Bibliotheca Polyglotta

▪ LWḤ_1 ‘to appear, come in sight, become visible; to shine, flash, glimmer, sparkle; to seem, appear’ ↗¹lāḥa
▪ LWḤ_2 ‘to wither, singe, parch, scorch; to tan’ ↗²lāḥa
▪ LWḤ_3 ‘board, slate, tablet, slab, plate, pane, plank, panel; shoulder blade, scapula’ ↗lawḥ; ‘plaque, surface, screen; poster; picture, painting’ ↗lawḥaẗ
▪ LWḤ_4 ‘program, project; bill, motion; order, decree, edict, regulation, rule’ ↗lāʔiḥaẗ

Other values, now obsolete, include (BK1860, Lane vii 1885, Hava1899, WKAS ii):

▪ ^†LWḤ_5 ‘air, atmosphere | espace entre le ciel et la terre’ : ^†¹lūḥ
▪ ^†LWḤ_6 ‘polishing agent for mirrors’ : ^†līḥaẗ
▪ ^†LWḤ_7 ‘the lure; owl used for decoy shooting; decoy (bird)’ : ^†milwāḥ (WKAS ii)
▪ ^†LWḤ_8 ‘unfertilized eggs | œuf qui ayant été miré, est rebuté comme n’étant pas bon pour l’éclosion’ : ^†lāḥ
▪ ^†LWḤ_9 ‘thirst’ : ^†²lūḥ
▪ ^†LWḤ_10 ‘to be afraid (min of s.o.), frightened, be on one’s guard (min against), shrink back, recoil (min from s.th.), blush (min at a word)’ : ^†ʔalāḥa, vb. IV
▪ ^†LWḤ_ ‘…’ : ^†…

♦ Semantic value spectrum in ClassAr (acc. to BAH2008): ‘shoulder blade, board, a slap; to be emaciated; to be tanned, to be scorched black, to be thirsty; to glitter, to appear from a distance; to wave, to brandish; to insinuate; a glance, a blink; to whip’

▪ [gnrl] There are at least three main values in the root that one will find hard to connect:

(a) *‘to become visible, flash’ [≙ v1];
(b) *‘to scorch, singe, sear, burn, parch, desiccate, wither, lose weight, get thinner’ [≙ v2]; and
(c) *‘board, tablet, plank; shoulder blade’ [= v3]. This is the only value that has cognates in Sem; in Ar, it may be a borrowing from Aram.

