Phoenix's blog

Ghadamès Riddles 1

I thought it'd be fun to start giving the translations of some riddles from Lanfry (1968) Ghadamès. étude linguistique et ethnographie. Volume I. Texte; Notes Philologique et Ethnographiques.

I have to admit that I'll be writing these without theGhadamès lexicon (Volume II, not available in the Leiden University Library), so sometimes I'm going to have to rely on Lanfry's translation to translate some words. I'll try to post up a new riddle every day or so. I'll be ammending the transcription to be more in line with Kossmann (1999) rather than Lanfry's rather odd transcription.

What Lanfry marks as 'long or accented' vowels, I will mark as accented. I often wonder what the phonemic status of these vowels are, but I wouldn't want to ignore the accuracy of his transcription.

This will be my first real contact with Ghadamès Berber texts, so I will be learning as I go along. Anyone with more knowledge than me, please feel free to correct me.

Illa wăǵǵid yăqqím tăγmərt ən-dáž-i, A d-inăzzăγ adánăn-ənnăs, ittăt; Nkúd əkmălăn yămmət

'There is a man who stays in the corner of the house, he is pulling his guts, he eats (them); When they are finished, he dies.'

• Illa 3sg.m. 'to exist'
• wăǵǵid 'man', it is interesting that 'man' is used to signify that we're looking for a Masculine word.
• yăqqím 'to stay, stand'
• tăγmərt 'corner'
• ən-dáž-i 'of the house', I am not sure what the -i suffix signifies here. Does it have the same function in Ghadamès as Aujila?
• A is the particle al whic can lose its l in front of consonants. It combines with the imperfect, and expresses progressive aspect. It seems to also express two things happening simultaneously. It attracts clitics on the verb.
• d-inăzzăγ 3sg.m.impf. 'to pull' with fronted directional clitic -d 'hither'. Unlike in Aujila, but very common in Berber, the -d clitic is fully productive. The progressive aspect doesn't translate well here.
• adánăn-ənnăs 'his bowels'
• ittăt 3sg.m.impf. 'to eat'.
• Nkúd 'when'
• əkmălăn 3pl.m.pf. 'to finish (intransitive)'. To finish here means 'to run out'.
• yămmət 3sg.m.aor. 'to die'

Answer after the break!

Spooning soup with a fork

Just the other day, I was going through my mother's substantial bookcase for no real reason. My eye suddenly fell on a book Titled Soep lepelen met een vork. tegen de spellingshervormers by Harry Mulisch. Literally this translates to 'Spooning soup with a fork. against/versus the spelling reformers.'

For those that don't know Harry Mulisch is the Dutch literary genius of our age, who only recently passed away. He has gained considerable international recognition because of the film adaptations The Assault (based on De aanslag) and The Discovery of Heaven (based on De ontdekking van de hemel).

But this book that I found, written in 1972, highlights a piece of linguistics history I was never even aware of. At the time, spelling reformers were planning to introduce a uniform and strictly phonemic spelling of Dutch. I was never aware of this, as it was never introduced, undoubtedly partially due to the convincing point Mulisch makes in this small 75 page booklet.

Dutch already has a particularly phonemic spelling compared to other European counties (at least, if you speak the standard variety of Dutch), and it's hard for me to imagine that people were actually considering to modify our spelling this drastically.

As an example, Mulisch cites a poem of Gerrit Achterberg in the proposed spelling.

SLAAP

Uw dootgedeelte blint
zintuigen en sijzoenen;
wat ik nog van u vint
is eeuwighijt te noemen:
geheugen en gehijm
wisselen dierbaarheden
als lichamen voorheen,
en slapen zeker in.

The original text is as follows:

SLAAP

Uw doodgedeelte blindt
zintuigen en seizoenen;
wat ik nog van u vindt
is eeuwigheid te noemen:
geheugen en geheim
wisselen dierbaarheden
als lichamen voorheen,
en slapen zeker in.

As you can see, the most important changes are the uniform spelling of the [ei] diphthong as ij whereas right now it can be written both as ei and ij, and the uniform phonetic (not phonemic!) spelling of the word final /d/ as the devoiced variant t. For example, mij 'me' and mei 'may (the month)' are homophones.

Besides that, there was a huge focus on the changing of the spelling of bastaardwoorden, literally 'bastard words', apparently the common term for loanword at the time, these days it's the far more neutral leenwoorden.

Either way. As the title of the book may suggest, Mulisch was against the spellingreform, and with good reasons. First of all, some linguistic play on words would be completely lost. Harry Mulisch himself once wrote a book called De verteller (The narrator), and he also wrote a commentary on this book called De verteller verteld (The narrator narrated)

In this new spelling, this play on words would be impossible, as both De verteller vertelt (The narrator narrates) and De verteller verteld would have the exact same spelling.

Another important point is, if a spelling claims to be phonemic, it automatically implies that the spelling represents the 'correct' speech, thus, discriminating anyone who would pronounce a word differently. In a country with a lot of dialect variation such as the Netherlands, this would, of course, be a great shame.

Most of all though, Mulisch feels that, spelling change, should come from below, from the people. We have plenty of loanwords with nativized spellings. Why would we force bastaardwoorden like computer to be spelled kompjoeter, if there is a need to do so, people will do it.

He thus argues that spelling should not be ordained from above by linguistic prescriptivists, but should come from the people. That it's a virtue that we, as a Dutch people, can write 'rhythm' as rhythme, rythme and ritme without having a single one of those words look 'wrong'.

Why do we have to be so prescriptivist about spelling? Obviously, there is something to be gained from not all writing in our own dialect, as it would seriously hamper communication. But, we knew that, even before any prescriptivist told us to not write in our own dialect. Even in Middle Dutch texts, we find clear attempts by dialectal writers to write a bit more like 'the rest of the Netherlands'.

Apparently, his book worked. As, today, Dutch still has the distinction between ei and ij, and still writes a word final d.

Today we have two types of spellings. One is given to us in the form of Het Groene Boekje and the other is Het Witte Boekje. The difference being that the Green spelling is far more prescriptivistic and nonsensical, and the White spelling allowing far more variation in spelling, as long as you keep it consistent.

I applaud this second form of spelling, and hope that we will go even further in allowing some more variations. It's not important how you spell. It is important to know why you spell the way you do.

In this line of reasoning though, I would like to go even further, and argue for a less prescriptivistic view on written language in general. As an example I'd like to introduce a lovely variation that we find in the reflexive pronoun of Dutch.

In the standard dutch language 'he beats himself' becomes hij slaat zichzelf. With a fantastically imported reflexive pronoun zich from German sich, because before this introduction, the North-Holland language did not distinguish between 'him' and 'himself'. Yet, in the south, where I live, people will say hij slaat z'n eigen 'he beats his own'.  Such a construction is absolutely forbidden in the written language, while it is perfectly understandable for anyone who speaks Dutch, and gives a lovely sense of regional flavour to the language.

Why can't both these variations be allowed? Why would we force a reflexive pronoun on the language if some dialects really don't have it. If there is a need for clarity, the people themselves will form a consensus and write that way. In the end, language is a means of communication, not a means of misundersanding each other (though, it certainly can be used that way). People will find the means to communicate, no governing body really needs to control this.

What does need to be taught, is a sense of 'history' and 'variation'. Make the students of the language and spelling that there is variation, and that there is a commonly accepted norm.

Of course, you need to teach children to read and write. And certainly, there's good reason to teach them some form of standard. But doesn't it make sense, to make students aware of the variation and reasoning behind some spelling conventions. If you fully understand a spelling convention, you can make your own individual or artistic choice to stray from this norm.

Mulisch does this too, both in his normal writing, and in this booklet. He, without fail, writes words like contact as kontakt and clearly points out that this is not the official spelling, but a personal choice, because he feels that the k is more representative of the sound he is trying to express. Agree with it or not, he does have a reason to be doing it, he thought about it. It would be great of people, all around the world, would develop this same sense of linguistic awareness.

Abu-Dabar and the Ogre Part III

Baʕád yǝ́čča, ámẓa yǝkkǝ́r u yəqqím inǝ́kki.

'After he had eaten, the ogre stood up and started to sniff'

• Baʕád 'after'
• yǝ́čča 'to eat' 3sg.m.pf.
• ámẓa 'ogre'
• yǝkkǝ́r 'to get up' 3sg.m.pf.
• yəqqím inchoative auxiliary verb
• inǝ́kki 'to sniff, smell' 3sg.m.impf.

u baʕadén yǝslá žlán ǝlməġġárǝt-i

'and then he heard talking in the cave'

• u baʕadén 'and then'
• yǝslá 'he heard'
• žlán 'talking, speech'
• ǝlməġġárǝt-i 'in the cave'

u yəʕáyəṭ ámẓa, slán amẓíwǝn ušánd lahhǝ́dǝn, nan-ís: Kǝ́nnǝk?

'And the ogre screamed, and the (other) ogres heard and came running, they said to him: What is it?'

• yəʕáyəṭ 'to yell' 3sg.m.pf.
• slán 'to hear' 3pl.m.pf.
• amẓíwǝn 'the ogres', meaning 'the ther ogres'
• ušánd 'to come' 3pl.m.pf.
• lahhǝ́dǝn 'to run' 3pl.m.pf., with Paradisi's translation, this word should mean 'to run', and seems to be of Arabic origin, as it's not in Paradisi's wordlist. Closest thing I could find in Classical Arabic was lahada 'to overburden, overextert', which I don't think is unlikely to have shifted in semantics to 'to run' in dialectal Arabic. Can someone confirm? [kato:] in ELA yelhad means something like 'to run on a horse'. I could see how the Awjili meaning is similar, but couldn't tell you what it has to do with the CA.
• nan-ís 'and they said to him'
• Kǝ́nnǝk? 'what is it?', I am not sure how this word is constructed, is it Arabic? The translation in Paradisi is unambiguous though. [kato:] ELA kann-ak, kann-ha, etc. 'what's with you, what's the matter with you'. Also I think Matrouḥ has something like kennek, so this might be an areal thing.

In-isín: gan míddǝn díla, qqăimát díla u nǝk a-unə́x ǝlməġárǝt-i

'He said to them: There are people here, wait here and I will go into the cave'

• In-isín 'he said to them'
• gan 'there'
• míddǝn 'people'
• díla 'here'
• u nǝk 'and I'
• a-unə́x 'to enter' 1sg.aor.

w-ǝndú iški azif-ǝnnúk dǝ-šṭáf, rwǝlát

'And if my tail comes out being black, run'

• w-ǝndú 'and if'
• iški 'to leave' 3sg.m.pf.
• azif-ǝnnúk 'my tail'
• dǝ-šṭáf copula + 'black'
• rwǝlát 'to flee' imp.pl.m.

Am I missing something cultural here? Why would testing if his tail goes black be a good way of checking if there are dangerous humans, or something else in there?

Tsǝnnə́ṭ tǝmígni alá itǝnn-ís ámẓa;

'The wife heard what the ogre was saying'

• Tsǝnnə́ṭ 'to hear' 3sg.f.pf., interesting that so shortly after each other both verbs that mean 'to hear' are used. Maybe this is closer to 'to listen' or 'to hear voluntarily', while the previous is hearing something involuntarily. [kato:] Tsǝnnáṭ is 'to listen' at least in ELA.
• tǝmígni 'wife, woman'
• alá 'that which'
• itǝnn-ís 'to say' 3sg.m.impf.

Yušád ámẓa, iš-án azif-ǝ́nnǝs ǝlməġárǝt-i.

