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Consonant dissimilarity in Biblical Hebrew defective nouns

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 May 2020

Emmanuel Aïm
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Abstract

Co-occurrence restrictions on Biblical Hebrew root consonants have received thorough treatment in the specialized literature. However, combinations involving glides on the one hand, and nominal roots on the other, have received very little attention. The aim of this paper is to argue for an incompatibility between medial consonants and final glides in defective nouns: a final w cannot generally follow a homorganic medial root consonant, viz. labial p, b, m and velar k, g, q. The III-w roots are rare: they came about as a result of a well-documented historical process and are found almost only in nominal roots. Previous investigations have overlooked this incompatibility owing to the incomplete scope of the studies.

Keywords

Biblical HebrewPhonologyMorphologyRoot incompatibilitiesDissimilationDefective nounsGlides
Type
Article
Information
Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , Volume 83 , Issue 2 , June 2020 , pp. 225 - 237
Copyright
Copyright © SOAS University of London, 2020

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Footnotes

*

I am grateful to the anonymous reviewers for BSOAS for important comments and suggestions.

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