The first two have developed a fairly high degree of differentiation in their respective semantic fields and are thus prob. rather old and genuine; all the more strange it seems that they do not seem to have counterparts in Sem (though perh. outside, in Eg). Gabal2012: 2013 suggests a derivation of all from a basic notion of *‘breadth, evenness and dryness or compactness in s.th.’, exemplarily represented in [v3] lawḥ ‘board, tablet, plank’. For, him, ‘dryness’ gave ‘thirst, desiccation, withering’, while ‘breadth’, he says, implies a higher degree of ‘visibility’. The strength of this argument would be the fact that only ‘board, tablet, plank’ seems to have a deeper Sem dimension; on the other hand, the theory appears to be rather far-fetched. Cf., however, a value of lawḥ (not mentioned by Gabal2012 but) given by ClassAr lexicographers, namely ‘tout ce qui, par sa surface plate et polie, reflète la lumière’ (BK1860) – here, s.th. with a flat, even, polished surface (as would be a ‘board, tablet, plank’) is combined with the reflexion of light, and the latter may look as if it could be derived from the former (see “a”). – Likewise, (a)[≙ v1] *‘to shine etc.’ and (b)[≙ v2] *‘to scorch, singe, sear, burn, parch, desiccate, wither, etc.’ may be connected via ^†[v8] lāḥ ‘eggs found unsuitable for hatching after having “X-rayed” (i.e., candled) them by holding them against the sun-light’, which combines the notions of ‘shining, light’ and ‘desiccation, emaciation, shrinking (> infertility?)’ etc.
▪ [v1] ‘to appear, be(come) visible; to shine, flash, glimmer, sparkle; to seem, appear’: etymology obscure. An essential element in the original semantics seems to be the notion of surprise and speed. – Borg2021 suggests comparison with Eg ꜣḫ (Urk. IV, 18th Dyn.) ‘schön, herrlich, trefflich, nützlich sein | glorious, splendid’ (Brockelmann 1932: 100 | Faulkner 1962: 4); ꜣḫ.t ‘Sonnenglanz’; ꜣḫ.t (NK) ‘Auge, besonders vom Auge der Sonne’ (Wb I 13, 17). – For Gabal2012’s hypothesis (“[v1]<[v3]”), see previous paragraph. – It is tempting to regard the meaning of [v3] lawḥ ‘board, tablet, plank’ registered by ClassAr lexicographers (in the translation of BK1860) as ‘tout ce qui, par sa surface plate et polie, reflète la lumière’ as a semantic bridge that could justify the semantic transition *‘board, plank > to be(come) visible, appear’; but this would need to be corroborated by broader and more reliable evidence—after all, the semantic “bridge” may be a homogenizing construction made by lexicographers to explain diversity within the root and give it more coherence. – [v1] related to [v2] via ^†[v8]? See above, s.v. [gnrl]. – [v1] is likely at the origin of values [v4]– ^†[v7], perh. also ^†[v8] – see below.
▪ [v2] ‘to wither, singe, parch, scorch; to tan’: etymology obscure. Semantic vicinity to ^†[v9] ^†²lūḥ ‘thirst’ is obvious, but does not help either, as also the latter is without cognates in Sem and outside. In some dictionaries, ‘to thirst’ is given as the first meaning of the corresponding vb. ^†lāḥa (Hava, Steingass, etc.). – ^†[v10] ‘to be afraid, frightened, shrink back, blush’ could be fig. use of [v2]. – [v2] related to [v1] ‘to appear, shine, flash’ via ^†[v8] ‘candled eggs’? See above, s.v. [gnrl] and [v1].
▪ [v3] ‘board, tablet, plank, etc.’: According to Jeffrey1939 borrowed from Aram lūḥā ‘id.’, but the word is widely attested in Sem (Akk, Ug, Hbr, Aram, Soq), so it may be genuine, directly from Sem *lawḥ ‘board, table, plank’. – A relation to [v1] ‘to appear, shine, flash’ has been suggested by Gabal2012 (see above, [gnrl] and [v1]), but this is little convincing. – The extended meaning ‘shoulder blade’ gave adj.s like ^†ʔalwaḥᵘ and ^†milwāḥ, both signifying s.o. ‘having broad bones, shoulder blades, tall’.
▪ [v4] ‘program, project; bill, motion; order, decree, edict, regulation, rule’: Formed on the FāʕiLaẗ pattern, lāʔiḥaẗ is evidently a PA I.f, most likely from [v1] lāḥa, thus meaning *‘the flashing one’. The connection between the modern meanings and the basic *‘becoming visible, appearing, flashing up’ becomes clear in the light of the D-stem, lawwaḥa ‘(*to let appear, let flash up >) to flourish, brandish, swing, wave, make a sign, signal’ (also with s.th. to eat or drink, to feed a child) and ^†[v7] milwāḥ ‘lure, decoy’ (< *s.th. waved with to attract attention, lure, entice). A lāʔiḥaẗ is thus, originally, *‘s.th. flashing up, giving an idea of s.th., sketch, outline’.
▪ ^†[v5] ‘air, atmosphere | espace entre le ciel et la terre’ : relation to [v1] not immediately obvious, but rather likely; perh. the layer of the air’s *‘flickering’.
▪ ^†[v6] ‘polishing agent for mirrors’ : with all probability related to [v1] ‘to shine, sparkle, gleam, glisten, glitter, etc.’
▪ ^†[v7] ‘the lure; owl used for decoy shooting; decoy (bird)’ : based on [v1] as *‘s.th. waved/signalled with (< made to shine, etc.) to attract attention and entice/lure s.o./s.th.’ (into a trap etc.). – Cf. D-stem lawwaḥa etc., as mentioned above, sub [v4].
▪ ^†[v8] ‘unfertilized eggs | œuf qui ayant été miré, est rebuté comme n’étant pas bon pour l’éclosion’ : ^†lāḥ : could serve as a semantic bridge betw. [v1] and [v2], since, accord. to ClassAr lexicographers, ‘unfertilized’ is rather *‘rejected as unsuitable for hatching after having “X-rayed” (candled) [the eggs] by holding [them] against the sun-light’ – here, the notions of [v1] ‘shining, light, etc.’ and [v2] ‘desiccation, emaciation, etc. (> infertility?)’ seem to overlap.
▪ ^†[v9] ‘thirst’ : Alongside with the n. ^†²lūḥ, many dictionaries list ‘to thirst’ as one of the primary meanings of the vb. lāḥa. The value is obviously related to [v2] ‘to scorch, burn, desiccate, cause to wither, lose weight, get thinner, etc.’.
▪ ^†[v10] ‘to be afraid (min of s.o.), frightened, be on one’s guard (min against), shrink back, recoil (min from s.th.), blush (min at a word)’ : ^†ʔalāḥa is prob. fig. use of an ʔa caus. formed from the G-stem lāḥa – but which one: [v1] ↗¹lāḥa or ↗²lāḥa? If from [v1], the ‘being afraid, shrinking back, etc.’ would have to be seen as result (?) of s.th. appearing, shining up (suddenly, and hence frightening?); if from [v2], it could be interpreted as fig. use of the latter (‘to be afraid’ as ‘to wither, become thin, shrink, etc.’. Neither of the two options seems particularly convincing, as pattern IV verbs usually express caus. meaning. Nor is there a n. in sight from which it could be denominative.
▪ …

