), North Syrian (including Aleppo), and Palestinian/Jordanian. He writes that distinctions between these groups are unclear, and isoglosses cannot determine the exact boundary.
thumb|An interview with Lebanese singer [[Maya Diab; she speaks in Lebanese.]]
thumb|Turkish politician [[Tülay Hatimoğulları is giving a political speech in Cilician Arabic.]]
The dialect of Aleppo shows Mesopotamian influence. Similarly, a "Standard Lebanese Arabic" is emerging, combining features of Beiruti Arabic (which is not prestigious) and Jabale Arabic, the language of Mount Lebanon. Bedouin varieties are spoken in the Negev and the Sinai Peninsula, areas of transition between Levantine and Egyptian. The dialect of Arish, Egypt, is classified by Linguasphere as Levantine. while other Jordanian and Palestinian Arabic dialects include Fellahi (rural) and Madani (urban). The Gaza dialect contains features of both urban Palestinian and Bedouin Arabic. Contrary to others, Druze and Alawite dialects retained the phoneme . MSA influences Sunni dialects more. Jewish dialects diverge more from Muslim dialects and often show influences from other towns due to trade networks and contacts with other Jewish communities. For instance, the Jewish dialect of Hatay is very similar to the Aleppo dialect, particularly the dialect of the Jews of Aleppo. It shows traits otherwise not found in any dialect of Hatay.
Levantine is primarily spoken by Arabs. It is also spoken as a first or second language by several ethnic minorities. In particular, it is spoken natively by Samaritans and by most Circassians in Jordan, Assyrians in Israel, and Lebanon, Kurds in Lebanon, and Dom people in Jerusalem. Most Christian and Muslim Lebanese people in Israel speak Lebanese Arabic. Syrian Jews, and Turkish Jews from Çukurova are native Levantine speakers; however, most moved to Israel after 1948. Levantine is the second language of Dom people across the Levant, Assyrians in Syria and most Kurds in Syria.
Speakers by country
In addition to the Levant, where it is indigenous, Levantine is spoken among diaspora communities from the region, especially among the Palestinian, The language has fallen into disuse among subsequent diaspora generations, such as the 7 million Lebanese Brazilians.) empires. From the early 1st millennium BCE until the 6th century CE, there was a continuum of Central Semitic languages in the Arabian Peninsula, and Central Arabia was home to languages quite distinct from Arabic.
Because there are no written sources, the history of Levantine before the modern period is unknown. Old Arabic was a dialect continuum stretching from the southern Levant (where Northern Old Arabic was spoken) to the northern Hijaz, in the Arabian Peninsula, where Old Hijazi was spoken. In the early 1st century CE, a great variety of Arabic dialects were already spoken by various nomadic or semi-nomadic Arabic tribes in the Levant, the Tanukhids, and the Ghassanids.
Muslim conquest of the Levant
The Muslim conquest of the Levant (634–640 The language shift from Aramaic to vernacular Arabic was a long process over several generations, with an extended period of multilingualism, especially among non-Muslims.
Different Peninsular Arabic dialects competed for prestige in the Levant, including the Old Hijazi Arabic of the Umayyad elites. These Peninsular dialects mixed with ancient Levantine forms of Arabic. By the mid-6th century, the Petra papyri show that the onset of the article and its vowel seem to have weakened. The article is sometimes written as /el-/ or simply /l-/. A similar, but not identical, situation is found in the texts from the Islamic period. Unlike the pre-Islamic attestations, the coda of the article in 'conquest Arabic' assimilates to a following coronal consonant. According to Pr. Simon Hopkins, this document shows that there is "a very impressive continuity in colloquial Arabic usage, and the roots of the modern vernaculars are thus seen to lie very deep".
Medieval and early modern era
The Damascus Psalm Fragment, dated to the 9th century but possibly earlier, sheds light on the Damascus dialect of that period. Because its Arabic text is written in Greek characters, it reveals the pronunciation of the time; it features many examples of imāla (the fronting and raising of toward ). It also features a pre-grammarian standard of Arabic and the dialect from which it sprung, likely Old Hijazi. Scholars disagree on the dates of phonological changes. The shift of interdental spirants to dental stops dates to the 9th to 10th centuries or earlier. The shift from to a glottal stop is dated between the 11th and 15th centuries. Imāla seems already important in pre-Islamic times.