'The ogre went, and he put his tail into the cave'

• Yušád 'to come' 3sg.m.pf.
• iš-án 'to put in' 3sg.m.pf., causative of an- 'to enter'

Tǝkkǝ́r tǝmígni u tǝggád tǝbaqqúšt u tšǝ́ṭṭəf azíf n ámẓa

The woman stood up and took a pan and made the tail of the ogre black'

• Tǝkkǝ́r 'to stand up' 3sg.f.pf.
• tǝggád 'to take' 3sg.f.pf. 
• tǝbaqqúšt 'pan', could not find this in Paradisi. It has a Berber circumfix, but is the underlying word Arabic anyway?
• tšǝ́ṭṭəf 'to make black' 3sg.f. This must be the causative of the stative verb 1sg. šeṭfâḫ 2sg. šeṭfât 3sg.m. šéṭṭåf 3sg.f. šéṭfet pl. seṭṭīfît 'to be black'. You can't actually see the s- prefix in this form. Maybe it is the stative form, simply taking non-stative conjugation which switches the meaning to transitive rather than intransitive.

w-iškí azíf n ámẓa d-šṭáf u gúlan-t amẓíwǝn dǝ-sṭáf w-ǝrwǝ́lǝn kkull

'And the tail of the ogre cam out being blac, and the ogres saw it being black and they all ran

• gúlan-t 'and they saw it'
• ǝrwǝ́lǝn 'and the fled'
• kkull 'all'

u tǝškí ǝnnát id amǝ́dǝn-nǝs it-tiriwín-nǝs

'She left with her husband and her children'

• ǝnnát 'she'
• id amǝ́dǝn-nǝs 'with her man/husband'
• it-tiriwín-nǝs 'with her daughters', assimilation of id, to the next t.

ufán ámẓa id amẓíwǝn ǝrwilína kull

'And they found the ogre and the (other) ogres had all run away.'

• ufán 'to find' 3pl.m.pf.
• ǝrwilína 'to flee' 3pl.m.pf.

wǝ frə́ḥnǝt tiríwin u ʕaddán ǝlxərbuš-ǝnnǝsín

'And the daughters were happy and they went to their garden'

• frə́ḥnǝt 'to be happy' 3pl.f.pf.
• ʕaddán 'to go' 3pl.m.pf.
• ǝlxərbuš-ǝnnǝsín 'their garden'

u baʕadén uṣálǝn gan u ččán u šwán

'And then they arrived there and ate and drank'

• uṣálǝn 'to arrive' 3pl.m.pf.
• ččán 'to eat' 3pl.m.pf.
• šwán 'to drink' 3pl.m.pf.

w-ǝkkǝ́rǝn rrəwwə́ḥən tfilli-nnǝsín

'And they stood up and returned to their home'

• ǝkkǝ́rǝn 'they stood up'
• rrəwwə́ḥən 'they returned'
• tfilli-nnǝsín 'their home'

Well that was it then. I'd like to thank Lameen Souag, Adam Benkato and Bulbul for their tireless assitance. Without their help, my translations wouldn't have been nearly as accurate as they are now.

 

Abu-Dabar and the Ogre Part II

Tǝ́kkǝr tǝmígni w-ǝtn-ís i-tiriwín-nǝs: kkǝ́rmǝt, xzǝ́rmǝt.

'The wife got up and said to her daughters: stand up and look!'

• Tǝ́kkǝr 'to get up' 3sg.pf.f.
• tǝmígni 'wife, woman'
• w-ǝtn-ís 'and she said'
• i-tiriwín-nǝs 'to her daughters'
• kkǝ́rmǝt 'to get up' imperative pl.f.
• xzǝ́rmǝt 'to look' imperative pl.f.

W-ǝkkǝ́rnǝt tiriwín id ǝmmá-tsnǝt qqăimánǝt ddawwarnǝt

'And they daughters and their mother got up and started to look around'

• W-ǝkkǝ́rnǝt 'and they got up'
• id ǝmmá-tsnǝt 'with their mother'
• qqăimánǝt 'they started'
• ddawwarnǝt 'they looked around'

u baʕadén nǝhínǝt ufánǝt alə́ġom yǝmmúta

'and then they found a dead camel'

• u baʕadén 'and then'
• nǝhínǝt 'they (f.)'
• ufánǝt 'they found'
• alə́ġom 'camel', commonly attested Berber word which continues to give me headaches. The Proto-Berber form should be something like *alǝġǝm, which has all the letters for CaMeL, but not in the right order, we also find a word *aġǝlǝm which usually seems to be a word for 'young camel' I believe. In that word, the root consonants are still in the wrong order. Haha.
• yǝmmúta 'to be dead' 3sg.m.pf.

u kkǝ́rnǝt, ǝrfə́ʕnǝt z-gan šummánǝt y-ámẓa

'and they stood up, and carried (it) from there and they cooked (it) for the ogre.'

• ǝrfə́ʕnǝt 'they carried', I'm missing a direct object here. Maybe the -ǝt is the 3sg.m. DO suffix, in which case the plural is the masculine plural, which would mean it also includes Abu-Dabar who is not explicitly mentioned in the story.
• z-gan 'from-there'
• šummánǝt 'they cooked' Again missing an object, as above.
• y-ámẓa 'for the ogre'

u taxzǝ́r ǝmmá-tsnǝt tmúrt-i u túfa ǝlmǝġġárǝt u tš-an gan tiríwt tǝmoqqărant

'and their mother looked around the grounds and found a cave and she made her oldest daughter entere there.

• tmúrt-i 'around the earth' I think tmúrt here is from tamúrt 'earth', no idea why the a is dropped though. Paradisi writes it as ä, which at least indicates that it's probably a short a.
• u túfa 'and she found'
• ǝlmǝġġárǝt 'cave'
• tš-an 'and she made enter' 3sg.f.pf. of the causative of yan/an 'to enter'.
• tiríwt tǝmoqqărant 'old daughter'

u yušád ámẓa u fkán-is ksúm wa mmána

'and the ogre came, and they gave him the meat that they prepared'

• yušád 'he came'
• ámẓa 'ogre'
• fkán-is 'they gave him', now in the 3pl.m. so perhaps the above expected 3pl.f. was indeed 3pl.m. with DO 3sg.m.
• ksúm 'meat'
• wa mmána 'that they prepared'

u yǝččí-t w-in-ísin: šummát-dik tiríwt táṭǝn, amišiw-ǝnnúk

'And he ate it and he said to them: prepare me another daughter, for my dinner'

• u yǝččí-t 'and he ate it'
• w-in-ísin 'and he said to them'
• šummát-dik 'prepare for me'
• táṭǝn 'another, the other' (fem. sg.)
• amišiw-ǝnnúk 'my dinner', curiously, no preposition to express 'for my dinner'

u gan-ís am táṭǝn.

'and they did to her like the other'

• u gan-ís 'and they did to her'
• am 'like'

U ṣbaḥ-ǝ́nnǝs: šummát-dik táṭǝn.

'and the next morning (he said): make me another'

• ṣbaḥ-ǝ́nnǝs litt. 'his morning/tomorrow', not sure why this possesive suffix is found here.

U gán-is am-alá gána i-wǝrtná-s

'And they did to her like they did to her sister'

• am-alá 'like' (is the different word chosen here because the following phrase is verbal instead of nominal?) alá functions as a relative pronoun usually, so this is not unlikely.
• gána 'they did'
• i-wǝrtná-s 'to her sister'

 u yúšad ámẓa u yǝ́čča amǝkliw-ǝ́nnǝs w-in-isín: šummát-dik amišiw-ǝnnúk.

'And the ogre came and ate his lunch and said to them: make me another for my dinner.

U šummán-is s-ar alə́ġəm yǝmmúta

'And the cooked for him (meat) from the dead camel'

• s-ar 'from' here to be read 'that from' meaning 'the meat from'.

u yúšad ámẓa u yǝ́čča amišiw-ǝ́nnǝs w-in-isín: ṣəbáḥ amǝklíw af tǝmigní-nnǝk

'And the ogre came and ate his dinner and said to them: tomorrow, (I will have) lunch on your wife'

• ṣəbáḥ 'tomorrow'
• amǝklíw af tǝmigní-nnǝk litt. 'lunch on your wife', I'm not really sure how this construction works.

U nan-is: báhi.

'and he said: fine'

Ṣbaḥ, šummán amǝklíw u túna ar tiriwín-nǝs.

'The next day, they cooked lunch and she entered   (the cave) with her daughters'

• túna 'to enter' 3sg.f.pf.

u yúšad ámẓa u yǝ́čča amǝkliw-ǝ́nnǝs w-in-ís ámẓa:

'And the ogre came and he ate his lunch and the ogre said to him:'

Amišíw fǝll-ík-kú, Abu-dabár

'I will have you for dinner Abu-Dabar'

• fǝll-ík-kú 'on you-you' Not sure how this expression works, but it is the same construction as amǝklíw af tǝmigní-nnǝk earlier. fǝll- is the pre-pronominal form of af.

U yəʕádd Bú-dabar yǝggád ġăstín id glim-ǝ́nnǝs id mlál w-igí-tǝn ǝlgǝdǝr-ǝ́nnǝs

'Abu-Dabar went and brought the bones and its skin (the camel's) and sand, and he put them in his cooking pot.'

• Bú-dabar oddly without initial a
• yǝggád 'to bring' 3sg.m.pf.
• id glim-ǝ́nnǝs 'and its skin'
• id mlál 'and sand'
• w-igí-tǝn 'and he put them'
• ǝlgǝdǝr-ǝ́nnǝs 'in the cooking pot', nothing in this sentence actually implies the 'in' part, again an expected -i not found here (Lameen suggested because of the possesive suffix, could this be true?) < Ar. qidr 'cooking pot'

u yúna ar tiriwín-nǝs

'and he entered the cave with his daughters'

u yúšad ámẓa u yǝ́čča ġəstín wǝ nǝttín itǝ́tta yəqqím itǝnn-ís: Ksum-ǝ́nnǝk aḥáš, kúll d-ġəstín.

'And the ogre came and he ate the bones and he while he was eating he started saying: Your meat is terrible, it's all bones!'

• itǝ́tta 'to eat' 3sg.m.impf.
• yəqqím 'to stay' 3sg.m.pf., inchoative. Although the translation feels a bit odd in English.
• itǝnn-ís 'to say' 3sg.m.impf.
• Ksum-ǝ́nnǝk  'Your meat', I wonder who he's saying this too, surely he thinks Abu-Dabar is dead now?
• aḥáš 'bad'
• kúll 'all'
• d- copula

W-ǝnhínǝt sǝnnáṭnǝt žlán n ámẓa.

'And they heard the words of the ogre'

• W-ǝnhínǝt 'and they' Feminine 3rd person plural, which is odd, as Abu-Dabar just joined them.
• sǝnnáṭnǝt 'to hear' 3pl.f.pf. 'to hear' is usually a root SL. [kato:] ELA ṣǝnnǝṭ ‘to listen’ (also Algiers Jewish ṣọ̌nnọ̌ṭ 'écouter'), probably metathesis of Classical naṣṣata.
• žlán 'story, words, speech'

 

 

 

 

Abu-Dabar and the Ogre Part I

So, this text is very long, and is taking some serious time to translate. I've decided to split the paragraphs in several parts, so that I can get some comments, before I translate the full text completely wrong. So, without further ado, the first part.

Gan Abú-dabăr ġár-əs təmígni w-iggáda s-ġár-əs sə́bəʕa n tiriwín

There once was (a man called) Abu-dabar who had a wife, and he had seven girls from her'

• Gan 'there is, there was'
• Abú-dabăr Personal Name. Is this a historical figure?
• ġár-əs 'to him' to mean 'he had'
• təmígni 'woman, wife'
• w-iggáda 'and he brought' 3sg.m.pf. of 'to bring' This verb must mean 'he had from her seven daughters', or 'he gave her seven daughters'
• s-ġár-əs 'from her' literally.
• sə́bəʕa n tiriwín 'seven daughters'

Wə nəttín ġár-əs əlxərbuš-ə́nnəs ínni ʕángara

'And he had a garden in ʕángara'

• Wə nəttín 'and he'
• ġár-əs əlxərbuš-ə́nnəs 'he had a garden' The word for garden looks like Arabic xarbūš 'tent', but this doesn't make sense to me, semantically.
• ínni 'to be, exist'
• ʕángara 'place name'

w-išúwwa gan əġərsat-ə́nnes w-igáy gan timẓín id əlgafúl u ġar-əs gan tnuvín nə bẓalím

'And he watered the young palms and he cultivated  barley there and Sorghum and there he had  irrigated land of onions.'

