Reconstructions Search

The origin of Proto-MSA *ˀar(V)m ‘road’ is uncertain. The comparisons with Arb. ˀiram ‘a sign of mark set up to show the way; stones set up as a sign to mark or show the way in the desert’ are not implausible. Of considerable interest is Akk. arammu ‘wharf, embankment (of a canal); ramp, causeway’. (Kogan 2015:544)

suppletive plural of *ˀaz- ‘goat’. Origin is not quite certain, for some tentative proposals see SED II Nos. 13, 16 and 18.

formal MSA isogloss suppletive plural *ˀirān- - goats

The etymology is uncertain. Consider Arb. ˀaˁbal ‘a mountain of which stones are white; rough, rugged thick stone which may be red, black or white’. (See Kogan 2015:548 for more detail).

The origin is unclear.

The origin is uncertain. note also the variant root *γdl in Mehri and Jibbali

The origin is uncertain. Cf. perhaps Arb. ˁqr (V) ‘to be accumulated (fat on an animal); to grow well (plants)’, Tna. ˁaḳärä ‘to save, to put in reserve; to hoard, to amass, to accumulate’, Amh. aḳḳwärä ‘to collect’. (Kogan 2015:548-549) also a verbal noun traceable to Proto-MSA: *ˁaḳar- ‘growth’, cf. Mhr. ˀāḳər ‘size’ (ML 20), Jib. ˁáḳər ‘size’ (JL 11), Soq. ˁáḳar ‘size, age’ (LS 325).

M. Bittner (1909:14, 1915b:8) and W. Leslau are undoubtedly correct to derive it from PS *ˁmḳ ‘to be deep’ (CDG 63), notwithstanding a somewhat peculiar semantic development

“Proto-MSA *ˁamal- must be identical to Arb. ˁamal- ‘work, labor’ (and PCS *ˁamal-). In Classical Arabic this term does not seem to display any agricultural meaning which is, however, well attested in the Arabic dialects of Southern Arabia (Landberg 1901:663, GD 2330‒2331, Behnstedt 867, Piamenta 341, Rhodokanakis 41). In such conditions, it is hard to say whether we are faced with a (relatively early?) Arabic loanword into individual MSA languages or rather with a Proto-MSA term which influenced the local Arabic dialects. Admittedly, the phonetic shape of the Soqotri word (final stress, the “soft” lʼ) rather unambiguously speaks in favor of the the first possibility.” (Kogan 2015:549)

Proto-MSA *ˁmr ‘to say’ has been identified by Leslau with Hbr. ˀmr with the same meaning and its CS cognates, but the presence of *ˁ in the proto-form makes this equation rather problematic (Kogan 2015:544)