▪ [v1] ¹lāḥa ‘to be(come) [clearly] visible, appear, emerge, come into view; to shine brightly, flash, sparkle, glint, glow, gleam, glitter, glisten (celestial bodies, fire, lamp, mirage, cloud of dust; water, butter, a spider’s web; traces left at an abandoned camp; … tracts of land, regions, paths, routes, buildings; flowers, blossoms; parts of the body; grey hair; weapons; implements, tools, materials, cloth, pieces of embroidery, jewelry, etc.; handwriting, ornaments, decorations; ship’s sails; pieces of jewelry, coins; brilliance of the morning sky, flash of lightning, thunder cloud, rainbow)’ (WKAS ii).¹ – ^†lawwaḥa bi’l-ʕaṣā ‘to raise a stick (upon s.o.)’, ^†lawwaḥa ‘to feed a child (*waving with the food/drink)’ (Hava1899). – ^†lāʔiḥaẗ ‘outward appearance, feature’ (Lane, Hava1899). – ^†layāḥ, liyāḥ, ‘intensely, shining, glistening white; daybreak, dawn; wild bull’, ^†ʔalwāḥ al-silāḥ ‘shining, glistening, flashing weapons’ (WKAS ii). – ^†ʔalāḥa ‘to make a sign, wave s.th. about’ (WKAS ii). – ^†milwaḥ ‘actively, busily waving’. – (=[v7]) ^†milwāḥ ‘the lure; owl used for decoy shooting; decoy (bird)’ (WKAS ii). – See perh. also [v5], below. – Should also ^†ʔalāḥa bi-ḥaqqi-h ‘to carry s.th. away, go away with, take away’ (WKAS ii) be grouped here? An underlying literal meaning of *‘to “flash up”, take s.th. and disappear with it as quickly as one showed up’ is not unconceivable.
▪ [v2] lāḥa (u, lawḥ, lūḥ, luwāḥ, luʔūḥ, lawaḥān) ‘to scorch, singe, sear, burn, parch, desiccate, s.o.; to cause s.o. to wither, to lose weight, to get thinner; to disfigure, to pester, harass, plague, beset (sun, midday heat; hot, dry wind; cold; grey hair, the colour black; shame, disgrace, worries, troubles) (WKAS ii); to thirst (Lane, Hava1899)’; lāḥa and lawwaḥa ‘to make s.o. lean, lank, light of flesh, slender, lank in the belly (thirst, travel, cold, illness, grief, …), alter the complexion, parch, scorch, burn, blacken; to render s.o. hoary (age)’, lawwaḥa ‘to ripen (grapes); become sick, exhausted’, lawwaḥa bi’l-nār ‘to heat s.th. in the fire’, milwaḥ, milwāḥ, milyāḥ ‘soon thirsty; slender’; lūḥ ‘thirst’ (Lane, Hava1899); lawḥaẗ ‘a scorching, singeing, parching, desiccating; a thirsting, yearning (for water)’, lawḥānᵘ ‘parched, desiccated, thirsty’, laʔiḥ ‘scorching, singeing, burning’, milwaḥ, milwāḥ ‘parched, desiccated, thirsty, emaciated’, mulawwaḥ ‘scorched, singed, burnt, parched, desiccated, withered, thin, lean, disfigured’ (WKAS ii). – Does also ^†ʔalāḥa ‘to cause the loss of, destroy s.th.’ (Lane, Hava1899) belong here?
▪ [v4] Cf. also ^†lawāʔiḥᵘ l-šayʔ ‘apparent, visible, external parts of s.th.’ (WKAS ii). lawāʔiḥᵘ is the pl. of lāʔiḥaẗ, which here clearly shows its dependence on [v1].
▪ ^†[v5] ^†lūḥ ‘airspace (above the Earth), air, ether, (blue) sky, vault of heaven’ (WKAS ii).
▪ ^†[v10] : ʔalāḥa ‘to be afraid (min of s.o.), frightened, be on one’s guard, shrink back, recoil from s.th. (WKAS ii), to blush at (a word) (Lane, Hava1899)’
▪ …

1. On the value ‘to see, espy, catch sight of’, listed in several dictionaries, Ullmann (WKAS ii) remarks that it is »falsch erschlossen«.

▪ [v1] (outside Sem:) Borg2021 compares Ar lāḥa ‘to appear, shine (star), flash (lightning)’ (DaṯAr lāḥ ‘paraître, briller’, lawḥaẗ ‘apparition d’une chose’, Rwala lāḥ ‘to appear, shine, gleam, glitter, flash, sparkle’, PalAr lāḥ ‘glänzen, funkeln’, EgAr lāḥ ‘to please, be attractive’) with Eg ꜣḫ (Urk. IV, 18th Dyn.) ‘schön, herrlich, trefflich, nützlich sein | glorious, splendid’ (Brockelmann 1932: 100 | Faulkner 1962: 4); ꜣḫ.t ‘Sonnenglanz’; ꜣḫ.t (NK) ‘Auge, besonders vom Auge der Sonne’ (Wb I 13, 17). – See also below, section DISC.
▪ [v2] : no obvious cognates.
▪ [v3] : Akk lēʔu ‘(wooden) board, writing board, document, sheet of precious metal, ingot’, Ug *lḥ /lūḥu/, older /lōḥu/ ‘(Brief-)Tafel’ (only pl. lḥt attested, meaning sg. ‘letter, message’), Hbr lūᵃḥ, Aram lūḥā, Mnd luha, Soq lūḥ ‘board’, Ar lawḥ ‘board, table, tablet, plank, plate, parchment’ (> Gz lawḥ ‘id.’, luḥ ‘plank of wood, timber’, loḥa ‘to write’)
▪ [v4] : ↗[v1].
▪ ^†[v5] : cf. prob. ↗[v1].
▪ ^†[v6] : ↗[v1].
▪ ^†[v7] : ↗[v1].
▪ ^†[v8] : ↗[v1], perh. also ↗[v2].
▪ ^†[v9] : ↗[v2].
▪ ^†[v10] : ? Perh. ↗[v1].

