Elementary Arabic Morphology 3

Declination

  1. What is declination?

  2. Are all nouns declinable?

  3. What verbs are declinable?

  4. What are the names of the declinable states?

  5. How many types of declinable words are there?

  6. What are vowel-declinable words?

  7. What are lettered declinable words, representing vowel-signed ones?

  8. What are the five nouns and how are they declined?

  9. How is the dual form declined?

  10. How is the sound masculine plural declined?

  11. What are the five verbs and how are they declined?

  12. Declination is the changing of the end of nouns and verbs due the change in their state, for example: قَدِمَ الغائبُ و رأیتُ الغائبَ و سلّمتُ علی الغائبِ.

  13. All nouns are declinable except for certain nouns which will be discussed in the indeclination section.

  14. The aorist tense from among the verbs is declinable except in the feminine nūn or the nūn of emphasis is added to it.

  15. The names of the states of declination are: nominative, accusative and subjunctive, genitive, and jussive. The nominative, subjunctive, and jussive states are for verbs and the nominative, accusative, and genitive states are for nouns.

  16. There are two types of declinable words: vowel-declinable words and lettered-declinable words.

  17. There are four types of vowel-declinable words: single nouns, broken plurals, feminine sound plurals, and aorist tense verbs without clear nominative pronouns. All of these have a dummah in the nominative state, a fathah in the accusative or subjunctive state except the feminine sound plural which has a kasrah, a kasrah in the genitive case except for words that do not conjugate which have a fathah, and a sakūn in the jussive case except for verbs whose last letter is weak, in this case the letter is erased, for example: لم یدعُ.

  18. There are four lettered declinable words: the five nouns, the dual form, the masculine sound plurals, and the five verbs.

  19. The five nouns are: أبٌ و أخٌ و حَمٌ و فَمٌ و ذُو. The condition on فَمٌ is that its mīm is erased. All of these nouns are given a wāw in the nominative state, for example: جاء أبوه, an alif in the accusative state, for example: رأیتُ أخاه, and a yā' in the genitive state, for example: مَررتُ بذي أدَبٍ.

  20. The dual form is given an alif in the nominative state, for example: جَلَسَ الرّجُلانِ and a yā' in the accusative and genitive states, for example: أحضَرتُ الغائبَینِ و ذَهَبتُ بالحاصرَینِ.

  21. A sound masculine plural is given a wāw in the nominative state, for example: وَصَلَ القادمونَ and a yā' in the accusative and genitive states, for example: اِستَقبَلنا القادمونَ و رَحَّبنا بالقادمونَ.

  22. The five verbs are the aorist tense verbs that are connected to the dual alif, the plural wāw, or the second person yā', for example: یَفعَلان و تَفعَلان و یَفعَلون و تَفعَلون و تَفعَلین. The nūn remains in the nominative state and is erased in the subjunctive and jussive states, for example: لم یَذهَبا و لن تَذهَبي.