a. šeṭáḥim ḥe ˁouyɛ́ghɛn wa-ḷaṭ sófik ˁãyš ‘My baby had wet himself, and I had to change him’ (CSOL I 17:52)
b. kések ˁob ḷe-tɛr di-ḳáˁar wa-ˁámok e-díˀʸho férhim tesófi deʰ mešṭáḥim men ḥaʰ ‘I found goat droppings at the door of the house and said to my daughter: “Clean up this filth here!”’ (CSOL I 17:52)
perfect 3 sg. f. séfe or sfe
‘To cleanse (urine and excrements) off a child (ˁan)’ (a)
- sᵉfe to cleanse
Most probably, a loan adaptation of Arabic ṣfy : to be clean’ (Lane:1703). The reception of Arabic ṣ as s is a common phenomenon both in Soqotri and the continental MSA (LS:35–36, JL:220). As rightly observed by Johnstone (ML:337), this is due to the fact that the partially voiced MSA – is acoustically very dissimilar from its Arabic etymological equivalent. (Naumkin et al. 2016a:59, fn. 66)