagdad. The normal field is around 30, but has numbered as many as 107.

It means Eddie's teacher got it:
I have spoken to my teacher. She says that it is in fact Arabic but uses some caligraphic characters she says are outside my level of Arabic!!! That said she can't read it completely but can see "The Royal ----- Cross" The missing word looks like Harithy which is of course a name not a word.


Again, thank you all for your contributions.
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  #23  
Old 28-11-16, 04:39 PM
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Thanks for that; frankly I didn't think it had much to do with Queen Saaida's Guard - having said that the words for Royal and Queen are not that different.

Harithiya is of course not a million miles removed from a derivation of Haaris which is a guard.

In Oman at any rate the word for hunt is Sayd while the word for cross is saleeb.

Add in a bit of calligraphic squiggle and some pronunciation variations and Bob's your Uncle. That's why I love Arabic and also why experts get it wrong all the time.

Eddie
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  #24  
Old 28-11-16, 04:42 PM
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And then: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=...unt%22&f=false
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  #25  
Old 29-11-16, 12:21 PM
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Hi Guys

I've been kicking this about with some fellow students of Arabic. We agree this is very hard to read because it's a very unusual script between the Kufic and Maghribi calligraphy styles.

We now read it as Sayd Al Harithiya Al Malaki, which in itself is odd because it should be Al Sayd or A'sayd. As established that mean Royal Harithiya Hunt. Sayd does not really have the same meaning as Hunt in old fashioned English in that it means the act of hunting rather than a group who go hunting together.

We think it was written out by native English speaker and then, given the Firmin back mark, the die/mold was cut by a non-Arab speaker .
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