In the Nedj Nedj database there are around 100 instances of the ‘loose arm /a/’ construction. Here is one, HAt a:
Table 1: HAt a
translit
|
respelt
|
meaning
|
EngJSM
|
source
|
glyph names
|
glyphs
|
"ḥ3t¬"
|
HAt-a =
|
"beginning"
|
front person:
|
Gardiner [580.1:7.2]
|
<lion: paw arm>
|  |
"ḥ3ty ¬"
|
HAt-i-a =
|
"local prince, mayor"
|
front agent person [leader]:
|
Gardiner [580.1:7.61]
|
<lion: paw arm>
| |
"ḥ3tj-¬"
|
HAt-i-a =
|
"high official"
|
front agent person [leader]:
|
Allen [463.1:2]
|
<lion: paw arm squatter>
|  |
All of these actually read "ḥ3t¬" [HAt a] but are generally transliterated by the scholars as "ḥ3ty ¬" [HAti a] or similar. However, whether or not the ‘-i’ suffix (indicating ‘agent’) is included in the writing is not what is of concern here, but rather the loose arm /a/.
This phenomenon is probably treated in detail somewhere, but Your Amateur Researcher (YAR) cannot put his finger on it just now. But what J.R. Allen says is the following:
“There were two kinds of Egyptian titles, defining an official’s status in the nobility(often in terms of its closeness to the king) and his actual bureaucratic responsibilities. The most common examples of the former are ......; <lion: paw arm> ḥ3t(j)-¬ [HAt a] meaning something like”high official” (literally,”whose arm is In front”); ...” [Allen 32:21*]
- * Allen, James P. 2000, 2001. Middle Egyptian: an introduction to the language and culture of hieroglyph. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Indeed the loose arm /a/ occurs in titles, but not only there. But first the titles.
The following examples are titles or roles, as seen in the third column:
Table 2: Titles or roles
"ỉmy-¬"
|
im-i-a =
|
"regional officer"
|
in agent person:
|
Faulkner Concise [18:12]
|
<reed cross-+ owl pair arm stroke>
|  |
"hry-¬"
|
kher-i-a =
|
"deputy"
|
under person [assistant]:
|
Col/Man [158.2:1]
|
<block arm>
|  |
"hr-¬"
|
kher-a =
|
"under the hand of"
|
under person [controlling]:
|
Faulkner Concise [204:1.1]
|
<block mouth arm stroke>
|  |
"hr(y)-¬"
|
kher-a =
|
"apprentice"
|
under person:
|
Faulkner Concise [204:2]
|
<block mouth arm stroke squatter>
|  |
"tp-¬"
|
tep-a =
|
"ancestor"
|
first person [ancestor]:
|
[:]
|
<profile arm stroke>
|  |
These titles might be explained in the terms used by Allen as somehow connected to the ‘hand’, even as in English there is a ‘farm hand’, or ‘helping hand’, perhaps even ‘handyman’.
However, there are even more examples where ‘hand’ does not seem to play any part at all. These are the non-titles, seen in the third column:
Table 3: Other loose arm /a/ uses
"3wt-¬"
|
Awut-a =
|
"gifts"
|
gift :
|
Faulkner Concise [2:1]
|
<ribs quail bun arm stroke plane plural>
|  |
"dr-¬"
|
djer-a =
|
"end"
|
end person:
|
Gardiner [604.1:10.4]
|
<skip: bow mouth arm stroke>
|  |
"m-wḥm-¬"
|
em weHem-a =
|
"again"
|
again in connection with / repeat:
|
Gardiner [605.2:5.1]
|
<owl leg: ox owl plane arm stroke>
|  |
"r-¬"
|
er-a =
|
"beside"
|
in relation to person:
|
Gardiner [577.2:2.32]
|
<mouth arm stroke>
|  |
"ḥrt-¬"
|
Her-et-a =
|
"arrears"
|
default what is person:
|
Faulkner Concise [175:4]
|
<face mouth bun arm stroke sparrow plural>
|  |
"tm3-¬"
|
tjemA-a =
|
"with powerful arm (epithet of Horus or King)"
|
boundary person:
|
Gardiner [601.1:18]
|
<tether sickle arm>
|  |
"pr-¬"
|
per-a =
|
"energetic"
|
emerge person:
|
Gardiner [565.2:7.4]
|
<house mouth arm stroke>
|  |
"st-¬"
|
set-a =
|
"ability"
|
:
|
Col/Man [158.2:15]
|
