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ضَيَافَه

ẓ̂ayέfɛʰ (du. ẓ̂ayɛfέti, pl. ẓ̂áyoyf)

basic morphological information

n. (f.)

wedding or circumcision feast
пир по случаю свадьбы или обрезания
وليمة العرس

LS 361; CSOL I 701; CSOL II 635

text examples

a. wa-ḥᵃme ˁag ébrɛhɛʸh díˀʸheʰ férhim wa-ˁö́mor ˁes ẓ̂ayέfɛʰ ‘And the man gave his daughter’s hand in marriage to his nephew and put on a wedding feast for her’ (CSOL I 6:23)

b. ˁö́mor di-yaˁséten ḷe-nhɔfš ẓ̂ayέfɛʰ ‘Little Isa arranged a (circumcision) feast for himself’ (CSOL II 8:15)

root

ẓ̂yf

derivates

ẓ̂ef 1. to arrange a wedding or a circumcision feast; 2. to slaughter animals for a feast’
šéẓ̂ayf to participate in a wedding feast

etymology

The substantive ẓ̂ayɛ́fɛʰ seems to be a direct borrowing from Arb. ḍiyāfat- ‘entertainment of a guest; a repast given to a guest, a banquet, a feast’, Dhofar ḍīfa ‘Hochzeitsmahľ (Rhodokanakis 1911:35), North Yemenite ḍīfih ‘Einlandung, Party über Frauen’ (Behnstedt 762, Piamenta 298–299). The same is true of its parallels in the continental MSA: Mhr. ẑeyáft ‘wedding food, marriage feast’, Jib. ẓ̂īft ‘wedding or funeral feast’. The intensive stem verb ẓ̂ef is probably denominative, cf. Dhofar Arabic mḍáyyif ḍīfa ‘ein Gasterei (ein Hochzeitsmahl) geben’ (Rhodokanakis 1911:35) and especially Mehri aẑyīf ‘to give a wedding feast’ (ML 479). For cultural-historical reasons, one cannot rule out that the Soqotri lexemes were borrowed via Mehri.