מִכְתָבָה or מכתבה "writing desk" kəṯōḇeṯ כְּתֹבֶת or כתובת "address" kəṯāḇ כְּתָב or כתב "handwriting" kāṯūḇ כָּתוּב or כתוב "written" hiḵtīḇ הִכְתִּיב or הכתיב "he dictated" hiṯkattēḇ הִתְכַּתֵּב or התכתב "he corresponded niḵtaḇ נִכְתָּב or נכתב "it was written" (m) kəṯīḇ כְּתִיב or כתיב "spelling" (m) taḵtīḇ תַּכְתִּיב or תכתיב "prescript" (m) məḵuttāḇ מְכֻתָּב or מכותב "addressee" kəṯubbā כְּתֻבָּה or כתובה "ketubah (a Jewish marriage contract)" (f) In Tigrinya and Amharic, this root was used widely but is now seen as an archaic form. Ethiopic-derived languages use different roots for things that have to do with writing (and in some cases counting). The primitive root ṣ-f and the trilateral root stems m-ṣ-f, ṣ-h-f, and ṣ-f-r are used. This root also exists in other Semitic languages, such as Hebrew: sep̄er "book", sōp̄er "scribe", mispār "number" and sippūr "story". This root also exists in Arabic and is used to form words with a close meaning to "writing", such as ṣaḥāfa "journalism", and ṣaḥīfa "newspaper" or "parchment". Verbs in other non-Semitic Afroasiatic languages show similar radical patterns, but more usually with biconsonantal roots; e.g. Kabyle afeg means "fly!", while affug means "flight", and yufeg means "he flew" (compare with Hebrew, where hap̄lēḡ means "set sail!", hap̄lāḡā means "a sailing trip", and hip̄līḡ means "he sailed", while the unrelated ʕūp̄, təʕūp̄ā and ʕāp̄ pertain to flight). Independent personal pronouns Cardinal numerals These are the basic numeral stems without feminine suffixes. Note that in most older Semitic languages, the forms of the numerals from 3 to 10 exhibit polarity of gender (also called "chiastic concord" or "reverse agreement"), i.e. if the counted noun is masculine, the numeral would be feminine and vice versa. Typology Some early Semitic languages are speculated to have had weak ergative features. Common vocabulary Due to the Semitic languages' common origin, they share some words and roots. Others differ. For example: Terms given in brackets are not derived from the respective Proto-Semitic roots, though they may also derive from Proto-Semitic (as does e.g. Arabic dār, cf. Biblical Hebrew dōr "dwelling"). Sometimes, certain roots differ in meaning from one Semitic language to another. For example, the root b-y-ḍ in Arabic has the meaning of "white" as well as "egg", whereas in Hebrew it only means "egg". The root l-b-n means "milk" in Arabic, but the color "white" in Hebrew. The root l-ḥ-m means "meat" in Arabic, but "bread" in Hebrew and "cow"