Verbum Search through Tip of the Day #22
Tip 22: Factbook Biblical Person: Lemma: Bible Word Study: Root
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Abarim Publications maintains a website Biblical Name Vault which I have pinned to my shortcut bar. Yes, I am aware that this site also has a comparison of Abraham’s family to the Standard Model of Physics so I do make sure I’m awake enough to turn on critical thinking. I include it here because it provides a good example of the use of roots, the next section of the Bible Word Study. Please glance through the entry for Abram.
From Glossary of Linguistic Terms:
[quote] Root
[Topics: root: defined]
Definition
A root is the portion of a word that
• is common to a set of derived or inflected forms, if any, when all affixes are removed
• is not further analyzable into meaningful elements, being morphologically simple, and
• carries the principle portion of meaning of the words in which it functions.
Discussion
If a root does not occur by itself in a meaningful way in a language, it is referred to as a bound morpheme .
Examples (English)
• Disestablish
• Establish ment
• Establish ments
Generic
A root is a kind of
• morpheme type
See also
• Stem
Sources
Crystal 1985: :268
Hartmann and Stork 1972: :199
Pei and Gaynor 1954: :187–188
Mish 1990: :1023
Matthews 1991: :64[1]
Note that some languages arrange their dictionaries according to root rather than lemma.
From Glossary of Linguistic Terms:
[quote]Word
[Topics: word: defined]
Definition
A word is a unit which is a constituent at the phrase level and above. It is sometimes identifiable according to such criteria as
• being the minimal possible unit in a reply
• having features such as
• a regular stress pattern, and
• phonological changes conditioned by or blocked at word boundaries
• being the largest unit resistant to insertion of new constituents within its boundaries, or
• being the smallest constituent that can be moved within a sentence without making the sentence ungrammatical.
A word is sometimes placed, in a hierarchy of grammatical constituents, above the morpheme level and below the phrase level.
Kinds
Here are some kinds of words:
• adjective
• adposition
• adverb
• classifier
• conjunction
• determiner
• dummy word
• emphasis marker
• exclamative
• existential marker
• fossilized term
• honorific
• ideophone
• interjection
• particle
• pro-form
• substantive
• verb
• clitic
Generic
A word is a kind of
• construction
Sources
Hartmann and Stork 1972: :256
Crystal 1980: 168, 383–384
Cruse 1986: :35–36
Mish 1991: :1358
Pike, K. and Pike, E. G. 1982: :462[2]
From Glossary of Linguistic Terms:
[quote]Compound
[Topics: compound]
Definition
A compound is a word containing a stem that is made up of more than one root .
Example (English)
Blackboard contains a stem that refers to "a large, smooth, usually dark surface on which to write or draw with chalk". However, the stem is made up of two roots, black and board.
Source: Neufeldt 1991: :144[3]
From Verbum Help:
[quote]Root Section
The Root guide section displays all the roots of the word being studied and all the lemmas derived from those roots. It appears in the Bible Word Study guide.
• Click a root heading to run a Morph search.
• Click a lemma to run a Bible Word Study for that word.
Compound lemmas display multiple roots.[4]
A definition of a word family: the collection of words sharing at least one root to which affixes (inflectional or derivational), cognates, or compound elements have been added. In the root section of the Bible Word Study, the lemmas under a given root are all are members of a word family.
The Root section bar contains the usual:
- An expand/contract arrowhead
- Section title “Translation”
- Bible translation for which the data is shown
- A mouse-over Help extracted from Verbum Help
- Settings which allows you to change the translation used for the data
- An “x” to delete the section from the guide.
Each root (1) included in the lemma under study has a header line containing:
- Root icon
- Root in original language (Hebrew)
- Root transliterated
- Gloss on the root
- A sparkline which should be the sum of the detail sparklines below
For each lemma (2) under a root there is:
- A red dot identifying the lemma of the Bible Word Study
- Lemma icon
- Lemma in original language (Hebrew)
- Lemma transliterated
- Speaker icon which when clicked provides a pronunciation
- Gloss on the lemma
- A sparkline of the occurrences of the lemma
- Potentially a “more” to show further lemmas if the initial list is incomplete.
Mouse-over the root entry, shows the search argument for a morphology search that is initiated on clicking the root.
As this search defaults to the last view, the results appear as “aligned”. In this context, what is most useful is an analysis view grouped by lemma:
Note that the count on Abram (61) in the Search does not correspond to the count on Abram (59) under the roots. But if the Bible is switched to the Lexham Hebrew Bible, the expected 61 results are returned.
How to reconcile the counts has already been demonstrated.
On mouse-over a lemma an information card is displayed. Clicking on the lemma will open a new Bible Word Study to that lemma.
[1] International Linguistics Department, Glossary of Linguistic Terms (SIL International, 1996–).
[2] International Linguistics Department, Glossary of Linguistic Terms (SIL International, 1996–).
[3] International Linguistics Department, Glossary of Linguistic Terms (SIL International, 1996–).
[4] Verbum Help (Bellingham, WA: Faithlife, 2018).
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