Questions & Answers about كان سور المدينة قديما.
Why does the word for "old" (قديما) have an extra alif (ا) at the end?
This is the main rule for using كان (was). In Arabic, the word that describes what the subject was (the predicate) must take the accusative case. For undefined masculine words like قديم (old), this case is shown by adding an "an" sound at the end, which is written with an extra alif: قديما (qadīman).
Why do we use the masculine كان (was) when المدينة (the city) is feminine?
The verb كان must agree with its main subject. Here, the subject of the sentence is سور (wall), which is masculine. The word المدينة is just there to tell us whose wall it is. Since the wall is the thing that "was" old, we use the masculine كان.
Why is قديما (old) masculine when the word right before it, المدينة (the city), is feminine?
Adjectives must match the noun they actually describe. In this sentence, قديما describes the سور (wall), not the المدينة (city). Because سور is a masculine word, the adjective describing it must also be masculine.
How do we know it means "the wall of the city" when there is no Arabic word for "of" here?
This is an Idafa (possession) phrase. By placing the noun سور (wall) directly before المدينة (the city), it automatically means "the wall of the city". In this structure, the first word never takes the prefix "al-" (the), but the second word usually does.
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