Ghadamès Riddles 2
Yá mǝn ḥayátǝk εáf—tălta ak tǝxǝddǝm, Asíd ttar ḍarăn-ǝnnăs'A woman who does not work, until she opens her legs'Yá mǝn ḥayátǝk εáf— Standard opening for riddles. I cannot make any sense of it. Is it...
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Yá mǝn ḥayátǝk εáf—tălta ak tǝxǝddǝm, Asíd tăβdǝd εáf-éγăf-ǝnnăs.'A woman that does not work until she will stand on her head'Most of this formula is the same as last riddle.tăβdǝd 3sg.f.aor. 'to stand...
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wăǵǵid inăqq əddrari-nnăs, Al as săllon ălžiran-ənnăs'A man (who) kills his children, the neighbours (are) hear(ing) him.'wăǵǵid'a man'inăqq 3sg.m.impf. 'to kill' An interesting, quite irregular verb,...
View ArticleLet's jump into the time machine!
A while ago, one of my professors at Leiden University, Michiel de Vaan, was asked to help out with an episode of a new television series on Belgian television about language. He was asked to write a...
View Article= /əw/
Sometimes, language presents evidence so clearly, you are kind of surprised that it works.While working out the Aujila phonology, I ran into severe problems with Paradisi's transcription, which is...
View ArticleGhadamès Riddles 5
Yá mən ḥayátək εaf—ažărtil iṭkár s-imaẓawăn, wăl illi dó-s xaf yón n-ărγa.‘A mat filled with fresh dates, there is only one yellow date.’ažărtil‘mat’ [Lameen:] ažărtil is widely borrowed into North...
View ArticleCC* verbs in Aujila
As my work on the Aujila language continues, I try to figure out some of the syntax and morphology. Part of every Berber language’s verbal morphology is the way it handles the CC* verbs, or CCa/i...
View ArticleMultiple reflexes of final PB *əv
There are not many cases of Proto-Berber final *əv in Aujila (only two). These two have two different reflexes.ĕrní [v.]imp. sg. ĕrní pl.m. ĕrniyât pl.f. ĕrnîmet; pf. 1sg. ernîḫ 3sg.m. yernî; pf2. 1sg....
View ArticleOriental Berber
The collaborative blog focused on the Berber languages of eastern north Africa is now live!Look forward to many translations and articles focusing on these fascinating...
View ArticleIndo-European and Prometheus
Ridley Scott’s latest film, Prometheus is a prequel to the events of the brilliant science fiction film Alien. If that isn’t enough of a reason for you to go watch it, get this: There is a small...
View ArticleLicking pots
In Dutch, we have a nursing rhyme that we sing to children before going to bed:Naar bed, naar bed, zei Duimelot,Eerst nog wat eten, zei Likkepot,Waar zal ik het halen? zei Lange Jan,Uit grootmoeders...
View ArticleProto-Berber Verbs: C1=C2 verbs
Similar to Semitic language, a very large amount of Berber verbs have three root consonants. This made it incredibly easy to integrate the basic Semitic verb stem from Arabic into its own system, which...
View ArticleThe problem with *hCC verbs.
As we've discussed in an earlier post Prasse reconstruct Berber verbs that start with a long vowel that has a in the aorist and u in the perfective as having an original initial radical *h which...
View ArticleVerbal Nouns in Proto-Berber #1: Weirdness in Awjila and Ghadames.
Like Arabic, Berber has 'verbal nouns' or 'maṣdars', nouns that express the action in a nominal way.In Arabic, the verbal noun form, especially of the basic verb stem is very difficult to predict, and...
View ArticleVerbal Nouns in Proto-Berber #2: Awareness of root-types.
We must accept that to some extent, Verbal Noun formations are probably irregular in Berber, like they are in Arabic, but there is a strange situation in Berber which is quite difficult to explain when...
View ArticleVerbal Nouns in Proto-Berber #3: The Glottal stop intial roots
In my previous post about the Verbal Nouns, I pointed out that, if the Apophonic Class I verbs are really all of the same triradical structure in Proto-Berber, one would expect the verbal nouns to have...
View Article'to write' and 'to open' and why reconstruction matters
I've lately been researching the origin of the Libyco-Berber script, and I ran into this article by Salem Chaker and Slima Hachi:...
View ArticlePlural formations of Proto-Berber
Plural formations in several Afro-Asiatic languages are notoriously complex, especially Cushitic, but also Semitic languages that retain 'broken plurals'. Berber is no exception to this trend, but as...
View ArticleIntrusive-r in Pink
Dutch as a language as a lot of vowels. Often the vowels are described in terms of short-long pairs, but technically, it is more correct to speak of lax-tense pairs. The tense vowels occasionally do...
View ArticleBroken Broken Almonds in Tashelhiyt
I've recently been reading some Tashelhiyt, after finishing Roux' Textes berbères du Maroc Central, I thought it'd be time to get to know Tashelhiyt better.I've been reading the still unpublished...
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