Talk:kmieni

Etymology of "kmieni"

I have no knowledge or insight whatsoever in the history of Arabic and/or Maltese, but I did find several sources putting the Arabic word "كَمَان" (kamān) under the root "ك-م-ن", which is related to meanings like "to lay in wait", "to lay hid", "to hide / conceal oneself" and "to be red-eyed"; cf. http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2002.02.0005%3Aalphabetic+letter%3Dk%3Aroot%3Dkmn as well as [J.G. Hava, Arabic-English Dictionary for the Use of Students, Beyrut, Catholic Press, 1899] and [Hans Wehr, A Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic, Spoken Language Services, 1976, →ISBN]. All three also have "كَمِيْن" (kamīn) with meanings like "hidden", "latent", "unawares", "concealed", "secret", and one has "lying in ambush" as well.

I imagine that:

• lying in wait may be done very early in the morning;
• what is done very early is done hidden from sight of people not awake then nor aware of these doings;
• who got up (too) early may be red-eyed for tiredness.

So I wonder if (either of) these two Arabic words may have led to Maltese "kmieni". Is there anyone knowledgeable who could contribute to this, maybe just by disproving my thoughts?Redav (talk) 12:39, 28 July 2021 (UTC)

@Redav 1. That the dialectal Arabic كَمان (kamān, “also”) is from classical كَمَا أَنَّ (kamā ʔanna, “as well as that”) is generally agreed upon, to my knowledge. The sound development is regular and also the sense is the same, except that the classical word is a conjunction and therefore can only be used in the beginning of a sentence. At any rate this is the standard etymology. I'd like to see a source that claims it's actually from the root "k-m-n". (Merely grouping it under it for simplicity doesn't necessarily mean that.)

2. Whether the Maltese word, which doesn't after all mean "also", could be from "k-m-n" is another question. The point that "very early in the morning" could mean so much as "secretly" is not entirely implausible. However, kamīn would yield Maltese "kmin", not "kmieni". I mean, yeah, in absence of an accepted etymology, some educated speculation can't do much harm, as long as it's indicated as such. 90.186.170.208 23:24, 29 October 2021 (UTC)

I've added a sentence. For what it's worth, if we derive it from "secretly" it could also be from كِتْمان (kitmān), but I'll leave it at that. The Latin derivation remains the most plausible. Everything else is highly speculative, because the semantics don't really fit. 90.186.170.208 00:06, 30 October 2021 (UTC)

@90.186.170.208 Thanks for replying! On http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2002.02.0005%3Aalphabetic+letter%3Dk%3Aroot%3Dkmn there is also the word "كَمِين" with translations given as: hidden, secret; lying in ambush; latent. I have no knowledge whatsoever about the "laws" of sound change between Arabic (dialects) and Maltese. Recently I acquired a copy of [C.L. Dessoulavy, A Maltese-Arabic Word-List, Showing which of the corresponding Arabic roots are shared by other Semitic Tongues or used in the Quran, Luzac & Co., London, 1938]. There may or may not be discussion about the quality of the analyses by Dessoulavy. I could provide a photograph or two of the lines in the book dealing with "kmieni", if only I knew how to. (I am saying this because with my basic knowledge of the Arabic script I may add errors while copying the Arabic parts in Dessoulavy's handwritten description.) What I can make of it is the following. “Kmieni (early), cp. perhaps كَمَان (still) e.g. it is still early = مَان الوَقْت بدرى, or it might stand for كَمَا يَأْني.” But I am very uncertain of the correctness of my copying of the part “يَأْني”: it might actually be two words: “يَأْ ني”, and the “ني” might actually contain one or two other other letters (than the ones that are in my copying), which I would then not have managed to decipher. (I do know there are various kinds of handwriting and printing.) The "ي" might have to be a "ى".Redav (talk) 13:41, 30 October 2021 (UTC)

I have not yet managed to locate Luzac & Co. or its legal successor nor have I been able to find out (if and) when Dessoulavy has passed away (which might have an influence on the copyright), so I would not know how to check whether my photograph of just four lines of text in Dessoulavy's book may be uploaded for use on Wikipedia.Redav (talk) 15:42, 30 October 2021 (UTC)

I found the sources [1] and [2] where there is an, on the face of it, convincing plight for the Latin-based etymology, which might actually be added as sources for the (primary) etymology in the Wiktionary entry for "kmieni". As a non-specialist, I cannot argue with the plight.Redav (talk) 17:50, 31 October 2021 (UTC)

Yes, your source 2 was that on which this was based to begin with. Source 1 is new; it mentions the dialectal Arabic "kamân" as a possibility, so that's edifying for me because I came up with it myself. Nevertheless I now think it's unlikely. More than one dictionary seems to indicate that the primary meaning is "early in the morning", which was then generalised to "early". I therefore changed the wording again some days ago, but I've only seen your comments just now. 2.201.0.85 22:46, 8 November 2021 (UTC)