• w-išúwwa 'and he watered', this can also mean 'he drank', so this move has both a transitive and intrasitive connotation.
• gan 'there is, there was', I don't quite understand what this word was doing here.
• əlġərsat-ə́nnes 'his plants', Paradisi translated as 'young palms' but is the plural of Arabic ġarsa(t) 'plant'. [Lameen:] I suspect Paradisi's gloss is correct. In an oasis, palms are the most conspicuous of the few plants that are always (trans)planted (ɣrs) rather than sown (zrʕ).
• w-igáy 'and he cultivated', I could not find this word in Paradisi's wordlist, is it Arabic?
• gan 'there is, there was' again, I don't get the word here.  is it 'he cultivated the barley that was there'
• timẓín 'barley'
• id əlgafúl 'and the gafuli'  [Lameen:] actually, this word is ultimately from Kanuri, though probably via Arabic; it means "sorghum".
• u ġar-əs 'and he had'
• gan 'there is, there was'
• tnuvín 'gedules' no idea what this word means, can't find it in Paradisi's wordlist, though it looks very Berber. Paradisi translates 'Gedùle'. [Lameen:]"Gedùle": I bet this is an Italian rendition of Arabic jadwal, originally "water conduit" and hence presumably "irrigated land." Adam - does this ring a bell?
• nə bẓalím 'of Onion', ultimately derived from Punic, compare Hebrew băṣālīm 'onions' (kind of winged the vocalisation there, but I think it's correct).

w-išuwi-tə́nət af afus-ə́nnəs w-irə́wwəḥ af tfillí-nnəs

'And he watered tehm on his hand (?) and returned to his home.'

• w-išuwi-tə́nət 'and he watered them'
• af afus-ə́nnəs 'on his hand', I don't understand this phrase. Paradisi translated something completely different Irrigava le palme a solo e tornava quindi a casa. 'He irrigated the palms alone and then went home to his house'. Does 'on his hand' mean 'alone'?
• w-irə́wwəḥ 'and he returned'
• af tfillí-nnəs 'to his home'

w-a-yaʕádd əlġə́bəs w-a-yúš mnišíw u gan tiríwt tməqqəránt tn-ís y-abbá-s:

'And he would go in the morning, and he would return in the evening, and one day the old(est) daughter said to her father:'

• w-a-yaʕádd 3sg.m.aor. 'he would go'
• əlġə́bəs 'morning', Arabic loanword, could not find it in my dictionary. Note that the meaning is 'in the morning', times do no seem to be designated with an 'at' or 'on', this is similar to Japanese, where expressions of time are one of the few things that don't take particles. [Lameen:] cp. Ouargli/Mzab ɣabəšša, presumably from Arabic ɣabaš "the last part of the night".
• w-a-yúš 'and he would come'
• mnišíw 'evening' here 'in the evening'
• u gan 'and there is/there was' in the meaning of 'and one day, once'
• tiríwt 'daughter'
• tməqqəránt 'old' fem. adj.
• tn-ís 'and she said'
• y-abbá-s 'to her father'

ərfə́ʕ-i ídd-ək a-ggúlax səwaní-nnək

 'Take me with you, so that I can see your garden'

• ərfáʕ-i 'take me' imp. sg. + -i 1sg.DO.
• ídd-ək 'with you'
• a-ggúlax 'to see' 1sg.aor.
• səwaní-nnək 'your garden', once again looks Arabic, but I can't find the word. [Lameen:] pl. of Ar. sāniya.

Yəkrí fəll-ís, in-ís: Qámak a-mmánət timẓín w-a-nnəʕádd gan kúll kəm id əmmá-m id sətmá-m

'He answered to her and said: Now, when the barley is ripened, we will all go, you and your mother, and your sisters'

• Yəkrí fəll-ís 'he answered her'
• in-ís 'and he said to her'
• Qámak 'now', I don't quite understand this word here, it translates nicely in English, but this specific use of 'Now' in English is pretty odd, as it has very little to do with 'now' as in 'the present' and is more of a filler word in sentences.
• a-mmánət 'to cook, to ripen' 2pl.f.aor.
• w-a-nnəʕádd 'and we will go' 1pl.aor.
• gan kúll 'all', again I don't understand what gan means here.
• kəm 'you'
• id əmmá-m 'and your mother'
• id sətmá-m 'and your sisters', this is a fantastically suppletive noun. sg. wə́rtna- (+ kinship suffixes) pl. sə́tma- (+ kinship sufixes).

U baʕadén yəʕádd nəttín əlxarbuš-ə́nnəs u yəqqím išúwwa tnuvinəs w-irrə́wwəḥ mnišíw

'And then he went to his garden and he started watering the irrigation fields and he went home in the evening.'

• U baʕadén 'and then'
• yəʕádd nəttín 'he went'
• əlxərbuš-ə́nnəs 'to his garden', I expect directional suffix -i here, most other constructions with this verb take that suffix, apparently it's not obligatory.
• u yəqqím 'and he started to'
• išúwwa 'give water to'

w-in-ísnət i-tiriwín-nəs id əmmá-tsnət: ṣbáḥ a-nnəʕádd suwaní-nnax.

'And he said to his daughter and their mother: tomorrow we will go to our garden'

• w-in-ísnət 'and he said to them'
• i-tiriwín-nəs 'to his daughters
• id əmmá-tsnət 'and their mother'
• ṣbáḥ 'tomorrow' < Ar. ṣabāḥ 'morning', can this word mean 'tomorrow' in Arabic as well without any modification?
• suwaní-nnax 'our garden', once again without -i.

u frə́ḥnət tiriwín u širə́dnət ksum-ənnə́snət (or: ġəstin-nə́snət) u yušád ar təmigní-nnəs w-in-ís:

'And the daughters were happy, and they washed themselves and he came to his wife and said:'

• frə́ḥnət 3pl.f.pf. 'to be happy'
• širə́dnət 3pl.f.pf. 'to wash'
• ksum-ənnə́snət 'their meat' (themselves, their body, take your pick).
• variant of the above that Paradisi listed was: ġəstin-nə́snət 'their bones', clearly the proto-berber word for bone is underlying here, probably *iġăs, but with an added suffix -t of unknown origin.
• yušád 'to come' 3sg.m.pf.
• ar təmigní-nnəs 'to his wife' ar < ġər 'to, toward' I think.

nəġə́lli a-nnəʕádd ṣbáḥ u ddíwa dgulít?

'We want to go tomorrow, and what do you think?'

• nəġə́lli 3sg.pf./aor. 'to want'
• ddíwa 'what'
• dgulít 'to see' 2sg.pf. So literally 'what do you see?' to mean something like 'how do you see it' to 'what do you think of it?'

təkrí fəll-ís ənnát w-ətn-ís: Alá dgít báhi

'She answered him and said: That what you do is good'

• Alá 'that which'
• dgít 'to do' 2sg.pf. I'm a bit surprised to find a perfect here.
• báhi 'good'

W-in-ís: wə́tti-dikkə́ni čču-nnáx ṣbáḥ id báʕad ṣəbáḥ.

'And he said: prepare for us our food (for) tomorrow and (the day) after tomorrow.'

• wə́tti-dikkə́ni imp.sg. 'to prepare' + IO.1pl. [kato:] wə́tti from dial. wattī 'to make ready, to prepare' (2nd form of the verb)
• čču-nnáx verbal noun of 'to eat' + 1pl possesive suffix.
• ṣbáḥ 'tomorrow', I would expect a 'for tomorrow' here.
• id báʕad ṣəbáḥ 'and after tomorrow'

təkrí fəll-ís tn-ís: kúlli šə́i yutáya

'she answered to him and said: all things are prepared'

• kúlli 'all' I don't understand the extra -i here.
• šə́i < Ar. šayʔ 'thing'
• yutáya 3sg.m.impf. 'to be prepared' <? Is this a derivation of wə́tti somehow? [kato:] yutáya is the 1st form of the above, thus yūtī 'to be ready'. In dial. the act.part. wātī is preferred to the conjugated forms.

Yušád, yuná nəttín ídd-əs amakan-nəsín u yəmḥə́ṭṭət avŏṭ-idín

'He came, he entered with her, their place, and laid her down this night'

• Yušád 'he came'
• yuná nəttín 'he entered'
• ídd-əs 'with her'
• amakan-nəsín 'their place'
• yəmḥə́ṭ-ṭət 'he laid her down' < Ar. ḥaṭṭa + recprocal mm- prefix?
• avŏṭ-idín 'that night'.  The word for 'night' is clearly from *evə/ăḍ The *e to a shift for the initial vowel is discussed in my Master Thesis. Interesting is the rendering of *ə by Paradisi as ŏ, usually a *ə near an emphatic vowel is written with a, å or ă. There's some other instances of this vocalism like alŏġem for 'camel'. Further research might yield something.

Kkə́rən əlġə́bəš, iwátan twə́tta əlmətʕat-ennə́snət w-iwátan tšírad

'They got up in the morning, one prepared their things and one washed'

• Kkə́rən 'to get up' 3pl.m.
• iwátan 'one'
• twə́tta 'to prepare' 3sg.f.pf.
• əlmətʕat-ennə́snət 'their things' < Ar. ʔamtiʕa(t) 'things' pl of matāʕ, but rather looks like it is a plural formation ʔamtiʕāt. [kato:] əlmətʕat would look f.sg. to me, dial. imtā‘it- (in construct state), if the def.art. weren't there. [phoenix:] in that case -at is simply coloured -ət due to the presence of ʕ
• tšírad 'to wash' 3sg.f.pf.

u baʕadén udə́nnət udún kuwáyəs u ʕaddán ġəllíyən a-zrə́dən əlxərbuš-ənnəsín

'and then they put on clothes, right,  and went wanting to eat in their garden.'

• udə́nnət 'to put on' 3pl.f.pf.
• udún 'clothing' verbal noun of above verb.
• kuwáyəs I'm not sure what this means. I expect a reciprocal pronoun of sorts? [Lameen:] kwayyis "good" [kato:]kuwáyes occurred before, but here it could either be a sort of pause in the narrative, i.e. "they put on clothes, ok, and ..." or an adverbial "they put on clothes well, they dressed nicely, or completely", both of which functions it can have in ELA. (p.c. Benkato)
• ġəllíyən 'they wanted'
• a-zrə́dən 'to eat' < Ar. zarada 'to devour'
• əlxərbuš-ənnəsín 'their garden', I would really expect a 'in their guarden' here, now it looks like they want to go and eat their garden.

u baʕadén tíva tafút təbarút-i u ġəllíyən a-šəlḥamən afíw

'and then the sun went under while underway, and they wanted to light a fire'

• tíva tafút 'the sun fell'
• təbarút-i 'on, along the road'
• a-šəlḥamən 'to light' 3pl.m.aor.
• afíw 'fire'

Yəxzə́r abbá-s žibərət-ə́nnəs yúfa gallúda n afíw

'And the father looked in his bag and found no match there.'

• Yəxzə́r 'to look at'
• žibərət-ə́nnəs 'his bag', looks like it is from Arabic, but I can't find the original word.
• yúfa 'and he found', the translation is odd, Paradisi translates Ma non vi trovò fiammiferi. 'but he didn't find a match', where did Paradisi get this negative from?
• gallúda n afíw 'a match' litt. gallúda of fire, I am not sure what a gallúda is, could not find it at all. [Lameen:] gallúda: must be gan "there" + luda "nothing", hence "no match there". [Phoenix:] litt. 'nothing of fire' could this be the negation of wa n afíw 'that of fire' > 'match'?

