Jewish/Phonecian Influence

[Garaad Awal]

I’m curious, is there any linguistic evidence of Jewish/Phonecian influence on the Somali language? I’ve found plenty in the Harari language, even though we are inland. I mean words only found in Hebrew and Geysinan/Somali, not Arabic. For example,

Harari - Hebrew

Gey - Goy + Gaya (both referring to nation, country, land)
Malaha - Malokh (to choose/chosen)
Ir/Or - Or (Ir in Geysinan means sun, Or means something pure, and the Hebrew Or is light)
Hegana- Hagana (to defend, a former Israeli paramilitary group was called Haganah)
Magan - Magan (both mean protector, in Geysinan we say Ala Magan)
Abdal - Abdiel (means slave of God, suggests that the previous deity of Hararis was Al, so it makes me think it’s Phonecian influence)
Alaf - Aluf (never knew what the harari word meant but I know it’s a Harari name, in Hebrew it means commander/champion)


These are the ones I can think from the top of my head. It was really interesting to see these connections, suggesting some sort of contact with the Levant. I’m thinking it’s probably someone like the Phonecians but I’m not sure.

You are just finding Semitic cognates shared between Semites. You can also find similarities between Amharic & Arabic for example