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Possessive Case / Mudaf & Mudaf Ilayh
November 7, 2006 on 1:28 pm | In Arabic, Arabic Grammar| By Ilm Seeker
You're already familiar with possessive case in English--when we show ownership of something. For example, we might say, "this is Amer's book" or "this is the book of Amer."
The possessive case has two elements:
- The possessor, i.e. the one who owns the thing. In this case, Amer.
- The possessed, i.e. the thing being owned. In this example, the book.
The possessive case in Arabic is the same. The possessed is called the mudaf, the possessor the mudaf ilayh. It's easiest to think of them as the form of "the x of y" rather then "y's x".
In English, you write an apostrophe-s after the possessor--so "Amer" becomes "Amer's".
In Arabic, there are two rules--one for the mudaf, and one for the mudaf ilayh.
- The possessor takes kasra (becomes majruw)
- The possessed becomes definite (by virture of being possessed).
As a first attempt before we knew these rules, we might write "the book of Amer" as "al-kitaabu Amerun". Applying our rules:
- Amerun becomes Amerin
- Al-kitaabu becomes kitaabu
So the final sentence is "kitaabu Amerin".
What about Ahmed's chair? kursiyu Ahmedin. Heaven's gate? Baabu jannatin!
If you feel you understand this bit of grammar, post an example (Arabic/transliteration and English translation) in the comments. If you have any questions, comments, clarifications, etc. post those in comments too inshallah!
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Sayyaratu Muhammadin–> Muhammad’s car
Jazak’Allahu Al Khair
Comment by Jeremiah — November 8, 2006 #
I do not understand one point.
It was mentioned that the mudaf when possesed becomes definite? But dont definite nouns start with Al? Where as it has been written above kitabu and not al-kitabu?
I am just new to arabic so appologise for any mistakes.
Comment by Qasim — October 25, 2008 #
The mudaf is definite WITHOUT alif-lam. It’s definite because it’s the mudaf; if it wasn’t definite, it would have double-tanween, i.e. kitaabun.
This is something a lot of students struggle with :) we generally don’t post Arabic posts anymore; try out Arabic resources (like ArabicGems.wordpress.com, ArabicTree.com, etc.)
Comment by Ilm Seeker — October 25, 2008 #