Xzə́rnət tiriwín u nanət-ís: ábba, ábba əlbəqís n afíw!

'The girls saw (something) and said to him: daddy, daddy, a glimmer of fire!'

• Xzə́rnət 'to look at' 3pl.f.pf. Oddly lacks an object.
• u nanət-ís 'and they said to him'
• ábba 'my father'
• əlbəqís 'glimmer' [Kato:] ELA bǝgis 'twinkle (of a star, etc.)', verb ībǝggis 'to twinkle'

In-ís abbá-s: wəttímət šġírən, qámak a-ggə́ġd afíw s-ġár təfilli-y-íwan.

'The father said: Prepare the firewoord, Now I will bring the fire from the house'

• wəttímət 'prepare' imp.pl.f.
• šġírən 'firewood'
• a-ggə́ġd 'to bring' 1sg.aor.
• s-ġár təfilli-y-íwan 'from that house'

Yəʕádd abbá-s, yufí-t d-ámẓa, in-ís: ssalám ʕaléikum.

'The father went, and he found that there was an ogre, he said: Ssalam alaykum'

• yufí-t 'he found him'
• d-ámẓa copula + 'ogre'. I have never encountered this word in the masculine, most stories that I've read (mostly Riffian and Middle Atlast Berber) without fail have a tamẓa 'ogress', Paradisi lists this form in his word list, but here we do find the masculine ogre.

In-ís ámẓa: s-mág tušídda Abu-dábăr

'The ogre said: from where did you come, Abu-dabar?'

• s-mág 'from where'
• tušídda 'to come' 2sg.pf.
• Abu-dábăr interesting that the ogre instantly knows his name. Is part of the introduction ellided, or do ogres have powers to read minds?

In-ís: ušíġda s-ašál-i nək id ləhil-ənnúk

'I come from my village, me and my family'

• ušíġda 'to come' 1sg.pf.
• s-ašál-i 'from my village'
• id ləhil-ənnúk 'and my family', notice the vocalism i in the root here, in earlier text we found  ləhál to mean 'people', I expect this is the same word but why is the vocalism different? < Ar. ʔahl 'relatives, folks, family; kin; people, members, followers etc.'

W-in-ís ámẓa: mág ənníyən ləhil-ə́nnək?

'And the ogre said: where is your family?'

• mág 'where?'
• ənníyən 'to be present' 3pl.m.pf. Somewhat surprised by the gender here. This is his seven daughters and his wife. That's all feminines, why is the verb in the masculine? motivated by the word for family? But that word isn't a plural is it?

In-ís Bu-dábăr: akkiwán ərišína dilíwan

'Abu dabar said: There, they're down there'

• Bu-dábăr Interesting that here we find Abu-dabar without initial a.
• akkiwán 'there' more in the sense of voi-là or ecco in Italian. A sort of spoken pointing of the finger.
• ərišína 'to go down' but apparently also 'to be down' as it is in the 3pl.m.pf.
• dilíwan 'there', the actual place marker.

W-in-ís: ġəllíx afíw.

'And he said: I want the fire'

In-ís: ərfə́ʕ-i ẓuṭ ləktuf-ə́nnək

'He said (the Ogre): take me on your shoulders'

• ərfə́ʕ-i 'take me'
• ẓuṭ 'on'
• ləktuf-ə́nnək 'your shoulders', we've seen this word before as a singular əlkətf, this time it's a plural, points to Arabic kutūf which is funny because classical Arabic actually has ʔaktāf how about dialectal Arabic? [kato:] the plural in ELA is indeed kǝtūf, sg. katǝf

Yərwəʕ Bú-dabar s-ar ámẓa u yərfə́ʕ-ət ẓúṭ ləktuf-ə́nnəs u yəʕádd ar ləhil-ə́nnəs.

'Abu-dabar was afraid of the ogre, and he carried him on his shoulders and went to his family'

• Yərwəʕ 'to be afraid' 3sg.m.pf.

Uṣə́lən w-in-ís ámẓā: əġrəš-dík tiríwt tməqqəránt.

'They reached (them) and the ogre said: Slaughter your oldest daughter for me'

• Uṣắlən 'to reach' 3pl.m.pf.  < Ar. waṣala 'to join, unite'
• əġrəš-dík 'slaughter for me', the translation says 'kill', but Paradisi's wordlist has the common Berber *nġʔ for 'to kill', I could not find this word in his wordlist, but it is a broadly attested Berber verb that means 'to slaughter'.

U yəfki-sín afíw w-in-isín: a-ušə́ġd a-ufáx-tət təmmáya.

'And he gave them the fire, and he said to them: I will come (back) and I will find her cooked'

• təmmáya 3sg.f. 'to be cooked, ripen'

Yəʕádd ámẓa, w-əqqimán abbá-s n tiriwín id əmmá-tsnət vəllánət u yəqárəb ušú n ámẓa

'The ogre left, the daughters of the father and their mother started to cry and the coming of the ogre drew near'

• vəllánət 'to cry' 3pl.f.pf.
• yəqárəb 'to draw near' < Ar. qāraba 'to be near; to come near, come close, get close'
• ušú 'the coming' v.n. of 'to come'

End of part I!

Considering that the father went to the ogre, he apparently did not find the match, but I really don't see how the text gives that connotation.

Sîdi Ḥámed ĕz-Zarrûq

So, I spent the better part of my day breaking my head over the before last text that is available for Aujila. I've had serious trouble translating some parts of this text, and the text type is quite radically different from most of the stories we've heard so far. This seems to be a religious legend aboud Sîdi Ḥámed ĕz-Zarrûq whom I assume is the same as Ahmad Zarruq.

I'll present my translation, apologies in advance that it won't be as satisfyingly easy to understand as previous texts, and I hope readers can help me out clear up some of the weirder pards.

Gan iwínan n-amedən ašál n-awílən

'There was a Aujilan man'

• Gan 'There is, was'
• iwínan n-amedən 'one man'
• ašál n-awílən 'village of Aujila', apparently phrase functions as an adjective in some way, I'd expect a preposition that means 'from' or maybe just n- 'off'.

márra yuġáya ksúm u yušád yəxṭíma af ammúd n Sídi Hamid az-Zarrúq

'One day he bought meat and came and visited the mosque of Sídi Ḥáməd əz-Zarrúq'

• márra 'once'
• yuġáya 'he bought'
• ksúm 'meat'
• yušád 'he came'
• yəxṭíma 'he visited'
• af ammúd n Sídi Hamid az-Zarrúq 'at the Mosque of S.Ḥ.Z.' It's interesting that the word ammúd means 'mosque', this is a, not very broadly attested, word for 'prayer' in Berber.

yufí-tən ʕə́mma mudán lʕə́ṣər

'He found them praying the afternoon prayer'

• yufí-tən 'He found them'
• ʕə́mma seems to be a particle to indicate progressive aspect < Ar. ʕamma 'to be or become general, universal, common' [Lameen:]< Arabic ʕammāl (also used in Siwi.)
• mudán 'they prayed'
• lʕə́ṣər 'the afternoon prayer' < ʕáṣr 'afternoon, afternoon prayer'

yúna ammúd-i w-ídd-əs ksúm

'He entered the mosque and (t0ok) with him the meat'

• yúna 'he entered'
• w-ídd-əs 'and with him'

iggí-t dít-a, w-əlimám sídi Ḥáməd əz-Zarrúq u baʕád ikkə́mməl yəʕádd irrə́wəḥ u šummán ksúm wa yərfíʕa

'He put it in front of him, the Imam was S.Ḥ.Z. and after he finished and he went to return home and he cooked the meat that he had brought'

• iggí-t 'he put it'
• dít-a 'in front of him' This takes a different suffix than the preposition idd-, I assume -a is related to Arabic somehow? [Lameen:] could reflect 3msh -hu, which goes to -a in some dialects. Also used with dəffər here though. [Phoenix:] That's what I thought. There seems to be completely free variation between using the Berber and Arabic suffixes in these cases. Very odd.
• w-alimám sídi Ḥáməd əz-Zarrúq'and the imam was S.Ḥ.Z.', I'd expect the copula d- here. Nowhere to be found.
• u baʕád 'and after'
• ikkə́mməl 'he finished'
• yəʕádd 'he went'
• irrə́wəḥ 'he went home'
• šummán 'to cook' 3pl.m. Is it 3pl.m. because the family is that is cooking along is automatically incorporated into the sentence without further introduction? [Lameen:] yeah, "they" is presumably the people of the house. I'm surprised it's not feminine plural, actually.
• ksúm wa yərfíʕa 'meat which he brought'

ʕala-má fəkkan-ís afíw yəlġăm a-yə́mm.

'As much as he was giving flames to it, it refused to become cooked'

• ʕala-má 'as much as', clearly an underlying Arabic form, but I couldn't find this exact phrase in Wehr.
• fəkkan-ís 3pl.m.impf. 'to give', this must be a 3pl.m. So šummán probably is as well.
• afíw 'fire'
• yəlġəm 'to refuse' 3sg.m.pf.
• a-yə́mm 'to be cooked' 3sg.m.aor.

Baʕadén yəʕádd yə́nšəd ərrəfəqá-nnəs wi ižinána nəttín-id-sín ksúm.

'Then he went to ask his companions whom he had divided the meat with'

• Baʕadén 'then'
• yə́nšəd 'he asked'
• ərrəfəqá-nnəs 'his companions' < Ar. rafīq pl. rufaqāʔ 'companion'
• wi ižinána pl. pronoun + 3sg.m.pf. 'to divide'
• nəttín-id-sín 'he-with-them'

Nan-ís: nəkkəní nəšummi-tíya u nči-tíya

'They said to him: we cooked it and we ate it'

• Nan-ís 'they said'
• nəkkəní 'we'
• nəšummi-tíya 'we cooked it'
• nči-tíya 'we ate it'

In-isín: nək ʕala-má fəkká-s afíw yəlġə́m a-yə́mm

'he said to them: I was giving it as much fire (as possible), it refused to be cooked'

• In-isín 'he said to them'
• fəkká-s 'to give' 1sg.impf. + indirect object 3sg.

Nan-ís: ddíwa dgíta?

'They said to him: What did you do?'

• ddíwa 'what'
• dgíta 'to do, put' 2sg.pf.

 In-isín: baʕád ušíġd uníx ammúd-i, ufíx-tən ʕə́mma mudán.

'He said to them: After I came and entered the mosque, I found them praying'

• Repetition of an earlier phrase, now in the 1sg.pf.

gíx dít-i ksúm u qqăimíx mudíx, wén-ma kəmmə́lx ʕaddíx; wa d-əlá ṣərána.

'I put the meat in front of me and I started praying, as soon as I had finished I went; That is what happened'

• gíx dít-i ksúm 'I put the meat in front of me'
• u qqăimíx mudíx 'and I started praying', notice the odd diphthong-like notation in qqăimíx.
• wén-ma 'as soon as' < Dialectal Arabic wēn 'where' < Ar. wa-ʔayna 'and where' + mā? Could not find this construction in Wehr.
• wa d-əlá ṣərána. 'that is what happened', we've seen this phrase in the previous text.

Nan-ís ərrəfəqá-nnəs ʕádd an-ís-t i-sídi Ḥamə́d ăz-Zarrúq.

'His companions said to him: go and tell it to S.Ḥ.Z.'

• No further notes needed I think.

Yəʕádd in-ís-t am-alá nan-ísa

'He went and he says it like they said to him'

• am-alá 'like'

wén-ma in-ís-t i-sídi Ḥáməd ăz-Zarrúq, in-ís:

'As soon as he said it to S.Ḥ.Z., he said to him:'

nək lukán wa ammudán də́ffər-i a-iččí-t afíw, maʕádč a-mmudə́x s-ḥíddan

'If he who would pray behind me would be eaten by fire (that is: burn in hell), I would no longer lead them in prayer.'