Swedish orientalist writes about the vulgarisms encountered in Damascene poet Usama ibn Munqidh's Memoirs: "All of them are found in today's spoken language of Syria and it is very interesting to note that that language is, on the whole, not very different from the language of ˀUsāma's days", in the 12th century. Lucas Caballero's Compendio (1709) describes spoken Damascene Arabic in the early 1700s. It corresponds to modern Damascene in some respects, such as the allomorphic variation between -a/-e in the feminine suffix, while the insertion and deletion of vowels differ.
From 1516 to 1918, the Ottoman Empire dominated the Levant. Many Western words entered Arabic through Ottoman Turkish as it was the main language for transmitting Western ideas into the Arab world. the British protectorate over Jordan (1921–1946), and the British Mandate for Palestine (1923–1948), French and English words gradually entered Levantine Arabic. Similarly, Modern Hebrew has significantly influenced the Palestinian dialect of Arab Israelis since the establishment of Israel in 1948. constitute the causes of dialect change. MSA is the sole official language in Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, and Syria; it has a "special status" in Israel under the Basic Law. French is also recognized in Lebanon. In Turkey, the only official language is Turkish. Levantine and MSA are mutually unintelligible. They differ significantly in their phonology, morphology, lexicon and syntax.
MSA is the language of literature, official documents, and formal written media (newspapers, instruction leaflets, school books). In spoken form, MSA is mostly used when reading from a scripted text (e.g., news bulletins) and for prayer and sermons in the mosque or church. In Israel, Hebrew is the language used in the public sphere, except internally among the Arab communities. Levantine is the usual medium of communication in all other domains.
Traditionally in the Arab world, colloquial varieties, such as Levantine, have been regarded as corrupt forms of MSA, less eloquent and not fit for literature, and thus looked upon with disdain. Because the French and the British emphasized vernaculars when they colonized the Arab world, vernaculars were also seen as a tool of colonialism and imperialism. Writing in the vernacular has been controversial because pan-Arab nationalists consider that this might divide the Arab people into different nations. Code-switching also happens in politics. For instance, not all politicians master MSA in Lebanon, so they rely on Lebanese. Many public and formal speeches and most political talk shows are in Lebanese instead of MSA. In Israel, Arabic and Hebrew are allowed in the Knesset, but Arabic is rarely used. MK Ahmad Tibi often adds Palestinian Arabic sentences to his Hebrew speech but only gives partial speeches in Arabic.
Education
In the Levant, MSA is the only variety authorized for use in schools, although in practice, lessons are often taught in a mix of MSA and Levantine with, for instance, the lesson read out in MSA and explained in Levantine. In most Arab universities, the medium of instruction is MSA in social sciences and humanities, and English or French in the applied and medical sciences. In Syria, only MSA is used. In Turkey, article 42.9 of the Constitution prohibits languages other than Turkish from being taught as a mother tongue and almost all indigenous Arabic speakers are illiterate in the Arabic script unless they have learned it for religious purposes.
In Israel, MSA is the only language of instruction in Arab schools. Hebrew is studied as a second language by all Palestinian students from at least the second grade and English from the third grade. Junior high schools must teach all students MSA, but only two-thirds meet this obligation.
Films and music
Most films and songs are in vernacular Arabic. As of 2013, about 40% of all music production in the Arab world was in Lebanese. Lebanese television is the oldest and largest private Arab broadcast industry. Most big-budget pan-Arab entertainment shows are filmed in the Lebanese dialect in the studios of Beirut. Moreover, the Syrian dialect dominates in Syrian TV series (such as Bab Al-Hara) and in the dubbing of Turkish television dramas (such as Noor), famous across the Arab world.
, most Arabic satellite television networks use colloquial varieties in their programs, except news bulletins in MSA. The use of vernacular in broadcasting started in Lebanon during the Lebanese Civil War and expanded to the rest of the Arab world. In 2009, Al Jazeera used MSA only and Al Arabiya and Al-Manar used MSA or a hybrid between MSA and colloquial for talk shows. On the popular Lebanese satellite channel Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation International (LBCI), Arab and international news bulletins are only in MSA, while the Lebanese national news broadcast is in a mix of MSA and Lebanese Arabic.
Written media
Levantine is seldom written, except for some novels, plays, and humorous writings. Prose written in Lebanese goes back to at least 1892 when Tannus al-Hurr published , 'The tale of the drunken youth, or The story of Nassur the Drunkard'. followed by the Gospel of Matthew and the Letter of James in 1946. The four gospels were translated in Lebanese using Akl's alphabet in 1996 by Gilbert Khalifé. Muris 'Awwad translated the four gospels and The Little Prince in 2001 in Lebanese in Arabic script.
