Biblical Hebrew Forum

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

david,

it has always been clear to me that many very ancient semitic roots were
bi-consonantal rather than tri-consonantal.

B), $B, GZ, BN, QM, GR, PL, TR, SM, LK, CM, DK, HK, $X, LP, RM, CD, GL, PR,
$L, CP, QB, QR, ....

and that they represent the older semitic root structure. assuming, say, 15-16
consonants this would give some 250 roots, clearly not enough for a
full-fledged language. gradually, a third (and even fourth) consonant was
added, providing some 3000-4000 roots, which are quite sufficient.

the third consonant, added to the two extent consonants, served 
to refine and sub-divide the original notion of the verb. clearly the 
process was not nearly as uniform as may appear from this description.
nevertheless, i imagine that this process may be used as a timer for the
separation of semitic into its branches/languages/dialects.

then, in later hebrew, a third letter was forced into the original
biconsonantal verbs in order to fit them into the general rule - a kind 
of a sodomite bed. the others that did not fit just disappeared.

if i remember correctly, ancient egyptian had a similar consonant-adding
mechanism, which also refined the meaning
of the word.

nir cohen
 
>>> I was reading the wikipedia entry on arabic and came across this curious
tidbit, any comments?
"With research scientists realized that the triconsonantal root consists
of: 1) two beginning sounds - a rootcell and 2) the third sound which is
a precision element. I.e.: the rootcell f-r has the meaning of scattering in
space. Then, f-r-g means cleaving, f-r-d - making separate, f-r-s - tearing to
pieces; the rootcell f-q means the main idea of absence, so: f-q-d means
loosing, f-q-r means poverty and so on. "

Shavua Tov,

David Kolinsky
Monterey, CA