Many
a say is more sever than an assault.
| ASSAULT
In comparison to
the use of the word "kill", statistically the use of the word "assault"
in daily news is quite staggering. When the media reports on international
news, political topics or social ones, the use of the word assault
seems always to dominate the headlines. Hence, for our purpose, the
word "assault" is naturally the topic of investigation in Episode
V of Parallel Universe: Alternate Etymologies.
DEFINITION OF
ASSAULT:
Assault
is a crime of violence against another person. However assault is often
defined to include not only violence, but also any physical contact with
another person without their consent.
|
CASE
OF ASSAULT RECENTLY
REPORTED IN THE NEWS IN EGYPT.
In
the aftermath of the return to the police state confirmed by the extension
of the state of emergency and extended to 2008. The following piece of
news gives us an idea what assaultin
Egypt is all about.This new violent attitude used by security forces against
peaceful demonstrators affirms the government's new tendency to use violence
as a tool to punish the opposition, referring to the assaults
on Judge Mahmuwd Hamzah, head of North Cairo Court, and the physical assaults
on Nadia Abuw al-Magd, the reporter of the Associated Press, in addition
to the assaults
on Al-Jazeera crew and confiscating their camera, and arresting more than
300 person and detaining them in an unknown place, where some of them were
subjected to beating. It's worth mentioning that the Egyptian security
forces now developed a new squad, they call it the karate squad, that dressed
in civilian clothes and they join the demonstrations and attack the demonstrators. |
DEFINITION OF
SEXUAL ASSAULT:
While
sexual assault
is any unwanted physical contact of a sexual nature perpetrated against
another person. Sexual assault
can take place by anyone and anywhere. While associated with rape, sexual
assault is much broader and the specifics may vary according to social,
political or legal definition.
|
THE
SHOCKING CASE OF SEXUAL ASSAULT
BY EGYPTIAN POLICE.
In
recent months, grainy amateur videos often taken using cellphones have
appeared purporting to show examples of police brutality. Take for example
the reprehensible sexual assault
case described in a report of the shocking Egyptian police sexual
assault. The footage is shocking: A man lies
screaming on the floor of a police station as officers sodomize him with
a wooden pole. Compounding the shock, it turns out that it was the police
who made the film, and that they then transmitted it to the cell phones
of the victim's friends in order to humiliate him. |
ETYMOLOGY OF ASSAULT
According
to the Oxford English Dictionary, the word assault was first
recorded in Middle English in 1297. The word is allegedly
derived from the Old French "asaut" from a hypothetical Latin *
adsaltus. The original "asaut", with an eye to Medieval
Latin assaltus, was altered to assault in c.1530. Assault
is a derivation from L. ad- "at" + salire "to leap" and is related
to other terms such as assail, insult & salient.
* (1)
However,
when comparing the words "asaut" and "assault” to Classical
Arabic terms such as Swl, Slt, and Stw,
with the exact meanings of "Assault” and/or "Assail",
the Oxford English Dictionary explanation failed on two accounts.
(For a comparison see the attached JPEGs below:
|
1st That
both forms "assault" and "asaut" are one and the same. In
fact they are not since they are both found separately in Classical Arabic
as slt, swl, and stw, all of which mean to
rush, to leap and/or to"assault" as well as to "assail".
2nd Any scientific
argument based on concrete and real data would eliminate the hazardous
postulate of the hypothetical reconstruction of a word which is assumed
to have existed, but due to the absence of any documentation, there is
no way to prove or deny its previous existence. Fortunately in this case,
the cognate Classical Arabic terms existed and preceded the western ones
by half a millennium. Hence, the hypothetical Proto Indo-European base
*sel-
"to jump” is an unsubstantiated assumption,
which has hitherto gone unquestioned. The existence of this root previously
in Classical Arabic, a non-Indo European language, squarely
preempts this assumption.
The
discovery of these Arabic terms is another challenge to the fundamental
perceptions of Western etymologists regarding their methods. The advantage
of the comparison with the Arabic terms offers a direct and simple procedure
for verification based on the first written records of western examples
and their counterparts in Classical Arabic.
This
exercise allows us to document the impact of the Arabic language on the
western ones in light of the historically documented introduction of the
Arabic language in Europe. In this instance, by way of Andalusia
Spain and Provence (cf. Old Spanish "asalto" and Provençal
"assalt").
To be Continued
Ishinan |
FOOTNOTES
| * (1)
assault
(n.)
1297,
from O.Fr. asaut, from V.L. *adsaltus
"attack, assault," a derivation of *adsalire (see assail). The verb is
from c.1450.
assail
c.1230,
from Old French asaillir, from Vulgar Latin
*adsalire "to leap at," from L. ad- "at" +
salire "to leap" .
insult
(v.)
c.1570,
"triumph over in an arrogant way," from L. insultare "to assail, to leap
upon" Sense of "to verbally abuse, affront, assail with disrespect"
is from 1620. The noun is recorded 1603 in the sense of "attack;" 1671
as "an act of insulting." To add insult to injury translates L. injuriæ
contumeliam addere.
salient
1562,
"leaping," a heraldic term, from L. salientem (nom. saliens), prp. of salire
"to leap," from Prot Indo-European base *sel-
"to jump" (cf. Gk. hallesthai "to leap," Middle
Irish. saltraim "I trample," and probably Sanskritt. ucchalati "rises quickly"). |
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