▪ [v1] : Any connection with ↗LYQ? If so, one may want to compare (with Dolgopolsky2012 #1285): Ar liyāq ‘flamme, feu qui s’élève en flamme | blaze’; [outside Sem:) Berb *-luqq- > Gd luqq (pf. yə-luqq) ‘shine (briller)’; Gh d. imv. əmləġləg, pf. imləġləġ ‘briller’; (outside AfrAs:) IndEur *leu̯k- ‘shine’ > Grk leukós ‘light, bright; white’, Lat lux (gen. luc-is) ‘light’, Ru luč ‘ray, beam’, etc. – according to Dolgopolsky all from a hypothetical Nostr *LûḲa ‘to shine’.
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¹lāḥ- / luḥ‑ لاحَ / لُحْـ , u (lawḥ)

ID – • Sw – • BP 3460 • APD … • © SG | 13Nov2022, last updated 20Nov2022

√LWḤ

vb., I

1a to appear, show, loom, emerge, come in sight; b to become visible (li‑ to s.o.); c to break, begin to show (dawn); 2 to shine, gleam, glint, flash, shimmer, glimmer, sparkle; 3 to seem, appear; 4 ↗²lāḥa – WehrCowan1976

▪ The vb. ¹lāḥa represents one of three main values in the root ↗√LWḤ that one will find hard to connect: (a) *‘to become visible, flash’; (b) *‘to scorch, singe, sear, burn, parch, desiccate, wither, lose weight, get thinner’ (↗²lāḥa); and (c) *‘board, tablet, plank; shoulder blade’ (↗lawḥ). The latter is the only value that has cognates in Sem (although, in Ar, it may be a borrowing from Aram), which makes it tempting to assume that the other two are specifically Arabic developments from this value. However, none of the attempts to explain (a) or (b) as derivations from (c) are convincing. Moreover, both (a) and (b) show a fairly high degree of variation within their respective semantic fields, a fact that lets them appear old and genuine rather than later derivations. The semantic field belonging to ¹lāḥa spans from undoubtedly derived values, such as lawwaḥa ‘to flourish, brandish, swing, wave (bi‑ s.th.), to make a sign, signal; (fig.) to allude to, hint at’ (< *‘to let appear, make flash up’), hence also ^†‘to feed a child (*waving with the food/drink)’ and ^†milwāḥ ‘lure, decoy’ (*‘s.th. waved/signalled with < made to shine, etc., to attract attention and entice/lure into a trap), ^†līḥaẗ ‘polishing agent for mirrors’ (*‘what makes mirrors glitter’) and ↗lāʔiḥaẗ ‘program, project; bill, motion (esp., in parliament); order, decree, edict; ordinance; regulation, rule; pl. lawāʔiḥᵘ ‘outward appearance, looks, outward sign’ (< *‘s.th. flashing up, shining, giving a first idea of s.th., sketch, outline’) to less obviously related items, such as ^†¹lūḥ ‘airspace (above the Earth), vault of heaven’, ^†lāḥ ‘eggs rejected as unsuitable for hatching after having “X-rayed” (candled) them by holding them against the sun-light’, and perh. also ^†ʔalāḥa ‘to be afraid (min of s.o.), frightened, blush (min at a word)’.
▪ Borg2021 suggests comparison with (and derivation from?) Eg ꜣḫ (Urk. IV, 18th Dyn.) ‘schön, herrlich, trefflich, nützlich sein | glorious, splendid’ (Brockelmann 1932: 100 | Faulkner 1962: 4); ꜣḫ.t ‘Sonnenglanz’; ꜣḫ.t (NK) ‘eye, esp. eye of the sun’ (Wb I 13, 17). If this etymology is valid it could explain the high degree of variation among the derivations of ¹lāḥa and, thus, its old age as well as the fact that the Ar word is apparently without cognates in other Sem languages.
▪ In contrast, Gabal2012: 2013 suggests a derivation of all LWḤ values from a basic notion of *‘breadth, evenness and dryness or compactness in s.th.’, in his view exemplarily represented in ↗lawḥ ‘board, tablet, plank’. For him, ‘breadth’ implies a higher degree of ‘visibility’, so he derives (a) ‘to be(come) visible, flash up’ from (c) ‘board, tablet, plank (< *broad, even, dry, compact thing’). The strength of his argument is the fact that, among all LWḤ items, only lawḥ has a deeper Sem dimension. On the other hand, compared to Borg’s idea of an Eg influence, Gabal’s theory seems rather far-fetched. Cf., however, a value of lawḥ given by ClassAr lexicographers, namely ‘tout ce qui, par sa surface plate et polie, reflète la lumière’ (BK1860) where s.th. with a flat, even, polished surface (as would be a ‘board, tablet, plank’) is combined with the reflexion of light, and the latter may look as if it could be derived from the former. Such a derivation can look tempting, but it would certainly need to be corroborated by broader and more reliable evidence—after all, the semantic “bridge” may be a homogenizing construction made by lexicographers to explain diversity within the root and give it more coherence.
▪ In a similar way, a semantic bridge betw. (a) *‘to shine, appear, flash, etc.’ and (b) *‘to scorch, singe, sear, burn, parch, desiccate, wither, etc.’ (↗²lāḥa) could be the obsol. ^†lāḥ ‘eggs found unsuitable for hatching after having “X-rayed” (i.e., candled) them by holding them against the sun-light’. This item combines the notions of ‘shining, light’ and ‘desiccation, emaciation, shrinking (> infertility?)’ etc.
▪ An essential element in the original semantics seems to be the notion of *surprise and *speed, or *quick passing, as in the glittering of things, the breaking through of the first sunrays at dawn, the flashing of a lightening, or sudden appearance of an idea or an image, or the sudden blushing (at a harsh word), or the waving with a decoy (letting it appear and disappear).
▪ …