• This is a pretty essential part of the text and I can't make sense of it at all.
• Paradisi translates: Se colui che prega dietro di me andasse all'inferno (lett: lo mangiasse il fuoco), non pregherei più per alcuno. Which Google Translate lovingly translated as: 'If the one who prays behind me to go to hell (litt: the fire eats him), do not beg for any more.' Which is not very helpful.
• lukán 'if'
• wa ammudán də́ffər-i 'who prays behind me' with a aor.ptc. ?
• a-iččí-t afíw 'the fire will eat him'
• maʕádč 'no longer' [Lameen:] maʕádč is Arabic mā-ʕād-š. In my dialect this would be "not yet", but I think in Libya this would be "no longer"; [kato:] Interesting that your dialect has maʕádč for 'not yet', Lameen. Here, it'd be "no more, no longer", and is placed before the vb as in ELA.
• a-mmudə́x 1sg.aor. [Lameen (paraphrased):] mmud + s-  = 'lead in prayer' calque of Ar. ṣallī bi- 'to lead in prayer'.
• s-ḥíddan 'to anyone' [Lameen:] ḥiddan is of course Arabic ʔaḥad-an "anyone" - with tanwīn! My own dialect has šayən for "nothing", so the survival of tanwīn in this context is not unprecedented, but it is interesting.

In-ís: ksum-áya ġár-ək ʕádd kəffə́n-t, u ʕádd mtí-t žəbbánət

'He said to him: That meat that you have, go wrap it up, and go bury it in the cemetary.'

• ksum-áya 'that meat'
• ġár-ək 'you have' ġár on it's own seems to be almost exclusively used for possesive constructions.
• ʕádd really seems to be used a lot as a sort of Auxiliary verb here, maybe to strengthen the imperative?
• kəffə́n-t 'wrap it up' < Ar. kaffana 'to wrap s.th. up'
• mtí-t 'bury it'
• žəbbánət I'd except a preposition here af žəbbánət or žəbbánət-i but instead the sentence says: "go bury it the cemetary", this is very odd to me.

Yəʕádd yəmtí-t u yəqqím ixəbbár míddən

'He went to bury it and he started telling the people'

• yəmtí-t 'he buried it'
• yəqqím 'he started to...'
• ixabbár 'he said' impf.3sg.m. < Ar. xabbara 'id.'
• míddən 'people'

wén-ma slán-t míddən n ašál kúll ušánd ġallíyən ammudán kull də́ffər-a w-ammúd məššə́k iġəlli-ká a-yúġ míddən n ašál.

'As soon as they heard this, all the people of the village came and wanted all to pray behind him, and the small mosque could not fit (litt: did not want to take) the people of the village.'

• slán-t 'they heard it'
• míddən n ašál kúll 'all the people of the village'
• ušánd 'they came'
• ġallíyən 'they wanted'
• ammudán 'to pray' 3pl.m.aor.
• kull this second kull surprises me a bit because of it's position
• də́ffər-a 'behind him'
• məššə́k 'small' m.sg.
• iġəlli-ká a-yúġ 'it did not want to take' interesting way of expressing 'They didn't fit'
• This sentence give us the impression that whatever S.Ḥ.Z said about sitting behind him is a good thing, since the whole village wants to do it now.

yəxammə́m əlfəkr-ə́nnəs sídi Ḥamə́d, illúff dbăš-ə́nnəs w-in-isín ġallíx a-ʕddaáx (sic) fḥáli.

'Sidi Ḥamə́d thought to himself (litt: he thought his thinking), packed up his stuff and he said to them: I want to go by myself.

•  yəxammə́m 'to think' 3sg.m.pf. I know this word, it's also found in Riffian and MA Berber. The x would suggest an Arabic origin, but the word itself doesn't look particuarly Arabic due to a double m. [Lameen:] from Arabic xammana 'to guess, conjecture, surmise' [Phoenix:] That's why it didn't look Arabic! Assimilation of nasals accross syllables. Cool.
• əlfəkr-ə́nnəs 'his thinking' < Ar. fikr 'thinking, cognitation, reflection'
• illúff 'to pack up' 3sg.m.pf. < Ar. laffa 'to wrap up'
• dbăš-ə́nnəs 'his stuff' < Ar. dabaš 'stuff'. This is interesting, this word is different from dbúš 'clothes'. This is odd, we had previously identified the latter word to be from dabaš. But this seems to be a different lexeme then. the shape of dbuš suggestes that it comes from an Arabic word da/ubūš, this derivation doesn't exist in classical Arabic at least. Is it the plural? Classical Arabic has ʔadbāš, but maybe one of the two Arabic dialects that influence Aujila Berber had dubūš as the plural instead?
• ġallíx 'I want'
• aʕddaáx (sic) This must be a typo for a-ʕaddə́x. 1sg.aor. 'to go'
• fḥáli 'by myself', I don't know this expression, but I assume it's from fī ḥālī 'in my condition/state'.

Nan-ís ləhál n ašál: a-nnaʕádd kull-ídd-ək

'The people of the village said to him: We will all go with you'

• ləhál n ašál 'people of the village' <  Ar. ʔahl 'relatives, folks, family; kin; people, members, followers etc.'
• a-nnaʕádd 1pl.aor. 'to go'
• kull-ídd-ək 'all-with-you' Maybe this sentence is better translated as 'we, and you, will go together'. That'show pronoun-idd-pronoun is usually translated (look back at previous texts with nəkk-ídd-ək for example), but it doesn't sound that good in English.

U škíyən ídd-əs ir a-hlə́bən ašál u baʕadén in-isín:

'And they left with him until they would leave the village and he said to them'

• U škíyən 'and they left'
• ídd-əs 'with him'
• ir 'until'
• a-hlə́bən 3pl.m.aor. of a root hlb, I can't find this, I only find Ar. haliba 'to be hairy', which is definitely not what we're looking for. Paradisi translates oltrepassrono.

ṣbərát, a-nna-kím nək d-awíl tláta marrát ílă yom əlqiyáma;

'Wait, I will tell you I will be an Aujilan three times until the Day of Judgment;'

• ṣbərát imperative 2pl.m. 'to wait' <Ar. ṣabara 'to bind, to be patient'
• a-nna-kím 'I will tell you (pl.)
• nək d-awíl 'I am an Aujilan'
• tláta marrát 'three times'
• ílă 'until', notice not Berber ir is used by Arabic ʔilā
• yom əlqiyáma < Ar. Yawm al-Qiyāma(t)

wása anzurrán s-ġar-kím a-ʕəyyə́ṭən-dîk təláta marrát; a-ušázd w-a-ffukkə́x-t

'One of you who will be suffering, will call me three times; I will come and alleviate it.'

• wása longer form of wa
• a-nzurrán ptc.aor. 'to suffer', I can't find this word anywhere. But should mean 'to suffer'
• s-ġar-kím 'from amongst you (pl.)
• a-ʕəyyə́ṭən-dîk 'they will call me'
• təláta marrát 'three times'
• a-ušá-zd 'and 'I will come for him'. A lot of assimilations have made this word incredibly unclear. It is like this: a- aorist particle uš 'to come' -a- 1sg. ending losing it's -x because the following 3sg.m. indirect object suffix -ís which in turn loses its i due to the a in the previous ending, and assimilates the s in voicing to z for the following -d direction particle.
• w-a-ffukkə́x-t 'and I will alleviate him' < Ar. fakka 'to seperate, disjoin, disconnect'

Undú ušiġd-ká, a-nmḥásəb nək ídd-əs yom əlqiyáma

'And if I don't you, I and him will be held responsible (on) the Day of Judgment'

• ušiġd-ká 'I don't come' 1pl.m.pf.-negative
• a-nmḥásəb 'to be held responsible' 1pl.aor. This would mean it's from Ar. ḥāsiba 'to hold responsible' which probably took the meaning 'to be responsible for s.th.' in Aujila. [Lameen:] The m- must be a passive formation here.

Nək wa d-əlá slíxa s-ar míddən lə́wwəl kəddímən ḥəkkán-dík af sídi Ḥáməd əz-Zarrúq.

'This is what I heard once from old people, who used to tell me about S.Ḥ.Z.'

• wa d-əlá slíxa 'what I heard'
• s-ar míddən 'from people'
• lə́wwəl 'first' < al-ʔawwal 'first', I don't really understand the meaning of this word in this context. [Lameen:] in Siwi this means "once, formerly" as well as "first", which would work here.
• kəddímən 'old' m.pl adj. This is a very odd form, this is clearly from Ar. qadīm 'old'. Why does it have k for q?
• ḥəkkán-dík 'they have told me' < ḥakā 'to tell'. Surprising that it has a kk, there's no reason why that geminate arises here. [Lameen:] the geminate suggests rather "they used to tell me" (imperfective.)" [Phoenix:] Imperfective can have a habitual meaning.

[Lameen:] The point of the story is the idea that God has granted Sidi Hamed the privilege that anyone whom he's led in prayer will be spared the Fire (of Hell) - even a piece of meat he's "led in prayer" can't be burned. On top of that, before leaving he agrees to intercede for any Awjili in trouble. Such ideas of intercession would now be seen as unacceptable by most Muslims (the last sentence suggests they were already starting to be seen that way), but they're fairly representative of the attitude people used to have towards saints in many regions.

999 Pounds

Žḥá yətəmə́nna s-ġar rə́bbi a-yəfk-ís əlf zní

'Žḥá wished of god to give him 1.000 Libyan pounds'

• yətəmə́nna 'to wish' 3sg.m.pf. < Ar. tamannā 'to desire, wish'
• s-ġar rə́bbi 'from god'
• a-yəfk-ís 'to give' aor.3sg.m. + 3sg. indirect object
• əlf 'thousand' < Ar. ʔalf 'id. '
• zní 'pound' < Ar. žunaih 'id.' but obviously the dialectal pronunciation, not the MSA pronunciation. MSA changed it to look/sound more classical. [Lameen:] From the British coin Guinea

u yəqqím iṭə́lləb u itənn-ís: Ya rắbbi undú yənqíṣa iwínan a-uġə́x-tenet-ká!

'and he started requesting/begging and saying: 'O god! If even one is lacking, I will not take them!'

• yəqqím inchoative 3sg.m.pf.
• iṭə́lləb 3sg.m.impf. 'to request' <Ar. ṭalaba 'to look, search; to request etc.'
• Ya rắbbi  'o god!' with an Arabic vocative particle ya instead of a/ay that we've seen so far.
• undú 'if'
• yənqíṣa 'to be lacking' 3sg.m.pf. < Ar. naqaṣa 'to decrease, become less, diminish, be diminished, be reduced'
• iwínan 'one'
• a-uġə́x-tenet-ká aor.1sg. 'to take' + 3pl.f. direct object suffix + negative.

Baʕadén yəslí-t əlhúdi aringí-nnəs

'Then his Jewish neighbour heard him'

• Baʕadén
• yəslí-t 'to hear' 3sg.mp
• əlhúdi 'Jew'. Clearly from Arabic, but my MSA dictionary wasn't of much help. I could find al-hūd 'Jewry' and yahūdiy 'jewish'. This word seems to be a mix between these two.
• aringí-nnəs 'his neighbour'. This final í is remarkable. In Paradisi's wordlist we find arîng,  anîrg pl. ringîn, nirgîn 'neighbour' (notice the interesting metathesized forms). The í is written with a short accented í, which you never really see, so this seems to actually be the schwa of the suffix, but I'm not sure what motivated it to be colored to an i-like sound for Paradisi to transcribe it as í.

Baʕadén in-ís lhúdi y-imán-nəs wăllahi qáma a-ḥdəfá-s tə́səʕa míyət id təsəʕa u təsʕín žní w-a-ggulə́x-t a-yuġí-tənət naġ wə́la

'Then the Jew said to himself: I swear, now, I will throw him 999 Libyan pounds and I'll see (if) he takes them or not.'

