For daily communication, Yemenite Jews used Arabic dialects that were typologically similar to the local Muslim vernaculars. The dialects spoken by the Jews of Yemen are therefore classified in accordance with the general classification of Yemenite Arabic dialects (Vanhove 2013), with clear-cut isoglosses differentiating between Sanʿa and the central mountains, the northern province of Saʿda, the southern high plateau, the Habban region in eastern Yemen, and Aden.

Linguistic differences existed between the speech of Jews and Muslims in the same area, but were m…