▪ The semantic field pertaining to ¹lāḥa in ClassAr can be sketched as follows: ¹lāḥa ‘to be(come) [clearly] visible, appear, emerge, come into view; to shine brightly, flash, sparkle, glint, glow, gleam, glitter, glisten (celestial bodies, fire, lamp, mirage, cloud of dust; water, butter, a spider’s web; traces left at an abandoned camp; … tracts of land, regions, paths, routes, buildings; flowers, blossoms; parts of the body; grey hair; weapons; implements, tools, materials, cloth, pieces of embroidery, jewelry, etc.; handwriting, ornaments, decorations; ship’s sails; pieces of jewelry, coins; brilliance of the morning sky, flash of lightning, thunder cloud, rainbow)’;² ^†lawāʔiḥᵘ l-šayʔ ‘apparent, visible, external parts of s.th.’ (WKAS ii). – ^†lawwaḥa bi’l-ʕaṣā ‘to raise a stick (upon s.o.)’, ^†lawwaḥa ‘to feed a child (*waving with the food/drink)’ (Hava1899). – ^†lāʔiḥaẗ ‘outward appearance, feature’ (Lane, Hava1899). – ^†layāḥ ~ liyāḥ, ‘intensely, shining, glistening white; daybreak, dawn; wild bull’, ^†ʔalwāḥ al-silāḥ ‘shining, glistening, flashing weapons’ (WKAS ii). – ^†ʔalāḥa ‘to make a sign, wave s.th. about’ (WKAS ii). – ^†milwaḥ ‘actively, busily waving’. – ^†milwāḥ ‘the lure; owl used for decoy shooting; decoy (bird)’ (WKAS ii). – ^†lūḥ ‘airspace (above the Earth), air, ether, (blue) sky, vault of heaven’ (WKAS ii). – Perh. also ^†ʔalāḥa bi-ḥaqqi-h ‘to carry s.th. away, go away with, take away’ (WKAS ii), and ^†ʔalāḥa ‘to be afraid (min of s.o.), frightened, be on one’s guard, shrink back, recoil from s.th. (WKAS ii), to blush at (a word) (Lane, Hava1899)’.
▪ …

2. On the value ‘to see, espy, catch sight of’, listed in several dictionaries, Ullmann (WKAS ii) remarks that it is »falsch erschlossen«.

▪ (outside Sem:) Borg2021 compares Ar lāḥa ‘to appear, shine (star), flash (lightning)’ (DaṯAr lāḥ ‘paraître, briller’, lawḥaẗ ‘apparition d’une chose’, Rwala lāḥ ‘to appear, shine, gleam, glitter, flash, sparkle’, PalAr lāḥ ‘glänzen, funkeln’, EgAr lāḥ ‘to please, be attractive’) with Eg ꜣḫ (Urk. IV, 18th Dyn.) ‘schön, herrlich, trefflich, nützlich sein | glorious, splendid’ (Brockelmann 1932: 100 | Faulkner 1962: 4); ꜣḫ.t ‘Sonnenglanz’; ꜣḫ.t (NK) ‘Auge, besonders vom Auge der Sonne’ (Wb I 13, 17).
▪ …

▪ Any connection with ↗LYQ? If so, one may want to compare (with Dolgopolsky2012 #1285): Ar ^†liyāq ‘flamme, feu qui s’élève en flamme | blaze’ (↗√LYQ); (outside Sem:) Berb *-luqq- > Gd luqq (pf. yə-luqq) ‘shine (briller)’; Gh d. imv. əmləġləg, pf. imləġləġ ‘briller’; (outside AfrAs:) IndEur *leu̯k- ‘shine’ > Grk leuk-ós ‘light, bright; white’, Lat lux (gen. luc-is) ‘light’, Ru luč ‘ray, beam’, etc. – according to Dolgopolsky all from a hypothetical Nostr *LûḲa ‘to shine’.
▪ …

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►yalūḥu lī ʔanna…, it seems to me that…;
►ʕalà mā yalūḥu, as it seems, apparently

►^BP#4027lawwaḥa, vb. II, 1a to make a sign, beckon, wave (bi‑, ʔilà or li- to s.o. with); b to signal; 2 to allude (bi- to), hint (bi- at), intimate, insinuate, give to understand; 3 to flourish, brandish, swing, wave (bi‑ s.th.); 4 ↗²lāḥa; 5 ↗lawḥ, ↗lawḥaẗ: D-stem, caus.| lawwaḥa bi-yaday-hi, to wave with the hands
►ʔalāḥa, vb. IV, 1 to appear, show, come in sight; 2 to shimmer, glimmer, glint, flash, sparkle; 3 to wave, brandish, flourish, swing (s.th.): *Š-stem, denom.(?)

►talwīḥ, pl. -āt, n., 1 beckoning, waving, flourishing, brandishing; 2a sign, signal, wink, wave; b allusion; c hint, intimation, insinuation; 3 metonymy; 4 pl. a hints, references; b remarks, annotations, marginal notes: vn. II
►^BP#2361lāʔiḥaẗ, pl. ‑āt, lawāʔiḥᵘ, 1 program, project; 2 bill, motion (esp., in parliament); 3a order, decree, edict; b ordinance; c regulation, rule; 4 pl. lawāʔiḥᵘ, outward appearance, looks, outward sign: PA I.f. | see ↗s.v.
►mulawwiḥaẗ, n.f., signal, semaphore (railroad): nominalized PA II

For other values attached to the root, cf., ↗²lāḥa, ↗lawḥ, ↗lawḥaẗ, and ↗lāʔiḥaẗ as well as, for the overall picture, root entry ↗√LWḤ.

