fear of the following vowel being a kasra or ḍamma (which would result in awkward pronunciations as in *lu-ibil or *lu-‘unuq). Despite the myriad of proofs for the argument, in most classical grammars and in modern Arabic, the opinion of Sibawayh is often taken as an axiomatic fact. There are many proofs and counterproofs, but the overarching argument in favour of this opinion is as follows: The lām in al- is the only lām particle in the language with a sukūn (to avoid confusion, as mentioned). Thus, it requires a volatile hamza. Moreover, al- is a particle, and Arabic particles do not drop letters (without losing their meanings or connotations). Yet the hamza in al- drops all the time. Therefore, it must be volatile, or al- would lose its ability to render the following word definite. Consequently, it turns out that the hamza in al- is considered the only volatile hamza in the language that has a fatḥa vowel. The lām in al- In very early Semitic languages, definiteness was achieved through gemination of the first letter in a word. For example, the word kitāb would be made definite by ak-kitāb. An additional benefit of this construction was to connote "determination". The lām in the Arabic al- was thus a result of a dissimilation process. In Arabic, this gemination occurs when the word to which al- is prefixed begins with one of the fourteen sun letters. Twelve of these letters (including lām) are originally designed to geminate. Ḍād and shīn have been included due to their similarities in pronunciation with lām and ţā, respectively. For example, the word 'the man' is actually pronounced "". Notice that the lām is written but not pronounced. In more modern dialects, the sun letters have been extended to include the velars gīm and kāf. The ancient people of Himyar replace the lām in al- with mīm. The Prophet Muhammad is recorded to have uttered the following words in that dialect: In some Semitic languages like Hebrew, words that include the letter lāmed have Arabic cognates that replace it with a Mīm as opposed to Lām, the equivalent letter. For example, skull in Hebrew is גֻּלְגֹּלֶת (gulgolet). Its Arabic cognate is (). This gives plausibility to the case of Banu Hamīr and indicates that lām is frequently equated with Mīm. The vowels in al- Regardless of whether the hamza in al- is volatile or not,