Page:Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar (1910 Kautzsch-Cowley edition).djvu/112

 6. A special kind of closed syllables are the, i.e. those which end in the same (strengthened) consonant with which the following syllable begins, e.g. ,. If without the tone, they have, like the rest, short vowels; but, if bearing the tone, either short vowels as, , or long, as ,.

On the omission of the strengthening of a consonant at the end of a word, see.

7. Syllables ending with two consonants occur only at the end of words, and have most naturally short vowels,, ; but sometimes , as , , or ,. Cf., however,. Usually the harshness of pronunciation is avoided by the use of a helping vowel.

The changes in sound through which the Hebrew language passed, before it assumed the form in which we know it from the Masoretic text of the O.T. (see ), have especially affected its vowel system. A precise knowledge of these vowel changes, which is indispensable for the understanding of most of the present forms of the language, is derived partly from the phenomena which the language itself presents in the laws of derivation and inflexion, partly from the comparison of the kindred dialects, principally the Arabic. By these two methods, we arrive at the following facts as regards Hebrew:

1. That in an open syllable the language has frequently retained only a half-vowel, where there originally stood a full short vowel, e.g. (ground-form ) ,  (groundform ) ,  (Arab. ),  (Arab. ).

2. That vowels originally short have in the tone-syllable, as also in the open syllable preceding it, been generally changed into the corresponding tone-long vowels, ă into ā, ĭ into ē, ŭ into ō (see, –, , ). If, however, the tone be shifted or weakened, these tone-long vowels mostly revert to their original shortness, or, occasionally, are still further shortened, or reduced to mere, or, finally, are entirely lost through a change in the division of syllables; e.g. (Arab. ) , when in close dependence on a following genitive in the ), becomes ;  (Arab. ), dual , dual (with attenuation of the original ă of the first syllable to ĭ)  [on the , see ];  (Arab. ), plur. (Arab. ). For instances of complete loss, as in, cf..