Page:Compendious Syriac Grammar.djvu/42

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— 4 —
§ 3.

ܙ‎ = z is a soft s as in chosen, German s in Rose, French in choisir or French z in zéro.

ܚ‎ = is quite a foreign sound to us, an h rattled in the throat (Arabic ح‎). The East-Syrians pronounce it as a very hard Swiss ch (Arabic خ‎).

ܛ‎ = is an emphatic and completely unaspirated modification of ܬt, in which the tip of the tongue is pressed firmly against the palate; ܩ‎ is a similar modification of ܟ‍k, produced in the back part of the mouth. ܛ‎ and ܩ‎ are employed by the Syrians as equivalents for the Greek sounds τ and κ, which at all events were quite unaspirated.

ܨ‎ = is an emphatic articulation of the sound of ܣs, by no means to be rendered as a German z (= ts).

ܥ‎ = ʿ is a guttural breathing, again quite foreign to us, which is formed by a peculiar compression of the upper part of the windpipe. It is nearly related to ܚ‎, and even to the Spiritus lenis (ܐ‎). Those who render it by the latter sound will make the least considerable mistakes.

ܫ‎ = š is the German sch, the English sh, or the French ch.

ܪ‎ seems to have been a lingual-dental, not a guttural.

The remaining consonants have nearly the same sound as the corresponding German or English ones.

DISPOSITION OF WORDS.

Disposition of words.§ 3. Particles, which consist of only a single letter, i. e. of a consonant with a short vowel, are attached as prefixes to the following word, thus ܒܡܠܟܐbe̊malkā, "in rege", not ܒ ܡܠܟܐ‎, ܘܩܛܠwaqṭal, "and killed", not ܘ ܩܛܠ‎, &c.

Certain short words, and to some extent even longer ones, which together belong to the same idea, are also frequently written as one, though not invariably. Thus ܐܦܠܐ‎ or ܐܦ ܠܐāf lā "neither", "not even"; ܒܪܢܫ‎ or ܒܪ ܐܢܫbar·nāš, "son of man", i. e. "man"; ܟܠܝܘܡ‎ or ܟܠ ܝܘܡkul yōm "every day"; ܟܠܡܕܡ‎ or ܟܠ ܡܕܡkul meddem "quicquid"; ܪܘܚܩܘܕܫܐ‎, more commonly ܪܘܚ ܩܘܕܫܐrūḥ quδšā "spirit of holiness", "the Holy Ghost"; even ܡܪܢܝܫܘܥܡܫܝܚܐ‎ instead of ܡܪܢ ܝܫܘܥ ܡܫܝܚܐmāran Ješūʿ me̊šīḥā "our Lord Jesus Christ", appears. On the fusion