²lāḥ- / luḥ‑ لاحَ / لُحْـ , u (lawḥ)

ID – • Sw – • BP … • APD … • © SG | 13Nov2022, last updated 21Nov2022

√LWḤ

vb., I

1–3 ↗¹lāḥa; 4a to wither, singe, parch, scorch; b to tan (‑h s.o.; sun) – WehrCowan1979

▪ The vb. ²lāḥa represents one of three main values in the root ↗√LWḤ that one will find hard to connect: (a) *‘to become visible, flash’ (↗¹lāḥa); (b) *‘to scorch, singe, sear, burn, parch, desiccate, wither, lose weight, get thinner’; and (c) *‘board, tablet, plank; shoulder blade’ (↗lawḥ). The latter is the only value that has cognates in Sem (although, in Ar, it may be a borrowing from Aram), which makes it tempting to assume that the other two are specifically Arabic developments from this value. However, none of the attempts to explain (a) or (b) as derivations from (c) are convincing. Moreover, both (a) and (b) show a fairly high degree of variation within their respective semantic fields, a fact that lets them appear old and genuine rather than later derivations. The semantic field belonging to ²lāḥa spans from undoubtedly related values, such as ^†²lūḥ ‘thirst’,¹ ^†lāḥa and ^†lawwaḥa ‘to alter the complexion; to render s.o. hoary (age)’, ^†lawwaḥa ‘to ripen (grapes); become sick, exhausted’, ^†milwaḥ ~ ^†milwāḥ ~ ^†milyāḥ ‘soon thirsty; slender’ to less obviously related items, such as ^†lāḥ ‘eggs rejected as unsuitable for hatching after being “X-rayed” (candled), held against the sun-light’ (?< *infertility = withering, shrinking), and perh. also ^†ʔalāḥa ‘to be afraid (min of s.o.), frightened, blush (min at a word)’ (?< *to shrink, wither etc. on experiencing fear) and ^†ʔalāḥa ‘to cause the loss of, destroy s.th.’ (Lane, Hava1899).
▪ Should one consider the possibility of ²lāḥa < ↗¹lāḥa? A ‘scorching, singeing, parching, desiccating, withering, etc.’ could possibly be the result of a ‘gleaming, glittering, flashing, shining (too intensely)’; but such a relation does not seem to be very likely and would still have to be corroborated by evidence that would make it more convincing. For the time being, the only lexical item that appears to combine both notions and thus could serve as a semantic “bridge” between the two is the obsol. ^†lāḥ ‘eggs found unsuitable for hatching’, where their condition of ‘desiccation, emaciation, shrinking (> infertility?)’ ‘appears, becomes visible’ on holding them against the sun-light (candling).
▪ …

1. In some dictionaries, ‘to thirst’ is given as the first meaning of ^†²lāḥa (Steingass1884, Hava1899, etc.).

▪ lāḥa (u, lawḥ, lūḥ, luwāḥ, luʔūḥ, lawaḥān) ‘to scorch, singe, sear, burn, parch, desiccate, s.o.; to cause s.o. to wither, to lose weight, to get thinner; to disfigure, to pester, harass, plague, beset (sun, midday heat; hot, dry wind; cold; grey hair, the colour black; shame, disgrace, worries, troubles) (WKAS ii); to thirst (Lane, Hava1899)’; lāḥa and lawwaḥa ‘to make s.o. lean, lank, light of flesh, slender, lank in the belly (thirst, travel, cold, illness, grief, …), alter the complexion, parch, scorch, burn, blacken; to render s.o. hoary (age)’, lawwaḥa ‘to ripen (grapes); become sick, exhausted’, lawwaḥa bi’l-nār ‘to heat s.th. in the fire’, milwaḥ, milwāḥ, milyāḥ ‘soon thirsty; slender’; lūḥ ‘thirst’ (Lane, Hava1899); lawḥaẗ ‘a scorching, singeing, parching, desiccating; a thirsting, yearning (for water)’, lawḥānᵘ ‘parched, desiccated, thirsty’, laʔiḥ ‘scorching, singeing, burning’, milwaḥ, milwāḥ ‘parched, desiccated, thirsty, emaciated’, mulawwaḥ ‘scorched, singed, burnt, parched, desiccated, withered, thin, lean, disfigured’ (WKAS ii). – Prob. also ^†ʔalāḥa ‘to cause the loss of, destroy s.th.’ (Lane, Hava1899). – Perh. also ^†ʔalāḥa ‘to be afraid (min of s.o.), frightened, be on one’s guard, shrink back, recoil from s.th.’ (WKAS ii).
▪ …

▪ no obvious cognates, neither in Sem nor outside.
▪ If related to ¹lāḥa, see ↗s.v.
▪ …

▪ …

–

►lawwaḥa, vb. II, 1-3 ↗¹lāḥa; 4a to turn grey (the head; of old age); b to burn, tan (s.o.; sun); 5 ↗lawḥ, lawḥaẗ, lāʔiḥaẗ: D-stem, caus.
►lawwāḥ, adj., withering, singeing, parching, scorching: ints. formation, pattern Faʕʕāl
►multāḥ, adj., sun-tanned, sunburned: PA/PP VIII