Newspapers usually use MSA and reserve Levantine for sarcastic commentaries and caricatures. Headlines in Levantine are common. The letter to the editor section often includes entire paragraphs in Levantine. Many newspapers also regularly publish personal columns in Levantine, such as , in the weekend edition of Al-Ayyam. From 1983 to 1990, Said Akl's newspaper Lebnaan was published in Lebanese written in the Latin alphabet. Levantine is also commonly used in zajal and other forms of oral poetry. In a 2013 study, Abuhakema investigated 270 written commercial ads in two Jordanian (Al Ghad and Ad-Dustour) and two Palestinian (Al-Quds and Al-Ayyam) daily newspapers. The study concluded that MSA is still the most used variety in ads, although both varieties are acceptable and Levantine is increasingly used.
Most comedies are written in Levantine. In Syria, plays became more common and popular in the 1980s by using Levantine instead of Classical Arabic. Saadallah Wannous, the most renowned Syrian playwright, used Syrian Arabic in his later plays. Comic books, like the Syrian comic strip , are often written in Levantine instead of MSA. In novels and short stories, most authors, such as Arab Israelis and Odeh Bisharat, write the dialogues in Levantine, while the rest of the text is in MSA. Some collections of short stories and anthologies of Palestinian folktales (, 'heritage literature') display full texts in Levantine. On the other hand, Palestinian children's literature is almost exclusively written in MSA.
Phonology
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center"
|+Consonant phonemes of urban Levantine (Beirut, A helping vowel is inserted:
- Before the word, if this word starts with two consonants and is at the beginning of a sentence,
- Between two words, when a word ending in a consonant is followed by a word that starts with two consonants,
- Between two consonants in the same word, if this word ends with two consonants and either is followed by a consonant or is at the end of a sentence.
In the Damascus dialect, word stress falls on the last superheavy syllable (CVːC or CVCC). In the absence of a superheavy syllable:
- if the word is bisyllabic, stress falls on the penultimate,
- if the word contains three or more syllables and none of them is superheavy, then stress falls:
- on the penultimate, if it is heavy (CVː or CVC),
- on the antepenult, if the penultimate is light (CV).
Orthography and writing systems
thumb|In Hatay, Turkey, two women hold a sign that says 'Mara Haya Hurriya', meaning 'Woman, Life, Freedom' in Levantine Arabic. The phrase is written using the Latin-based Turkish alphabet.
Until recently, Levantine was rarely written. Brustad and Zuniga report that in 1988, they did not find anything published in Levantine in Syria. By the late 2010s, written Levantine was used in many public venues and on the internet, especially social media. There is no standard Levantine orthography.
Written communication takes place using a variety of orthographies and writing systems, including Arabic (right-to-left script), Hebrew (right-to-left, used in Israel, especially online among Bedouin, Arab Christians, and Druze), Latin (Arabizi, left-to-right), and a mixture of the three. Arabizi is a non-standard romanization used by Levantine speakers in social media and discussion forums, SMS messaging, and online chat. Arabizi initially developed because the Arabic script was not available or not easy to use on most computers and smartphones; its usage declined after Arabic software became widespread. According to a 2020 survey done in Nazareth, Arabizi "emerged" as a "'bottom-up' orthography" and there is now "a high degree of normativization or standardisation in Arabizi orthography." Among consonants, only five (ج ,ذ ,ض ,ظ ,ق) revealed variability in their Arabizi representation.
A 2012 study found that on the Jordanian forum Mahjoob about one-third of messages were written in Levantine in the Arabic script, one-third in Arabizi, and one-third in English. Another 2012 study found that on Facebook, the Arabic script was dominant in Syria, while the Latin script dominated in Lebanon. Both scripts were used in Palestine, Israel, and Jordan. Several factors affect script choice: formality (the Arabic script is more formal), ethnicity and religion (Muslims use the Arabic script more while Israeli Druze and Bedouins prefer Hebrew characters), age (young use Latin more), education (educated people write more in Latin), and script congruence (the tendency to reply to a post in the same script).
50px|thumb|A [[shadda.]]
