Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Nir cohen - Prof. Mat." <nir AT ccet.ufrn.br>]

david,

SHAMIR: it makes sense to suggest shamir for brier or similar thorny-head 
plants in the region, some possibly extinct by now. but there are two 
problems: 

1) the s-->sh transformation. as it happens, SMR for thorny 
is used in modern hebrew in several ways (samar se'ar rosho, 
masmer, samur) and none of them with sh. (see below for s<-->sh).

2) another possible candidate for brier would be dorban used in the expression
"kotzim vedorbanot." also the name for porcupine and for any
instrument of the same quality used on animals. see the (talmudic?) expression
"dvarim ke-dorvanot". 

can anybody verify if SMR or DORBAN are BH?
--------------

SHAIT: maybe related with ShTT, i.e. a plant which causes one's
skin to bleed. it might even be the case that "shamir va-shait" is an 
inseparable idiomatic pair (similar to "shod va-shever") simply 
characterizing a whole family of plants which are BOTH thorny  
(shape) and brewsing (function). see also "kotzim ve-dorbanot" or 
"shotim ve-akrabim", also used as complete pairs.

----------------------

do i understand that you see a common linguistic source for 

             shem(name) and sam(put)?                      
             shamar(guarded) and samar(got thorny)?

i can only say i believe your use of the s<-->sh transformation 
within hebrew is far too liberal. i see no possible etymological
connection here, either.

-------------------------------- 

i always get uneasy when you (and isaac) non-challantly 
reduce three-letter roots to the first two letters, AND 
ATTRIBUTE A COMMON ETYMOLOGICAL VALUE TO THESE TWO LETTERS, from 
which all these roots supposedly emanate. sounds cool! except that 
(correct me if i'm wrong) you do it selectively, i.e. only for a 
subset of roots which fits the a posteriori chosen etymology. 
the remaining roots remain, so too speak, orphans. 

thus, shama'=heard and samax=was happy also start with SM/ShM, and so do
shemen=oil, shum=garlic, shmama=desert, smol=left, shemex=fish,
shamat=dropped, shemetz=trace, shimtzah=calumny, shmad=extinction, 
shemesh=sun. 

a) are all these words reducible to "SM=put=name"? 

b) if not, what are they reducible to, under your system?

regards
nir cohen

> Isaac and Nir,
> The root ShMR is an extension of SYM = put, place, impose, label; therefore:
             ShM\ - listen is literally "stay put and pay attention / listen"
             ShMSh - wait upon, attend to is literally "stay put so as to
attend to"
             ShMR - watch, guard is literally "stay put and watch / guard"
             (SMR) In Arabic : (stay put > stand around >)
                                   to chat, converse;
                                   to turn brown;
                                   to fasten, nail; pin, rivet, peg,
                                   corn;
and therefore   ShAMIR, Isaiah 5:6, is brier (what pins / rivets itself into
the skin)