CHAPTER II

THE VERB

§ 38. General View.

a

Verbal stems are either original or derived. They are usually divided into —

(a) Verbal stems proper (primitive verbs), which exhibit the stem without any addition, e. g. %l;m' he has reigned.

b

(b) Verbal derivatives, i. e. secondary verbal stems, derived from the pure stem (letter a), e. g. vD;qi to sanctify, vDeq;t.hi to sanctify oneself, from vd;q' to be holy. These are usually called conjugations (§ 39).

c

(c) Denominatives,1 i. e. verbs derived from nouns (like the Latin causari, praedari, and Eng. to skin, to stone), or even from particles (see d, end) either in a primitive or derivative form, e. g. lh;a', Qal and PiÇeÒl, to pitch a tent, from lh, aoñ tent; vyrIv.hi and vrevo to take root, and vreve to root out, from vr, vo root (§ 52 h).

d

This does not exclude the possibility that, for nouns, from which denominative verbs are derived, the corresponding (original) verbal stem may still be found either in Hebrew or in the dialects. The meaning, however, is sufficient to show that the denominatives have come from the noun, not from the verbal stem, e. g. hn"bel. a brick (verbal stem !bl to be white), denomin. !b;l' to make bricks; gD' a fish (verbal stem hg"D' to be prolific), denomin. gWD to fish; @r;x' to winter (from @r, xoñ autumn, winter, stem @r;x' to pluck); #Wq to pass the summer (from #yIq;ñ summer, stem #yqi to be hot).
On 'Semitic verbs derived from particles' see P. Haupt in the Amer. Journ. of Sem. Lang., xxii (1906), 257 ff.

Footnotes:

1[1] Cf. W. J.Gerber, Die hebr. Verba denom., insbes. im theol. Sprachgebr. des A.T., Lpz. 1896.