Ugaritic

Introduction

Ugaritic verbs are based on mostly three-literal roots (like all Semitic languages) (a few verbs have two- or four-consonant roots). For example, r-g-m, ‘to say’. By adding prefixes, infixes, and suffixes, and varying the vowels, the various verbal forms are formed. (Because in Ugaritic vowels are hardly written, these vowel variations often are not clearly visible).

Verbs can take several of a dozen stem patterns, or binyanim, that change the basic meaning of the verb, and make it for example passive, causative, or intensive. The basic form (in German: Grundstamm) is the G stem.

The verbal forms for each stem can be divided in five verbal form groups:

• the suffix conjugation, also called qtl (pronounced qatal), or perfect;
• the prefix conjugation, also called yqtl (pronounced yiqtol), or imperfect;
• imperatives;
• two different infinitives;
• an active and a passive participle.

Verbs have one of three different vowel patterns, -a-, -i-, and -u-:

• in the qtl (G stem): qatala, qatila, or qatula (cf. Hebrew qaṭal, kavēd, qaṭon);
• in the yqtl (G stem): yiqtalu, yaqtilu, or yaqtulu.

There is no one-on-one link between morphology and tense (past, present or future). This is because Ugaritic is an aspect language: verbal forms do not primarily indicate the timing of activities, but they indicate aspect: the suffix conjugation (qtl) has perfective aspect, it is used when viewing an activity as having a completion; the prefix conjugation (yqtl) has imperfective aspect, it is used when it is deemed irrelevant whether the activity has an end or beginning.

Ugaritic verbs can have several moods, both indicative and injunctive (jussive, cohortative). Moods are most clearly visible in the prefix conjugation (see below).

Suffix conjugation

The suffix conjugation (qtl) has perfective aspect. Taking the root RGM (which means "to say") as an example, ragama may be translated as “he says” (at this very moment), or “he has said” (and has finished speaking).

The vowel between the second and third root consonant can be -a-, -i-, or -u-. Most verbs describe an activity (so-called “active verbs”) and have -a-. Verbs describing a state or property (“stative verbs”) have -i- or (rarely) -u-.

The paradigm of the suffix conjugation (or Perfect) is as follows for the a-verb RGM, the i-verb ŠBᶜ (“to be (become) satiated”), and the u-verb MRṢ (“to fall ill”):

Prefix conjugation

The prefix conjugation yqtl- takes three forms: yiqtal-, yaqtil-, and yaqtul-. The specific pattern is determined by the stem consonants.^[19] Therefore, there is no simple one-on-one relation with the three qtl vowel patterns, qatal, qatil, and qatul, because the qtl vowel pattern depends not on the consonant pattern, but on a verb's meaning (active or stative).

For example, the following three verbs all have a qtl of the qatal type, but their yqtl patterns differ:

More information verb, qtl ...

verb		qtl		type	yqtl
QRᵓ	“to call, invoke”	qaraᵓa	“he calls”	yiqtal-	yiqraᵓu	“he will call”
YRD	“to go down”	yarada	“he goes down”	yaqtil-	yaridu	“he will go down”
RGM	“to say, speak”	ragama	“he says”	yaqtul-	yargumu	“he will say”

Close

The Imperfect paradigms for the three patterns are as follows, for the verbs RGM, “to say” (yaqtul- pattern), Š’iL, “to ask” (yiqtal- pattern), and YRD, “to go down” (yaqtil pattern):

The prefix conjugation takes four or five different endings (yqtl, yqtlu, yqtla, yqtln). There are three clear moods (indicative, jussive, and volitive or cohortative). The so-called energic forms, yqtln, with an -n suffix (-an, -anna; possibly also -un, -unna), apparently have the same meaning as the shorter forms without the -n suffix.^[20]

Imperative

The imperative probably takes three forms, qatal, qutul, and qitil, where the vowels correspond with the vowels in the imperfect.

Examples (the verb YRD “to go down, to descend” is a so-called ‘weak’ verb, the first consonant Y disappears in the imperative):

Participles

The paradigm of the active participle of G stems is as follows (verb MLK, “to be king”):

The passive participle is quite rare. There seem to be two forms (verbs RGM “to say”, ḤRM “to divide”):

Other stems than the G (and N) stem form their participles by means of a m- prefix; for example mulaḫḫišu (“conjuror”, D stem LḪŠ “to whisper”), mušamṭiru (“[the god] who rains”, Š stem, MṬR “to rain down”).

Infinitives

Like other Semitic languages, Ugaritic has two infinitives, the infinitive absolute and the infinitive construct. However, in Ugaritic the two have an identical form. The usual form is halāku (“to go”, verb hlk), but a few verbs use an alternative form *hilku, for example niģru, “to guard” (verb nģr).

The infinitive absolute is often used preceding a perfect or imperfect verbal form, to put emphasis on that following verbal form. Such an infinive absolute may be translated as “verily, certainly, absolutely”. For example, halāku halaka, “he certainly goes” (literally, “to go! he goes”). An isolated infinitive absolute may also be used instead of any perfect, imperfect, or imperative verbal form.

