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b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] Any meaning to the Dagesh?

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  • From: David Kummerow <farmerjoeblo AT hotmail.com>
  • To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Any meaning to the Dagesh?
  • Date: Thu, 26 Feb 2009 10:27:01 +1100

Hi John,

Well, you pick an example where the "base" parts are the same. Dividing between a "base" morpheme and a "prefix" morpheme to answer you question is entirely arbitrary, linguistically speaking. In any case, [ha$omer] differs from [ha$$omer] with respect to the dagesh. The prefixed morphemes are /ha/ and /haC/ (more correctly /haμ/, where μ stands for mora). Again I assert that in this morpheme, removal of the dagesh changes the morpheme, and hence its semantics, entirely. The principle, therefore, that in BH the dagesh is phonemic -- and hence meaningful -- is established. Whether a linguistic side effect of this is that some verbal or nominal morphology solely differs with respect to this morpheme is entirely secondary -- meaning that the answer to your question regarding "bases", whether affirmative or negative, does not really matter with respect to the phonemic status of dagesh. By removing dagesh from /haC/, you remove the distinguishing phoneme from the morpheme, hence there is significant meaning loss in doing so.

Regards,
David Kummerow.


So with the example:
<H:A/$OM"R> vs <HA/$.OM"R>

The "base" parts are :
<$OM"R> vs <$.OM"R>
They both have the exact same letters.
They both have the exact same vowels.
One has a dagesh - one doesn't.
But they have the same meaning: Qal Participle Masculine Singular

Is there ever a case that a word will have all of the above criteria,
except that the words have different meaning?





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