Business Wire

Sharjah Ruler Launches First 17 Volumes of ‘Historical Corpus of the Arabic Language’

3.11.2021 18:21:00 EET | Business Wire | Press release

Share

A historical cultural feat for the Arab world has been attained, as His Highness Sheikh Dr. Sultan bin Muhammad Al Qasimi, Member of the Supreme Council and Ruler of Sharjah, released the first 17 volumes of the Historical Corpus of the Arabic Language – the first-of-its kind project to chronicle 17 centuries of development in the Arabic language, in the presence of His Highness Sheikh Sultan bin Ahmed Al Qasimi, Crown Prince and Deputy Ruler of Sharjah.

This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20211103005884/en/

To view this piece of content from mms.businesswire.com, please give your consent at the top of this page.

HH Ruler of Sharjah signs the copies of ‘Historical Corpus of the Arabic Language’ at the Sharjah International Book Fair (Photo: AETOSWire)

The Corpus volumes were unveiled by the Sharjah Ruler during the opening ceremony of the 40th edition of the Sharjah International Book Fair (SIBF) on Tuesday (2 November) at Expo Centre Sharjah, in the presence of a host of Arab ministers, presidents of Arabic language academies in the region and several Arabic scholars and researchers. HH Ruler of Sharjah also unveiled the official website of The Historical Corpus of the Arabic Language on this occasion.

In his keynote address, the Sharjah Ruler noted: “Arabic is one of the oldest living languages. We are here to celebrate Arabic language experts who gathered to work for years to document the roots and meanings of the Arabic language alphabet. We have started to work hard and bridge the gaps that existed in the documentation of the language. Finally, the sun has risen on this beautiful Corpus, which is the fruit of the efforts of a number of Arabic language institutions across the region.”

He added: “The role this detailed corpus will play in informing and educating students, researchers, and linguists and even the everyday language enthusiasts will be immense. I am not exaggerating when I say that there has been no other project that has attracted my attention or the attention of the Arab linguist community in our region to the extent that this project has. I am following up on the development of the efforts of everyone involved in this project, and I assure you that in the coming years we will be publishing several more volumes. I thank each and everyone involved in making this project a success.”

The Sharjah Ruler spoke about the online platform and smart phone applications that have been designed to make the Historical Corpus available digitally, and facilitate easy access to these resources from anywhere in the world. He also signed the copies of the first edition of the Historical Corpus of the Arabic Language at the SIBF 2021 opening ceremony.

The first volumes of the corpus are dedicated to the first five Arabic letters: the Hamza, ba, ta, tha and jeem and outline their evolution throughout the pre-Islamic period, the Islamic era from 1 AH to 132 AH, the Abbasid Caliphate from 133 AH to 656 AH, and the modern-day era from 1214 AH to date.

Dedicated website

The website dedicated to the Historical Corpus of the Arabic Language will offer scholars, linguists, researchers and language enthusiasts access to the 17 volumes of the corpus from anywhere in the world.

Champions of the Arabic language from across the region joined hands

The corpus has seen the collaboration of hundreds of researchers and linguists, editors and experts from 10 Arabic language academies across the Arab world, under the supervision of the Union of Arab Scientific Language Academies in Cairo, Egypt, and with the Arabic Language Academy in Sharjah managing the project’s executive committee. The corpus relies on a database of sources collected and digitised over the last four years, comprising 20,000 Arabic books, manuscripts, sources, and historical documents, including old inscriptions and archaeological finds.

The Historical Corpus of the Arabic Language is dedicated to providing key information about the history of Arabic lexicon, the original root of each word and all other words that are derived from the root with their vocal and phonetic changes. It traces the history of a given word and identifies the first user and evolution of that word from pre-Islamic Arabia all the way to the modern time. In this respect, it is different from any other dictionary because it cites living verses of the Holy Quran and Hadith of the Prophet, peace be upon him.

It also reveals the development of Arabic idioms and expressions through the centuries, and documents the entry of new words into Arabic language, lists words that are no longer used, and explains the reasons why. Besides, the corpus reviews the development of arts and sciences that directly relate to linguistics including grammar, morphology, philology, phonetics, rhetoric, rhyme, and so on.

It also offers comparative lexical reviews on Arabic and the influence it had on other Semitic languages such as Hebrew, Akkadian, Syriac, Abyssinian, and Amharic. An expert committee outlined the similarities and differences between Arabic words and the equivalent words in those languages, citing examples and documenting the bibliography and reference books that were used in the project.

Several senior officials were present during the launch, including Sheikh Nahyan bin Mubarak Al Nahyan, UAE Minister of Tolerance and Coexistence; Bodour Al Qasimi, President of the International Publishers Association; Sheikha Hoor Al Qasimi, President of the Sharjah Art Foundation; Sheikh Khalid bin Issam Al Qasimi, Chairman of the Department of Civil Aviation in Sharjah; Sheikh Salem bin Abdulrahman Al Qasimi, Chairman of the Sharjah Ruler's Office; Sheikha Nawar bint Ahmed Al Qasimi, Director, SAF; Abdul Rahman bin Mohammad Al Owais, UAE Minister of Health and Prevention.

The launch of the corpus’s 17 volumes was also witnessed by Dr. Salah Fadl, President of the Arab Language Academy in Cairo; Dr. Mamoun Wajeeh, Scientific Manager of the Historical Corpus of the Arabic Language; Dr. Abdulhamid Madkour, Secretary General of the Union of Arab Scientific Language Academies, and Secretary-General of the Arabic Language Academy in Cairo.

