ID – • Sw – • BP … • APD … • © SG | 15Feb2021, update 05Mar2021
√ḤMR
▪ DRS (#ḤMR-2) groups Ar ḥumar ‘asphalt’ together with Akk amār ‘heap of bricks’ (cf. Ar †ḥumraẗ ʻpounded bricks’?) and Hbr ḥomęr ‘mud, potter’s clay’ (see root entry ↗√ḤMR [v10]), but adds that their grouping should not necessarily be considered reflecting etymological dependence. In fact, ‘asphalt’ may perh. rather be related to the notion of ʻred’ (↗ʔaḥmarᵘ) which, in its turn, could be dependent on the idea of *‘to glow, be hot, burn, be burning’ [cf. vb. II, ḥammara ‘to fry, roast’, ClassAr †ḥamārraẗ ‘intense heat’, as well as the 2-consonantal ↗√ḤMː (ḤMM)].
▪ If DRS is right, one may also have to consider †ʔaḥmara ‘ramasser, réunir de tous côtés’ as well as †ḥimāraẗ ‘large rock; tombstone’ – cf. root entry ↗√ḤMR.
▪ Fraenkel1886 thought the word was a loan from Syr. But no such word seems to exist in Syr… .
▪ …
▪ DRS 9 (2010) #ḤMR (for a comment on the grouping, see above, section CONC, and below, section DISC): -1 Akk emēru ‘être rouge’, emr‑, Ug ḥmr, Ar ʔaḥmar, yaḥmūr ‘rouge’, Sab ḥmrt (?) ‘rouge (?)’, Gz ḥamar ‘baie rouge’, Tña ḥamär, ḥamray ‘rouge; roux, brun clair (cheval)’, Amh ḥamär ‘roux (cheval)’. Hbr ḥᵃmarmar ‘être rougeâtre’. – nHbr ḥämar ‘brûler’; EmpAram hmr ‘colère’, Ar ḥamira ‘être rouge de colère’, ḥamrāʔ, ḥamārraẗ ‘chaleur brûlante (de midi, de l’été)’, ḥimirr ‘très violent’, ḥamira ‘avoir mauvaise haleine’ Jib aḥmír ‘mauvaise haleine et indigestion’. -2 Akk amār ‘tas de briques’, Hbr ḥomęr ‘boue, argile de potier’, JP ḥemārā, Ar ḥumar ‘asphalte’, Soq ḥamóra ‘bitume’, ḥámreh ‘saleté, lie’. – -3-11… [irrelevant].
▪ …
▪ DRS 9 (2010) #ḤMR: On their grouping, the authors remark that »[l]e classement a ici principalement pour but d’ordonner commodément les diverses valeurs. Il n’implique pas toujours des séparations fondamentales. Les valeurs peuvent, pour certaines, être liées à d’autres dont elles constitueraient des emplois métaphoriques.«
▪ …
ḥumarī, adj., asphaltic, asphalt, tar, tarry: nisba formation.For other values attached to the root, cf. ↗ḥimār, ↗ʔaḥmarᵘ, ↗yaḥmūr, as well as, for the overall picture, root entry ↗√ḤMR.
http://www2.hf.uio.no/common/apps/permlink/permlink.php?app=polyglotta&context=ctext&uid=d83ebd4e-06ff-11ee-937a-005056a97067