also from a glimpse of iraq:
As an illustration of the derivation of words from those roots, consider the Arabic verb corresponding to ‘to write’: kataba. All three vowels are short ones in this case and the verb is written: k’t’b’ : ﹶﺏﹷﺘﹷﻜ or, less formally, ktb : ﺏﺘﻜHence it can be regarded as a three-letter word.The interesting feature is that many words can be derived from these three letters. For example: (I will denote short vowels by one character and long vowels by two.)
Kataba – he wrote
Katabat – she wrote
Katabaa – they (two, male) wrote
Katabataa - they (two, female) wrote
Katabu - they (male) wrote
Katabna – they (female) wrote
and so on for numerous verb variants for past, present and future tenses like…
Yaktubu – he writes
Taktubu – she writes
Yaktubaan – they (two, male) write
Taktubaan – they (two, female) write…
Iktub – write (command tense, male)
Iktubee – write (command tense, female)…
Other verbs can be derived from the original verb root, for example:
Kattaba – to dictate
Kaataba – to correspond with… t
hese become roots for the same derivations of verb tenses similar to those mentioned above!Apart from verbs, numerous other words are derived from those ‘three’ letters (similar to, say, ‘writer’, ‘writings’, etc. in English). Below are some examples to illustrate the concept.
Kitaaba – writing
Kaatib – writer
Kaatiba – writer (female)
Kitaab – book
Kutaib – booklet
Maktoob – letter
Maktab – office
Maktaba – library
Mukaataba – correspondence or contract
Kuttaab – school (old form)
Kitba – fate
This actually leads to a profusion of words that can be derived from almost every verb. The result is a wide variety of words that refer to the same basic thing but with slightly differing shades of meaning.
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utterly fascinating to me