The Arabic alphabet is always cursive, and letters vary in shape depending on their position within a word. Letters exhibit up to four distinct forms corresponding to an initial, medial (middle), final, or isolated position (IMFI). Only the isolated form is shown in the tables below. In the Arabic script, short vowels are not represented by letters but by diacritics above or below the letters. When Levantine is written with the Arabic script, short vowels are usually only indicated if a word is ambiguous. In the Arabic script, a shadda above a consonant doubles it. In Latin alphabet, the consonant is written twice: , , 'a female teacher' / , , 'a school'. Said Akl's Latin alphabet uses non-standard characters.
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;"
|+ Consonants
|-
! rowspan="2" | Letter(s)
! colspan="8" | Romanization
! rowspan="2" | IPA
! rowspan="2" | Pronunciation notes
|-
! Cowell
! Al-Masri
! Aldrich
!
! Liddicoat
! Assimil
! Stowasser
! Arabizi
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | أ إ ؤ ئ ء || ʔ || ʔ || ʔ || || || || ʔ || 2 or not written || [] || glottal stop like in uh-oh
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ق || q || g || ʔ<br />q || q<br />q̈ || <s>q</s><br />q || || q<br />q̈ || 2 or not written<br />9 or q or k || [] or []<br />[] || – glottal stop (urban accent) or "hard g" as in get (Jordanian, Bedouin, Gaza)<br />- guttural "k", pronounced further back in the throat (formal MSA words)
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ع || ε || 3 || 3 || <sup>c</sup> || ع || <sup>c</sup> || ε || 3 || [] || voiced throat sound similar to "a" as in father, but with more friction
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ب
| colspan="8" | b || [] || as in English
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | د
| colspan="8" | d || [] || as in English
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ض || ḍ || D || ɖ || ḍ || ḍ || <u>d</u> || ḍ || d or D || [] || emphatic "d" (constricted throat, surrounded vowels become dark)
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ف
| colspan="8" | f || [] || as in English
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | غ || ġ || gh || ɣ || ġ || <u>gh</u> || gh || ġ || 3' or 8 or gh || [] || like Spanish "g" between vowels, similar to French "r"
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ه
| colspan="8" | h || [] || as in English
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ح || ḥ || H || ɧ || ḥ || ḥ || <u>h</u> || ḥ || 7 or h || [] || "whispered h", has more friction in the throat than "h"
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | خ || x || x || x || ꜧ̄|| <u>kh</u> || kh || x || 7' or 5 or kh || [] || "ch" as in Scottish loch, like German "ch" or Spanish "j"
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ج
| ž
| colspan="5" | j || ž || j or g || [] or [] || "j" as in jump or "s" as in pleasure
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ك
| colspan="8" | k || [] || as in English
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ل
| colspan="8" | l || []<br />[] || – light "l" as in English love<br />- dark "l" as call, used in Allah and derived words
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | م
| colspan="8" | m || [] || as in English
|- as in English
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ن
| colspan="8" | n || [] || as in English
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ر
| colspan="8" | r || []<br />[] || – "rolled r" as in Spanish or Italian, usually emphatic<br />- not emphatic before vowel "e" or "i" or after long vowel "i"
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | س
| colspan="8" | s || [] || as in English
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ث || θ || th || s || s<br />ṯ || <u>th</u> || t || s<br />t || t or s or not written || []<br />[] || – "s" as in English (urban)<br />- voiceless "th" as in think (rural, formal MSA words)
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ص || ṣ || S || ʂ || ṣ ||| ṣ || <u>s</u> || ṣ || s || [] || emphatic "s" (constricted throat, surrounded vowels become dark)
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ش || š || sh || š || š || <u>sh</u> || ch || š || sh or ch or $ || [] || "sh" as in sheep
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ت
| colspan="8" | t || [] || as in English but with the tongue touching the back of the upper teeth
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ط || ṭ || T || ƭ || ṭ || ṭ || <u>t</u> || ṭ || t or T or 6 || [] || emphatic "t" (constricted throat, surrounded vowels become dark)
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | و
| colspan="8" | w || [] || as in English
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ي
| colspan="8" | y || [] || as in English
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ذ || 𝛿 || dh || z || z<br />ḏ || d || d or z || z<br />d || d or z or th || []<br />[] || – "z" as in English (urban)<br />- voiced "th" as in this (rural, formal MSA words)
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ز
| colspan="8" | z || [] || as in English
|-
| style="font-size: 1.5em;" | ظ || ẓ || DH || ʐ || ẓ || ẓ || <u>z</u> || ḍ<br />ẓ || th or z or d || [] || emphatic "z" (constricted throat, surrounded vowels become dark)
|}
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;"
|+ Vowels
|-
! Letter(s)
! Aldrich
! Elihay
! Liddicoat
! Assimil
! Arabizi SVO is more common in Levantine, while Classical Arabic prefers VSO. Subject-initial order indicates topic-prominent sentences, while verb-initial order indicates subject-prominent sentences. In interrogative sentences, the interrogative particle comes first.
