Semitic root
The roots of verbs and most nouns in the Semitic languages are characterized as a sequence of consonants or "radicals" (hence the term consonantal root). Such abstract consonantal roots are used in the formation of actual words by adding the vowels and non-root consonants (or "transfixes") which go with a particular morphological category around the root consonants, in an appropriate way, generally following specific patterns. It is a peculiarity of Semitic linguistics that a large majority of these consonantal roots are triliterals (although there are a number of quadriliterals, and in some languages also biliterals).
Such roots are also common in other Afroasiatic languages. While Berber mostly has triconsonantal roots, Chadic, Omotic, and Cushitic have mostly biconsonantal roots,[1] and Egyptian shows a mix of biconsonantal and triconsonantal roots.[2]
Triconsonantal roots
A triliteral or triconsonantal root (
: ܫܪܫܐ, šeršā) is a root containing a sequence of three consonants.The following are some of the forms which can be derived from the triconsonantal root k-t-b כ־ת־ב ك-ت-ب (general overall meaning "to write") in Hebrew and Arabic:
Note: The Hebrew
; where there was historically gemination, they are reduced to single consonants, with consonants in the begadkefat remaining the same.Semitological Abbreviation |
Hebrew
Name |
Arabic Name |
Morphological Category |
Hebrew Form |
Arabic Form |
Approximate Translation | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
G verb stem | פָּעַל קָל |
pā‘al or qāl |
فَعَلَ | fa‘ala (Stem I) |
3rd Sg. M. Perfect | כתב | kāṯaḇ | كتب | kataba | He wrote |
1st Pl. Perfect | כתבנו | kāṯaḇnū | كتبنا | katabnā | We wrote | |||||
3rd Sg. M. Imperfect | יכתוב | yiḵtoḇ | يكتب | yaktubu | He writes, will write | |||||
1st Pl. Imperfect | נכתוב | niḵtoḇ | نكتب | naktubu | We write, will write | |||||
Sg. M. Active Participle | כותב | kōṯēḇ | كاتب | kātib | Writing | |||||
Š verb stem | הִפְעִיל | hip̄‘īl | أَفْعَلَ | af‘ala (Stem IV) |
3rd Sg. M. Perfect | הכתיב | hiḵtīḇ | أكتب | aktaba | He dictated |
3rd Sg. M. Imperfect | יכתיב | yaḵtīḇ | يكتب | yuktibu | He dictates, will dictate | |||||
Št(D) verb stem | הִתְפָּעֵל | hiṯpā‘ēl | استَفْعَلَ | istaf‘ala (Stem X) |
3rd Sg. M. Perfect | התכתב | hiṯkattēḇ | استكتب | istaktaba | He corresponded (Hebrew), had a copy made (Arabic) |
3rd Sg. M. Imperfect | יתכתב | yiṯkattēḇ | يستكتب | yastaktibu | (imperfect of above) | |||||
Noun with m- prefix & original short vowels |
מִפְעָל | mip̄‘āl | مَفْعَل | maf‘āl | Singular | מכתב | miḵtāḇ | مكتب | maktab | Letter (Hebrew), Office (Arabic) |
In
Biliteral origin of some triliteral roots
Although most roots in Hebrew seem to be triliteral, many of them were originally biliteral, cf. the relation between:
ג־ז √g-z | ||
---|---|---|
ג־ז־ז | √g-z-z | shear |
ג־ז־ם | √g-z-m | prune, cut down |
ג־ז־ר | √g-z-r | cut |
פ־ר √p-r | ||
---|---|---|
פ־ר־ז | √p-r-z | divide a city |
פ־ר־ט | √p-r-ṭ | give change |
פ־ר־ר | √p-r-r | crumble into pieces |
פ־ר־ע | √p-r-‘ | pay a debt [3] |
The Hebrew root ש־ק־ף – √sh-q-p "look out/through" or "reflect" deriving from ק־ף – √q-p "bend, arch, lean towards" and similar verbs fit into the shaCCéC verb-pattern.
ק־פ √q-p | |
---|---|
ק־פ־א | √q-p-' |
ק־פ־ה | √q-p-h |
ק־פ־ח | √q-p-ḥ |
ק־פ־י | √q-p-y |
This verb-pattern sh-C-C is usually causative, cf.
