Re: mSr & Arabic roots [Was: Re: New To List]
| From: | Steg Belsky <draqonfayir@...> |
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| Date: | Thursday, February 13, 2003, 4:21 |
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On Wed, 12 Feb 2003 13:03:33 +0000 Stephen Mulraney
<ataltanie@...> writes:
> Interesting: Do Semitic roots undergo such drift? They are never
> pronounced themselves, but such a change might make itself known in
> the words derived from it. OTOH, if ancient roots are continuously
> referred to when coining new words, it might impart an unusual
> degree
> of stability on the phonology. Anyway, new roots seem to be added
> occasionally, or at least borrowings such as "television" (in
> Arabic)
> seem to be conceived as deriving from a root like t-l-f-z-y-n or
> thereabouts.
> s.
-
From what i've seen, Semitic roots drift along with general soundshifts
in their languages. So for instance, the root for "return" is HhZR /Hzr/
in Hebrew and HDR /hdr/ in Aramaic, because Proto-Semitic /D/ (edh)
merged with /z/ in one and /d/ in the other. I'm not sure about the
relationship between the /H/ and /h/, though.
Hebrew has created new roots:
(many of which are quadriliteral)
2RGN /?rgn/ = "to organize" |le'argein|, "organization" |irgun|
TtLVZ /t.lvz/ = "to televize" |letalveiz| (from |televizya| "television")
-Stephen (Steg)
"The Rat's Ass shall be given unto thee on many occasions -
but yea, none of them this day."
~ matidjahu