▪ ṬRF_1 (≙
DRS #ṬRP-5)
ṭarf ‘eye, glance, look, to blink’ : Kogan2015:220,n5 thinks that the ClassAr vb. I
†ṭarafa ‘to strike one’s eye’ is almost certainly denominative from
ṭarf. In contrast, Ar lexicographers usually regard
ṭarf as originally a vn. of this
†ṭarafa, supporting their argument with the fact that
ṭarf does not take a pl. – Any relation to ṬRF_2 ‘end, extremity’ (the eye as an “extremity” of the head, or a twinkling interpreted as a look “from a side”)? Or to (C)Sem *ṬRP ‘to tear, pluck, seize’ (cf. ṬRF_12 ≙
DRS #ṬRP-1) as reconstructed by Huehnergard2011 and Kogan2015 (with a shift of meaning from ‘to tear, pluck, seize’ to ‘to strike’, then ‘to strike the eye’ > ‘eye’)? All highly speculative! (Cf. however ṬRF_3, below.) The same holds true for making ṬRF_2 ‘side’ depend on ṬRF_1 ‘eye’, as suggested by Nişanyan (23Oct2014, s.v. Tu
taraf), in rendering Ar
ṭaraf as ‘bakım, cihet, yan, yön’ and in this way identifying ‘direction, side’ (ṬRF_2) with ‘glance’ (ṬRF_1), tracing it all back to Ar
ṭarafa ‘to look, cast an eye on’, from
ṭarf ‘eye’. – Whatever the origin of
ṭarf and
ṭarafa themselves, some believe that ‘to strike the eye’ is the original meaning of value ṬRF_3 ‘novelty’ (*what strikes the eye because it is new).
▪ ṬRF_2 (≙
DRS #ṬRP-4)
ṭaraf ‘utmost part, edge, extremity’ : This value is without doubt one of the oldest ones; yet, its etymology needs still further research. Nişanyan23Oct2014 (s.v. Tu
taraf), in rendering Ar
ṭaraf as ‘bakım, cihet, yan, yön’, sees the meaning
cihet, yan, yön ‘direction, side’ (ṬRF_2) and
bakım ‘glance’ (ṬRF_1) as one unit, tracing it all back to Ar
†ṭarafa ‘to look, cast an eye on’, from Ar
ṭarf ‘eye’. In contrast,
DRS finds cognates of Ar
ṭaraf only in modSAr, keeping it separate from other values of Sem *ṬRP. Yet another position is taken by Klein1987 and Zammit2002: both see Ar
ṭaraf ‘utmost part, edge, extremity’ together with Hbr
ṭārap̄ ‘to tear to pieces, rend; to pluck’, Aram
ṭᵊrap̄ ‘to tear, seize’ (and derivates), i.e., with the value that lies at the basis also of the obsolete Ar vb.
†ṭarafa ‘to seize, carry off by force’, preserved in ClassAr
†sibāʕ ṭawārifᵘ (sg.
†ṭārifaẗ, f. of *
ṭārif, PA I) ‘animals that seize, or carry off by force, the objects of the chase’, which with all likelihood is the “purest”, least “contaminated” descendant of an original CSem *ṬRP ‘to tear, pluck, seize’ (cf. ṬRF_12 in root entry ↗ṬRF). The link between ‘edge, extremity’ and ‘to tear, pluck’ here would be the obsolete vb. Ar
†ṭarafa ‘to graze, depasture the lateral parts of a pasturage (said of a camel)’. This would give us the semantic chain *‘to tear, pluck, seize > to graze, depasture the lateral parts of a pasturage > utmost part, edge, extremity’. This, however, would contradict Kogan2015’s assumption that the vb. »almost certainly« is denom. from
ṭaraf, not the other way round. – However that may be, quite a number of the other values are with some probability derived from ṬRF_2 ‘utmost part, edge, extremity’. One line of semantic development could be: *‘utmost part, edge, extremity > to depasture the lateral parts of a pasturage > to make a choice (for more, better, more delicate food) > to choose, anything chosen, choice’ (ṬRF_8). Another branch (unless dependent on ṬRF_1) seems to identify the preference of the lateral parts of a pasturage with a looking for alternatives, hence: *‘~ > to appreciate a novelty > novelty’ (ṬRF_3). (There is, however, some overlapping with ↗ẒRF here, and another theory derives the value ‘novelty’ from CSem *ṬRP ‘to tear, pluck, seize’—cf. above, ṬRF_1, and below, ṬRF_12/13 —in the sense of ‘fresh-plucked’, cf. ṬRF_5.) – The value ‘to drive away, repel’ (ṬRF_6), too, could be explained—in theory—as a derivation from ‘utmost part, edge, extremity’, the act of repelling being a driving away “to the utmost parts”; cf., however,
DRS (and also Klein1987) where Ar
ṭarafa ‘éloigner qn de qc; repousser’ is grouped differently on account of the wider Sem evidence. –
†ṭirāf ‘leather tent, tent of skin’ (ṬRF_9), too, seems to be somehow connected to
ṭaraf ‘utmost part, edge, extremity’, but the relation is not really clear. –
ṭaraf was, and is still, used in many expressions with a specialized or figurative meaning. The pl.
