▪ From protSem *√ʔMR ‘to see, know, make known, say’ – Huehnergard2011.
▪ Albright1954: »It should be noted that the original meaning of Hebrew √ʔMR ‘to say’ was ‘to see’, as in Akk and prob. in Ug […]. The shift in meaning came through the factitive sense ‘to show’, hence ‘to speak’.«
1
.With this theory, Albright reaffirms the findings of Moscati’s earlier study (Moscati1946) which concluded with the assumption that practically all values attached to the root √ʔMR in Sem should be regarded as developments from the one primary meaning *‘to see’, as preserved in Akk (and Ug). According to Moscati, the values found in Sem √ʔMR reflect several stages of a’logical development« (
sviluppo logico) along the line *‘to see > to indicate > to command’ (
vedere >
indicare >
comandare), which for Moscati has an »eloquent parallel« in Lat
índico >
dico >
indíco (1946: 125). – Moscati’s study seems plausible in many respects, but it remains silent at least about [v5] ‘pericardium (
anat.); soul, mind, spirit’ (
taʔmūr), nor would Moscati exclude that [v4]
†‘ram, lamb’ (and hence ‘simple-minded, stupid’) perh. is a separate item, unrelated to the remaining spectrum.
▪ Kogan2015:331 : »if one follows S. Moscati (1946:125) and W.F. Albright (1954:229) in regarding the meaning ‘to see’ as the most primitive one, Ug must be the only Sem lang where this archaic meaning is attested virtually side by side with the innovative ‘to say’, ‘to command’, normal for the rest of CSem.«
▪ Kogan2015:331 n.976: »Remnants of the original meaning ‘to see’ have been surmised for √ʔMR in other CSem langs as well (…; for Ar
ʔamaraẗ,
tuʔmur ‘sign, mark’ in Lane 97-98 v. Moscati 1946:124, Rundgren 1963:182), but they are much less certain. It would be tempting to regard the meaning shift ‘to see’ > ‘to say’ as a shared semantic innovation of CSem, but modSAr *ʕMR ‘to say’ (Mhr
ʔāmōr, Jib
ʕor, Soq
ʕémor) is hard to separate from this root in spite of the irregular *
ʕ‑.«
▪ Dolgopolsky2012 #42 reconstructs protSem *√ʔMR ‘to see, be seen’, but wants to keep this distinct from both protCush *√ʔMR (< AfrAs *ʔMR < #41 Nostr *
ʔam˻˅˼R˅ or *
ʔam˹o˺(˻R˅˼)) ‘morning, daylight, dawn’, and protBerb *√˹W˺MR (< AfrAs *ʔMR < #42 Nostr *
˹ʔ˺Umr˅) ‘to burn (intr.); to shine, be bright; dawn’. He thinks that Sem *√ʔMR ‘to see, be seen’ and other »alleged cognates […] are semantically and\or phonetically unfit for comparison«. No further details given.
▪ Elaborating slightly on Moscati and Albright, and observing Dolgopolsky’s caveat, one may assume a semantic development along the line’(?
0 Nostr *‘morning, daylight’ × *‘to burn (intr.); to shine, be bright; dawn’ > ) Sem ‘
A to be visible, observable; fact, issue, matter, affair >
B to see, take notice of s.th. (that is visible or comes into sight, a fact, an issue, etc.) >
C to indicate, show, demonstrate, point to s.th. (a thing, matter, case, etc.) >
D to say >
E to command’. – Most of the values represented by Ar items can be seen as reflections of some stage in this development:
- 0 The only Sem words that in Dolgopolsky’s view have a Nostr dimension are those given in DRS as ʔMR-2 (Gz ʔamir, Gaf aymerä, Har īr ‘sun’). Dolgopolsky excludes a relation between these and the rest, but he seems to be slightly too apodictic about that. DRS holds that it is »not impossible« that the EthSem value ‘sun’ should be seen together with the complex of ‘visibility’ treated below as primary value (A) in Sem. However, while DRS suggests that the EthSem ‘sun’ originally may have been *‘the shining one’ and thus be derived from ‘visibility’, we would assume it more likely, in the light of Dolgoposky’s material, that it is the other way round, i.e., that the appearance of the sun at dawn, its becoming visible and catching the observer’s attention, is the primary value. –DRS also asks whether there may be a relation between the EthSem ‘sun’ and Sem √QMR (cf. Ar ↗qamar ‘moon’).
