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Re: Hebrew waw consecutive (was: Beijing, Zhongguo, etc)

From:Veoler <veoler@...>
Date:Wednesday, August 20, 2008, 11:43
David McCann wrote:
> The fast-forward version is that archaic Hebrew had a verbal form in w- > and later writers assumed that this prefix was the synonymous word > "and". Thus wayyiktōb "he wrote (perfective)" was taken to be wa "and" > plus yiktōb "he writes (imperfective)". It looked as if the conjunction > was switching the aspect of the verb.
Is there some hard evidence for this? As far as I have heard there was no real foundation behind waw conversive, and I haven't ever seen any proof in any direction. So I'm 67% non-believer in waw conversive and 33% agnostic, until I see evidence. Do you have any references about the justification or reason to assume the theory? I have'nt got very far in learning Hebrew and thought I should wait with this question, but since it was brought up... -- Veoler