Researching David Appleyard

He is Professor Emeritus of the Languages of the Horn of Africa at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in the University of London, where he specialized in Amharic and other Ethiopian Semitic languages, as well as various Cushitic languages of the region. He went first to SOAS as a student in 1968, studying Amharic and Linguistics, and completed his doctorate there on the Semitic basis of the Amharic lexicon in 1975, with Edward Ullendorff as supervisor. He then joined the staff at SOAS where he remained from 1975 until his retirement in September 2006. He taught Amharic language and literature, as well as courses on Ge’ez, Tigrinya, Somali, Oromo, African linguistics, and Ethiopian cultural history.

His linguistic research focuses both on Ethiopian Semitic and Cushitic, especially on the Central Cushitic or Agaw languages on which he has published numerous articles and monographs and a book. He has also published on Ethiopian linguistics in general, Ethiopian manuscripts, and the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, and has published a beginner’s textbook for learning Amharic, Colloquial Amharic.

He acts as a consultant on Ethiopian manuscripts and magic scrolls, and has worked for, amongst others, Christie’s of London, Sam Fogg Rare Books of London, and Princeton University Library. Since 2007 he was involved as an editor and field specialist with the Encyclopaedia Aethiopica project. More recently, he has been a co-editor and contributor to the book Ethiopia. History, Culture and Challenges, published as a joint project hosted under the Hiob Ludolf Centre for Ethiopian Studies, Hamburg University.

In 2014 he was awarded the British Academy Edward Ullendorff Medal for Semitic Languages and Ethiopian Studies.