a. ŝi aḷ ˁeḳáḷoʰ ľa έˀɛfo wa-ľa ḳénho ˁᵃṭaf féred έˀɛfo wa-ˀékeb gezíreʰ ‘She spared nothing, neither people nor cattle. And people fled from there and scattered throughout the island (lit. entered the island)’ (CSOL I 8:2)
b. ṭad ˁag fɔ́ne be-zemán báˁaḷ ˁážeʰ wa-ḥaľ ses ḥaʰ báˁad-ˀaḷ ḥaľ ses fotérek έˀɛfo ‘A long time ago, there was a man who married a woman and dwelt with her. After he had dwelt with her for some time, the people (the man and his wife) became poor’ (CSOL I 1:1)
Often used with the meaning ‘married couple, parents’ (see example b).
Direct parallels to the Soqotri lexeme are found in Mhr. ḥā-bū and Jib. έ-yɔ́ with the same meaning. Müller’s suggestion to compare them to PS *ˀab- ‘father’ (1909:350) still preserves its attractivity in spite of the obvious phonological, structural and semantic difficulties (cf. Lonnet 1999:189, Kogan 2015:547 and, most recently, Bulakh 2023:205).