<throne bun arm stroke>
|  |
WEAPONS
A curious instance of loose arm /a/ occurs in ‘fight’, or ‘warfare’, er a KHet:
Table 4: er a KHet: warfare
translit
|
respelt
|
meaning
|
EngJSM
|
source
|
glyph names
|
glyphs
|
"r-¬ ḫt"
|
er a KHet =
|
"warfare"
|
warfare :
|
Gardiner [577.2:2.4]
|
<mouth arm stroke branch bun stroke>
|  |
"r-¬-ḫt"
|
er a KHet =
|
"combat"
|
fight :
|
Faulkner Concise [146:7.1]
|
<mouth stroke arm stroke branch bun stroke stander: stick>
|  |
KHet means ‘thing’, among other meanings. But in this 'thing' usage it is always has a spelling based on <string bun> [not <branch bun> as in Table 4 above]:
Table 5: KHet: thing
"ḫt"
|
KHet =
|
"things"
|
thing :
|
Gardiner [583.2:7.2]
|
<string bun>
|  |
Another KHet meaning is ‘wood’:
Table 6: KHet: wood
"ḫt"
|
KHet =
|
"wood"
|
wood :
|
Faulkner Concise [198:3]
|
<branch bun stroke>
|  |
and with that 'wood' meaning the spelling is always based on <branch bun>.
So where does the ‘weapon’ er a KHet construction come from?
Here we enter the realm of speculation.
First, perhaps weapons were made of wood, so a piece of wood, a club or an early sword, or spear, might have been wooden.
Then, more speculatively still, a search for ‘weapon’ in the database turns up the following:
Table 7: KHawu: weapons
translit
|
respelt
|
meaning
|
EngJSM
|
source
|
glyph names
|
glyphs
|
"ḫ¬w"
|
KHa-wu =
|
"weapons"
|
weapon :
|
Faulkner Concise [186:2.1]
|
<sunrise arm coil branch plural>
|  |
"ḫ¬w"
|
KHa-wu =
|
"weapons"
|
weapon :
|
Gardiner [628.2:20.2]
|
<sunrise arm quail branch plural>
|  |
"ḫ¬w"
|
KHa-wu =
|
"weapons"
|
weapon :
|
Gardiner [584.1:8.1]
|
<sunrise arm quail horncup plural>
|  |
This usage appears only in the plural, presumably based on a singular KHa, for ‘weapon’.
Perhaps not recorded, but nevertheless used, was a relative form, ‘weapon what is’, using the relative suffix -t, which might have yielded:
Table 9: KHat [YAR weapon speculation]
"ḫ¬t"
|
KHa-t =
|
"WEAPON"
|
weapon what is :
|
JS SPECULATION [:]
|
<sunrise arm bun branch>
|  |
featuring KHat as ‘weapon what is’, together with the <branch> KHet determinative—except who is to know how <branch> was in reality pronounced, there being no vowel? It might have been KHat, or KHot, or KHut.
So, deducing from supposed sound alone in er a KHet (warfare, fight) as seen above (in Table 4, reproduced below as Table 10):
Table 10: er a KHet warfare
"r-¬ ḫt"
|
er a KHet =
|
"warfare"
|
warfare :
|
Gardiner [577.2:2.4]
|
<mouth arm stroke branch bun stroke>
| |
this might comprise [see Table 9 regarding these comments] ‘WEAPON’ KHa followed by the relative <bun>, completed with determinative <branch>, resulting in the full word for just ‘weapon’ being <sunrise arm branch> KHa.
But even YAR finds this idea a challenge to accept.
---------
CHAMBER
Let us conclude the loose arm /a/ investigation with consideration of the following expression for ‘overseer of the chamber’:
Table 11: emer a khenuti overseer of the chamber
translit
|
respelt
|
meaning
|
EngJSM
|
source
|
glyph names
|
glyphs
|
"m-r ¬hnwty"
|
emer a khenuti =
|
"overseer of the chamber"
|
overseer [of] interior :
|
Col/Man [34:14.2]
|
<owl mouth arm headless water pot coil cosh house>
|  |
"m-r ¬hnwty"
|
imir a khenuti =
|
"overseer of the chamber"
|
overseer [of] interior :
|
Col/Man [44:3.1]
|
<tongue stroke arm headless pot bun pair>
|  |
The two examples in Table 11 above are transcribed in the respelt column as emer/imir akhenuti, meaning ‘overseer [of the] chamber’.
