The language serves as the officialworking language of the Ethiopian federal government, and is also the official or working language of several ofEthiopia's federal regions.[11] In 2020 in Ethiopia, it had over 33.7 million mother-tongue speakers of which 31 million are ethnically Amhara, and more than 25.1 millionsecond language speakers in 2019, making thetotal number of speakers over 58.8 million.[12][13] Amharic is the largest, most widely spoken language in Ethiopia, and the most spoken mother-tongue in Ethiopia. Amharic is also the second most widely spoken Semitic language in the world (afterArabic).[14][15]
Amharic is written left-to-right using a system that grew out of theGeʽez script.[16] The segmentalwriting system in which consonant-vowel sequences are written as units is called anabugida (አቡጊዳ).[17] The graphemes are calledfidäl (ፊደል), which means'script, alphabet, letter, character'.
There is no universally agreed-uponRomanization of Amharic intoLatin script. The Amharic examples in the sections below use one system that is common among linguists specializing in Ethiopian Semitic languages.
TheBeta Israel who today live mostly in Israel speak a dialect of Amharic called Jewish Amharic (Hebrew:אמהרית מעוברת). It replaced many Christian phrases with Jewish ones. One example is the replacing the phrase "It is good that Mary had pardoned you" with "It is good that God has relieved you peacefully"; these phrases are used to congratulate a mother on successful childbirth. Another example is calling a type of grasshopper "Moses's horses" instead of "Mary's horses".[20] This variety also contains influence fromModern Hebrew due to the large Beta Israel presence in Israel. Currently Jewish Amharic is declining as the Beta Israel gradually abandon Amharic in favor of Hebrew.[20]
Amharic has been the official working language of Ethiopia, language of the courts, the language of trade and everyday communications and of the military since the late 12th century. The Amhara nobles supported theZagwe princeLalibela in his power struggle against his brothers which led him to make AmharicLisane Negus (tongue of the king) as well as fill theAmhara nobles in the top positions of his kingdom.[21] The appellation of'language of the king' (Ge'ez:ልሳነ ነጋሢ,Lǝssanä nägaśi;Amharic:የነጋሢ ቋንቋ,Yä-nägaśi qʷanqʷa) and its use in the royal court are otherwise traced to theAmhara EmperorYekuno Amlak.[22][23] It is one of theofficial languages ofEthiopia, together with other regions likeOromo,Somali,Afar, andTigrinya. Amharic is an Afro-Asiatic language of the Southwest Semitic group and is related toGeʽez, or Ethiopic, the liturgical language of the Ethiopian Orthodox church; Amharic is written in a slightly modified form of the alphabet used for writing the Geʽez language. There are 34 basic characters, each of which has seven forms depending on which vowel is to be pronounced in the syllable. There are also 49 "wa" letters, which form compound sounds involving "w." All together, the alphabet has some 280 letters. Until 2020 Amharic was the sole official language of Ethiopia.[24][25][5][26][27] The 2007 census reported that Amharic was spoken by 21.6 million native speakers in Ethiopia.[28] More recent sources state the number of first-language speakers in 2018 as nearly 32 million, with another 25 million second-language speakers in Ethiopia.[14] Additionally, 3 million emigrants outside of Ethiopia speak the language.[citation needed] Most of theEthiopian Jewish communities in Ethiopia andIsrael speak Amharic.[29][citation needed][30] Furthermore, Amharic is considered aholy language by theRastafari religion and is widely used among its followers worldwide.
TheEthiopian anthem (since 1992) in Amharic, done on manual typewriter.
