Page:Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar (1910 Kautzsch-Cowley edition).djvu/464

 5. When the genitive, following a construct state, is used periphrastically to express the idea of a material or attribute ( and p), the pronominal suffix, which properly belongs to the compound idea (represented by the and genitive), is, like the article (§ 127), attached to the second substantive (the genitive), e.g.  prop. the hill of my holiness, i.e. my holy hill,, &c.; , ; , , , ; cf. ,, , , f., , , ; 38:6; after an adjective as ,   .—On the same analogy is the use of e.g.   his weapons of war [cf. ];, although the genitive here does not convey the idea of an attribute.

Rem. 1. Through a weakening in the distinction of gender, which is noticeable elsewhere (cf., 144 a, 145 p, t, u) and which probably passed from the colloquial language into that of literature, masculine suffixes (especially in the plural) are not infrequently used to refer to feminine substantives; thus a noun-suffix in the singular, , , ; in the plural, , , , , , (but the feminine suffix twice immediately after, and so the Samaritan also in verse 7); 36:6 (Samaritan , but also ); , , , 10b ; 9:20, ,  ff. (alternating with ); f. (but afterwards a feminine suffix);,  ( in parallelism with ); 42:15, , ,  ff. (along with feminine suffixes);,. Verbal suffixes in the singular, ; in the plural,, ,. But, 18, 33:13, , a are to be explained according to. On as feminine, see. On the use of the masculine in general as the prior gender, see.

2. The suffix of the 3rd person singular feminine (as also the separate pronoun, , ) sometimes refers in a general sense to the verbal idea contained in a preceding sentence (corresponding to our it); thus the verbal suffix, , , , , , ; cf. , 42:36, 47:26,, . Elsewhere the suffix of the 3rd singular feminine refers to the plurals of things, e.g.