Table Of ContentCONTRIBUTIONSTOORIENTALHISTORYANDPHILOLOGY
No. VI.
ROOT-DETERMINATIVES
IN
SEMITIC SPEECH
,,,..
A CONTRIBUTION TO SEMITIC PHILOLOGY
BY
SOLOMON THEODORE HAL&VY HURWITZ, PH.D.
(Tlew
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS
1913
All rights reserved
PRiNTLD IH
Printed by W. DKUQULIH, Leipzig
NOTE
During the last fifty years the horizon of ourviewuponthe extent
and development of the Semitic languages has been singularly en-
larged; on the one hand by archaeological investigations that have
brought to light unknown Semitic civilizations, and on the other by
a study of the most modern developments of these languages. The
origin and early history of these languages offer a problem that is at
once interesting and perplexing. It has been in the mind ofscholars
since the first attempts were made in Europe to grasp the extent
and the importance of ancient and mediaeval Semitic culture. Even
in the Early Middle Ages, essays were put forward to solve the
question, at least in regard to one of these tongues, the Hebrew. In
modern times such undertakings have been quite numerous.
The difficulties in the way of proving any theorythatwillaccount
for this development are, of course, great: the pitfalls are numerous.
Dr. Hurwitz has tried to overcome the one and to avoid the other
by a strict adherence to a scientific method and by choosing his
examples with great care. It is idle to hope thathe willconvince all
students of so vexed and contentious a question; but he has offered
a solution that deserves the careful attention and scrutiny of his
fellow-workers in the same field.
May, 1913. RICHARD GOTTHEIL
.
TO MY MOTHER
HANNAH LANGLEBEN-HURWITZ
PREFACE
The "biliteral theory", sometimes attacked, at other times
defended, and almost entirely rejected in recent years, forms
the subject of these studies. They were begun in 1907 in
a somewhat empirical fashion, but the author became deeply
interested in the mass of literature which had accumulated
on the subject, although these researches had apparently
resulted in hopeless confusion rather than in even an
approximate solution of their problem. As a result of his
investigations, the writer was very glad to find that able
grammarians had not labored for centuries in vain, con-
tending blindly over something that had no existence; but
that, on the contrary, the biliteral root in Semitic was an
actual
entity.
In 1910, encouraged by the friendly interest shown to
him at Columbia University, the author presented a thesis
in which he briefly outlined the possibility ofthe assumption
of an original biliteral character of the Semitic root as a
key to the solution of many vexing problems in Semitic
etymology, although he has been obliged, from the very first,
to modify his views, and to adopt an entirely conservative
position. His results, which have been attained indepen-
dently, have shown that he has been anticipated in almost
every point by such scholars as Pappenheim and Lagarde;
but this very fact only renders him the more sure that his
position is justified. In fact, he does not claim originality
in any one of his conclusions, for they have, each and all,
been the historical and logical result of the labors of the
ix
PREFACE
x
scholarly world before him. He has merely combined,
sifted, and profited by the researches and even by the
errors of former generations, and he believes that he has
brought the biliteral theory within a restricted field, and
that he has placed it upon a scientific foundation. His
method has necessarily been conservative; he has been
obliged to consider each of the Semitic languages as an
individual unit, the vocabulary of which can best be ex-
plained by itself, i. e., by a comparison of kindred words
within the same dialect having identical fundamental el-
ements. Only when such means were unavailable was he
compelled to tolerate cross-comparisons ofwords in different
dialects, which may have been separated from each other
by many centuries of usageJ. Whatever light semasiology
has thrown upon the development ofwords and their usages
he has liberally used. Doubtless a more generous equip-
ment of lexicons (especially for Arabic and Ethiopic) would
have aided much, but this defect has long been felt, in the
Semitic world of scholarship, and can be remedied only by
degrees. On the whole, the fundamental idea conveyed by
each root in the various languages is quite evident from a
study of all its derived forms.
The subject naturally falls into two divisions: the gram-
matical and the lexicographical. The first is considered
in the opening chapter; the last, which is by far the most
A
important, in the following chapters. survey of the
various theories of former Jewish biliteralists would have
been interesting, but would have added nothing ofperman-
1 The rule has been generally applied that it is safest to compare
one North Semitic form with its phonetic equivalentinanotherNorth
Semitic dialect, while South Semitic has been generally compared
with South Semitic (Of. Noldeke, DiesemitischenSprachcn, p.14, and
Wright, Comp. Gram., p. 10).
PREFACE
xi
ent value to the subject; since all such theories were based
on an imperfect and unscientific knowledge of the laws
which govern Hebrew grammar2. It was therefore thought
advisable not to enter into the matter at the present
moment.
The author's thanks are due for the constant aid and
advice tendered by his teachers at Columbia University,
Professor Richard J. H. G-ottheil, Professor John D. Prince,
and Professor A. V. "Williams Jackson. To Dr. Louis
H. Gray he is grateful for many valuable suggestions.
S. T. H. H.
2 For literature on the subject consult the appended bibliography.