EarlyAfro-Asiatic populations speaking proto-Semitic, proto-Cushitic and proto-Omotic languages would have diverged by the fourth or fifth millennium BC. Shortly afterwards, the proto-Cushitic and proto-Omotic groups would have settled in the Ethiopian highlands, with the proto-Semitic speakers crossing theSinai Peninsula intoAsia. A later return movement of peoples fromSouth Arabia would have introduced the Semitic languages to Ethiopia.[31] Based on archaeological evidence, the presence of Semitic speakers in the territory date to some time before 500 BC.[32] Linguistic analysis suggests the presence of Semitic languages in Ethiopia as early as 2000 BC. Levine indicates that by the end of that millennium, the core inhabitants of Greater Ethiopia would have consisted of dark-skinned agropastoralists speaking Afro-Asiatic languages of the Semitic, Cushitic and Omotic branches.[31]
Other scholars such as Messay Kebede and Daniel E. Alemu argue that migration across the Red Sea was defined by reciprocal exchange, if it even occurred at all, and that Ethio-Semitic-speaking ethnic groups should not be characterized as foreign invaders.[33][34]
Amharic is a South Ethio-Semitic language, along withGurage,Argobba,Harari, and others.[35][36][37] WhileTigrinya is 68% similar to Geʽez, the lexical similarity of Amharic to the ancient language is lower at 62%.[38] Due to the social stratification of the time, the CushiticAgaw adopted the South Ethio-Semitic language and eventually absorbed the Semitic population.[39][40][41][42] Amharic thus developed a larger Cushiticsubstratum than the more northwardly languages where it also exists such as theModern South Arabian family, along with the Semiticsuperstratum.[43][44] The northernmost South Ethio-Semitic speakers, or the proto-Amhara, remained in constant contact with their North Ethio-Semitic neighbors, evidenced by linguistic analysis and oral traditions.[45][46] A 7th century southward shift of the center of gravity of theKingdom of Aksum and the ensuing integration and Christianization of the proto-Amhara also resulted in a high prevalence of Geʽez sourced lexicon in Amharic.[47][48][49] Some time after the 9th century AD, Amharic diverged from its closest relative,Argobba, probably due to religious differences as theArgobba adopted Islam.[50]
In 1983, Lionel Bender proposed that Amharic may have been constructed as apidgin as early as the 4th century AD to enable communication between Aksumite soldiers speaking Semitic, Cushitic, and Omotic languages, but this hypothesis has not garnered widespread acceptance. The preservation in Old Amharic ofVSO word order andgutturals typical of Semitic languages, Cushitic influences shared with other Ethio-Semitic languages (especially those of the Southern branch), and the number of geographically distinct Cushitic languages that have influenced Amharic at different points in time support anatural evolution of Amharic from a Proto-Ethio-Semitic language with considerable Cushitic influences (similar to Gurage, Tigrinya, etc.).[51][35][52]
Based off Amharic terms loaned into nearby languages, and the distinction between /ʔ/, /a/, /x/, /h/, and /ħ/ in the earliest known written form of the language, pre-17th century Amharic exhibited all thephonemes typical of Semitic languages. Along with that, pre-Gondarine period Amharic was not a rigidlySOV word order language as it is today and a VSO order like that ofGeʽez andClassical Arabic was common. During the end of themedieval period a transition from the more Semtic-featured earlier version of the language, along with other sound shifts, to the more innovative modern Amharic took place.[53][54]
The Ethiopic (or Geʽez) writing system is visible on the side of thisEthiopian AirlinesFokker 50: it reads "Ethiopia's":የኢትዮጵያye-ʾityop̣p̣ya.
The Amharic script is anabugida, and thegraphemes of the Amharic writing system are calledfidäl.[53] It is derived from a modification of theGeʽez script.[16] Each character represents a consonant+vowel sequence, but the basic shape of each character is determined by the consonant, which is modified for the vowel. Some consonantphonemes are written by more than one series of characters:/ʔ/,/s/,/tsʼ/, and/h/ (the last one hasfour distinct letter forms). This is because thesefidäl originally represented distinct sounds, butphonological changes merged them.[53] The citation form for each series is the consonant+ä form, i.e. the first column of thefidäl. TheAmharic script is included inUnicode, and glyphs are included in fonts available with major operating systems.
A modern usage of Amharic: the label of aCoca-Cola bottle. The script readsኮካ-ኮላ (koka-kola).
As in most otherEthiopian Semitic languages,gemination iscontrastive in Amharic. That is, consonant length can distinguish words from one another; for example,alä 'he said',allä 'there is';yǝmätall 'he hits',yǝmmättall 'he will be hit'. Gemination is not indicated in Amharic orthography, but Amharic readers typically do not find this to be a problem. This property of the writing system is analogous to the vowels ofArabic andHebrew or thetones of manyBantu languages, which are not normally indicated in writing. Ethiopian novelistHaddis Alemayehu, who was an advocate of Amharicorthography reform, indicated gemination in his novelLove to the Grave by placing a dot above the characters whose consonants were geminated, but this practice is rare.
Amharic grammar distinguishesperson,number, and oftengender. This includespersonal pronouns such as EnglishI, Amharicእኔǝne; Englishshe, Amharicእሷǝsswa. As in other Semitic languages, the same distinctions appear in three other places in their grammar.
Subject–verb agreement
All Amharic verbsagree with theirsubjects; that is, the person, number, and (in the second- and third-person singular) gender of the subject of the verb are marked bysuffixes or prefixes on the verb. Because the affixes that signal subject agreement vary greatly with the particular verbtense/aspect/mood, they are normally not considered to be pronouns and are discussed elsewhere in this article under verbconjugation.
Object pronoun suffixes
Amharic verbs often have additional morphology that indicates the person, number, and (second- and third-person singular) gender of the object of the verb.
While morphemes such as-at in this example are sometimes described as signalingobject agreement, analogous to subject agreement, they are more often thought of as object pronounsuffixes[citation needed] because, unlike the markers of subject agreement, they do not vary significantly with the tense/aspect/mood of the verb. Forarguments of the verb other than the subject or the object, there are two separate sets of related suffixes, one with abenefactive meaning (to,for), the other with an adversative or locative meaning (against,to the detriment of,on,at).
Morphemes such as-llat and-bbat in these examples will be referred to in this article asprepositional object pronoun suffixes because they correspond to prepositional phrases such asfor her andon her, to distinguish them from thedirect object pronoun suffixes such as-at 'her'.
