Search results
The Semitic languages are a branch of the Afroasiatic language family. They include Arabic, Amharic, Aramaic, Hebrew, Maltese and numerous other ancient and modern languages.
- Afroasiatic Languages
The Afroasiatic languages (or Afro-Asiatic, sometimes...
- West Semitic
The West Semitic languages are a proposed major sub-grouping...
- East Semitic
Modern understanding of the phonology of East Semitic...
- Ethiopian Semitic Languages
Ethio-Semitic (also Ethiopian Semitic, Ethiosemitic,...
- Proto-Semitic Language
Proto-Semitic is the reconstructed proto-language common...
- Generations of Noah
Noah dividing the world between his sons. Anonymous painter;...
- Northwest Semitic languages
Northwest Semitic is a division of the Semitic languages...
- Semitic people
Semitic people or Semites is an obsolete term for an ethnic,...
- Afroasiatic Languages
People also ask
Where do Semitic languages come from?
Is 'Semitic' a linguistic or cultural classification?
What are the South Semitic languages?
How many people speak Semitic languages?
Northwest Semitic is a division of the Semitic languages comprising the indigenous languages of the Levant. It emerged from Proto-Semitic in the Early Bronze Age. It is first attested in proper names identified as Amorite in the Middle Bronze Age.
The Semitic languages are a branch of the Afroasiatic language family, which originated in the Middle East. Semitic languages are spoken by more than 470 million people across much of Western Asia, North Africa and the Horn of Africa, as well as in large communities of people from different countries in North America and Europe.
Semitic people or Semites is an obsolete term for an ethnic, cultural or racial group [2] [3] [4] [5] associated with people of the Middle East, including Arabs, Jews, Akkadians, and Phoenicians. The terminology is now largely unused outside the grouping "Semitic languages" in linguistics.
- Overview
- General overview
- The Northwest Semitic languages and Arabic
Semitic verbs are classified into various groups on the basis of the configuration of the stem. These groups are known as stems, forms, or binyān-îm (singular binyān), a Hebrew term. The most basic form is called the G-stem (from the German Grundstamm ‘master stem’). The table provides examples of the relation between basic and derived stems.
The most basic form is a root (Square root of√CCC) that combines with two related patterns (-V- and -V-V-) to create a one-vowel stem (-CCVC-) and a two-vowel stem (-CVC[C]VC-). This alternation of vowel shape is the key to the temporal and aspectual inflection of the verb. In Arabic, for instance, the one-vowel stem formed from the root Square root of√ktb indicates the present tense (ya-ktub-u ‘[he] writes’), while the two-vowel shape indicates the past tense (katab-a ‘[he] wrote’). The Akkadian preterite i-prus ‘(he) divided’ and present tense i-parras ‘(he) is dividing’ provide another example, this time formed on the root Square root of√prs.
The remaining stem types of the verb are known as the derived stems and feature the incorporation of one or more of a set of morphological elements—stem prefixes, stem infixes, consonantal doubling, and vocalic length—into the stem. Several of the derived stem classes are associated with an identifiable meaning such as causativity or reflexivity, although such associations are not absolutely consistent. A number of the derived stems—among them the N-stem, the D-stem (characterized by the optional doubling of the second root-consonant), and secondary stems derived through the addition of the marker *t(a)—are attested throughout all or most of the Semitic languages.
Other derived stem verb formations are limited to specific languages and represent local innovations. An example is the Ethiopic stem type ʾastaCāCaC-, as in ʾastaḥāmam-a ‘he studied closely,’ which combines the stem prefix ʾasta- with a long vowel ā and the root Square root of√ḥmm.
Inflectionally governed ablaut, or vowel alternation, is systematically found in the final vowel of the verb stem. Ablaut is characteristic of the G-stem, as demonstrated by the vowels a and u in Akkadian present i-parras versus preterite i-prus. In this example the vowel patterns specify the meaning of each verb.
Ablaut is also employed as a grammatical process among the derived verbs, as in Akkadian present ušapras ‘he causes to divide’ versus preterite ušapris ‘he caused to divide.’ In several of the West Semitic languages, characteristic vowel patterns have developed as a means of marking the passive voice—Arabic katab-a ‘he wrote’ versus kutib-a ‘it (masculine) was written.’
In Akkadian, the tenseless “stative” of Akkadian used auxiliaries rather than inflection (a technique known as periphrastic construction, as with English “book of mine” rather than “my book”) and included a deverbal adjective (an adjective based on a verb, as with the English “achievable” from “to achieve”) to which a subject-marking suffix was added. It was used to express situations resulting from a prior event, as in qebr-ēku ‘I have been buried,’ based on qebir- ‘buried.’ Finite verbs (verbs which express tense) had only a single set of person-number markers and the task of distinguishing the various tense and aspect forms therefore fell to the various shapes assumed by the stem itself, as in present i-qebbir ‘he buries,’ preterite i-qbir ‘he buried,’ and the so-called perfect i-qtebir ‘he had buried.’
Analogous forms to those in Akkadian are found also in several West Semitic languages, though with slightly different functions. Geʿez, for instance, had a perfective stem qabar-a ‘he buried’ (compare qebir); an imperfective stem yə-qabbər ‘he buries’ (compare i-qebbir); and a modal stem yə-qbər ‘may he bury’ (compare i-qbir). Many researchers believe that the stative attested in Akkadian was the basis of the perfective conjugation of West Semitic, a development often cited as a key diagnostic in the classification of a West Semitic branch.
A different verbal system in the Northwest Semitic languages and Arabic has led many scholars to posit a Central Semitic group within the West Semitic branch. On the one hand, like other West Semitic languages, the Northwest Semitic languages and Arabic have two contrasting sets of affixes for finite verbs, the first associated with the past perfective form of the stem and the second with the nonpast imperfective stem. The perfective markers are suffixes: compare -tî and -û in Hebrew qābar-tî ‘I buried’ and qābər-û ‘they buried.’ In contrast the imperfective affixes are composed of a prefix (ʾe- in ʾe-qbor ‘I bury’) or a circumfix (yi-stem-û in yi-qbər-û ‘they [masculine] bury’). On the other hand, the Northwest Semitic languages and Arabic are set apart in their use of the old modal form as the regular imperfect (compare the Hebrew imperfective yi-qbor with the Geʿez imperfective yə-qabbər and modal yə-qbər).
Markers reflecting the moods—in the case of Arabic, the indicative, jussive, and subjunctive and the inadequately understood “energetic”—are placed at the end of the imperfective stem verb, as in Arabic indicative ʾaqbur-u ‘I bury’ and subjunctive ʾaqbur-a ‘…that I bury.’ The most extensive system of moods is shown by classical Arabic, but clear indications of comparable modal markers are also to be found in several of the Northwest Semitic languages, most notably Ugaritic.
Semitic languages, Family of Afro-Asiatic languages spoken by more than 200 million people in northern Africa and South Asia. No other language family has been attested in writing over a greater time span—from the late 3rd millennium bce to the present.
The West Semitic languages are a large branch of Semitic languages. It is the only branch of Semitic languages with languages still spoken. The other branch of Semitic languages was East Semitic. It is extinct. The two branches of West Semitic languages are Central and Southern. Some linguists disagree with the branches.
