The vowels of verbs with third weak radical

Abstract

The first point that strikes the attention is that the first vowel in the perfect of many of these verbs long ago definitely established itself as e. Thus beda, beka, bena, feda, fela, ġera, ħeba, ħela, ħema, kera, lewa, mexa, nesa, għewa, qeda, qela, reħa. These words are all so written to- day as they are to be found already in the dictionaries of Caruana and Falzon. On the other hand, verbs whose third radical letter is għajn, have not attained the same stability. In the dictionaries just mentioned we find the spellings bala: ba:ta', ġama', naża', sama', tafa', :tara'.