Possessive suffixes
Amharic has a further set of morphemes that are suffixed to nouns, signalingpossession:ቤትbet'house',ቤቴbete,'my house',ቤቷ;betwa,'her house'.
In each of these four aspects of the grammar, independent pronouns, subject–verb agreement, object pronoun suffixes, and possessive suffixes, Amharic distinguishes eight combinations of person, number, and gender. For first person, there is a two-way distinction between singular (I) and plural (we), whereas for second and third persons, there is a distinction between singular and plural and within the singular a further distinction between masculine and feminine (you m. sg.,you f. sg.,you pl.,he,she,they).
Amharic is apro-drop language: neutral sentences in which no element is emphasized normally omit independent pronouns:ኢትዮጵያዊ ነውʾityop̣p̣yawi näw 'he's Ethiopian',ጋበዝኳትgabbäzkwat 'I invited her'. The Amharic words that translatehe,I, andher do not appear in these sentences as independent words. However, in such cases, the person, number, and (second- or third-person singular) gender of the subject and object are marked on the verb. When the subject or object in such sentences is emphasized, an independent pronoun is used:እሱ ኢትዮጵያዊ ነውǝssu ʾityop̣p̣yawi näw 'he's Ethiopian',እኔ ጋበዝኳትǝne gabbäzkwat 'I invited her',እሷን ጋበዝኳትǝsswan gabbäzkwat 'I invitedher'.
The table below shows alternatives for many of the forms. The choice depends on what precedes the form in question, usually whether this is a vowel or a consonant, for example, for the first-person singular possessive suffix,ሀገሬhagär-e 'my country',ገላዬgäla-ye 'my body'.
Amharic personal pronouns
English
Independent
Object pronoun suffixes
Possessive suffixes
Direct
Prepositional
Benefactive
Locative/ adversative
I
እኔ ǝne
-(ä/ǝ)ñ
-(ǝ)llǝñ
-(ǝ)bbǝñ
-(y)e
you (m. sg.)
አንተ antä
-(ǝ)h
-(ǝ)llǝh
-(ǝ)bbǝh
-(ǝ)h
you (f. sg.)
አንቺ anči
-(ǝ)š
-(ǝ)llǝš
-(ǝ)bbǝš
-(ǝ)š
you (polite)
እርስዎ ərswo
-(ǝ)wo(t)
-(ǝ)llǝwo(t)
-(ǝ)bbǝwo(t)
-wo
he
እሱ ǝssu
-(ä)w,-t
-(ǝ)llät
-(ǝ)bbät
-(w)u
she
እሷ ǝsswa
-at
-(ǝ)llat
-(ǝ)bbat
-wa
s/he (polite)
እሳቸው ǝssaččäw
-aččäw
-(ǝ)llaččäw
-(ǝ)bbaččäw
-aččäw
we
እኛ ǝñña
-(ä/ǝ)n
-(ǝ)llǝn
-(ǝ)bbǝn
-aččǝn
you (pl.)
እናንተ ǝnnantä
-aččǝhu
-(ǝ)llaččǝhu
-(ǝ)bbaččǝhu
-aččǝhu
they
እነሱ ǝnnässu
-aččäw
-(ǝ)llaččäw
-(ǝ)bbaččäw
-aččäw
Within second- and third-person singular, there are two additional polite independent pronouns, for reference to people to whom the speaker wishes to show respect. This usage is an example of the so-calledT–V distinction that is made in many languages. The polite pronouns in Amharic areእርስዎǝrswo 'you (sg. polite)'. andእሳቸውǝssaččäw 's/he (polite)'. Although these forms are singular semantically—they refer to one person—they correspond to third-person plural elsewhere in the grammar, as is common in other T–V systems. For the possessive pronouns, however, the polite 2nd person has the special suffix-wo 'your sg. pol.'
For possessive pronouns ('mine', 'yours', etc.), Amharic adds the independent pronouns to the prepositionyä- 'of':የኔyäne 'mine',ያንተyantä 'yours m. sg.',ያንቺyanči 'yours f. sg.',የሷyässwa 'hers', etc.
Forreflexive pronouns ('myself', 'yourself', etc.), Amharic adds the possessive suffixes to the nounራስras 'head':ራሴrase 'myself',ራሷraswa 'herself', etc.
Like English, Amharic makes a two-way distinction between near ('this, these') and far ('that, those')demonstrative expressions (pronouns, adjectives, adverbs). Besides number, Amharic – unlike English – also distinguishes between the masculine and the feminine genders in the singular.
Amharic demonstrative pronouns
Number, Gender
Near
Far
Singular
Masculine
ይህyǝh(ǝ)
ያya
Feminine
ይቺyǝčči,ይህችyǝhǝčč
ያቺ yačči
Plural
እነዚህǝnnäzzih
እነዚያǝnnäzziya
There are also separate demonstratives for formal reference, comparable to the formal personal pronouns:እኚህǝññih 'this, these (formal)' andእኒያǝnniya 'that, those (formal)'.