Nouns and noun phrases
Nouns are either masculine or feminine and singular, dual or plural. The dual is formed with the suffix . Most feminine singular nouns end with , pronounced as –a or -e depending on the preceding consonant: -a after guttural () and emphatic consonants (), -e after other consonants. Adjective endings in (i) and (u) are changed into (a). If the second and third consonant in the root are the same, they are geminated (pattern: / ʾaCaCC). When an elative modifies a noun, it precedes the noun, and no definite article is used.
Levantine does not distinguish between adverbs and adjectives in adverbial function. Almost any adjective can be used as an adverb: , 'good' vs. , 'Did you sleep well?'. MSA adverbs, with the suffix -an, are often used, e.g., , 'at all'. Adverbs often appear after the verb or the adjective. , 'very' can be positioned after or before the adjective. Adverbs of manner can usually be formed using bi- followed by the nominal form: , 'fast, quickly', . The future can also be expressed by the imperfect preceded by the particle or by the prefixed particle . The present continuous is formed with the progressive particle followed by the imperfect, with or without the initial b/m depending on the speaker.
The active participle, also called present participle, is grammatically an adjective derived from a verb. Depending on the context, it can express the present or present continuous (with verbs of motion, location, or mental state), the near future, or the present perfect (past action with a present result). It can also serve as a noun or an adjective. The passive participle, also called past participle, has a similar meaning as in English (i.e., sent, written). It is mainly used as an adjective and sometimes as a noun. It is inflected from the verb based on its verb form. However, passive participles are largely limited to verb forms I (CvCvC) and II (CvCCvC), becoming maCCūC for the former and mCaCCaC for the latter.
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;"
|+ Table of prefixes, affixes, and suffixes added to the base form (for sound form I verbs with stressed prefixes)
|-
! colspan="2" |
! colspan="3" | Singular
! colspan="3" | Dual/Plural
|-
! colspan="2" |
! 1st person
! 2nd person
! 3rd person
! 1st person
! 2nd person
! 3rd person
|-
! rowspan="2" | Past
!
| rowspan="2" | -it
| -it
| ∅ (base form)
| rowspan="2" | -na
| rowspan="2" | -tu
| rowspan="2" | -u
|-
!
| -ti
| -it (North)<br />-at (South)
|-
! rowspan="2" | Present
!
| rowspan="2" | bi- (North)<br />ba- (South)
| bti-
| byi- (North)<br />bi- (South)
| rowspan="2" | mni-
| rowspan="2" | bti- -u
| rowspan="2" | byi- -u (North)<br />bi- -u (South)
|-
!
| bti- -i
| bti-
|-
! rowspan="2" | Present with helping verb
!
| rowspan="2" | i- (North)<br />a- (South)
| ti-
| yi-
| rowspan="2" | ni-
| rowspan="2" | ti- -u
| rowspan="2" | yi- -u
|-
!
| ti- -i
| ti-
|-
! rowspan="2" | Positive imperative
!
| rowspan="2"
| ∅ (Lengthening the present tense vowel, North)<br />i- (Subjunctive without initial consonant, South)
| rowspan="2"
| rowspan="2"
| rowspan="2" | -u (Stressed vowel u becomes i, North)<br />i- -u (South)
| rowspan="2"
|-
!
| -i (Stressed vowel u becomes i, North)<br />i- -i (South)
|-
! rowspan="2" | Active participle
!
| colspan="3" | -ē- (North) or -ā- (South) after the first consonant
| colspan="3" rowspan="4" | -īn (added to the masculine form)
|-
!
| colspan="3" | -e/i or -a (added to the masculine form)
|-
! rowspan="2" | Passive participle
!
| colspan="3" | ma- and -ū- after the second consonant
|-
!
| colspan="3" | -a (added to the masculine form)
|}
Compound tenses
The verb , followed by another verb, forms compound tenses. Both verbs are conjugated with their subject.
