Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Vadim Cherny <vadimcherny AT gmail.com>]

A famous English phonaesthetical cell gl- is widely present in Hebrew  
as gl[hey] with related meaning "to reveal, open", but more  
importantly, it is traceable to gl's basic meaning of "to heap up,  
cover something in a heap, to cover something round about".

English sl- phonaesthetical cell may be related to Hebrew samech-lamed  
which means "to push down".

Phonaesthesia is built into Hebrew where three-letter roots share  
their two-letter root cell's meaning. In English, the origin of  
phonaesthesia are obscure. Might not such roots enter the Romance and  
Germanic languages from Semitic?

Vadim Cherny