Grammar
Many Syriac words, like those in other Semitic languages, are built out of triliteral roots, collations of three Syriac consonants with variable vowel sets as a "glue". For example, the root ܫܩܠ, ŠQL, has the basic meaning of taking, and so we have the following words that can be formed from this root:
- ܫܩܠ – šqal: "he took"
- ܢܫܩܘܠ – nešqōl: "he will take"
- ܫܩܠ – šāqel: "he takes, he is taking"
- ܫܩܠ – šaqqel: "he has lifted/raised"
- ܐܫܩܠ – ašqel: "he has set out"
- ܫܩܠܐ – šqālâ: "a taking, burden, recension, portion or syllable"
- ܫܩ̈ܠܐ – šeqlē: "takings, profits, taxes"
- ܫܩܠܘܬܐ – šaqlûṯā: "a beast of burden"
- ܫܘܩܠܐ – šûqālâ: "arrogance"
Read more about this topic: Syriac Language
Famous quotes containing the word grammar:
“Syntax is the study of the principles and processes by which sentences are constructed in particular languages. Syntactic investigation of a given language has as its goal the construction of a grammar that can be viewed as a device of some sort for producing the sentences of the language under analysis.”
—Noam Chomsky (b. 1928)
“Grammar is a tricky, inconsistent thing. Being the backbone of speech and writing, it should, we think, be eminently logical, make perfect sense, like the human skeleton. But, of course, the skeleton is arbitrary, too. Why twelve pairs of ribs rather than eleven or thirteen? Why thirty-two teeth? It has something to do with evolution and functionalism—but only sometimes, not always. So there are aspects of grammar that make good, logical sense, and others that do not.”
—John Simon (b. 1925)
“Literary gentlemen, editors, and critics think that they know how to write, because they have studied grammar and rhetoric; but they are egregiously mistaken. The art of composition is as simple as the discharge of a bullet from a rifle, and its masterpieces imply an infinitely greater force behind them.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)