The singular pronouns have combining forms beginning withzz instead ofy when they follow a preposition:ስለዚህsǝläzzih 'because of this; therefore',እንደዚያǝndäzziya 'like that'. The plural demonstratives, like the second and third person plural personal pronouns, are formed by adding the plural prefixእነǝnnä- to the singular masculine forms.
Amharic nouns can have a masculine or femininegender. There are several ways to express gender. An example is the old suffix-t for femininity. This suffix is no longer productive and is limited to certain patterns and some isolated nouns. Nouns and adjectives ending in-awi usually take the suffix-t to form the feminine form, e.g.ityop̣p̣ya-(a)wi 'Ethiopian (m.)' vs.ityop̣p̣ya-wi-t 'Ethiopian (f.)';sämay-awi 'heavenly (m.)' vs.sämay-awi-t 'heavenly (f.)'. This suffix also occurs in nouns and adjective based on the patternqǝt(t)ul, e.g.nǝgus 'king' vs.nǝgǝs-t 'queen' andqǝddus 'holy (m.)' vs.qǝddǝs-t 'holy (f.)'.
Some nouns and adjectives take a feminine marker-it:lǝǧ 'child, boy' vs.lǝǧ-it 'girl';bäg 'sheep, ram' vs.bäg-it 'ewe';šǝmagǝlle 'senior, elder (m.)' vs.šǝmagǝll-it 'old woman';ṭoṭa 'monkey' vs.ṭoṭ-it 'monkey (f.)'. Some nouns have this feminine marker without having a masculine opposite, e.g.šärär-it 'spider',azur-it 'whirlpool, eddy'. There are, however, also nouns with the-it suffix that are treated as masculine:säraw-it 'army',nägar-it 'big drum'.
The feminine gender is not only used to indicate biological gender, but may also be used to express smallness, e.g.bet-it-u 'the little house' (lit. house-FEM-DEF). The feminine marker can also serve to express tenderness or sympathy.
Amharic has special words that can be used to indicate the gender of people and animals. For people,wänd is used for masculinity andset for femininity, e.g.wänd lǝǧ 'boy',set lǝǧ 'girl';wänd hakim 'physician, doctor (m.)',set hakim 'physician, doctor (f.)'.
For animals, the wordstäbat,awra, orwänd (less usual) can be used to indicate masculine gender, andanəst orset to indicate feminine gender. Examples:täbat ṭǝǧǧa 'calf (m.)';awra doro 'cock (rooster)';set doro 'hen'.
The plural suffix-očč is used to express plurality of nouns. Somemorphophonological alternations occur depending on the final consonant or vowel. For nouns ending in a consonant, plain-očč is used:bet 'house' becomesbet-očč 'houses'. For nouns ending in aback vowel (-a, -o, -u), the suffix takes the form-ʷočč, e.g.wǝšša 'dog',wǝšša-ʷočč 'dogs';käbäro 'drum',käbäro-ʷočč 'drums'. Nouns that end in afront vowel pluralize using-ʷočč or-yočč, e.g.ṣähafi 'scholar',ṣähafi-ʷočč orṣähafi-yočč 'scholars'. Another possibility for nouns ending in a vowel is to delete the vowel and use plainočč, as inwǝšš-očč 'dogs'.
Besides using the normal external plural (-očč), nouns and adjectives can be pluralized by way ofreduplicating one of theradicals. For example,wäyzäro 'lady' can take the normal plural, yieldingwäyzär-očč, butwäyzazər 'ladies' is also found.[58]: 173
Somekinship-terms have two plural forms with a slightly different meaning. For example,wändǝmm 'brother' can be pluralized aswändǝmm-očč 'brothers' but also aswändǝmmam-ač 'brothers of each other'. Likewise,ǝhǝt 'sister' can be pluralized asǝhǝt-očč ('sisters'), but also asǝtǝmm-am-ač 'sisters of each other'.
Incompound words, the plural marker is suffixed to the second noun:betä krǝstiyan 'church' (lit. house of Christian) becomesbetä krǝstiyan-očč 'churches'.
Amsalu Aklilu has pointed out that Amharic has inherited a large number of old plural forms directly from Classical Ethiopic (Geʽez) (Amharic:gǝ'ǝz).[58]: 172 There are basically two archaic pluralising strategies, called external andinternal plural. The external plural consists of adding the suffix-an (usually masculine) or-at (usually feminine) to the singular form. The internal plural employs vowel quality orapophony to pluralize words, similar to Englishman vs.men andgoose vs.geese. Sometimes combinations of the two systems are found. The archaic plural forms are sometimes used to form new plurals, but this is only considered grammatical in more established cases.
Examples of the external plural:ምምህርmämhǝr 'teacher',ምምህራንmämhǝr-an;ṭäbibጠቢብ 'wise person',ተቢባንṭäbib-an;ካህንkahǝn 'priest',ካህናትkahǝn-at;ቃልqal 'word',ካላትqal-at.
