Page 130 - Arabiab Studies (IV)

120 Arabian Studies IV
(18) /ary Al, Sh, Aq, fang Ab ‘way’.
(19) mi'l&j pi. ma'Slij Aq, mi1 lag Ruf ‘hook’.
(c) The treatment of s and z.
In T the following variants have been noted: magris and magris
(46), gasim and gasim (58), mirzab and mirzab (10).
The variants s/s and z/z have been encountered in several
regions, but they were most marked in T and Na. Some of the
examples are:
(1) tiS'In Na ‘ninety’.
(2) xamsln Na ‘fifty*.
(3) yis&'dak, yisS'dak T ‘he will help you’.
(4) yiksir, yiksirT ‘he breaks’.
(5) hazm Na ‘elevated hard ground in the desert*.
(6) razzeh Na ‘(part? of a) lock*.

REMARKS ON THE DIALECT OF NAJRAN
The dialect of Najran belongs to the NajdT group in which
trisyllabic forms of the type fa'alah/fa'alat are not permissible.7
Instead the disyllabic forms Vilah/Vilat, f'alah/Falat (Vulah/Vulai)
are used. This aspect of syllabication is reflected in Na in the
following examples:
(1) Sbatah < *sabatab (37).
(2) xSibah < *xasabah (38).
(3) g$ubah < *ga$abah, to be compared with ga$abah T, Ab, J (66).
In the dialects of the Southern Hijaz and the Tihamah (al-Qauz)
trisyllabic forms are of regular occurrence, and the following
examples illustrate the difference between these dialects and that
of Najran:
(4) bagarah T, Qauz, bgarah Na ‘cow’.
(5) sajarah Ab, sayarah Ruf, sjarah Na ‘tree’.
(6) katabat Ar, Al, T, Ab, Sah, Ruf, Qa, Qauz, ktibat Na ‘she wrote*.

Notes

1. For a description of architecture in the area see Geoffrey King,
‘Some observations on the architecture of South-West Saudi Arabia’,
Architectural Association Quarterly, VIII, 1976, 20-9. Also passim, P.
Lippens, Expedition en Arabie Ccntralc, Paris, 1956; H. St. J. B. Philby,
Arabian Highlands, Ithaca, 1952; id., ‘The Land of Sheba’, GJ, XCII,
1938, 1-21; W. Thesiger, ‘A journey through the Tihama, the ‘Asir, and
the Hijaz Mountains’, GJ, CX, 1947, 188-200. The writer gave a lecture