*Source: AETOSWire

To view this piece of content from cts.businesswire.com, please give your consent at the top of this page.

Contact information

Hussain Al Mulla
Email: hussain.almulla@sgmb.ae
Phone: +97156 3980067

About Business Wire

For more than 50 years, Business Wire has been the global leader in press release distribution and regulatory disclosure.

Subscribe to releases from Business Wire

Subscribe to all the latest releases from Business Wire by registering your e-mail address below. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Latest releases from Business Wire

Pure Lithium Receives Australian Patent for "Lithium Metal Anode and Battery"6.8.2026 23:49:00 EEST | Press release

Pure Lithium Corporation, a vertically integrated next-generation lithium metal battery technology company, today announced that the Australian patent office has granted the company a patent (AU2025271196) titled “Lithium metal anode and battery.” Australia mines roughly half of the world’s lithium, yet has no domestic battery production at all; every battery the country uses is imported. The granted patent is directed to ways in which Pure Lithium’s technology can change that. Rather than trying to catch up in lithium-ion, Australia can leapfrog the incumbent technology and establish a next-generation industry. As worldwide demand for batteries grows, every country capable of making batteries needs to be making them. That is Pure Lithium’s central goal: opening up markets around the world through battery technology that enables local, independent supply chains, keeping pace with demand and strengthening economies. China controls the lithium-ion battery supply chain and manufactures th

Vercel Appoints Amit Agarwal, Standard Template Labs CEO and former Datadog President, to Board of Directors6.8.2026 18:00:00 EEST | Press release

Vercel, the agentic infrastructure company, today announced the appointment of Amit Agarwal, former president of Datadog and founder and CEO of Standard Template Labs, an AI-first service management platform, to its board of directors. Agarwal brings 25 years of enterprise software experience and a track record of scaling a product-led company from its earliest days into one of the defining public software companies of the cloud era. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260806738617/en/ Amit Agarwal Agarwal joined Datadog in 2012 as its Chief Product Officer and was named President in 2022, overseeing product, corporate development, and go-to-market functions as the company grew past $2.5 billion in annual revenue. Across 13 years, including Datadog's 2019 IPO and its first years as a public company, Agarwal helped build one of the industry's most studied examples of product-led growth at enterprise scale. He conti

Laserfiche Launches Advanced Enterprise Security to Deliver Multi-Region Disaster Recovery and GovRAMP-Ready Compliance for Highly Regulated Industries6.8.2026 17:00:00 EEST | Press release

Laserfiche — the leading SaaS provider of intelligent content management — today announced the launch of Enterprise Security, an advanced suite of security enhancements designed for organizations navigating complex regulatory environments. Enterprise Security addresses GovRAMP and CJIS (Criminal Justice Information Services) security requirements based on the NIST SP 800-53 framework. For organizations handling privileged citizen, legal or corporate data, these built-in controls streamline audit preparation and fortify defenses. With organizations placing a higher priority on data stewardship and corporate governance, enterprise IT leaders require a security architecture that protects data without slowing down operations. Laserfiche Enterprise Security extends Laserfiche Cloud’s highly resilient infrastructure with multi-region data replication, elevated security controls for privileged accounts, and built-in governance safeguards. “Maintaining data integrity and compliance has always

Khimji Ramdas Group Chooses Rimini Street to Reduce SAP Support Costs, Protect 700+ Customizations and Reinvest Savings in Innovation6.8.2026 16:00:00 EEST | Press release

Rimini Street, Inc. (Nasdaq: RMNI), the Software Support and Agentic AI ERP Company™ and the leading third-party support provider for Oracle, SAP and VMware software, today announced that Khimji Ramdas Group, one of Oman’s largest privately held conglomerates, has selected Rimini Support™ for SAP, a move that has helped the organization reduce costs, reinvest savings in AI innovation and maintain its highly customized SAP ECC 6 environment with zero downtime. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260806244148/en/ Khimji Ramdas Group Chooses Rimini Street to Reduce SAP Support Costs, Protect 700+ Customizations and Reinvest Savings in Innovation “Staying on SAP ECC is a strategic decision for us,” said Prashant Kumar, CTO, Khimji Ramdas Group. “We went to an industry analyst to ask what options we have to keep our ECC systems running without vendor support dependencies, and they suggested that we contact Rimini Stree

AM Best Upgrades Fortegra Insurance Subsidiaries to A (Excellent)6.8.2026 16:00:00 EEST | Press release

The Fortegra Group, Inc. (“Fortegra” or the “Company”), a global specialty insurer and part of DB Insurance Co., Ltd., today announced that AM Best has upgraded the Financial Strength Rating (FSR) of its insurance subsidiaries to A (Excellent) from A- (Excellent) and the Long-Term Issuer Credit Ratings (Long-Term ICRs) to “a” (Excellent) from “a-” (Excellent). The outlook assigned to the ratings is stable, and AM Best removed the ratings from under review with positive implications. KBRA has also upgraded all of its ratings for the Company. The upgrade applies across Fortegra’s insurance platform. The property and casualty companies include Lyndon Southern Insurance Company, Insurance Company of the South, Response Indemnity Company of California, Blue Ridge Indemnity Company, Fortegra Specialty Insurance Company and Fortegra Europe Insurance Company SE. The life and health companies include Life of the South Insurance Company, Bankers Life Insurance Company of Louisiana and Southern F

In our pressroom you can read all our latest releases, find our press contacts, images, documents and other relevant information about us.

Visit our pressroom
World GlobeA line styled icon from Orion Icon Library.HiddenA line styled icon from Orion Icon Library.Eye