Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Henry Churchyard <churchyh AT ccwf.cc.utexas.edu>]

> Subject: attah variations, I
> From: Vincent DeCaen <decaen AT chass.utoronto.ca>
> Date: Tue, 10 Aug 1999 14:10:36 -0400 (EDT)

> for those willing to take an educated guess:

> how would you expect the three variations of attah
> )^FT.FH
> )^AT.FH
> )AT.F^H

> to pattern, relative to (1) accents, (2) syntax and/or (3) prosody?

Well, 'attAA with final-syllable stress is the non-pausal form,
'AAttaa with penultimate stress is the full pausal form, and 'Attaa
with penultimate stress is an intermediate form, what Richard Goerwitz
calls the "minor pausal" form.  On pages 484-485 and following pages
of my dissertation, I attempt to correlate the distinction between the
non-pausal form and the other two forms with the accentual parse
and/or prosody, but I don't find this type of pausally-alternating
form to show conspicuously different conditioning than other types of
forms that show pausal variations in stress positioning.

I imagine Richard Goerwitz has something to say about this in his
dissertation, but I don't think I have the relevant sections here.

--
Henry Churchyard   churchyh AT ccwf.cc.utexas.edu   http://www.crossmyt.com/hc/