# PA-RA (parr(u))

> skin, fleece (a hide with its wool)

A Linear A word in the Linear A Lexicon. The reading is a proposal and carries its tier.

- Reading: parr(u)
- Confidence: Speculative. A proposed reading on a word too rare to test. Most occur only once.
- Root: [\*parw- ~ \*parr-](<https://linear-a.ai/roots/1995/index.md>) 'skin, fur, husk, etc'
- Kind: Commodity
- Language: Semitic
- Signs: PA (pa) · RA (ra)

## Compared forms

- Akkadian: paru A (parru, baru) 'skin, hide' (CAD P 209); pāru, parru, bāru 'Haut' (AHw 836)
- Arabic: *farw-* — farw- 'fur'; farwa 'a skin, but not unless having upon it fur or wool' (Lane 2390)
- Syriac: partā, pl. parrē 'bran, husk; scurf of the head' (Brock. 591)

## Attestations

- [PH 3a](<https://linear-a.ai/texts/PH3a/index.md>): PA-RA 𐝓
- [HT 128a](<https://linear-a.ai/texts/HT128a/index.md>): PA-RA

## Commentary

PH 3a .3 ]MA+RU ⅓ · PẠ-RẠ ⅓ (GORILA I 291): after the wool ligature MA+RU and the MA ligatures *556, *557 and *563, with the wool entry's ⅓ measure; a fractional measure fits a material counted by weight. PA and RA at their primary values, the geminate unwritten, both signs dotted. parr(u) 'skin, fleece': Akk. pāru, parru 'skin, hide' (CAD P 209; #1995). Rivals: *parʕ- '(loose) hair of the head' (Akk. pērtu, Heb. päraʿ; SED I No. 218), head hair rather than a traded material; *ɣapar- 'stiff hair' (Kogan 2011, 223) with its first syllable unwritten. HT 128a .1 *326 PA-RA TU-RU-NU-SE-ME GRA 10, with no quantity of its own (GORILA I 221): there a personal name, or *barr- 'grain' (Heb. bār; Akk. burru '(a cereal)', Mari, CAD B 330) with PA for /b/. Weak point: a two-sign word, so the PH 3a context, not the spelling, selects the sense.

## References

- Reading: di Mino; CAD P; Kogan 2011; SED I; CAD B
- Kogan, Leonid (2011), Proto-Semitic Phonetics and Phonology. The Semitic Languages: An International Handbook, ed. Stefan Weninger et al.,De Gruyter Mouton, Berlin,54–151
- AHw: von Soden, Wolfram (1981), Akkadisches Handwörterbuch, Bd. I–III. Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden
- SED I: Militarev, Alexander; Kogan, Leonid (2000), Semitic Etymological Dictionary, Vol. I: Anatomy of Man and Animals. Ugarit-Verlag, Münster (Alter Orient und Altes Testament 278/1)
- Lane: Lane, Edward William (1863), An Arabic-English Lexicon. Williams and Norgate, London
- CAD B: Oriental Institute (A. Leo Oppenheim and Erica Reiner, eds.) (1965), The Assyrian Dictionary of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, vol. 2, B. The Oriental Institute, Chicago; J. J. Augustin, Glückstadt
- CAD P: Oriental Institute (Martha T. Roth, ed.) (2005), The Assyrian Dictionary of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, vol. 12, P. The Oriental Institute, Chicago
- GORILA I: Godart, Louis; Olivier, Jean-Pierre (1976), Recueil des inscriptions en linéaire A, volume 1: Tablettes éditées avant 1970 (GORILA I). École française d'Athènes (Études crétoises XXI, 1); Librairie orientaliste Paul Geuthner, Paris

---

Page: https://linear-a.ai/lexicon/PA-RA/
Licence: CC BY 4.0, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Cite as: di Mino, Tom. 2026. Linear A Lexicon. Plasma AI. https://linear-a.ai/. Data: kaphtor, commit 50525edd.
