Page:Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar (1910 Kautzsch-Cowley edition).djvu/139

 persons of the  are derived, and the  also is connected with it. or, like the Imperative and Infinitive construct in sound, may also be regarded as an alternative ground-form, with which the Imperfect (see § 47) is connected.

In verbs (i.e. with  for their second radical) the stem-form, given both in Lexicon and Grammar, is not the 3rd sing. masc. Perfect (consisting of two consonants), but the form with medial, which appears in the Imperative and Infinitive; e.g. (3rd pers. perf. ): the same is the case in most stems with medial , e.g..

2. From the pure stem, or, the derivative stems are formed according to an unvarying analogy, in which the idea of the stem assumes the most varied shades of meaning, according to the changes in its form (intensive, frequentative, privative, causative, reflexive, reciprocal; some of them with corresponding passive forms), e.g. , ; , ; ,. In other languages such formations are regarded as new or derivative verbs, e.g. Germ. fallen (to fall), fällen (to fell); trinken (to drink), tränken (to drench); Lat. lactere (to suck, Germ. saugen), lactare (to suckle, Germ. säugen); iacĕre (to throw), iacēre (to lie down); γίνομαι, γεννάω. In Hebrew, however, these formations are incomparably more regular and systematic than (e.g.) in Greek, Latin, or English; and, since the time of Reuchlin, they have usually been called conjugations of the primitive form (among the Jewish grammarians, i.e. formations, or more correctly species), and are always treated together in the grammar and lexicon.

3. The changes in the primitive form consist either in internal modification by means of vowel-change and strengthening of the middle consonant (, ;, ; cf. to lie, to lay; to fall, to fell), or in the repetition of one or two of the stem-consonants , or finally in the introduction of formative additions , which may also be accompanied by internal change. Cf. .

In Aramaic the formation of the conjugations is effected more by formative additions than by vowel-change. The vocalic distinctions have mostly become obsolete, so that, e.g. the reflexives with the prefix, , have entirely usurped the place of the passives. On the other hand, Arabic has preserved great wealth in both methods of formation, while Hebrew in this, as in other respects, holds the middle place.

4. Grammarians differ as to the number and arrangement of these conjugations. The common practice, however, of calling them by the