Croft’s cycle in Arabic: The negative existential cycle in a single language

Abstract

AbstractThe negative existential cycle has been shown to be operative in several language families. Here it is shown that it also operates within a single language. It happens that the existentialfīthat has been adduced as an example of a type A in the Arabic of Damascus, Syria, negated with the standard spoken Arabic verbal negatormā, does not participate in a negative cycle, but another Arabic existential particle does. Reflexes of the existential particlešay(y)/šē/šī/šiof southern peninsular Arabic dialects enter into a type A > B configuration as a univerbation betweenmāand the existential particlešiin reflexes ofmaši. It also enters that configuration in others as a univerbation betweenmā, the 3rd-person pronounshūorhī, and the existential particlešīin reflexes ofmahūš/mahīš. At that point, the existential particlešīloses its identity as such to be reanalyzed as a negator, with reflexes ofmahūš/mahīšnegating all manner of non-verbal predications except existentials. As such, negators formed of reflexes ofšīskip a stage B, but they re-enter the cycle at stage B > C, when reflexes ofmahūš/mahīšbegin negating some verbs. The consecutive C stage is encountered only in northern Egyptian and southern Yemeni dialects. An inchoate stage C > A appears only in dialects of Lower Egypt.