kꜣm

Egyptian

Etymology

Possibly from Proto-Afroasiatic *ka/urVm-; compare Proto-West Chadic *kurVm ("woods"), whence Kanuri kulimi (“forest”) and Hausa kurmi (“jungle”); as well as Proto-Semitic *karm, whence Hebrew כֶּרֶם (kerem, “vineyard”), Aramaic כַּרְמָא (karmā, “vineyard”), Arabic كَرْم (karm, “vineyard”). However, Peust argues that these Semitic words must be borrowed from Egyptian, as the Egyptian word seems to have originally been kꜣnw before undergoing a sound change that caused the coalescence of the two final consonants into m.

Pronunciation

 

• (reconstructed) IPA^(key): /ˈkaʀnVw/ → /ˈkaʀm/ → /ˈkoːm/

• (Old Egyptian, c. 2500 BCE) IPA^(key): /ˈkaʀnVw/

  where V represents an unknown short vowel.

• (Middle Egyptian, c. 1700 BCE) IPA^(key): /ˈkaʀm/

  where V represents an unknown short vowel.

• (latest Late Egyptian, c. 800 BCE) IPA^(key): /ˈkoːm/

• (modern Egyptological) IPA^(key): /kɑm/
  • Conventional anglicization: kam

Noun

 m

1. vineyard

Inflection

Declension of kꜣm (masculine)

singular	kꜣm
dual	kꜣmwj
plural	kꜣmw

Alternative forms

Alternative hieroglyphic writings of kꜣm  

kꜣm

Derived terms

• kꜣmw

Descendants

• Demotic: kꜣm
  • Coptic: ϭⲱⲙ (cōm)

References

• Erman, Adolf, Grapow, Hermann (1931) Wörterbuch der ägyptischen Sprache‎^[1], volume 5, Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, →ISBN, pages 106.3–106.9
• Peust, Carsten (1999) Egyptian Phonology: An Introduction to the Phonology of a Dead Language‎^[2], Göttingen: Peust und Gutschmidt Verlag GbR, page 163