There are several prefixes in the

Hebrew language Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

which are appended to regular words to introduce a new meaning. In

Hebrew Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

, the letters that form those prefixes are called "formative letters" (

: אוֹתִיּוֹת הַשִּׁמּוּשׁ, ''Otiyot HaShimush''). Eleven of the twenty-two letters of the

Hebrew alphabet The Hebrew alphabet ( he, אָלֶף־בֵּית עִבְרִי, ), known variously by scholars as the Ktav Ashuri, Jewish script, square script and block script, is an abjad script used in the writing of the Hebrew language and other Jewi ...

are considered ''Otiyot HaShimush''. These letters are Aleph (א),

Bet Black Entertainment Television (acronym BET) is an American basic cable channel targeting African-American audiences. It is owned by the CBS Entertainment Group unit of Paramount Global via BET Networks and has offices in New York City, Los ...

(ב), He (ה), Vav (ו), Yud (י), Kaf (כ),

Lamed Lamedh or Lamed is the twelfth letter of the Semitic abjads, including Hebrew Lāmed , Aramaic Lāmadh , Syriac Lāmaḏ ܠ, Arabic , and Phoenician Lāmed . Its sound value is . The Phoenician letter gave rise to the Greek Lambda (Λ), Latin ...

(ל), Mem (מ),

Nun A nun is a woman who vows to dedicate her life to religious service, typically living under vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience in the enclosure of a monastery or convent.''The Oxford English Dictionary'', vol. X, page 599. The term is o ...

(נ), Shin (ש), and Tav (ת). A

mnemonic A mnemonic ( ) device, or memory device, is any learning technique that aids information retention or retrieval (remembering) in the human memory for better understanding. Mnemonics make use of elaborative encoding, retrieval cues, and imag ...

to remember these letters is איתן משה וכלב (''Eitan, Moshe, v'Kalev''), which translates to " Ethan, Moses, and Caleb."

Otiyot HaShimush

Prefixes in Hebrew serve multiple purposes. A prefix can serve as a

conjunction Conjunction may refer to: * Conjunction (grammar), a part of speech * Logical conjunction, a mathematical operator ** Conjunction introduction, a rule of inference of propositional logic * Conjunction (astronomy), in which two astronomical bodies ...

, preposition,

definite article An article is any member of a class of dedicated words that are used with noun phrases to mark the identifiability of the referents of the noun phrases. The category of articles constitutes a part of speech. In English, both "the" and "a(n)" a ...

, or interrogative. Prefixes are also used when conjugating verbs in the future tense and for various other purposes.

Conjunctions

Inseparable prepositions

Other prepositions

Definite article

Interrogative

Conjugation of verbs

Other uses

Non Otiyot HaShimush

European languages had a large stock of prefixes for technical terminology mostly taken from

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

and

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

. While Hebrew traditionally did not use this kind of prefixes, professionals in the

Yishuv Yishuv ( he, ישוב, literally "settlement"), Ha-Yishuv ( he, הישוב, ''the Yishuv''), or Ha-Yishuv Ha-Ivri ( he, הישוב העברי, ''the Hebrew Yishuv''), is the body of Jewish residents in the Land of Israel (corresponding to the ...

who started to teach and work in Hebrew were used to this terminology, and incorporated most of these prefixes into Hebrew. Meanwhile people working on revitalising the language coined some Hebrew parallels, so today those foreign and Hebrew prefixes are used interchangeably.

References

External links

Hebrew Language: Root Words
{{Hebrew language Hebrew grammar Prefixes