Questions & Answers about بدأ نباح الكلب يزعج الجار.
Why is there no أن (to) before يزعج even though the sentence translates to 'began to annoy'?
The verb بدأ is one of the verbs of beginning (أفعال الشروع). When these verbs take another action as their predicate, that second action must be a present tense verb and absolutely cannot be preceded by the particle أن. Therefore, we must say بدأ يزعج rather than بدأ أن يزعج.
Why is the verb يزعج in Form IV here instead of a simpler form?
The verb يزعج comes from the Form IV past tense أزعج, which carries a causative meaning. It means 'to cause annoyance to someone else', which is why it can take الجار (the neighbor) as a direct object. You might already be familiar with its very common active participle, مزعج, which means 'annoying'.
Since نباح translates to 'the barking', why doesn't it have the definite article ال attached to it?
The phrase نباح الكلب forms an Idafa (possessive construction) literally meaning 'the barking of the dog'. In an Idafa, the first word never takes the definite article ال. Instead, it becomes definite grammatically by being attached to the definite second word, الكلب. This is a classic earlier-level rule that often trips learners up when translating English possessives!
Does the verbal noun (masdar) نباح follow a recognizable pattern?