Examples of the internal plural:ድንግልdǝngǝl 'virgin',ድናግልdänagǝl;ሃገርhagär 'land',ኣህጉርahǝgur.
Examples of combined systems:ንጉስnǝgus 'king',ነገስትnägäs-t;ኮክብkokäb 'star',ክዋክብትkäwakǝb-t;ምጽሓፍmäṣǝhaf 'book',መጻህፍትmäṣahǝf-t.
If a noun is definite orspecified, this is expressed by a suffix, thearticle, which is -u or -w for masculine singular nouns and-wa,-itwa or-ätwa for feminine singular nouns. For example:
masculine sg
masculine sg definite
feminine sg
feminine sg definite
ቤት
bet
ቤት
bet
house
ቤቱ
bet-u
ቤቱ
bet-u
the house
ሠራተኛ
särratäñña
ሠራተኛ
särratäñña
maid
ሠራተኛዋ
särratäñña-wa
ሠራተኛዋ
särratäñña-wa
the maid
In singular forms, this article distinguishes between the male and female gender; in plural forms this distinction is absent, and all definites are marked with -u, e.g.bet-očč-u 'the houses',gäräd-očč-u 'the maids'. As in the plural,morphophonological alternations occur depending on the final consonant or vowel.
Amharic has an accusative marker, -(ə)n. Its use is related to the definiteness of the object, thus Amharic showsdifferential object marking. In general, if the object is definite, possessed, or a proper noun, the accusative must be used, but if the direct object is not determined, the accusative marker is generally not used.[58]: 181–182 ff.
Amharic has various ways to derive nouns from other words or other nouns. One way of nominalizing consists of a form ofvowel agreement (similar vowels on similar places) inside the three-radical structures typical ofSemitic languages. For example:
-e, suffixed to place name X, yields 'a person from X':goǧǧam-e 'someone fromGojjam'.
-äñña and-täñña serve to express profession, or some relationship with the base noun:ǝgr-äñña 'pedestrian' (fromǝgǝr 'foot');bärr-äñña 'gate-keeper' (frombärr 'gate').
Amharic lacks a specific verb ‘to have’. Instead, it uses verbs of existence combined with an object suffix pronoun. For the present, the verbአለallä ‘there is’ is used. For the past,ነበረnäbbärä ‘there was’ is used, and for the future, the imperfect ofኖረnorä,ይኖራልyənorall is used. Thus, a sentence likeአራት፡መጽሐፍ፡አለኝaratt mäṣhaf alläññ ‘I have four books’ literally translates to ‘four books is-to-me’. Furthermore, since the possessee is the subject, the verb agrees with the possessee rather than the possessor.[58]: 439
The basic meaning of Amharic verbs are given by its consonants known as 'radicals' with vowels used to express shades of meaning. They can be divided into the following classes: triradicals, biradicals, quadriradicals, and pluriradicals or verbs with more than four radicals.[58]: 280–282
In biradicals the 2nd consonant is geminated in the perfect if it is the 2nd radical of the root. The only classes to have three types are:ሰማsämma andቀረqärrä. Other biradicals only have one type.
Derived stems are formed by either reduplication of the 2nd radical in triadicals, and of the 3rd radical in quadriradicals, or by prefixing morphemes.
As in otherSemitic languages, Amharic verbs use a combination of prefixes and suffixes to indicate the subject, distinguishing three persons, two numbers, and (in the second and third persons singular) two genders.
The perfect is typically used to express the past and formed using suffixes.[58]: 287–292
Perfect conjugation
Pronoun
Suffix
Example verbሰበረsäbbärä “to break”
I
-hu, ku
ሰበርሁ/ሰበርኩsäbbarhu/säbbärku
you (m. sg.)
-h, -k
ሰበርህ/ሰበክsäbbarh/säbbärk
you (f. sg.)
-š
ሰበርሽsäbbärš
he
-ä
ሰበረsäbbärä
she
-äčč
ሰበረችsäbbäräčč
we
-(ə)n
ሰበርንsäbbärn
you (pl.)
-aččəhu
ሰበራችሁsäbbäraččəhu
they, (s)he (polite), you (polite)
-
ሰበሩsäbbäru
The negative perfect is formed by adding the prefixአል-al- and the suffix-ም-(ə)mm to the affirmative perfect, though the suffix-ም-əm may be omitted in subordinate clauses introduced by a conjunction or relative marker.