• in-ís 'he said'
• y-imán-nəs 'to himself'
• wăllahi 'by god'  means 'I swear to god'
• qáma 'now'
• a-ḥdəfá-s 'I will throw to him' 1sg.aor. This should be from Arabic, but I can't find the word in Wehr. Apparently Siwi has ʕadef with the same meaning.
• tə́səʕa míyət id təsəʕa u təsʕín 999 litt: nine hundred with nine and ninety.
• žní 'pound' Notice that this time the word has the expected ž
• w-a-ggulə́x-t 'and I will see him' 1sg.aor.
• a-yuġí-tənət  'he takes them' 3sg.m.aor.
• naġ 'or'
• wə́la < Ar. wa-lā 'nor, neither', a bit of an odd construction 'or nor' for 'or not'. Dialectal use of wa-lā? [Lameen:] cp. Siwi ula "no" (and discussion of its origins in my thesis...)

w-igi-tə́nət arəqúṭ-i u yəḥdəf-tə́nət dit nə Žḥá s-ar ərróšən.

'And he put them in rags and he threw them in front of Zha from the window'

• w-igi-tə́nət 'and he did/put them'
• arəqúṭ-i 'in rags'. For some reason this word was ringing a bell. Not sure why.
• u yəḥdəf-tə́nət 'and he threw them'
• dit nə Žḥá 'in front of Žḥá'
• s-ar ərróšən 'from the window' <Ar. rawšan 'skylight, scuttle; peep-window, peep-hole, spy-hole'

 U yətuár arăqúṭ u yəḥsəb-tə́nət yufi-tə́nət ənqəṣníta iwínan u baʕadén in-ís:

'And he opened the rags and he counted them and found them to be missing one (pound) and then he said:'

• yətuár 'to open, to be opened' 3sg.m.pf. Actually a passive of yar/ar 'to open', but can have an active meaning as well.
• yəḥsəb-tə́nət 'he counted them'
• yufi-tə́nət 'found them'
• ənqəṣníta 'to be lacking' 3pl.f.pf.

wa yəfki-díka lʕə́lla a-yəfki-dík iwínan

'He who gave me many (pounds), may he give me one (more pound)'

• wa yəfki-díka 'he who gave me'
• lʕə́lla 'much, many'
• a-yəfki-dík 'may he give me', Aorist used to express a wish here.

baʕadén igi-tə́nət ṣṣundúq-i u nəttín yəfríḥa

'Then he put them in a box and he was happy'

• igi-tə́nət 'he put them'
• ṣṣundúq-i 'in a box' < Ar. ṣundūq ‘crate, box; chest’. Here a short u is retained from Arabic. It seems that, the q-dialect Aujila loaned from retained the opposition of u and i, and Aujila simply took it over. This makes the short vowel system in Aujila oddly versatile considering that only one short vowel is present in the Berber lexicon.
• u nəttín 'and he'
• yəfríḥa 'he was happy, satisfied'

baʕadén yəškí əlhúdi w-in-ís yə-Žḥá: aġíd əlbarat-ənnúk.

'Then the Jew cam out and said to Žḥá: bring (me) my money!'

• yəškí 'to come out'
• aġíd Imperative 'bring'

In-ís Žḥá: rə́bbi yəfki-díka albəṣírət u ku tġallít a-ttuġát-tət s-ġár-i?

'Žḥá said: god gave it to me willingly and you want to take it away from me?'

• albəṣírət < Ar. baṣīra(t) 'insight, penetration, discernemnent, understanding' but the phrase ʕan baṣīra(t) means 'deliberately, willingly', which makes more sense to be the meaning here. Does dialect arabic drop the ʕan?
• u ku 'and you'
• tġallít 'to want' 2sg.pf.
• a-ttuġát-tət 'to take' 2sg.aor. + 3sg.f. DO
• s-ġár-i 'from me'

In-ís əlhúdi: nək wa əḥdəx-títa i-kú dax a-gguláx-ku a-ttuġa(t)-tə́net ənqəṣníta naġ wə́la

'The Jew said: I was the one who threw it to you in order to see (if) you would take them with (one pound) missing or not.'

• nək wa əḥdəx-títa 'I'm the one who threw it'
• i-kú 'to you' [Lameen:] All Berber languages, as far as I know, use the full forms of pronouns after i, not the prepositional ones.
• dax 'so, in order to'
• a-gguláx-ku 'to see you'
• a-ttuġa(t)-tə́net 'you would take them'

yəlġóm a-yəfki-tə́net y-əlhúdi

'he refused to give them (back) to the Jew'

• yəlġóm 'to refuse' 3sg.m.pf.
• a-yəfki-tə́net 'to give them' 3sg.m.aor.

Baʕadén in-ís əlhúdi: nək a-nṭárəx-ku-ká ir a-nnaʕádd nək-ídd-ək ar əlqə́ḍi.

'Then the Jew said: I will not let you go until me and you have gone to the Qadi'

• a-nṭárəx-ku-ká 'I will not let you go' 1sg.aor. with 2sg. object. + negative. An Arabic word must lie at it's origin but naṭara means 'to watch, to guard', which seems like the exact opposite of the word that I'd expect.
• ir 'until'
• a-nnaʕádd 'to go' 1pl.aor.
• nək-ídd-ək I with-you
• ar əlqə́ḍi 'to the qadi'

In-ís Žḥá: nək ʕəyyánəx u zmərx-ká a-ʕaddə́x af šərin-núk w-ərwə́ḥa s-ġar šmuṭ u ġar-i-ká təlába

'Žḥá said: I am sick and I am unable to go by foot(?) and I am afraid of the cold and I don't have a Barracan'

• ʕəyyánəx 'I am sick'. Arabic must underly this, I could not find the word. [Lameen:] < Ar. ʕayyān "exhausted, tired, ill".
• zmərx-ká 'I am not able' The form looks like a Perfect, but that is not the tense I would expect, I'd rather expect an Imperfect.
• a-ʕaddə́x 'to go' 1sg.aor.
• af šərin-núk 'on my legs'?? translation by Paradisi as 'a piedi', I can't find the word that this represents. Is it Arabic?
• w-ərwə́ḥa 'and I am afraid' I think this, again, is a Perfect, while I'd expect an Imperfect here. Am I thinking of Perfect too much as a past tense? Or am I not regarding Imperfect enough as a way to express habitual action?
• s-ġar šmuṭ  'of the cold'
• u ġar-i-ká təlába 'and I don't have a barracan' Litt: and to me is not a barracan'

In-ís əlhúdi: afká-k aẓíṭ id təlába ġar ʕádd ídd-i ar əlqə́ḍi

'The Jew said: I will give you a donkey and a Barracan but you must go with me to the Qadi'

• afká-k 'I will give you' 1sg.aor.+2sg.DO
• aẓíṭ id təlába 'donkey and barracan'
• ġar 'but'
• ʕádd 'go' imperative singular
• ídd-i 'with me'

Baʕád uṣə́llən ar əlqə́ḍi išərw-ís ləhúdi s-alá ṣarána.

'Later they arrive at the Qadi, the Jew tells him about what happened'

• Baʕád 'later'
• uṣə́llən 'to arrive' 3pl.pf. I think this is from Arabic waṣala 'to join, unite', possibly form II.
• išərw-ís 'to tell' 3sg.m.pf. + 3sg.IO.
• s-alá s- 'from' but also apparently 'about' + alá 'that wich', a sort of relative pronoun.
• ṣarána 'to happen' 3pl.m. < Ar. ṣāra 'to happen'

In-ís əlqə́ḍi i-Žḥá: ṣəḥíḥ žlan-íya?

'The Qadi says to Žḥá: Trutful is this story? (The force, you must use!)'

• ṣəḥíḥ 'truthful, healthy'
• žlan-íya 'this story', I'm a bit surprised by the Yoda-like flipping of the word order from what I would expect. Is ṣaḥíḥ being used as a stative verb? That would not require endings, but I'm a bit surprised that Arabic adjectives can be employed like that.

Baʕadén in-ís: lhúdi iqə́lləz fəll-íwi u nək rwíḥḥa a-yə́qləz w-a-in-ís ḥə́tta tlaba-nnúk ta tənní fəll-íwi t-tá-nnəs nəttín id aẓiṭ-ənnúk a-in-ís d-wá-nnəs nəttín.

'Then he said: The Jew is lying about me! And I am afraid that he will lie and say that even my Barracan that I'm wearing is his and that he will say that my donkey is his!'

• iqə́lləz 'to lie' 3sg.m.impf.
• fəll-íwi 'on me' to mean 'about me'
• rwíḥḥa 'to be afraid' 1sg.pf. (once again a, unexpected to me, Perfect. It seems like I really can't get my head around this use of the Perfect, isn't he currently in the state of being afraid, thus not having finished it?)
• a-yə́qləz 'to lie' 3sg.m.aor.
• w-a-in-ís 'and he will say'
• ḥə́tta 'even' < Ar. ?
• ta tənní fəll-íwi 'that is on me' Pronoun + 'to be, exist' 3sg.f.pf. + on-me
• t-tá-nnəs nəttín assimilation of d- 'copula' + tá-nnəs 'that of his', nəttín 'he' apparently placed after it to emphasize the possesive relationship. 'He will even says that this Baraccan is his'
• a-in-ís d-wá-nnəs nəttín. 'he will say is his!' once again with extra pronoun 'he'.

Baʕadén iʕáyəṭ əlhúdi w-in-ís y-əlqə́ḍi: wălláhi t-ti-nnúk

'Then the Jew scremead and said to the Qadi: I swear they are mine!'

• iʕáyəṭ 'to scream' 3sg.m.pf., now that I have confirmed what the perfect looks like, I can be sure that the form in the previous text was indeed an imperfect.
• t-ti-nnúk copula d- + fem plural pronoun ti-nnúk 'those of mine'

In-ís əlqə́ḍi: ku təqəllət ṣəḥíḥ ʕádd ʕádd rə́waḥ

'The Qadi said: You really are lying! Go! Go! Go home!'

• təqə́llət 'you are lying' 2sg.impf.
• ṣəḥíḥ 'truthfull, healthy' used as an adverb here. I like how nicely it translates to English.
• rə́waḥ 'go home' imperative singular.

U yəʕádd Žḥá yəfríḥa yəḥəṣṣíla ədbúš id aẓíṭ id əlbarát

'And Žḥá went (away) happy, having obtained clothes, a donkey and money'

• yəḥəṣṣíla 'to obtain' 3sg.m.pf. < Ar. ḥaṣṣala 'id.'
• ədbúš 'clothes'
• əlbarát 'money'

Waiting for the Police

Today, a rather morbid story.

Gan iwínan yərfíʕa af təgilí-nnəs əlḥə́ml ẓẓák s-ġár ləmluxíyət

'There was a (man) carrying a heavy load of Mulukhiyah on his head.'

• Gan 'There is, there was'
• iwínan 'one'
• yərfíʕa 3sg.m.pf. 'to carry'
• af təgilí-nnəs 'on his head'
• əlḥə́ml 'load' < Ar. ḥiml/ḥaml 'burden, load'
• ẓẓák 'heavy' m.sg.
• s-ġár 'from' <- Odd use of this ablative particle (which I still can't distinguish from s- 'from'), as here it shows a definition of material. This is similar to the Dutch word van 'of, from' 'een lading van Mulukhiyah' litt: 'a load from Mulukhiyah'
• ləmluxíyət 'mulukhiyah'

W-ižigáž žənqín-i n ašál u nəttín iʕəyáṭ w-itənn-ís: ləmluxíyət báhəyət!

'And he was walking in the streets of the village and he yelled and was saying: Good Mulukhia!'

