Le ʿaṭf nasaq : une « coordination » pléonastique ? Contribution à l’histoire de la grammaire arabe

Abstract

Among the five appositives recognized by the grammar of classical Arabic, two appear in the form of possessive phrases: ʿaṭf bayān (“explanatory apposition”) and ʿaṭf nasaq (“coordination”), both composed of a first term, ʿaṭf, which means “addition”, “with”. If the three other appositives, naʿt/ṣifa (“qualification”), tawkīd (“corroboration”), and badal (“permutation”) fall under a functionalist denomination, this is not the case for ʿaṭf bayān and ʿaṭf nasaq. This article proposes a terminological history of ʿaṭf nasaq. First, this history shows that if the above terminology seems to be the only one used in modern Arabic grammars, as well as in grammars drafted by Arabists, the same is far from applying to Medieval grammarians. Among the latter, the minority of grammarians to make use of it are for the most part linked to the Arab West, on the one hand, and either to the Ǧumal of Zaǧǧāǧī (d. 337/949) or to the ʾAlfiyya of Ibn Mālik (d. 672/1274), on the other hand. This terminological history also shows that ʿaṭf and nasaq are conceived by some of the Medieval grammarians as strictly equivalent and therefore interchangeable, which would then explain why only a minority of grammarians use ʿaṭf nasaq. It seems, however, that this equivalence is not strict, and that it is rather a hyperonym-to-hyponym relationship. Finally, this terminological history shows that, by a sort of a coincidence, apart from being relatively late for classical Arabic grammar, dating at least from the 6th/12th century, ʿaṭf nasaq could join its Greek and Latin equivalents, syndesmos, and coordinatio, which designate exactly the same grammatical process based on the same notions of “adding” a “link” and an “ordering”.

Keywords

• appositive
• Arab West
• ʿaṭf nasaq
• coordinatio
• coordination
• hyperonym