The simple imperfect form is used for the present and future in the main negative clause, and both affirmative and negative in subordinate clauses, including the relative clause. It is formed used using a combination of prefixes and suffixes.[58]: 301–303
Simple Imperfect conjugation
Pronoun
Prefix and suffix
Type A Examplesäb(ə)r
Type B Examplefälləg
Type C Examplemarrək
I
ə-
እሰብርəsäbr
እፈልግəfälləg
እማርክəmarrək
you (m. sg.)
tə-
ትሰብርtəsäbr
ትፈልግtəfälləg
ትማርክtəmarrək
you (f. sg.)
tə- -i
ትሰብሪtəsäbri
ትፈልጊtəfälləgi
ትማርኪtəmarrəki
he
yə-
ይሰብርyəsäbr
ይፈልግyəfälləg
ይማርክyəmarrək
she
tə-
ትሰብርtəsäbr
ትፈልግtəfälləg
ትማርክtəmarrək
we
ənnə-/ən-
እንሰብርənnəsäbr/ənsäbr
እንፈልግənnəfälləg/ənfälləg
እንማርክənnəmarrək/ənmarrək
you (pl.)
tə- -u
ትሰብሩtəsäbru
ትፈልጉtəfälləgu
ትማርኩtəmarrəku
they, (s)he (polite), you (polite)
yə- -u
ይሰብሩyəsäbru
ይፈልጉyəfälləgu
ይማርኩyəmarrəku
The negative imperfect is formed by adding the prefixአ-a- and the suffix-ም-(ə)mm.
The compound imperfect is used to express the present or future in the main clause and is formed by combining with simple imperfect with the verbአለallä.[58]: 341–344
Thejussive is formed using the same prefixes and suffixes as the imperfect except for the 1st person singular, which usesልlə-. The 2nd person is only used in the negative jussive which formed using the prefixአa-.[58]: 347–348
Theimperative is used for orders and commands, and only has forms for the second person singular and plural. Negative imperatives are expressed using the negative jussive.[58]: 353
Participles are derived from basic and derived stems. The participle forms of triradicals for type A isሰባሪsäbari, for type Bፈላጊfällagi, and for type Cማራኪmaraki .[58]: 390
The verbal noun of a regular triradical is formed by prefixingመmä- to the form-ስበር-sbär for type A,-ፈለገ-fällägä for type B, and-ማረከ-marräkä for type C.[58]: 393
Along with the infinitive and the present participle, the gerund is one of threenon-finite verb forms. The infinitive is a nominalized verb, the present participle expresses incomplete action, and the gerund expresses completed action, e.g.ali məsabältowädä gäbäya hedä 'Ali, having eaten lunch, went to the market'. There are several usages of the gerund depending on its morpho-syntactic features.
The gerund functions as the head of a subordinate clause (see the example above). There may be more than one gerund in one sentence. The gerund is used to form the following tense forms:
present perfectnägro-all/näbbär 'He has said'.
past perfectnägronäbbär 'He had said'.
possible perfectnägroyǝhonall 'He (probably) has said'.
Adjectives are words or constructions used to qualify nouns. Adjectives in Amharic can be formed in several ways: they can be based on nominal patterns, or derived from nouns, verbs and other parts of speech. Adjectives can be nominalized by way of suffixing the nominal article (seeNouns above). Amharic has few primary adjectives. Some examples aredägg 'kind, generous',dǝda 'mute, dumb, silent',bič̣a 'yellow'.
The adjective and the noun together are called the 'adjective noun complex'. In Amharic, the adjective precedes the noun, with the verb last; e.g.kǝfu geta 'a bad master';təlləqbetsärra (lit. big house he-built) 'he built a big house'.
If the adjective noun complex isdefinite, the definite article is suffixed to the adjective and not to the noun, e.g.tǝllǝq-u bet (lit. big-def house) 'the big house'. In a possessive construction, the adjective takes the definite article, and the noun takes the pronominal possessive suffix, e.g.tǝllǝq-u bet-e (lit. big-def house-my)'my big house'.
When enumerating adjectives using-nna 'and', both adjectives take the definite article:qonǧo-wa-nna astäway-wa lǝǧ mäṭṭačč (lit. pretty-def-and intelligent-def girl came)'the pretty and intelligent girl came'. In the case of an indefinite plural adjective noun complex, the noun is plural and the adjective may be used in singular or in plural form. Thus, 'diligent students' can be renderedtǝgu tämariʷočč (lit. diligent student-PLUR) ortəguʷočč tämariʷočč (lit. diligent-PLUR student-PLUR).
Baalu Girma (1939–1984), regarded as one of the greatest novelists, journalists and critiques in Ethiopia, with which one of his six works such asThe End.[59]
Haddis Alemayehu (1910–2003), foreign minister and novelist, author ofLove to the Grave, considered the greatest novel in contemporary Ethiopian literature.[60]
Haddis Alemayehu (1910–2003), foreign minister and novelist, including author ofLove to the Grave, considered the greatest novel in Ethiopian literature. The oldest surviving examples of written Amharic date back to the reigns of the 14th centuryEmperor of EthiopiaAmda Seyon I and his successors, who commissioned a number of poems known as "የወታደሮች መዝሙር" (Soldier songs) glorifying them and their troops. There is a growing body of literature in Amharic in many genres. This literature includes government proclamations and records, educational books, religious material, novels, poetry,proverb collections, dictionaries (monolingual and bilingual), technical manuals, medical topics, etc. The Bible was first translated into Amharic byAbu Rumi in the early 19th century, but othertranslations of the Bible into Amharic have been done since. The most famous Amharic novel isFiqir Iske Meqabir (transliterated various ways) byHaddis Alemayehu (1909–2003), translated into English by Sisay Ayenew with the titleLove unto Crypt, published in 2005 (ISBN978-1-4184-9182-6). Others includeBaalu Girma,Tsegaye Gabre-Medhin,Kebede Michael.