ט־ף | √ṭ-p | "wet" | ש־ט־ף | √sh-ṭ-p | "wash, rinse, make wet" |
ל־ך | √l-k | "go".[3] | ש־ל־ך | √sh-l-k | "cast off, throw down, cause to go" |
History
There is debate about whether both bi- or triconsonantal roots date back to
Quadriliteral roots
A quadriliteral is a consonantal root containing a sequence of four consonants (instead of
Generally, only a subset of the verb derivations formed from
Another set of quadriliteral roots in modern Hebrew is the set of secondary roots. A secondary root is a root derived from a word that was derived from another root. For example, the root מ-ס-פ-ר m-s-p-r is secondary to the root ס-פ-ר s-p-r. סָפַר saphar, from the root s-p-r, means "counted"; מִסְפָּר mispar, from the same root, means "number"; and מִסְפֶּר misper, from the secondary root מ-ס-פ-ר, means "numbered".
An irregular quadriliteral verb made from a loanword is:
- נַשְׁפְּרִיץ[1] Archived 2011-07-21 at the Wayback Machine (/naʃˈprit͡s/) – "we will sprinkle" or "we will splash", from Yiddish spritz (from German spritzen)
Quinqueliteral roots
A quinqueliteral is a consonantal root containing a sequence of five consonants. Traditionally, in Semitic languages, forms with more than four basic consonants (i.e. consonants not introduced by morphological inflection or derivation) were occasionally found in nouns, mainly in loanwords from other languages, but never in verbs.[6] However, in modern Israeli Hebrew, syllables are allowed to begin with a sequence of two consonants (a relaxation of the situation in early Semitic, where only one consonant was allowed), which has opened the door for a very small set of loan words to manifest apparent five root-consonant forms, such as טלגרף tilgref "he telegraphed".[7] However, -lgr- always appears as an indivisible cluster in the derivation of this verb and so the five root-consonant forms do not display any fundamentally different morphological patterns from four root-consonant forms (and the term "quinqueliteral" or "quinquiliteral" would be misleading if it implied otherwise). Only a few Hebrew quinqueliterals are recognized by the Academy of the Hebrew Language as proper, or standard; the rest are considered slang.
Other examples are:
- סִנְכְּרֵן[2] Archived 2011-07-21 at the Wayback Machine (/sinˈkren/ – "he synchronized"), via the English word from Greek
- חִנְטְרֵשׁ[3] Archived 2011-07-21 at the Wayback Machine (/χinˈtreʃ/ – "he did stupid things")
- הִתְפְלַרְטֵט[4] Archived 2011-07-21 at the Wayback Machine (/hitflarˈtet/ – "he had a flirt"), from the English or Yiddish past tense of the English word
In
See also
- Apophony
- Arabic grammar
- Broken plural
- Indo-European ablaut
- Khuzdul
- K-T-B
- Modern Hebrew grammar
- Nonconcatenative morphology
- Phono-semantic matching
- Proto-Indo-European root
- Š-L-M
- Transfix
Notes
- ^ Hayward, Richard J. (2000). "Afroasiatic". In Heine, Bernd; Nurse, Derek (eds.). African Languages: An Introduction. Cambridge University Press. pp. 74–98, here 93.
- ISBN 9781646022120.
- ^ ISBN 1-4039-1723-X.
- S2CID 133888593.
- ^ Agmon (2010:23)
- ISBN 0-85331-585-X, p. 261.
- ^ "The inadequacy of the consonantal root: Modern Hebrew denominal verbs and Output-Output correspondence" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 2013-07-22. Retrieved 2012-12-10..
- ^ p. 153. Thomas Leiper Kane. 1990. Amharic-English Dictionary. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz.
- ^ pp. 566–569, 1043. Wolf Leslau. Reference Grammar of Amharic. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz.
References
- Agmon, Noam (2010), "Materials and Language: Pre-Semitic Root Structure Change Concomitant with Transition to Agriculture" (PDF), Brill's Annual of Afroasiatic Languages and Linguistics, 2: 23–79, doi:10.1163/187666310X12688137960669, archived from the original(PDF) on 2021-11-13, retrieved 2019-09-03
External links
- Semitic Roots Repository
- Roots in Quranic Arabic
- Project Root List
- Learn Hebrew Verbs
- Alexis Amid Neme and Eric Laporte (2013), Pattern-and-root inflectional morphology: the Arabic broken plural |year=
- Alexis Amid Neme and Eric Laporte (2015), Do computer scientists deeply understand Arabic morphology? – هل يفهم المهندسون الحاسوبيّون علم الصرف فهماً عميقاً؟, available also in Arabic, Indonesian, French