The Origin of the Ethiosemitic Verb hlw 'to be present'.

• Author: Suchard, Benjamin D.

One of the few shared innovations uniting the Ethiopian branch of Semitic is the occurrence of an existential verb with the root *hlw (Hetzron 1972: 18; Weninger 2011: 1115). In Classical Ethiopic, which provides us with the oldest evidence of its use, the third person masculine singular perfect form is attested as both hallo and hallawa (both referred to as hallo in this paper unless indicated otherwise). When used alone, this verb most commonly means 'to be present', indicating the subject's location (Bombeck 1997): (1)

(1) 'ayte hallo-[phi] baggd-u la=mas'wa't-u where hlw\pf-3m.sg.s sheep-3M.SG.POSS to=sacrifice-3M .SG.POSS Where is the sheep for the sacrifice? (Gen. 22:7)

It may also be used with a closely preceding or following Imperfect. The use oihallo does not alter the meaning of the Imperfect, which expresses an event that concurs with or is later than the reference time (Weninger 2001: 314-19; Tropper 2002: 186-91): (2)

(2) wa=hallo-[theta] muse ya-rai-[theta] 'abagd',-a and=hlw\PF-3M.SG.S Moses 3.s-pasture\lPF-M.SG.S sheep\PL-POSS (2) wa=hallo-[theta] yotor and=hlw\PF-3M.SG.S Jethro And Moses was pasturing the sheep of Jethro (Exod. 3:1)

(3) wa-ya-naddad-[theta] dabr-u and=3.s-burn\IPF-M.SG.S mountain-3M.SG.POSS And the mountain was burning (Deut. 4:11)

(4) wa=lot[??]=ssa hallo-[theta] ya-nabbar-[theta] wasta and=Lot=DlsC hlw/pf-3m.sg.s 3.S-sit\lPF-M.SG.S in sadom Sodom (4) wa=lot[??]=ssa 'anqas-a and=Lot=DlsC gate-POSS sadom Sodom Now Lot was sitting in the gate of Sodom (Gen. 19:1)

(5) wa=may-a 'ayh ya-massa'-[theta] hallo-[theta] diba and=water-POSS flood 3.S-come\IPF-M.SG.S hlw/pf-3m.sg.s on kw[??]ll-u madr all-3M.SG.POSS earth And the water of the Flood will come over all the earth (Enoch 10:2)

(6) 'd-damasss-o la=?3gwal-a 'dm-a-hdyaw lSG.S-wipe_out\IPF-3M.SG.O to=offspring-POSS mother-POSS-living I will wipe out mankind (Gen. 6:7)

Examples (2), (4) and (5) show hallo + Imperfect or Imperfect + hallo constructions expressing the same meaning as a bare Imperfect, as seen in (3) and (6). In many cases, the choice of a construction with hallo in these translated texts is motivated by the presence of a form of the verb siui 'to be' and a Present participle in the Greek source text, where this can be ascertained, as in (2) (Weninger 2001: 269). The other cases where hallo is used with an Imperfect in the past all involve the verb nabara 'to sit, dwell', also 'to be'; the use of hallo then serves to unambiguously indicate the more concrete meaning of nabara, as in (4).

Finally, hallo may occur in two somewhat rare constructions involving a Jussive, as in examples (7) and (8) (Weninger 2001: 271-78):

(7) wa=hallaw-a ya-rkab-[theta]-lomu fsrhat and=hlw/PF-3M.SG.S 3.S-find\JUSS-M.SG.S-2M.PL.O fear And fear will find you (Enoch 100:8)

(8) za=ta-gbar-u hallaw-a-kkamu gdbar-u REL=2.s-make\JUSS-M.PL.s hlw/PF-3M.SG.S-2M.PL.O make\IPV-M.PL Make what you want to make (Exod. 16:23)

These constructions consist of an inflected form of hallo + Jussive, as in (7); or of hallo, always in the third person masculine singular, followed by an object suffix agreeing with the subject of the preceding or following Jussive, as in (8). Both of these constructions express future events, often with deontic or volitional modality.

In modern Ethiosemitic languages, the lexical meaning of 'to be present' may be preserved. Furthermore, hlw develops into an auxiliary verb that is used to form progressives and perfects. These uses are illustrated in the following Tigrina examples, taken from Mulugeta Girmay Melles (2001):

(9) ab=[??]t-i gdza [??]t-i kalbi all-o in=DEF-M.SG house DEF-M.SG dog hlw-3M.SG.S There is a dog in that house

(10) t[??]-ball[??]r all-a 3F.SG.S-eat\IPF hlw-3F.SG.S She is eating (11) bali'-u all-o eat\GER-3M.SG.S hlw-3M.SG.S He...