The wordRastafari comes fromRas Täfäri, thepre-regnal title ofHaile Selassie, composed of the Amharic wordsRas (literally'Head', an Ethiopian title equivalent toduke) and Haile Selassie's pre-regnal name, Tafari.[61]
Many Rastafarians learn Amharic as a second language, as they consider it to be sacred. After Haile Selassie's 1966 visit to Jamaica, study circles in Amharic were organized in Jamaica as part of the ongoing exploration of Pan-African identity and culture.[62] Variousreggae artists in the 1970s, includingRas Michael,Lincoln Thompson andMisty in Roots, have sung in Amharic, thus bringing the language to a wider audience.The Abyssinians, a reggae group, have also used Amharic, most notably in the song "Satta Massagana". The title was believed to mean'give thanks'; however, this phrase means'he thanked' or'he praised', assäṭṭä means'he gave', andamässägänä'thanks, praise'. The correct way to say'give thanks' in Amharic is one word,misgana. The wordsatta has become a common expression in the Rastafari dialect of English,Iyaric, meaning'to sit down and partake'.[63]
Amharic is supported on most majorLinux distributions, including Fedora and Ubuntu. Amharic script is included inUnicode, in theEthiopic block (U+1200 – U+137F). Nyala font is included on Windows 7 (seeYouTube video)[64] and Vista (AmharicLanguage Interface Pack)[65] to display and edit using the Amharic Script. In February 2010, Microsoft released itsWindows Vista operating system in Amharic, enabling Amharic speakers to use its operating system in their language.
Google added Amharic to itsLanguage Tools,[when?][66] which allows typing Amharic script online without an Amharic keyboard. Since 2004 Wikipedia has had an Amharic-language Wiki that uses Ethiopic script. There has been some work on building tools for information retrieval in Amharic with some success even before the recent advances in neural processing.[67][68][69][70]
^"Amharic".dictionary.com. Retrieved10 August 2013.
^Meyer, Ronny (2011). "The Role of Amharic as a National Language and an African lingua franca". In Stefan Weninger (ed.).The Semitic Languages. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. pp. 1212–1220.
^Gebremichael, M. (2011).Federalism and conflict management in Ethiopia: case study of Benishangul-Gumuz Regional State (PhD). United Kingdom: University of Bradford.hdl:10454/5388.
^Shaik Johny Basha; Duggineni Veeraiah; Boddu Venkat Charan; Wiltrud Sahithi Yeddu; Devalla Ganesh Babu (2023). "Detection and Comparative Analysis of Handwritten Words of Amharic Language to English using CNN-Based Frameworks".2023 International Conference on Inventive Computation Technologies (ICICT). pp. 422–427.doi:10.1109/ICICT57646.2023.10134103.ISBN979-8-3503-9849-6.S2CID259028086.
^Tefera, Anbessa (1999). "Differences Between the Amharic Dialects of Gondär and Addis Abäba". In Parfitt, T.; Semi, E. Trevisan (eds.).The Beta Israel in Ethiopia and Israel, Studies on the Ethiopian Jews. London: Curzon Press. pp. 257–263.ISBN0-7007-1092-2.
^Aklilu, Amsalu; Marcos, Habte Mariam (1973). "The dialect of Wällo".Journal of Ethiopian Studies.11 (2):124–29.JSTOR41988260.
^The Southern Marches of Imperial Ethiopia: Essays in History and Social Anthropology, Donham Donald Donham, Lecturer in Social Anthropology Wendy James, Dr, PhD, Former Senior Lecturer in Mathematics Christopher Clapham, Patrick Manning CUP Archive, Sep 4, 1986, p. 11,https://books.google.com/books?id=dvk8AAAAIAAJ&q=Lisane+amharic
^Teferra, Anbessa (2013). "Amharic: Political and social effects on English loan words". In Rosenhouse, Judith; Kowner, Rotem (eds.).Globally Speaking: Motives for Adopting English Vocabulary in Other Languages. Multilingual Matters. p. 165.
