Reconstruction talk:Proto-Semitic/mataḳ-

This should be modified, the Reconstruction is more likely to be matq- not matk-, just visually observing its descendants can confirm this. There is also a variant form using an emphatic "t", *maṭq- like the Arabic مَطَقَ (maṭaqa, “to smack ones lips, to taste repeatedly”) seeming to be more popular only in the South Semitic sphere. For backing see also *mVtVḳ- and Foreign elements in the Proto-Indo-European vocabulary. A Comparative Loanword Study by Rasmus Gudmundsen Bjørn on page 95 (107 of the pdf). The "emphatic k", "ḳ", which is an alternative way of transcribing the Semitic /q/ seems to have spawned this misunderstanding in the other sources listing it just merely as "k". -Profes.I. (talk) 04:19, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

@Victar Yes. No descendants here even have /k/. It is always /q/ which is never confused, on en.Wiktionary since Rhemmiel (talk • contribs)’s uniformization transcribed in titles as ḳ. Also the verb needs to have a vowel between the t and the ḳ, presumably to be *mataḳ-. Also the “>? Arabic: مَتَاق (matāq, “(something) desirable”)” listed there has nothing to do with this because it is from تَاقَ (tāqa, “to crave towards”) with مَـ (ma-) formans which is used to form verbal nouns of frequent action (you see it is a verbal noun in the declension table), and this is converted into an adjective by apposition. Fay Freak (talk) 15:12, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

No objections from me in moving it, but I highly doubt مَطَقَ (maṭaqa, “to smack ones lips”) is related, but is instead a convolution with another root meaning "to suck", and intentionally did not include it. --{{victar|talk}} 15:46, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

@Victar: ( ；´Д｀) I also doubt مَطَقَ (maṭaqa, “to smack ones lips”) is related, since this has a different consonant again, as ṭ is to be distinguished from t, and there are other words like common مَصَّ (maṣṣa) and مَزَّ (mazza) that are all similar, it is all suspect of ideophonic phenomena, easier than that one word derives from another, at best one invents one word motivated by the presence of another – in the primitive human mind spontaneous generation works. Indo-Europeanists do it with insufficient justification and make it appear more common than it is: to confound emphatic with unemphatic. It looks in transcription like there were only a speck of a difference, and sounds like that to Western ears, but as a speaker of a Semitic language one has internalized the distinctness of t and ṭ, h, ḫ and ḥ, s and ṣ, etc., so that one does not usually find variations in native words (the voiceless laryngeal fricatives merged around 0 AD in Hebrew and Aramaic and became confused a millenium later in Geʿez, see w:Semitic languages § Consonants, but the others even didn’t, and how Hebrew is pronounced now after resurrection is of course not authentical); there is no mechanism for root derivation or something like that (not a regular thing and not an understood thing), and that brings me to the second point that probably because to learn a Semitic language is so difficult one just browses the dictionaries without understanding how in Semitic languages one derives by transfixes, so while something looks as if it shared a root consonant m it is actually part of the derivation type; mainly this is in terms beginning with m- and following three consonants: if a root consonant is the semiconsonant y or w then it appears like a three consonant word to those wo do not see, and in verb forms there are (-)t- *š- derivations about which last I have talked at User talk:Fay Freak § هل; it became ʾ, but to handle the glottal stop in comparisons the Indo-Europanists are of course outsmarted and they prefer to ignore it to let it appear as if their comparisons fitted; I observe it tends to be rhetorics enabled by the use of Latin script: mataka and maṭaḳa look like acceptable comparisons as opposed to متك and مطق), else there aren’t even prefixes in Semitic, these are parts of transfixes, and at least for Arabic only the nisba ending as a real suffix. As I have seen these comparisons multiple times from you, be it carrying over the ignorance of published academia towards non-Indo-European languages or not, please do it better than they usually do, especially keep in mind the distinctness of h, ḫ (ḵ in other transcription) and ḥ, t and ṭ, s and ṣ (ṯ̣ and ṣ́ are the rarest consonants); luckily if one is not tenured, if one is not in economic state where one always has to market one’s position, to inflate the importance of one’s findings, one is incentivized to do it right rather than to let it appear right. Not to disencourage, Semitic grammar is, summarizing it thus concisely, not hard, just radically different (and things one has not learned are hard), and one should not expect to happen in that group what happens in Indo-European languages. They tend to assume universal that which isn’t universal. I mean if you see that and that sound change plausible in Slavic, Iranian, Germanic etc., the picture can be radically different for Semitic. See we have a language with only three vowels, of course one clings to the consonants more than one has done in the Indo-European group. Fay Freak (talk)

What should be done regarding the roots featuring the /ṭ/ if we are not considering them variations. There is also a Sabaean 𐩣𐩸𐩤 (mṭq) form listed as occurring DASI however not indicating its semantics, it might have illuminated the Arabic sense. Are we deeming the senses of sucking, tasting repeatedly, too irreconcilable with being sweet and good tasting? This has been suggested in the past, Strong's Hebrew, the idea of relishing being the interconnection. There are also Tigre መጠቀ (mäṭäḳä /⁠mäṭṭäḳä⁠/), Jibbali/Shehri miṭáyḳ, and Harsusi maṭq, which do mean being sweet (The Semitic Languages, An International Handbook Chapter 8 Section 9.3, which lists both *mtḳ and *mṭḳ as Proto-Semitic).

@Victar Lastly for clarification what is the source for Targumic Aramaic (itmattaq)? I seem to be finding that rendering in a Etymologische Untersuchungen auf Grund des palaestinischen Arabisch by Josua Blau of Palestinian Arabic. I guess more of concern to me is the tagging it as "akk" and an East Semitic language, is the term borrowed into Aramaic from there or is it rather to be place under Northwest Semitic as an Aramaic word? Are we speaking of Jewish Babylonian Aramaic, , Jewish Palestinian Aramaic when we say Targumic? -Profes.I. (talk) 19:23, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Also of possible interest, there is a usage in Akkadian for Matqu describing a disease of lice or biting insects infesting ones head, literally "sweet lice" if we take it to solely mean sweet. Perhaps it is connected to the biblical sense in Job 24:20, where the worm is seen as constantly feeding off of, continually biting. -Profes.I. (talk) 19:51, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

@Profes.I.: The source of itmattaq is in the reference below: "late Targumic Aramaic itmattaq “to become sweet”. I don't really know anything about it otherwise. --{{victar|talk}} 20:31, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Thank you, I will work from there, I imagine this is the same Late Jewish Literary Aramaic as it is designated here Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon. Thanks for your efforts in compiling for us all. -Profes.I. (talk) 00:24, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

@Profes.I.: Sure thing. Thanks for any cleanups. --{{victar|talk}} 00:29, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

@Fay Freak: I only care about Semitic roots in so much as they're related to PIE, and specifically PII, but I think I did a pretty good just with compiling the entry otherwise, so cut me some slack on using *k instead of *ḳ, thanks. Again, feel free to move this entry wherever you like. --{{victar|talk}} 20:26, 29 May 2020 (UTC)