نادِر
root: ن-د-ر / adjective, form I active participle / definition: uncommon, rare
As they say, one discovery in the dictionary leads to another. So that’s why—for the second week in a row—I couldn’t resist adding to the Dictionary Finds series.
And this time, our dictionary find brings us back to an uncommon triliteral verb form we explored in Arabic Verb Forms XI-XV almost five years ago…
On page 913 of the Hans Wehr dictionary, under the root ق-ع-س, here’s what we find:
Ahh—isn’t it a beauty?
We’ve stumbled upon a form XIV (fourteen) verb, اِقعَنسَسَ / يَقعَنسِسُ.
Form XIV verbs follow the pattern اِفعَنلَلَ / يَفعَنلِلُ, with the verbal noun pattern being اِفعِنلال. Yes, that means there’s an added ن in this verb form pattern plus the final root letter (represented by ل) appears twice.
As mentioned in Arabic Verb Forms XI-XV, form XIV verbs usually have meanings related to physical attributes. The subject of this post, اقعنسس, carries the meaning “to be pigeon-breasted” (the same as the form I verb of the root).
By the way, you can download my chart of all the verb forms (triliteral I-XV and quadriliteral I-IV) from here! That’s 19 verb form patterns with their verbal nouns plus active/passive participles.
It’s always fun to stumble upon verb forms above X in the dictionary. Which ones have you come across?
!مع السلامة
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