ʔaṭrāf, for instance, can also mean ‘fingers’ (i.e., the extremities of the hand); the construct
ʔaṭrāf al-nahār signifies the *‘extremities of a day’, i.e., ‘morning and afternoon, daybreak and sunset’, and the *‘extremities of the people’,
ʔaṭrāf al-nās , mean ‘the lower orders of society’. Furthermore,
ʔaṭrāf can mean ‘a man’s father and mother and brothers and paternal uncles and any relations whom it is unlawful for him to marry’. – Ar lexicographers also tend to regard ṬRF_10 ‘noble, of high breed; generous’ as a derivation from
ṭaraf ‘utmost part, edge, extremity’:
†ṭaraf, as well as
†ṭarīf, can mean ‘having many ancestors, up to the greatest (i.e. most remote [= “extreme”]) forefather, of long descent’ (Lane), and
†ṭarf ‘man generous, noble’ is likewise explained as ‘…in respect of ancestry, up to the greatest [i.e. most remote] forefather’ (ibid.).
1
– In addition, with the notion of ‘generosity’ and the plentitude of ancestors we are already in close to value ṬRF_11 ‘to be numerous, abound with’.
▪ ṬRF_3 (≙
DRS #ṬRP-2)
ṭurfaẗ ‘novelty’ : dependent on ṬRF_1 ‘eye’ (a novelty being s.th. that “strikes the eye”) or on ṬRF_2 ‘utmost part, edge, extremity’ (see preceding paragraph)? Probably neither the former nor the latter, but, as Klein1987 assumes, a derivation from the (C)Sem vb. *
ṭrp (see ṬRF_12 below) along the line ‘to tear, pluck, seize > to be freshly plucked > to be fresh, new’. – Cf. also ṬRF_5 ‘tamarisk’? – There is some overlapping also with ↗ẒRF.
▪ ṬRF_4
miṭraf ‘shawl’ : The explanation, given by ClassAr lexicographers, that
miṭraf is a ‘garment, square or four-sided, having ornamental or coloured or figured borders’ (Lane) connects the word with ṬRF_2
ṭaraf ‘edge, extremity’, which seems plausible.
▪ ṬRF_5 (≙
DRS #ṬRP-9)
ṭarfāʔᵘ ‘tamarisk (
bot.)’: probably related to Akk
ṭarpaʔ- ‘sort of tamarisk’, which, however, may in itself be a borrowing from a foreign language. Do we have to compare Hbr
ṭārāp̄ ‘fresh-plucked’, hence also ‘fresh leaf’, Aram Syr
ṭarpâ ‘id.’? If so then Ar
ṭarfāʔᵘ ‘tamarisk’, like a number of other values in this root, is based on (C)Sem *ṬRP ‘to tear, pluck, seize’ (see ṬRF_12/13, below). – In contrast, based on the evidence in Akk and some Aram langs, Militarev&Stolbova2007 reconstruct a Sem *
ṭarpaʔ- ‘tamarind [sic!]; leaf’, to which they juxtapose an EChad (Bidiya)
tìrìp ‘kind of tree’, all from an hypothetical AfrAs *
ṭarip- ‘tree’.
▪ ṬRF_6 (≙
DRS #ṬRP-1)
†ṭarafa i (
ṭarf) ‘to drive away, repel’: While semantics may suggest a connection between this vb. and ṬRF_2 ‘utmost part, edge, extremity’, the act of repelling being a *‘driving to the edges’,
DRS and others rather see it akin to the notion of ‘tearing (to pieces), plucking, seizing’ (cf. ṬRF_12, below). The idea, put forward by Klein1987, that Hbr ²
ṭārap̄ ‘to cast, knock; to mix, confuse’ (which is seen together with Ar
ṭarafa ‘to strike back’) »probably« is a »sense enlargement« of Hbr ¹
ṭārap̄ ‘to tear to pieces, rend; to pluck’ (< CSem *ṬRP ‘to tear, pluck, seize’, see ṬRF_12/13, below), may help to understand a development that is far from being immediately evident. – Yet another theory is Ehret’s: he suggest to regard Ar
ṭarafa ‘to turn off, repel’ as an extension in intensive (manner) *
f from a bi-consonantal root nucleus
*ṬR- ‘to send’ (Ehret1989); for other extensions from the same nucleus, he refers to ↗
ṭaraʔa ‘to fall upon unexpectedly, happen, occur’, ↗
ṭaraḥa ‘to remove, turn from, avert, throw far away, (Hava1899:) to fling, cast away s.th.’, ↗
ṭarada ‘to push away, drive away, repel, expel, pursue, chase, drive together, (Hava1899:) to persecute, drive back etc.; to collect (scattered flocks)’.