The infinitive construct is often used after the prepositions lê (“to”) and bi (“in, by”): bi-ša’āli “in asking, by asking, while asking” (verb š’al “to ask”; note that after the preposition b (bi) the genitive of the infinitive is used).

Patterns (stems)

Ugaritic verbs occur in about a dozen reconstructed patterns or binyanim (verb RGM, “to say”, unless indicated otherwise):^[21][22] The large majority of verbal forms (about 70%) belong to the G stem (German: Grundstamm, “basic stem”).

Weak Verbs

In Ugaritic, “weak verbs” are verbs whose roots contain a weak consonant, that is, a consonant that may disappear in some forms (in particular the imperative), or change into another consonant (some imperfect forms). Weak consonants are w and y, and also n if it is the first root consonant. Verbs with only two root consonants are weak too.

Due to their weak consonants, weak verbs can undergo phonetic changes, such as the assimilation of waw (w) to yod (y), especially in the absence of an intervening vowel. This characteristic impacts the verb's inflection, resulting in variations that are atypical compared to regular (strong) verbs.^[26] This phenomenon is akin to that observed in other Semitic languages, including Hebrew.

The following list shows the various classes of weak verbs. Weak forms are shown in bold, the strong verb RGM is shown for comparison:

In Ugaritic there also exist "doubly weak verbs", which contain two weak consonants.

Paradigm

Nouns (substantives, adjectives, personal names) in their basic form (nominative singular) end in -u. Nominal forms are categorized according to their inflection into: cases (nominative, genitive, and accusative), state (absolute and construct), gender (masculine and feminine), and number (singular, dual, and plural).

Here is the full paradigm for a masculine substantive (malku, “king”) and a feminine substantive (malkatu, “queen”).^[27][28]

Note (*): with lengthening of the final vowel of the stem: mal(a)kat- > mal(a)kāt-.

Case

Ugaritic has three grammatical cases corresponding to: nominative, genitive, and accusative. Normally, singular nouns take the ending -u in the nominative, -i in the genitive and -a in the accusative. After prepositions as a rule the genitive is used. The accusative is also used adverbially (ṭābu, “good” > ṭāba, “well”) and as a kind of locative (šamîma = “to the heavens, in heaven”). More often, a locative is formed by appending a suffix -h to the accusative: ’arṣu, “earth”, accusative ’arṣa, locative ’arṣah, “earthward”. There is no dative; instead the preposition lê, “to, for”, + genitive is used.

As in Arabic, some exceptional nouns (known as diptotes) have the suffix -a in the genitive. There is no Ugaritic equivalent for Classical Arabic nunation or Akkadian mimation.

State

Nouns in Ugaritic occur in two states: absolute and construct. The construct (or ‘bound’) state indicates that a noun is closely linked to the following noun. For example, “the house of the king” could in Ugaritic in principle be expressed in two ways:

1. “the house” (absolute state) “of the king” (absolute state, genitive). This might be called the ‘Latin’ way of expression (domus regis);

2. “the house of” (construct state) “the king” (absolute state, genitive). This might be called the ‘Hebrew’ way of expression (bēt hammelek).

The construct state is also the basic form used when a personal pronoun is suffixed: malakūma = “(the) kings” (absolute state, nominative) > malakū (construct state) > malakūhu = “his kings”; similarly malakĩhu = “(of) his kings” (genitive, accusative).

Ugaritic, unlike Arabic and Hebrew, has no definite article.

Gender

Nouns which have no gender marker are for the most part masculine, although some feminine nouns do not have a feminine marker. However, these denote feminine beings such as ʼumm- (mother). /-t/ is the feminine marker which is directly attached to the base of the noun.

Number

Ugaritic distinguishes between nouns based on quantity. All nouns are either singular when there is one, dual when there are two, and plural if there are three or more.

Adjectives

Adjectives follow the noun and are declined exactly like the preceding noun.

Independent personal pronouns

Independent personal pronouns in Ugaritic are as follows (some forms are lacking because they are not in the corpus of the language):

Suffixed (or enclitic) personal pronouns

Suffixed (or enclitic) pronouns (mainly denoting the genitive and accusative) are as follows:

Other pronouns

The relative (or ‘determinative’) pronoun is d (dū), “that of, of which”; often simply translatable as “who, which”. It introduces a specification, property, or action by the subject and is congruent with the governing noun. Declension: dī, dā; feminine dt (dātu, dāti, dāta); plural dt (dūtu, dūti(?)).

The demonstrative (or ‘deictic’) pronouns are hnd (hānādū), “this”, and hnk (hānākā) “that”. Extended forms are hanadūna, hanadūti, hanamati.

Interrogative pronouns are my (mīyu) “who?”, and mh (maha) “what?”.

Indefinite pronouns seem to be derived from the interrogative pronoun by appending to them the particles -n(a)-, -k(a), and/or -m(a) (in that order). Thus, for example: mnkm (mīnukumu?) and mnm (mīnama?) “anyone, someone”, mhkm (mahkīma?) and mnm (mannama?) “anything, something, whatever”.

Ordinals

The following is a table of Ugaritic ordinals. The vocalisations (predominantly based on comparison with Hebrew, Aramaic and Arabic) are very uncertain:^[30]