^abLevine, Donald N. (2014).Greater Ethiopia: The Evolution of a Multiethnic Society. University of Chicago Press. pp. 27–28.ISBN978-0-226-22967-6.The analysis of linguistic distributions suggests that the proto-Ethiopians of the third millennium B.C. spoke languages derived from a single stock, that is known as Hamito-Semitic or Afro-Asiatic. This ancestral language probably originated in the eastern Sahara, before the desiccation of that region... the homeland of Afro-Asiatic may have been in southwest Ethiopia. Wherever the origins of Afro-Asiatic, it seems clear that peoples speaking proto-Cushitic and proto-Omotic separated as groups with distinct languages by the fifth or fourth millennium BC and began peopling the Ethiopian plateaus not long after. Proto-Semitic separated at about the same time or somewhat earlier and passed over into Asia Minor... it seems reasonable to follow I. M. Diakonoff in assuming that the Semitic-speakers moved from the Sahara across the Nile Delta over Sinai, so that the presence of Semitic-speaking populations in Ethiopia must be attributed to a return movement of Semitic-speakers into Africa from South Arabia... As a base line for reconstructing the history of Greater Ethiopia, then, we may consider it plausible that by the end of the third millenium B.C. its main inhabitants were dark-skinned Caucasoid or "Afro-Mediterranean" peoples practicing rudimentary forms of agriculture and animal husbandry and speaking three branches of Afro-Asiatic – Semitic, Cushitic and Omotic.
^Alemu, Daniel E. (2007). "Re-imagining the Horn".African Renaissance.4 (1):56–64 – via Ingenta.
^abMeyer, Ronny (2011)."Amharic". In Weninger, Stefan (ed.).The Semitic Languages: An International Handbook. Walter De Gruyter. pp. 1178–1212.ISBN9783110251586.
^Edzard, Lutz (2019). "Amharic". In John Huehnergard; Naʽama Pat-El (eds.).The Semitic Languages. London: Routledge. pp. 202–226.
^Hetzron, Robert (1972).Ethiopian Semitic: Studies in Classification. Manchester University Press. p. 36.ISBN9780719011238.
^Bender, M. L. (May 1971). "The Languages of Ethiopia: A New Lexicostatistic Classification and Some Problems of Diffusion".Anthropological Linguistics.13 (5): 173.JSTOR30029540.
^Hetzron, Robert (1972).Ethiopian Semitic: Studies in Classification. Manchester University Press. pp. 36,87–88.ISBN9780719011238.
^Appleyard, David. "Amharic: History and dialectology of Amharic".Encyclopedia Aethopica. Vol. 1. p. 235.
^Prunier, Gérard; Ficquet, Éloi, eds. (2015).Understanding Contemporary Ethiopia: Monarchy, Revolution and the Legacy of Meles Zenawi. London: C. Hurst & Co. p. 19.ISBN9781849042611.
^Hetzron, Robert (1972).Ethiopian Semitic: Studies in Classification. Manchester University Press. p. 124.ISBN9780719011238.
^Hetzron, Robert (1972).Ethiopian Semitic: Studies in Classification. Manchester University Press. pp. 22, 67, 88.ISBN9780719011238.
^abcHudson, Grover (2009). "Amharic". In Comrie, Bernard (ed.).The World's Major Languages. Oxon and New York: Routledge. pp. 594–617.ISBN978-0-203-30152-4.
^The Origin of Amharic - Girma A. Demeke, Red Sea Press, 2014
^abcdHayward, Katrina; Hayward, Richard J. (1999). "Amharic".Handbook of the IPA. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 44–51.
^Atelach Alemu Argaw, Lars Asker, Rickard Cöster, and Jussi Karlgren. 2004. "Dictionary-based Amharic–English information retrieval". Cross-Language Evaluation Forum (CLEF 2004). Bath.
^AA Argaw, L Asker, R Cöster, J Karlgren, M Sahlgren. 2005. "Dictionary-based Amharic-French information retrieval." Cross-Language Evaluation Forum (CLEF 2005). Vienna.
^Yeshambel, Tilahun, Josiane Mothe, and Yaregal Assabie. "Amharic document representation for adhoc retrieval." In KDIR 2020. 2020.
^Yeshambel, Tilahun, Josiane Mothe, and Yaregal Assabie. "Amharic adhoc information retrieval system based on morphological features." Applied Sciences 12, no. 3 (2022): 1294.
Abraham, Roy Clive (1968).The Principles of Amharic. Occasional Publication / Institute of African Studies, University of Ibadan. [rewritten version of 'A modern grammar of spoken Amharic', 1941]
Baye Yimam (2007).Amharic Grammar. Second Edition. Addis Ababa University. Ethiopia.
Bender, M. Lionel. (1974) "Phoneme frequencies in Amharic".Journal of Ethiopian Studies 12.1:19–24
Bender, M. Lionel and Hailu Fulass (1978).Amharic verb morphology. (Committee on Ethiopian Studies, monograph 7.) East Lansing: African Studies Center, Michigan State University.
Bennet, M. E. (1978).Stratificational Approaches to Amharic Phonology. PhD thesis, Ann Arbor: Michigan State University.
Cohen, Marcel (1936).Traité de langue amharique. Paris: Institut d'Ethnographie.
Cohen, Marcel (1939).Nouvelles études d'éthiopien merdional. Paris: Champion.
Dawkins, C. H. (¹1960, ²1969).The Fundamentals of Amharic. Addis Ababa.
_in_amharic.jpg)