‘chamber’ the scholars agree, is akhenuti, as specifically shown in the first two examples , in the respelt column, in Table 12 below:
Table 12: akhenuti: ‘chamber’
translit
|
respelt
|
meaning
|
EngJSM
|
source
|
glyph names
|
glyphs
|
"¬hnwtj"
|
akhenuti =
|
"chamber"
|
inner apartment :
|
Allen [456.1:20]
|
<arm headless water pot cosh bun pair house>
|  |
"¬hnwty"
|
akhenuti =
|
"inner apartments; audience chamber"
|
inner apartment :
|
Gardiner [558.2:13]
|
<arm headless water pot bun cosh house>
|  |
"¬hnwty"
|
a-khenu-t-i =
|
"audience chamber"
|
inner apartment what is agent :
|
Kamrin [251.1:12]
|
<arm headless pot coil cosh bun pair house>
|  |
"¬hnwty"
|
a-khenu-t-i =
|
"audience-chamber"
|
inner apartment what is agent :
|
Faulkner Concise [48:19.1]
|
<arm headless jar coil cosh bun pair house>
|  |
[The last two examples feature YAR's respelling concept as outlined in the paragraph before Table 13.]
But are the scholars right? Is the ‘inner compartment’ or ‘chamber’ really akhenuti? Could they all be wrong? Could it all be a mis-analysis of emer akhenuti?
Indeed, could this be a case of one of those loose arm /a/ job descriptions or titles, so that it is not emer that we are looking at but emer a?
This would then change akhenuti to just khenuti.
If so, does khenut mean anything?
It does: it means ‘skin’, but based on khenet.
Another form, ‘female musician’, is based on KHen together with feminine and plural markers, and feauring KH rather than kh.
So this next line of enquiry was not really fruitful.
Well then, could khenuti be khenu-t-i, that is khenu combined with two suffixes, the first the relative ‘what is’ -t, and the second the agent marker, -i? Does khenu mean anything? Back to the database to check.
Aha! There are indeed numerous khenu examples, meaning ‘abode’ and ‘interior’, some given in Table 13 below:
Table 13: khenu interior
translit
|
respelt
|
meaning
|
EngJSM
|
source
|
glyph names
|
glyphs
|
"hnw"
|
khenu =
|
"interior"
|
interior :
|
Gardiner [586.2:21.2]
|
<headless water pot quail house>
|  |
"hnw"
|
khenu =
|
"interior"
|
interior :
|
Kamrin [254.2:03]
|
<headless water pot quail house>
| |
"hnw"
|
khenu =
|
"residence"
|
abode :
|
Gardiner [586.2:21.3]
|
<headless water pot quail town>
|  |
No wonder then that the scholars often call ‘chamber’ an ‘inner compartment’, the word khenu being based on ‘interior’.
In the light of this discovery, we could re-analyse akhenuti as a-khenu-t-i, as follows:
Table 14: a-khenu-t-i: chamber
"¬hnwtj"
|
a-khenu-t-i =
|
"chamber"
|
inner apartment what is agent :
|
Allen [456.1:20]
|
<arm headless water pot cosh bun pair house>
|  |
"¬hnwty"
|
a-khenu-t-i =
|
"chamber"
|
inner apartment what is agent :
|
Col/Man [153.1:17]
|
<arm headless pot bun pair house>
|  |
"¬hnwty"
|
a-khenu-t-i =
|
"audience-chamber"
|
inner apartment what is agent :
|
Faulkner Concise [48:19.1]
|
<arm headless jar coil cosh bun pair house>
|  |
With this discovery we might deduce that the initial ‘a-’ should be omitted from a-khenu-t-i, [to leave it as khenu-t-i] this element most likely forming part of emer a, a loose arm /a/ role indicator (‘overseer’). from which the records themselves in Table 14 most likely were derived).
CONCLUSION
It has not been possible to reach any conclusion about the loose arm /a/ phenomenon.
Sometimes it was associated with roles and sometimes not. Perhaps the scholars have resolved the issue but in a place not so far stumbled upon by YAR.
But quite apart from this, perhaps YAR has noticed something in relation to ‘chamber’ (khenu-t-i interior what is agent) and its overseer (emer a) that might be a better analysis than that commonly presented by the scholars.
Jeremy Steele
