172 Essay towards a Grammar of the Berber Language. 



Or-alla, he will not be Or-attUa, she will not be (?) 



Or-ogga?i, ne tinieas (Zacharia !) Or-attaggah, ne timeas (Si- 

 Or-atlaggacad, ne timeatis mou ! Mariaiu !) 



This negative often takes a sort of complement, following the verb, (as 



the French ne pas,) in the particle ara. Thus the length of words 



continues to increase, and the syllables need modification with it. 



Or-addusiy-ara, Or-a^Umn-ara, 



Non venio oranino. Non noverant omnino. 

 Or-ay-Qat^ufm-ara Or-ayn-atyjhb-ara, 



Ne nie quaeratis omnino. Non nos amet omnino. 



The Imperative Mood forms a i)lural by adding 0, or sometimes t ; which 

 plural seems applicable to all three persons, by adding the pronoun. 



lliQ, be ye ! 



Roy^, go thou ! Ro\a%, go ye ! 



RoyaQ ayyasnay, go we ! 



Axcam, do thou ! XahnaQ, do ye ! 



A participle or verbal adjective is formed in an f. ant : as baddan, trr- 

 Ttficwg ; baddant, £ffrt}Kv~in ; from Ibad, he stood. A sort of future partici- 

 ple is produced by prefixing ara; as ara-^o«2-(j-rt6rflK, debens-vos-baptizare j 

 from (jabber, be sponsor, baptize. Sometimes again ant is found, where we 

 expect a iiiasculine singular : and altogether we suspect the sounds of the 

 language are unsettled, as to final an, ant, ad. 



Another participle imitates Arabic, in prefixing M ; as from Amna^, 

 to save ; Mlman^an, saving, salvatory. 



Ordinarily the language evades the passive by a periphrasis ; as, " They 

 have sent me," or, " One has sent me," instead of " I am sent." The 

 verbs have likewise exceeding liberty of being either active or neuter. Yet 

 the preposition As (in), prefixed to a root, frequently makes it transitive. 

 Roots are also compounded with the preposition, Az (at). Possibly they 

 are but variations of the same word. 



From cokkal (to gather) is formed Ascokkal, or Azcokkal (gather in) : 

 so we find Jezahnar, he answered, <3)azzahnar, she answered ; where Az 

 intervenes between the root and the pronominal prefix. Instances of as 

 are more common than of az, in composition. The prefix m or mi, if it 

 be not indicative of a new tense, appears like a preposition in compo- 

 sition. 



Verbal Substantives : — 



H^r Nihdar, speech. 

 Kml Nakmal, completion. 



Perhaps with these may be classed those formed by initial L, as ; — 

 Lahcir, word, speech; Lafhhk, deliverance, ending; Laktcib, a book; LaX' 