- A ‘1 to be visible, observable; 2 fact, issue, matter, affair’: They main value belonging here is ʔMR_2, represented first and foremost by ²ʔamr ‘matter, affair, concern, business’ and derivatives, incl. ‘to consult s.o./each other on an issue’, hence (as a neologism) also ‘to conspire’. The quasi-PP ʔamīr ‘commander; prince, emir; tribal chief’, usually attributed to E, has also been interpreted as *‘person consulted, or to be consulted, in an affair/on all kinds of issues’, in which case it would belong to A2. Likewise, ʔimmar in the sense of ‘simple-minded, stupid’ is often explained in ClassAr lexica as meaning, literally, *‘(mostly children) who always ask others to explain things, seek advice on every issue’. – In an attempt to explain some values attached to Hbr ʔMR items such as ʔāmîr ‘top, summit’ and tîmārāʰ ‘column’, Barth1902 took as evident and sufficiently proven that one has to assume a homonymous Sem root √ʔMR meaning *‘to be high’ alongside ʔMR ‘to see > say > command’ (1902: 5-6). He saw reflexes of this *‘to be high’ also in [v7] ‘to be plentiful, many’ (Ar †ʔamira), [v8] ‘serious, painful, very difficult (affair)’ (†ʔimr) (see also BAH2008 ‘to afflict’), or in †ʔamaraẗ~ʔamār(aẗ) ‘(high) heap of stones’ (ibid.). His theory comes close to others that derive Ar †tuʔmur ‘sign, mark’ from the root √TMR, particularly ↗tamr ‘date palm’, sharing with the latter the notion of ‘altitude’. (On Hbr tîmārāʰ ‘column’, DRS thinks it may be from ‘to be visible, to see’, but also adds: »Il n’est pas exclu cependant que nous ayons affaire à des racines différentes, v.s. TMR.«) Accordingly, ʔamīr, too, has not only been interpreted as *‘person (to be) consulted on all kinds of issues’ (< ²ʔamr ‘affair, issue’, etc. – see above) or *‘person who commands, gives orders’ (< ʔamara ‘to command’, etc. – see below), but also as *‘person of high standing’, or *‘person excelling among the people’. However, both ‘palm tree’ and ‘s.th. high’ are at the same time s.th. visible, observable from afar and/or attracting attention, so that *‘altitude’ and ‘palm tree’ are not really necessary to explain the semantics in this group. – The relative distance of [v7] ‘multitude, plentitude, abundance’ to ‘visibility’ has led some scholars to assume that [v7] should be explained as originally belonging to ↗ʕMR, not ʔMR (so, e.g., DRS s.v. #ʔMR-5). – Group A belongs closely together with B and especially C, as it is difficult to keep ‘visibility’ apart from its effect on the observer for whom s.th. visible may serve as a sign, an indicator, and thus makes him/her see.
- B ‘to see, take notice of s.th. (that is visible or comes into sight, a fact, an issue, etc.), observe’ is the main value of ʔMR in Akk, to be found also in Ug. In Ar, its only immediate remnant seems to be ↗taʔammala, probably from taʔammara *‘to take s.th. as an indicator\sign for o.s.’ (see C), with assumed sound shift *r > l.2
- C ‘to indicate, show, demonstrate, point to s.th. (a thing, matter, case, etc.)’: As mentioned above, this value is very close to the two preceding ones – it may be interpreted as a shift of perspective (an object that is visible for s.o. has at the same time also the “active” part of indicating s.th. for the observer and, thus, make him/her see it, take notice of it, etc.). The value that reflects this notion in its essence is certainly [v3] ‘sign, token, symptom, mark, characteristic’ (ʔamāraẗ, and – with emphasis on the object’s own “activity”3
– †tuʔmūr). The Qur’anic ʔamr meaning ‘revelation’ may also belong here, either directly or as a borrowing from Aram, as suggested by Jeffery1938.4
- D ‘to say’: not represented in Ar, but central e.g. in Hbr. As pointed out by, e.g., Moscati, the value can easily be connected to C ‘to indicate, etc.’, as ‘to say s.th. to s.o.’ means ‘to draw his/her attention to it, point to it’ (1946: 121).
- E ‘to command’: [v1], with the n. ¹ʔamr ‘order, command, etc.’, the vb. ʔamara ‘to order, command, bid, instruct’, and the quasi-PP ʔamīr ‘commander; prince, emir; tribal chief’, is the main representative of this value. Obviously, it overlaps, and is thus closely connected, with C and D, and ultimately A, as ‘commanding’ is a specific, imperative way of ‘saying’ s.th. (D), and it implies ‘pointing to, indicating’ s.th. (C), in this way drawing the addressed person’s attention to an ‘issue’, ²ʔamr (A). – As already mentioned above, the FaʕīL formation ʔamīr has been interpreted not only as *‘person endowed with authority, commander, chief’, but also as *‘person (to be) consulted in all kinds of affairs’ and *‘person of high standing’. – Clearly in group E belong [v9] the ‘passions’ (†ʔammārāt, as these are the instincts or bad emotions that ‘command’ us to do evil, cf. the well-known term al-nafs al-ʔammāraẗ bi’l-sūʔ ‘the baser self (of man) that incites to evil’. According to ClassAr lexica, also taʔmūr in the sense of [v5] ‘soul, mind, spirit’ belongs to the complex of E ‘commanding’, »because it is that which is wont to command« (Lane i 1863). From ‘soul’ then also values like ‘intellect’ and ‘heart’, hence also ‘pericardium’ are derived. In a further step, taʔmūr(aẗ) may occasionally also signify the “soul” or “heart” of a monestry, or a community of believers, hence [v10] †‘convent of monks’. If taʔmūr is used synecdochically, the ‘soul’ comes to mean anybody having a ‘soul’, i.e., [v11] † ‘man’ in general (also expressed by nisba formations such as †taʔmurī, †taʔmūrī, or †tuʔmurī).
▪ The modern word
ĭsti(ʔ)māraẗ, the standard term for [v6] ‘form, blank’, now in ubiquitous use, is obviously a singulative of a desiderative vn. X, thus meaning either *‘(document/move) to ask for a decree, ¹
ʔamr’ (↗
ʔamara), or *‘(document/move) to look into a matter, ↗²
ʔamr’ (?).
▪ The only item that it might be difficult to assign to some of the above groups is probably
†yaʔmūr~
taʔmūr, signifying either a [v12] ‘certain beast of the sea’ or a ‘small beast, kind of mountain-goat, having a single branching horn in the middle of his head’. Lane suggests to regard this as a variant of ↗
yaḥmūr ‘roebuck’.
▪ …
EtymArab
ʔ
