Case Endings on the Alif Maqsoora (ى)

مَقْصور

root: ق-ص-ر / form I passive participle / definition: limited, shortened

I’ve been thinking recently about this blog. Well, of course I have—I’ve been writing posts twice a week, every week, for four-and-a-half years now—I can’t think of a way not to think about it.

But I guess my dedication to writing here does surprise me every now and then, seeing as I’ve unceremoniously abandoned many a plan and project over the years. But this is all very ceremonious. Our twice-weekly meetings here on this blog, I mean.

I try not to think too much about the fact that my messy thoughts which grace each post can be read by anyone with internet access, and by people who know me in real life (which I think makes me feel more exposed).

I imagine, instead, that I’m throwing words into a void—a necessary and liberating cathartic experience before I can actually focus on whatever Arabic-related stuff I want to share. It helps.

There I’ve gone again, with the messy thoughts. Time to balance things out with some structured grammar now.

I’ve wanted to talk about the alif maqsoora (ى) for a while, a letter that sits on the end of some words.

What’s interesting about it is how it carries (or… sometimes doesn’t carry) case endings for nouns and adjectives.

Ryding divides nouns and adjectives ending in ى into two types: indeclinable and invariable. Let’s take a look at each type and how they deal with case endings…

Indeclinable

In this category, we find nouns derived from defective roots. It includes passive participles (starting with مُـ) and nouns of place (مَـ) . And also some nouns outside of this.

Indeclinable nouns end in fathatayn when indefinite (ىً), and have no case ending when definite (ى).

Examples:

مَقهىً maqhan, المَقهى al-maqhaa (a café, the café): this is a noun of place from the root ق-ه-و
مُستَوىً mustawan, المُستَوى al-mustawaa (a level, the level): this is a form VIII passive participle from the root س-و-ي—which is hollow as well as defective
مَعنىً ma’nan, المَعنى al-ma’naa (a meaning, the meaning): this noun is derived from the root ع-ن-ي
قُرىً quran, القُرى al-quraa ((some) villages, the villages): a plural noun—the singular of which is قَرية—from the root ق-ر-ي

Edit: as someone rightly pointed out, the case endings traditionally don’t sit on the ى but rather on the letter preceding it. So, مقهًى rather than مقهىً—but in books you might see it either way!

Invariable

Invariable words include:

feminine nouns with ى after the three root letters (often following the patterns فُعْلى or فِعْلى or فَعْلى)
feminine comparative/superlative adjectives which follow the forms فُعْلى or أَفعى (the words أُولى and أُخرى also fall into this group)
many plural nouns and adjectives that end in ى (but not all of them! Note قُرىً above was indeclinable, not invariable—we’ll find out a sure way to know which ones further down)
nouns ending in ى that are borrowed from foreign languages

Examples:

ذِكْرى dhikraa, الذِكْرى al-dhikraa (a memory, the memory): this is a feminine noun from the root ذ-ك-ر which follows the pattern فِعْلى
كُبْرى kubraa, الكُبْرى al-kubraa (greatest): a feminine superlative adjective (the masculine form is أَكبَر) from the root ك-ب-ر which follows the pattern فُعْلى
أَدْنى adnaa, الأَدْنى al-adnaa (lower): this comparative adjective following the pattern أَفْعى is from the root د-ن-و
مَرْضى marḍaa, المَرْضى al-marḍaa (sick (people), the sick (people)): this plural noun/adjective (depending on how it’s used) is from the root م-ر-ض and is the plural form of مَريض (sick, a sick person/a patient)
مُوسيقى mooseeqaa, المُوسيقى al-mooseeqaa (music, the music): this noun is a borrowed word

Okay, so I mentioned that some plural nouns ending in ى are indeclinable whilst some are invariable. So how do we know which words are which?

Well, we just have to head to our Hans Wehr dictionary and take a look at how the word is transliterated.

If we go to قرى, for instance:

…we see that the transliteration is quran, meaning that the indefinite form ends in fathatayn (ىً)—so it’s indeclinable.

But when we look up مرضى:

…we find that it is transliterated as marḍā, with the ā indicating that the ى is simply pronounced as an alif without a case ending. So we know it’s invariable.

This is one of those posts I’ve been wanting to write because I actually didn’t know how to work out whether indefinite words ending in ى carried a case ending or not, so I needed to set aside time to find out. I hope it’s been useful for you too!

!إلى اللقاء