mrḥ

Egyptian

Etymology 1

Pronunciation

• (modern Egyptological) IPA^(key): /mɛrɛh/
  • Conventional anglicization: mereh

Verb

 3-lit.

1. (intransitive, of buildings and tools) to fall to ruin, to decay [since the 18th Dynasty]
2. (intransitive, of one’s ba or corpse, usually negated) to perish, to die
3. (intransitive, of plans, words, festivals, etc., usually negated) to come to nought, to perish, to be erased

Usage notes

Often found used in parallel with skj (“to perish”).

Inflection

Conjugation of mrḥ (triliteral / 3-lit. / 3rad.) — base stem: mrḥ, geminated stem: mrḥḥ

infinitival forms			imperative
infinitive	negatival complement	complementary infinitive1	singular	plural
mrḥ	mrḥw, mrḥ	mrḥt	mrḥ	mrḥ

‘pseudoverbal’ forms
stative stem	periphrastic imperfective2		periphrastic prospective2
mrḥ	ḥr mrḥ	m mrḥ	r mrḥ

suffix conjugation
aspect / mood	active	contingent
		aspect / mood	active
perfect	mrḥ.n	consecutive	mrḥ.jn
terminative	mrḥt
perfective3	mrḥ	obligative1	mrḥ.ḫr
imperfective	mrḥ
prospective3	mrḥ	potentialis1	mrḥ.kꜣ
subjunctive	mrḥ

verbal adjectives
aspect / mood	relative (incl. nominal / emphatic) forms	participles
	active	active	passive
perfect	mrḥ.n	—	—
perfective	mrḥ	mrḥ	mrḥ, mrḥw5, mrḥy5
imperfective	mrḥ, mrḥy, mrḥw5	mrḥ, mrḥj6, mrḥy6	mrḥ, mrḥw5
prospective	mrḥ, mrḥtj7	mrḥtj4, mrḥt4
Used in Old Egyptian; archaic by Middle Egyptian. Used mostly since Middle Egyptian. Archaic or greatly restricted in usage by Middle Egyptian. The perfect has mostly taken over the functions of the perfective, and the subjunctive and periphrastic prospective have mostly replaced the prospective. Declines using third-person suffix pronouns instead of adjectival endings: masculine .f/.fj, feminine .s/.sj, dual .sn/.snj, plural .sn. Only in the masculine singular. Only in the masculine. Only in the feminine.

Alternative forms

Alternative hieroglyphic writings of mrḥ  

mrḥw	mrḥw
[Greco-Roman Period]	[Greco-Roman Period]

Etymology 2

Apparently a back-formation from mrḥt (“oil, fat”); compare the older verb wrḥ (“to anoint”), from which mrḥt itself may originally derive.

Pronunciation

• (modern Egyptological) IPA^(key): /mɛrɛh/
  • Conventional anglicization: mereh

Verb

 3-lit.

1. (transitive) to anoint [Late Period literature]
2. (transitive, with m) to coat or provide (a clay figurine) with (enamel)
3. (transitive) to lacquer (wood)

Inflection

Conjugation of mrḥ (triliteral / 3-lit. / 3rad.) — base stem: mrḥ, geminated stem: mrḥḥ

infinitival forms			imperative
infinitive	negatival complement	complementary infinitive1	singular	plural
mrḥ	mrḥw, mrḥ	mrḥt	mrḥ	mrḥ

‘pseudoverbal’ forms
stative stem	periphrastic imperfective2		periphrastic prospective2
mrḥ	ḥr mrḥ	m mrḥ	r mrḥ

suffix conjugation
aspect / mood	active	passive	contingent
			aspect / mood	active	passive
perfect	mrḥ.n	mrḥw, mrḥ	consecutive	mrḥ.jn	active + .tj1, .tw2
		active + .tj1, .tw2
terminative	mrḥt
perfective3	mrḥ	active + .tj1, .tw2	obligative1	mrḥ.ḫr	active + .tj1, .tw2
imperfective	mrḥ	active + .tj1, .tw2
prospective3	mrḥ	mrḥḥ	potentialis1	mrḥ.kꜣ	active + .tj1, .tw2
		active + .tj1, .tw2
subjunctive	mrḥ	active + .tj1, .tw2

verbal adjectives
aspect / mood	relative (incl. nominal / emphatic) forms		participles
	active	passive	active	passive
perfect	mrḥ.n	active + .tj1, .tw2	—	—
perfective	mrḥ	active + .tj1, .tw2	mrḥ	mrḥ, mrḥw5, mrḥy5
imperfective	mrḥ, mrḥy, mrḥw5	active + .tj1, .tw2	mrḥ, mrḥj6, mrḥy6	mrḥ, mrḥw5
prospective	mrḥ, mrḥtj7	—	mrḥtj4, mrḥt4
Used in Old Egyptian; archaic by Middle Egyptian. Used mostly since Middle Egyptian. Archaic or greatly restricted in usage by Middle Egyptian. The perfect has mostly taken over the functions of the perfective, and the subjunctive and periphrastic prospective have mostly replaced the prospective. Declines using third-person suffix pronouns instead of adjectival endings: masculine .f/.fj, feminine .s/.sj, dual .sn/.snj, plural .sn. Only in the masculine singular. Only in the masculine. Only in the feminine.

Etymology 3

Based on the form of the Coptic descendants, apparently the same word as mrḥt (“oil, fat”) in origin; with the loss of syllable-final -t, the originally-feminine word was reanalyzed as a masculine noun when used in the sense of ‘asphalt’.

Pronunciation

 

• (reconstructed) IPA^(key): /məˈɾeħə/

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

• (modern Egyptological) IPA^(key): /mɛrɛh/
  • Conventional anglicization: mereh

Noun

 m

1. asphalt [Late Period literature]

Descendants

• Demotic: mrḥ
  • Akhmimic Coptic: ⲁⲙⲣⲏϩⲉ (amrēhe)
  • Bohairic Coptic: ⲙⲣⲉϩⲓ (mrehi), ⲉⲙⲣⲉϩⲓ (emrehi), ⲙⲃⲣⲉϩⲓ (mbrehi), ⲃⲣⲉϩⲓ (brehi), ⲉⲣⲡⲣⲉϩⲓ (erprehi)
  • Fayyumic Coptic: ⲁⲙⲣⲉϩⲓ (amrehi)
  • Sahidic Coptic: ⲁⲙⲣⲏϩⲉ (amrēhe), ⲁⲙⲣⲉϩⲉ (amrehe)

References

• “mrḥ (lemma ID 72810)”, “mrḥ (lemma ID 72790)”, and “mrḥ (lemma ID 72800)”, in Thesaurus Linguae Aegyptiae‎^[1], Corpus issue 18, Web app version 2.1.5, Tonio Sebastian Richter & Daniel A. Werning by order of the Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften and Hans-Werner Fischer-Elfert & Peter Dils by order of the Sächsische Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Leipzig, 2004–26 July 2023
• Erman, Adolf, Grapow, Hermann (1928) Wörterbuch der ägyptischen Sprache‎^[2], volume 2, Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, →ISBN, pages 111.11–112.1
• Faulkner, Raymond Oliver (1962) A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, Oxford: Griffith Institute, →ISBN, page 112