• W-ižigáž 3sg.m.impf. 'to walk' looks like a causative of a root gž, not sure what that root would mean. Not attested in Aujila at any rate.
• źənqín-i 'in the streets' < Ar. zinaq 'narrow street' Wehr says that in Moroccan Arabic this is the normal word for 'street'. This word has been Berberised, the plural is also spelled dzanqín and the singular is tzenắqt.
• n ašál 'of the village' note how an interpretation 'country' would not make much sense here.
• u nəttín 'and he'
• iʕəyáṭ <Ar. ʕāṭa ‘to yell, scream’. In my notes I have written down that this is a 3sg.m. perfect. But I think an interpretation as imperfect would make more sense here. Sadly without any other forms, it is difficult to determine what the perfect would have looked like. This form also arose in the story about the donkey at the auction, where it also preceeded w-itənn-ís (an imperfect). 
• w-itənn-ís 3sg.m.impf. 'to say'. This is a pretty clear example of proof that the -ís is an obligatory indirect object, because in this case, there definitely isn't a 3rd person indirect object being adressed to.
• báhəyət 'good' < dial. Ar. bāhi, with feminine conjugation.

W-ižigáž ggút išfíwan u ižíž lúda

'And he was walking for many days, and he sold nothing'

• ggút 'many'
• išfíwan 'days'
• ižíž 'to sell' 3sg.m.pf.
• lúda 'nothing' Does this come from Arabic?

u tafút təḥmáya fəll-ís u taqqím təttá afiš-ə́nnəs id əlgəfán-nəs u təqqím am əžžaḥím fəll-ís

And the sun shone upon him and it was starting to eat his face and back of the head and it continued (to shine) like hell was upon him.

• tafút 'sun', this word mysteriously lacks a k as its final consonant (which it has in common with Ghadamès) the Proto-Berber word is *taʔfuḱt (Ghd. tofətt).
• təḥmáya 3sg.f.pf. 'to burn, scald'. Could be from two Arabic words: Ar. ḥamma 'to heat, make hot' or Ar. ḥamiya 'to be or become hot; to glow (metal)'. These two seem etymologically related in Arabic, though I've never heard of an -y intransitivising suffix.
• təqqím 3sg.f.pf. 'to stay' as an inchoative auxiliary verb.
• təttá 3sg.f.impf. 'to eat'. A well known irregular verb in Berber. Aor. əčč Pf. əčči/a Impf. tətti/a. The 3sg.f.impf. has lost its feminine prefix. If you imagine that word would have become **tətəttá, it doesn't take much imagination to figure out why it was simplified. Kossmann wrote an interesting article on the history of this verb. The verb 'to eat' is used symbolically here in the sense that it means that the sun is starting to cause a sunburn.
• afiš-ə́nnəs 'his face'
• id 'with' but here should be understood as 'together with, and'
• əlgəfá-nnəs 'his back of the head' < Ar. qafa(n) 'nape; occiput, back of the head; back; reverse'
• tăqqím 'she remained'. I think this should be read as '(the sun) continued (to shine)'
• am 'like'
• əžžaḥím 'hell' < Ar. žaḥīm 'fire, hellfire, hell'

u nəttín lləkká ižigáž u iʕəyáṭ: əlmluxíyət báhəyət

'and he was still walking and yelling 'Good mulukhiyah!'

• u nəttín 'and he'
• lləkká 'still'

U taxzə́r ġár-əs təmígni w-ətn-ís: i-kí a-wá-n ləmluxíyət

'and a woman looked at him and said to him: hey you with the mulukhiyah!

• U taxzə́r 'and she looked'
• ġár-əs 'to him'
• təmígni 'woman'
• w-ətn-ís 'and she said to him'
• i-kí this should mean 'hey you!', but I don't really understand how it should be interpreted. Surely Paradisi had a reason to supply this word with a dash, so what's i? and what's kí?
• a-wá-n ləmluxíyət 'o that one of the Mulukhiyah' a- 'vocative' wá 'dummy pronoun' n 'possesive'

U yəxzə́r nəttín ġár-əs w-igá əlḥəməl-ə́nnəs dít n təmígni u tənšə́d-t: z-díwa?

'And he saw her and he put his load in front of the woman and she asked him: how much?'

• U yəxzə́r nəttín ġár-əs 'and he saw her'
• w-igá 'and he put'
• dít n təmígni 'in front of the woman'
• u tənšə́d-t 'and she asked him'
• z-díwa? 'how much?' litterally this is s- instrumental suffix + díwa 'what' =  'with what?'

In-ís: s-sə́bəʕa n millím.

'He says to her: 7 miliemes'

• s-sə́bəʕa 'seven' < Ar. sabaʕa(t) 'id.' [Lameen:] s- is "for" with prices (at least in Siwi), so "for 7 milliemes".
• n millím 'of milliem' [kato:] this wouldn't be 'thousand' i don't think, as in "7,000 dinars". at that time in libya, the millim was the subunit of the girsh which was the subunit of the dinar, so there were 100 girsh in a dinar, and 1000 milliemes in a dinar. him selling molokhiya for ~ 7 milliemes sounds about right for the 1960s.

Tn-ís ənnát: s-ə́rbəʕa bə́ss

'She says to him: (I'll do it) for 4 (milliemes) only'

• Tn-ís ənnát 'she says to him'
• s-ə́rbəʕa literally 'with four'. < Ar. arbaʕa(t) 'four'
• bə́ss 'only, just'. [kato:] common in many dialects.

In-ís: ə́rbəʕa ḥə́nṭā.

'He says to her: 4 is (too) little'

• ḥə́nṭā 'a bit, a little'

Tn-ís: nək ná-ka s-ə́rbəʕa n millím, yəʕžəb-kúya naġ yəʕžəb-kúya-ká?

'She said: I have told you, for four thousand, does it please you or doesn't it please you?'

• nək ná-ka 'I have told you'
• yəʕžəb-kúya 3sg.m. '??' + 2sg. direct object. I'm not sure what this verb means. Ar. ʕažaba 'to wonder, marvel, be astonished' makes very little sense semantically. Apparently this word has undergone a semantic shift in Libyan Arabic. Maybe it means 'to please' now, 'does it please you, or doesn't it please you?' makes sense. [kato:] also common in dial. Ar. as a way of saying "to like" e.g. yǝ‘žǝb-ak "does it please you? (do you like it?)". it takes the suffixed obj. pronouns. [Lameen:] The relevant form is ʔaʕjaba "to please".
• naġ 'or'
• yəʕžəb-kúya-ká negative of above.

In-ís: yəʕžəb-íya-ká.

'He said: it does not pleace me'

Tn-ís: blaš, u təqqə́š əlbáb fəll-ís

'She said: "too bad", and closed the door in front of him (litt. on him).'

• blaš surely dialectal Arabic, don't know what it means. [kato:] blaš - dial. Ar. in Libya meaning 'free' usually. i can't think of using it to say 'too bad', but a shift wouldn't be implausible. [phoenix:] Paradisi translates it as non fa niente 'it doesn't matter' which still makes little sense to me in the meaning 'free'. Do you mean 'free' as in 'not locked up' or 'free' as in 'for no money'?
• təqqə́š 3sg.f.pf. 'to close', it is curious to note that according to Paradisi this verb literally means 'to close from the outside', which would make no sense in this context.
• əlbáb 'door' < Ar. bāb 'id.'

u baʕadén yəxzə́r af əlḥəməl-ə́nnəs wa-ẓẓákən dax a-yərfə́ʕ-t

'And then he looked at his load that was (too) heavy to carry'

• u baʕadén 'and then'
• wa-ẓẓákən wa+ptc. of stative verb ẓẓák 'to be heavy'
• dax 'for, in order to'
• a-yərfə́ʕ-t 3sg.m.aor. + 3sg.m. direct object 'to carry'

lákən yəkrí u yə́vdəd u baʕadén yəmmúdd afus-ə́nnəs yəddúgg af əlbáb

'but he returned and stopped and then he extended his hand and knocked on the door'

• lákən 'but' I'd expect a word that means 'so, therefore' here, not 'but'
• yəkrí 'he returned'
• yə́vdəd 'to stop, stand' 3sg.m.pf.
• yəmmúdd 'to extend' 3sg.m.pf. <Ar. madda 'to extend, distand, expand, dilate; to stretch, stretch out'
• afus-ə́nnəs 'his hand'
• yəddúgg 'to knock' 3sg.m.pf. <Ar. daqqa 'to knock, rap, bang (on the door)' it's interesting to see that Aujila seems to consistently render C1aC2C2a verbs as C1C1úC2C2 (Paradisi writes it as ú not as û, which may point to an accented short u or schwa instead).

u təškí təmígni ġár-əs w-ətn-ís: amúr džižít s-alúwəl axér-lək-ká

'The woman came out to him and said to him: if yo had sold (it) in the first place, would it not be better?''

• təškí 'to come out, to leave' 3sg.f.pf.
• amúr 'if'
• džižít 'to sell' 2sg.pf.
• s-alúwəl 'at first' maybe 'at the first time' < Ar. ʔawwal 'first, first time'
• axér-lək-ká 'would it not be better?' axér = better. -ká = negative. But what is lək? < Ar. la-ka 'to you' ? [kato:] you've analyzed it correctly. it's Ar. xēyr l-ak "better for you (m.)" [phoenix:] interesting that this phrase switches to full-on Arabic. Also not here that axér has vowel e instead of i that we've seen so far.

Yəkri-ká fəll-ís žlán

'He didn't answer a word to her'

• Yəkri-ká + af/fəll 'to answer' 3sg.m.pf. + neg.
• fəll-ís 'to her'
• žlán 'word, speech, story'

u baʕadén yərfə́ʕ əlmizán-nəs wa yəḥməl-tíya u yəxbóṭ-ṭ af təgíli n təmígni

'and then he lifted up his scales that he was carrying and he smashed them on the head of the woman'

• yərfə́ʕ 'to lift up' 3sg.m.pf.
• əlmizán-nəs 'his scales'
• wa yəḥməl-tíya 'that he carried'
• yəxbóṭ-ṭ 'and he smashed it (scales is singular)' <Ar. xabaṭa 'to beat, strike'
• təgíli 'head'

tíva təmígni təmmút

'the woman fell and died'

• tíva 'to fall' 3sg.f.pf. This verb has a very strange imperfect form inə́vva with a prefix n- and gemination of v, which is usually avoided in Berber. [Lameen:] no, biconsonantal verbs of the form *ənC become iC in Awjila, so the original form of this verb is *ənv. Cp. iž impf. nəžža "to be sold", iš impf. nəšša "sleep".
• təmmút 'to die' 3sg.f.pf.

u yəqqím yəvdída agur-ə́nnəs ir a-yúš əl-bulís

'and he stayed standing in her vincinity until the police came'

• yəqqím 'he remained'
• yəvdída 'to stop, to stand' 3sg.m.pf.
• agur-ə́nnəs 'near her'
• ir 'until'
• a-yúš 'to come' 3sg.m.aor.
• əl-bulís < Ar. būlīs 'police' < Fr. police 'id.' Arabic and Berber don't have p so they settled for the next best thing. [kato:] iIthink it could be English or Italian as well, since the French were never really in Libya and I don't see why the libyans would have borrowed the word from another arabic dialect. [Phoenix:] Italian seems unliekly polizia would probably be rendered different in Arabic. English is of course possible.

I am not really sure what invokes the rage of the man.

A deceptively small country

While reading through the Aujila texts I have noticed something about the word ašal usually glossed as 'country' or, in French 'pays'. This suggests that it is related to PB *aʔḱal 'earth' > Kb. akal, MA akal, ašal Tashl. akal, Ghd okăl. okal , Zng aʔgäy To. ăkal, which all have the meaning 'earth'.

The correspondence is problematic neither *k nor *ḱ ever correspond to Aujila š except for this word.

If we take a look at the actual entry in Paradisi's wordlist we learn that ašal is glossed 'paese, villaggio'. This could mean 'country, village'; A bit of a wide range of semantics don't you think?

It just so happens, that Italian paese has a second meaning 'small village'. I think it's much more likely that this is the meaning Paradisi is aiming at with paese, since this would explain why he casually wrote 'paese, villaggio' as the gloss without pointing out the huge disparity in meaning and that the entry 'villaggio' has 'ved. "paese" ' as it's only comment.