For other values attached to the root, cf. ↗¹lāḥa, ↗lawḥ, ↗lawḥaẗ, and ↗lāʔiḥaẗ as well as, for the overall picture, root entry ↗√LWḤ.

lawḥ لَوْح , pl. ʔalwāḥ, lawāʔiḥᵘ

√LWḤ

1a board, blackboard; b slate; c tablet; d slab; 2 plate, sheet; 3a pane; b plank, board; c panel; d small board, signboard; 4 shoulder blade, scapula – WehrCowan1976

▪ lawḥ represents one of at least three main values found in the root ↗LWḤ: (a) *‘to become visible, flash’ (↗¹lāḥa); (b) *‘to scorch, singe, sear, burn, parch, desiccate, wither, lose weight, get thinner’ (↗²lāḥa); and (c) *‘board, tablet, plank; shoulder blade’. The latter is the only value that has cognates in Sem.
▪ According to Jeffrey1938, the word is borrowed from Aram lūḥā ‘id.’, but it is widely attested in Sem (Akk, Ug, Hbr, Aram, Soq – see below, section COGN), so it may be genuine, directly from Sem *lawḥ ‘board, table, plank’. (Pennacchio2014: 126 tends to agree with Jeffrey, though.)
▪ ClassAr lexicographers see lawḥ related to ↗¹lāḥa ‘to become visible, flash’ as it can also mean (in the translation of BK1860) ‘tout ce qui, par sa surface plate et polie, reflète la lumière’, assuming a semantic transition *‘board, plank > to be(come) visible, appear’; but this would need to be corroborated by broader and more reliable evidence—after all, the semantic “bridge” may be a homogenizing construction made by lexicographers to explain diversity within the root and give it more coherence.
▪ In a similar vein, Gabal2012: 2013 suggested a derivation of all values in √LWḤ from a basic notion of *‘breadth, evenness and dryness or compactness in s.th.’, which he saw exemplarily represented in lawḥ ‘board, tablet, plank’ (accord. to him the * ‘broad, even, dry and compact thing’). (The aspect of *‘breadth’ then gave, ‘visibility’, and the element of ‘dryness’ gave ‘thirst, desiccation, withering’, etc.). – A strength of this argument is the fact that only ‘board, tablet, plank’ seems to have a deeper Sem dimension; on the other hand, the theory appears to be rather far-fetched.
▪ The meaning ‘shoulder blade’ is prob. a semantic extension rather than the original value, as the Sem cognates do not include it.
▪ …

▪ eC7 Q 7:145, 150, 154; 54:13; 85:22. – Jeffrey1938: »There are two distinct uses of the word in the Qurʔān. In 54:13, it is used for the ‘planks’ of Noah’s ark, and elsewhere for ‘tablets’ of revelation, in Sura 7 for the tablets of Moses, and in 85:22 for the heavenly archetype of the Qurʔān.«
▪ The (prob. extended) value ‘shoulder blade’ gave adj.s like ^†ʔalwaḥᵘ and ^†milwāḥ, both signifying s.o. ‘having broad bones, shoulder blades, tall’.
▪ …

▪ Akk lēʔu ‘(wooden) board, writing board, document, sheet of precious metal, ingot’, Ug *lḥ /lūḥu/, older /lōḥu/ ‘(Brief-)Tafel’ (only pl. lḥt attested, meaning sg. ‘letter, message’), Hbr lūᵃḥ, Aram lūḥā, Mnd luha, Soq lūḥ ‘board’, Ar lawḥ ‘board, table, tablet, plank, plate, parchment’ (> Gz lawḥ ‘id.’, luḥ ‘plank of wood, timber’, loḥa ‘to write’)
▪ …

▪ Jeffrey1938: »In the related languages we find both these meanings [‘planks’ and ‘tablets’]. The Hbr lūᵃḥ means both the ‘planks’ of a ship (as in Ez. xxvii, 5), and the ‘stone tablets’ of the Ten Commandments (Ex. xxiv, 12). Similarly, Aram lūḥā can mean a ‘table’ for food, or, as constantly in the Targums, the ‘tablets’ of the Covenant, so Syr lūḥā is used of a ‘wooden board’, e.g. the títlos affixed to the Cross, and for the ‘tablets’ of the Covenant. Also the Eth [Gz] lawḥ, though not a common word, is used for the broken ‘boards’ on which Paul and his companions escaped from shipwreck in Acts xxvii, 44 (ed. Rom.), and also for ‘writing tablets’ of wood, metal, or stone. / In the early Arabic poetry we find the word used only in the sense of ‘plank’, cf. Ṭarafa iv, 12; Imruʔ al-Qays, x, 13, and Zuhayr, i, 23 (in Ahlwardt’s Divans),¹ and the Lexicons take this as the primitive meaning. The word may be a loan-word in both senses, but even if a case could be made out for its being a genuine Ar word in the sense of ‘plank’, there can be no doubt that as used for the ‘Tables of Revelation’ it is a borrowing from the older faiths. Hirschfeld, Beiträge, 36, would have it derived from the Hbr, but Horovitz, KU, 66; JPN, 220, 221, is more likely to be correct² in considering it as from the Aram, though whether from Jewish or Christian sources it is difficult to say. / If we can trust the genuineness of a verse of Sarāqaẗ b. ʕAwf in Aġānī, xv, 138, which refers to Muḥammad’s revelations as ʔalwāḥ we may judge that the word was used in this technical sense among Muḥammad’s contemporaries.« -- Cf., however, above, section CONC.
▪ …

1. Cf. also ash-Shammakh, xvii, 13, in Geycr, Zwei Gedichte, i, 136. 2. Vide also Fraenkel, Vocab, 21; Cheikho, Naṣrāniyya, 221.