{| class="wikitable"
|+ Compound tenses with the example of the verb , 'to do'
!
! colspan="2"| kān in the past tense
! colspan="2"| kān in the present tense
|-
! Followed by
! Levantine !! English !! Levantine !! English
|-
! Past tense
| || he had done
| || he will have done
|-
! Active participle
| || he had done
| || he will have done
|-
! Subjunctive
| || he used to do / he was doing
| || he will be doing
|-
! Progressive
| || he was doing
| || he will be doing
|-
! Future tense
| <br /> || he was going to do
| colspan="2" rowspan="2"
|-
! Present tense
| || he would do
|}
Passive voice
Form I verbs often correspond to an equivalent passive form VII verb, with the prefix n-. Form II and form III verbs usually correspond to an equivalent passive in forms V and VI, respectively, with the prefix t-. While the verb forms V, VI and VII are common in the simple past and compound tenses, the passive participle (past participle) is preferred in the present tense.
{| class="wikitable"
|+ Examples of passive forms
! colspan="3"| Active
! colspan="3"| Passive
|-
! Verb form !! Levantine !! English
! Verb form !! Levantine !! English
|-
| I || || to catch
| VII || || to be caught
|-
| II || || to change
| V || || to be changed
|-
| III || || to surprise
| VI || || to be surprised
|}
Negation
Verbs and prepositional phrases are negated by the particle either on its own or, in the south, together with the suffix at the end of the verb or prepositional phrase. In Palestinian, it is also common to negate verbs by the suffix only.
{| class="wikitable"
|+ Examples of negation with mā and -š
! colspan="2" | Without -š !! colspan="2" | With -š !! rowspan="2" | English
|-
! Levantine (Arabic) !! Levantine (Latin) !! Levantine (Arabic) !! Levantine (Latin)
|-
| style="text-align: right;" | ||
| style="text-align: right;" | || || He didn't write.
|-
| style="text-align: right;" | ||
| style="text-align: right;" | || || I don't speak English.
|-
| style="text-align: right;" | ||
| style="text-align: right;" | || || Don't forget!
|-
| style="text-align: right;" | ||
| colspan="2" || He doesn't want to come to the party.
|}
Vocabulary
The lexicon of Levantine is overwhelmingly Arabic, and a large number of Levantine words are shared with at least another vernacular Arabic variety outside the Levant, especially with Egyptian. Many words, such as verbal nouns (also called gerunds or ), are derived from a Semitic root. For instance, , 'a lesson' is derived from , 'to study, to learn'. Levantine also includes layers of ancient languages: Aramaic (mainly Western Aramaic), Canaanite, classical Hebrew (Biblical and Mishnaic), Persian, Greek, and Latin. Aramaic is still spoken in the Syrian villages of Maaloula, al-Sarkha, and Jubb'adin;), French (especially in Lebanese due to the French Mandate), German, and Italian. Loanwords are gradually replaced with words of Arabic root. For instance, borrowings from Ottoman Turkish that were common in the 20th century have been largely replaced by Arabic words after the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. Arabic-speaking minorities in Turkey (mainly in Hatay) are still influenced by Turkish.
With about 50% of common words, Levantine (especially Palestinian) is the closest colloquial variety to MSA in terms of lexical similarity. In the vocabulary of five-year-old native Palestinians: 40% of the words are not present in MSA, 40% are related to MSA but phonologically different (sound change, addition, or deletion), and 20% are identical to MSA. In terms of morphemes, 20% are identical between MSA and Palestinian Arabic, 30% are strongly overlapping (slightly different forms, same function), 20% are partially overlapping (different forms, same function), and 30% are unique to Palestinian Arabic.
Sample text
{| class="wikitable"
|+ The Little Prince: Chapter 6
! Lebanese (Arabic) !! Lebanese (Romanized) !! MSA (Romanized)
|-
| <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || The Little Prince
|-
| <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || Oh, little prince!
|-
| <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || Bit by bit I came to understand the secrets of your sad little life.
|-
| <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || For a long time you had found your only entertainment in the quiet pleasure of looking at the sunset.
|-
| <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || I learned that new detail on the morning of the fourth day, when you said to me:
|-
| <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || <div dir="rtl" align="right">.</div> || . || <div dir="rtl" align="right"></div> || || I am very fond of sunsets.
|}