I believe that we are dealing with a Aujila word ašal '(small) village' that has absolutely no relation to PB *aʔḱal 'earth'. A mistake that has gone unnoticed for years because of the obvious phonetically similar French pays 'country' (obviously, also etymologically related).

Of course, it is still possible to argue that '(small) village' could have been derived from 'ground' as well. After all, the word paese underwent a similar semantic shift. But add to it that the correspondence is imperfect and that even 'country' isn't quite 'ground' yet, I think this word probably isn't a cognate.

Proto-Berber C1C1C2 verbs

Me and Glen Gordon have been brainstorming furiously about some of the bigger issues in Proto-Berber reconstructions on his blog.

A lot of the discussion ended up coming down to the prefixes of Berber nouns, and specifically the prefix *u- as in *ulβ 'heart' (or *ulv, when accepting Glen's suggestion for a changed PB orthography, which I won't yet, as long as I haven't discussed it on this blog).

Some evidence leads me to believe that this prefix *u- is originally from a *w-, that came to be vocalised as *u- in some way. We see this because Iwwellemeden əwəl 'heart'. Other evidence presents itself in *urə/ăγ (*urə/ăḳ) 'gold' which seems to be derived from a root *wrγ 'to be yellow'.

While this is promising, we do not yet understand the deeper underlying ways that PB *w interacts with other consonants and vowels. To get a sense just how difficult it is to understand what exactly is going on, I would like to discuss a certain class of Berber verbs today, the so C1C1C2 verbs. Such verbs have a geminated initial consonant and a second consonant. Prasse (1972-1974) believes such verbs to have originally been wC1C2, and he has a point. Because of the complex ablaut patterns of the verbal system, we get a a good view of the many different interections in different positions of *w with surrounding vowels and consonants.

But, before we start looking at a difficult class like C1C1C2 verbs, let' s first establish a general reconstruction of the C1C2C3 verbs the most 'unmarked' form. It should be noted that, in general, the verbal system of Berber is quite irregular, so it is not always easy to establish a regular system of reconstruction.

Let us use the root *KRZ 'to cultivate; to acquire'

For Proto-Berber we can (probably) reconstruct four tenses: Aorist, Perfect, Imperfect, Negative Perfect and Negative Imperfect.

For triradical roots the form is usually:

Aor. ăC1C2əC3 Perf. əC1C2ăC3 Impf. C1ăC2C2ăC3, Neg.Perf. əC1C2eC3, Neg.Impf. C1əC2C2əC3

So for the root KRZ its respective forms will look as follows:

Aor. *ăkrəz Perf. *əkrăz Impf. *kărrăz Neg.Perf. *əkrez Neg.Impf. *kərrəz

Even within this elegant system, we sometimes find irregularities in some languages. For example in the verb LMD 'to learn'  (a loanword from Punic) we usually find this system as above, but the Middle Atlas variety described by Amaniss we find a different form for the Imperfect.

Aor. əlməd Perf. əlməd Impf. tt-ələmad Neg.Perf. ləmid (MA doesn't have a Neg.Impf.)

In Mali Touareg (Heath 2006) this verb behaves as expected.

The imperfective prefix *tt- often shows up in verbs that have two radicals, or whose first radical is somehow 'weak'. The root *ʔKR 'to steal' for example conjugates as follows:

Aor. *ăʔkər Perf. *əʔkăr Impf. *tt-ăʔkăr Neg.Perf. *əʔker Neg.Impf. *tt-əʔkər

Word with an initial long vowel (<*h?) behave in the same way.

 So, since C1C1C2 verbs were originally *wC1C2, they technically have three radicals as well, so formally you would expect them to behave in the same way as a triradical root.

Let's take the root *KKS (<*WKS) 'to take away'

Aor. *ăkkəs Perf. *əkkăs Impf. *tt-ăkkăs Neg.Perf. *əkkes Neg.Impf. *tt-əkkəs

As you can see *w too is treated as a weak initial radical. Berber seems to have some avoidance of initial *w, *ʔ and long vowels (< *h?), but from these examples we can at least probably conclude that *ăwC and *əwC yield *ăCC and *əCC respectively.

Watchful readers may have noticed that there is not much evidence for a third consonant *w at all in the examples above. This is true, this suspcion is based on both the Verbal Noun formation and the verbal derivatons.

Verbal derivations work as follows *ss- is the causative prefix (no doubt familiar to those who have worked with Semitic) and *mm- is the reciprocal prefix. *ss- assimilates to any fricative in the root, and *mm- dissimilated to *nn- if there is an *mm- in the root. The passive prefix *tt-/*ttw- is also common and probably related to the *tt- prefix that you see in the weak-initial roots.

*ss-LMD 'to teach'

Aor. *əss-əlməd Perf. *ăss-əlmăd Impf. *əss-ălmad

*mm-LMD 'to get to know each other'

Aor. *ənn-ălmăd Perf. *ănn-əlmăd Impf. *tt-ănn-ălmăd

*ZZY 'to get better'

Aor. *ăzzəy Perf. *əzzăy Impf. *ətt-ăzzăy

*ss-ZZY 'to cure'

Aor. *əzz-uzăy Perf.  *ăzz-uzăy Impf. *əzz-uzuy/*əzz-izuy

The variant *əzz-izuy as the impf. is quite common, and may be a dissimilation.

As you can see, the geminate is gone, and instead a u appears. This is the main reason why an initial radical *w is assumed (besides the verbal noun scheme of this type of verbs is uC1əC2).

So assuming that the *u is a regular reflex of *w in this context, can we understand why in the non-causative form we find a geminate and in the causative form we find a *u + single consonant?

Imposing the regular triradical vowel scheme of *ss-LMD on the once of *ss-WZY we would expect a hypothetical Pre-Proto-Berber paradigm:

Aor. **əss-əwzəy Perf. **ăss-əwzăy Impf. **əss-ăwzay

These forms definitely do not wrok perfectly. The aorist of *ss-WZY clearly has a final *ă. This in itself is quite surprising as ə-ə-ă is not a typicaly vowel pattern for the aorist.

As Kossmann shows in his Ayer Touareg grammar (pg. 57/58) Perf. vowel pattern *ă-ə-ă correspondes to *ə-ə-ə. While these vowel patterns are not directly assigned by him to causatives, the form of *ss-LMD seems to suggest that they do apply to to these derivations. (I'm pretty sure Kossmann wasn't the first to suggest this vowel pattern, nor is this the first publication to print this table, but I'm not sure who first proposed it).

The Perfect corresponds perfectly with *ss-LMD. The Imperfect differs quite a bit, as the 'full vowel' inserted before the last consonant in the WCC verbs is an *u not an *a. This almost looks as a sort of progressive vowel harmony. Let's, for the sake of the argument assume this is true, and let's assume that The Aor. form somehow innovated the final *ă, and that the Proto-Berber pattern followed the regular Aorist pattern *ə-ə-ə.

We are left with yet another problem, it would mean that əwC and ăwC yield *u, while earlier we established that these sequences yield əCC and ăCC.

The difference is, that this time there is a causative suffix *ss- in front of it. I don't find *ssə/ăwC > *ssuC a particularly convincing sound law, since nothing about the sound *ss motivates vocalisation. moreover the *mm- reciprocal causes the same vocalisation.

The thing *mm- and *ss- do have in common is that they're both geminate consonant prefixes (although this is not always the case in all Berber languages). Since these prefixes are geminate, and the person prefixes are not, in some way syllable weight or shape may play a role here.

It's almost too obvious to state, but because of the prefixes, the sequence ə/ăwC is always in a CVC context while in the non causative/reciprocal form it is sometimes in a VC context (1sg., 3pl.m./f. and the imperatives). But we would expect that the non-prefixed forms would then have an alternation between *ə/ăwC and *uC. Analogy could obviously play a role, but are the far more marginal 1sg., 3pl. and imperatives enough to influence, for example the commonly occuring 3sg.m. and 3sg.f.?

Another issue with this hypothesis is the question why the *tt- imperfective prefix doesn't cause vocalisation.

Also, if this hypothesis is correct (and I'm far from certain it is), we get in trouble with the verbal nouns of this type whose shape is *uCəC, this would mean we'd need an extra consonant prefixed (*w??) to get the desired syllable shape *wə/ăwCəC is not particularly elegant. Once again we can pull out the 'analogy' get-out-of-jail-free-card and say that the the original form was *awCəC and that the EA (état d'annexion) was *w-ăwCəC, and that the EA spread to the EL (état libre). But this is not entirely in line with what we know about triradical verbal nouns either which tend to have the shape *aC1C2aC3 and *aC1əC2C2uC3.

A final point that casts some doubt on the C1C1C2 verbs = wC1C2 verbs, is the fact that Proto-Berber has no issue with the sequence *ə/ăw or *ə/ăw in final position at all, where, without fail it is found in a CVC shape, without changing into *u (although it does in a great deal of Berber languages, comparative evidence shows this wasn't the case in Proto-Berber). But we should not that there indeed is a eerie absence of wC1C2 and yC1C2 roots.

To sum up:

While it is tempting to think that C1C1C2 verbs originally had an initial semi-vowel. It is almost impossible to find a defining context which motivated the assimlation of wC > CC on the one hand and a vocalisation of *ə/ăw > *u on the other hand. The Verbal nouns present a whole extra issue as their phonetic context seems more similar to the unprefixed forms of C1C1C2 verbs, while their reflex of *ə/ăw looks like a prefixed form.

Maybe the solution to this problem will not be available through internal reconstruction. Maybe, or knowledge of Semitic vocalic patterns can give us more insight. It is not outside of the realm of possibility that the Berber vocalic patterns underwent metathesis. Let's say if the Perfect triradical form actually corresponds to the Proto-Semitic perfect *C1aC2aC3 it would mean that *əC1C2ăC3 was originally *C1əC2ăC3 (vocalic problems aside). Then the causative form would correspond to the Proto-Semitic causative *S-vC1C2vC3, Proto-Berber *ss-əC1C2ăC3

So in a Pre-Proto-Berber stage we would have:

Stage 1: *wəzăy Causastive *ss-əwzăy.

Shift one: *əw > *u occurs.

Stage 2: *wəzăy Causastive *ss-uzăy

Shift two: vocalic metathesis occurs

Stage 3: *əwzăy Causastive *ss-uzăy

Shift three: assimilation of semi-vowel occurs

Proto-Berber *əzzăy Causastive *ss-uzăy

Would that work? Could it also account for the fact that the *tt- prefix does not cause this vocalisation of *u? I believe Proto-Semitic had *t-C1vC2vC3 > Arabic form VI t-CāCaC with a prefix *t.

Form VI is problematically reciprocal while form VII (*n- prefix ~ Berber *mm-?) is passive, which is the exact opposite of the Berber semantic distribution.

The solution is elegant, but I know nowhere near enough about Semitic vocalisation (and Proto-Afro-Asiatic for that matter) to confirm this hypothesis.

I hope this article hasn't become too rambly, and that, those who are interested can make sense of it. It's a difficult subject with a lot of different factors. Please let me know if anything is unclear and I'll attempt to rewrite it. I don't want you to break your head over some impossible formulation.

[EDIT] I just realized that in Semitic Linguistics, the Perfect is usually considered a secondary development from an original past participle, which explains that the suffix conjugation that goes with the perfect looks like the possesive conjugation. The 'true' form is the imperfect aC1C2iC3 with prefix conjugation (like Berber). So the clever scenario I came up with doesn't hold much ground, unless you want to assume a Berbero-Semiticsub-branch of Afro-Asiatic that had already developed this past participle class, after which Berber lost its suffix conjugation.

While possible, this is certainly a few too many steps with too little proof to feel entirely comfortable positing this. Alternatively it maybe be possible that the root of the perfect is similar to the Arabic form III, but I don't see the relation between transitive and perfect, nor do I think Arabic form III is reconstructable for Proto-Semitic.