▪ ṬRF_7
†ṭarrafa ‘to lose the teeth’ : acc. to Lane said of a camel that loses teeth by reason of extreme age. If this explanation is correct, the value is dependent on ṬRF_2 (≙
DRS #ṬRP-4), denom. from
ṭaraf ‘utmost part, edge, extremity’.
▪ ṬRF_8
†ṭarrafa ‘to choose s.th.’: denom. from
ṭaraf in the sense (now obsolete) of
†‘anything chosen, choice’, which seems to have developed from the word’s basic meaning of ‘utmost part, edge, extremity’ (ṬRF_2 ≙
DRS #ṬRP-4). Animals that depasture the lateral parts of a pasturage ‘make their choice (for better food)’, cf. the meaning given in
DRS for the modSAr cognates, Mhr
ṭərūf and Jib
ṭorof, namely ‘mettre de côté pour une occasion meilleure’.
▪ ṬRF_9
†ṭirāf ‘leather tent, tent of skin’: probably connected to
ṭaraf ‘utmost part, edge, extremity’ (ṬRF_2 ≙
DRS #ṬRP-4)—but this would need further explanation.
▪ ṬRF_10 (≙
DRS #ṬRP-3)
†ṭirf ‘noble, of high breed; generous’: The explanation, given in Lane, for
ṭirf in the more specific sense of ‘generous horse, one that is looked at (
yuṭrafu) because of its beauty’ would connect this value to ṬRF_1 ‘eye’. Hava1899, however, translates
ṭirf as ‘noble from both parents’, suggesting that we have to draw a line to ṬRF_2 ‘utmost part, edge, extremity’ rather than to ṬRF_1 ‘eye’. This would be in line with the var.
†ṭarf ‘man generous, noble’ which the lexicographers (acc. to Lane) understand as ‘noble in respect of ancestry, up to the greatest (i.e. most remote [!]) forefather’, and
†ṭaraf ~
ṭarif,
†ṭarīf ‘having many ancestors, up to the greatest [i.e. most remote] forefather, of long descent’ (Lane).
▪ ṬRF_11
†ʔaṭrafa ‘to be numerous, abound with’: is probably the same as (or a generalization of) ṬRF_10 (≙
DRS #ṬRP-3), cf.
†ṭaraf ~
ṭarif,
†ṭarīf ‘reckoning many ancestors’ (Hava1899),
ṭarufa (
a,
ṭarāfaẗ) ‘to descend from an ancient family (man)’.
▪ ṬRF_12
†ṭarafa ‘to seize, carry off by force’: Preserved only in ClassAr
sibāʕ ṭawārifᵘ (sg.
†ṭārifaẗ, f. of
ṭārif, PA I) ‘animals that seize, or carry off by force, the objects of the chase’, this is with all likelihood the “purest”, least “contaminated” descendant of an original CSem *ṬRP ‘to tear, pluck, seize’. Klein1987 connects the corresponding Hbr
ṭārap̄ ‘to tear to pieces, rend; to pluck’ and Aram
ṭᵊrap̄ ‘to tear, seize’ with Ar
†ṭarafa ‘to graze (said of a camel)’ (cf. ṬRF_2 ‘utmost part, edge, extremity’) as well as with
†ṭarufa ‘to be freshly plucked’ (cf. ṬRF_3 ‘novelty’), which in turn may be akin to ṬRF_5 ‘tamarisk’ (if this is cognate with Hbr
ṭārāp̄ ‘fresh-plucked’, hence also ‘fresh leaf’). Furthermore, if Klein1987 is right, then Hbr
ṭārap̄ ‘to cast, knock; to mix, confuse’ and Aram Syr
ṭᵊrap̄ ‘to shake, clap, smite’ are cognate with Ar
ṭarafa ‘to strike back’ (ṬRF_6), and this complex is a secondary development (Klein: »sense enlargement«) from the original CSem ‘to tear, pluck, seize’.
▪ ṬRF_13
†ṭaraf ‘flesh, flesh-meat’: This value is without doubt derived from the preceding, cf. Hbr
ṭᵊrēp̄āʰ ‘animal torn by wild beasts’ (> postBiblHbr ‘animal with organic defect’, mHbr ‘ritually forbidden food’),
ṭ ärā̈p̄ ‘prey; food’ (»orig. prob. meaning ‘food carried off’«, Klein1987), from Hbr
ṭārap̄ ‘to tear to pieces’, from CSem ‘to tear, pluck, seize’.
EtymArab
ʔ