–

►lawḥ ʔarduwāz, n., slab of slate, slate;
►lawḥ muǧaʕqad, n., corrugated iron;
►lawḥ al-ǧalīd, n., block of ice;
►lawḥ ḥadīd, n., sheet iron;
►lawḥ zuǧāǧ, n., sheet of glass, pane;
►al-lawḥ al-maḥfūẓ, n., (Q 85:22) the Preserved/Guarded Tablet whereon are said to be inscribed all the divine decrees; the depository of the decrees, or willed events, ordained by God;
►lawḥ mutaḥarrik, n., spring board (in sports);
►lawḥ maʕdinī, n., metal plate, metal sheet;
►lawḥ al-nāfiḏaẗ, n., windowpane

►lawwaḥa, vb. II, 1-3 ↗¹lāḥa; 4 ↗²lāḥa; 5 to plank, lay with planks (the floor): D-stem, denom. from lawḥ and/or ↗lawḥaẗ
►^BP#1276lawḥaẗ, pl. -āt, lawāʔiḥᵘ, n.f., 1a board; b blackboard; c slate; d tablet; e slab; 2a plate, sheet; b pane; c panel; 3 plaque; 4 plane, surface; 5 screen; 6a placard, poster; b picture, painting: f. of lawḥᵘ | ↗s.v.

For other values attached to the root, cf. ↗¹lāḥa, ↗²lāḥa, ↗lawḥaẗ, and ↗lāʔiḥaẗ as well as, for the overall picture, root entry ↗√LWḤ.

lawḥaẗ لَوْحة , pl. -āt, lawāʔiḥᵘ

√LWḤ

n.f.

1a board; b blackboard; c slate; d tablet; e slab; 2a plate, sheet; b pane; c panel; 3 plaque; 4 plane, surface; 5 screen; 6a placard, poster; b picture, painting – WehrCowan1976

▪ The f. word lawḥaẗ seems to be, originally, a singulative (n.un.) coined from ↗lawḥ. Semantics of lawḥ and lawḥaẗ are still largely overlapping, but lawḥaẗ has also developed a number of own specific values.
▪ …

▪ …

▪ ↗lawḥ
▪ …

–

►lawḥaẗ al-ĭsm, doorplate, name plate;
lawḥaẗ al-tawzīʕ, switchboard (el., tel.);
lawḥaẗ al-dāmā, checkerboard;
lawḥaẗ zaytiyyaẗ, oil painting;
lawḥaẗ sawdāʔ, blackboard; bulletin board;
lawḥaẗ al-šaṭranǧ, chessboard;
lawḥaẗ al-kitābaẗ, slate; writing tablet; blackboard

►lawwaḥa, vb. II, 1-3 ↗¹lāḥa; 4 ↗²lāḥa; 5 to plank, lay with planks (the floor): D-stem, denom. from ↗lawḥ or lawḥaẗ

For other values attached to the root, cf. ↗¹lāḥa, ↗²lāḥa, ↗lawḥ, and ↗lāʔiḥaẗ as well as, for the overall picture, root entry ↗√LWḤ.

lāʔiḥaẗ لائحة , pl. ‑āt, lawāʔiḥᵘ

√LWḤ

n.f.

1 program, project; 2 bill, motion (esp., in parliament); 3a order, decree, edict; b ordinance; c regulation, rule; 4 pl. lawāʔiḥᵘ, outward appearance, looks, outward sign – WehrCowan1976

▪ Formed on the FāʕiLaẗ pattern, lāʔiḥaẗ is evidently a PA I.f, most likely from ↗¹lāḥa ‘to appear, be(come) visible; to shine, flash, glimmer, sparkle; to seem, appear’, thus originally meaning *‘the flashing one’. The connection between the modern meanings and the basic *‘becoming visible, appearing, flashing up’ becomes clear in the light of the D-stem, lawwaḥa ‘(*to let appear, let flash up >) to flourish, brandish, swing, wave, make a sign, signal’ (also with s.th. to eat or drink, to feed a child) and ^†milwāḥ ‘lure, decoy’ (< *s.th. waved with to attract attention, lure, entice). A lāʔiḥaẗ is thus, originally, *‘s.th. flashing up, letting appear an idea of s.th., a sketch, an outline of it’, a draft giving a first idea.
▪ …

▪ ^†lāʔiḥaẗ ‘outward appearance, feature’ (Lane, Hava1899), pl. ^†lawāʔiḥᵘ l-šayʔ ‘apparent, visible, external parts of s.th.’ (WKAS ii).
▪ …

▪ ↗¹lāḥa
▪ …

▪ See above, section CONC.
▪ …

–

►lāʔiḥaẗ qānūniyyaẗ, lāʔiḥaẗ al-qānūn, n.f., bill, draft law;
►lāʔiḥaẗ al-safar, timetable, train schedule, railroad guide;
►lāʔiḥaẗ al-ṭaʕām (SyrAr) menu, bill of fare

For other values attached to the root, cf. ↗¹lāḥa, ↗²lāḥa, ↗lawḥ, and ↗lawḥaẗ, as well as, for the overall picture, root entry ↗√LWḤ.

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