The passive participle in Egyptian Arabic
Introduction
Passive participles, like active participles, act as adjectives, and so they must agree with the noun they're describing. A passive participle may express a current state of being; a couple of examples would be "known" and "understood." Or it may express a state of having been — the result of an action that has already been performed. Examples would be "written" (i.e. the item is in a state of already having been written) and "cooked" (i.e. the item has already been cooked). Use of the passive participle obscures the identity of the person who performed the action.
| ممثل معروف (mumassil ma3ruuf) | بيض مقلي (beiD ma'li) |
| a well-known actor | fried eggs |
Derivation of the passive participle
Passive participles are derived in different ways from their root verbs. However, if you know the type of verb you're working with, deriving the passive participle from that verb is quite regular.
| Type of verb | Passive participle |
| Form 1 sound verbs (of the type فعل fi3il) | مفعول (maf3uul) |
| كتب (katab) to write | مكتوب (maktuub) written |
| فهم (fihim) to understand | مفهوم (mafhuum) understood |
| Form 1 geminate/doubled verbs (of the type فعّ fa33) | مفعوع (maf3uu3) |
| حبّ (Habb) to love | محبوب (maHbuub) beloved |
| كبّ (kabb) to spill/pour | مكبوب (makbuub) spilled/poured |
| Form 1 defective verbs (of the type فعي fi3i or fa3a) | مفعي (maf3i) |
| شوى (šawa) to grill | مشوي (mašwi) grilled |
| نسى (nisi) to forget | منسي (mansi) forgotten |
| Most other triliteral verb forms | Substitute "mi" for the "yi" of the imperfect howwa verb conjugation* |
| كسّر (kassar) to smash | مكسّر (mikassar) smashed |
| اتخرّج (itxarrag) to graduate | متخرّج (mitxarrag) (a) graduate |
| اختار (ixtaar) to choose | مختار (muxtaar) chosen |
| استخدم (istaxdim) to use | مستخدم (mistaxdim) used |
* Educated Egyptians often pronounce this "mi" as "mu" due to influence from standard Arabic — see the pronunciation "muxtaar" (as opposed to "mixtaar") as an example.
Note: For verbs that are not of Form 1, the active participle and passive participle are usually exactly the same! You would use context to tell which it is.
This could be the active participle, "occupying," or the passive participle, "occupied."
You might also have noticed that hollow verbs were not included in the above table of passive participle derivations. This is because passive participles are not used for these verbs. Rather, you would derive a passive participle from the verb's corresponding passive form (which would generally begin with اتـ it-).
This has no passive participle. So you would instead use the verb:
اتباع (itbaa3) to be sold
From this you would derive the appropriate passive participle, متباع (mitbaa3), "sold."
But also note that aside from passive verb forms of hollow verbs, you do not usually use passive participles derived from اتفعل itfa3al verb forms — except, in some cases, if you want to distinguish between a passive and active participle that would otherwise be the same.
The active and passive participle of this verb is the same: مدلّع (midalla3)
So people will use مدلّع only in its active participle sense. For the passive participle, they use:
متدلّع (mitdalla3) spoiled, as in a spoiled child
ربّى (rabba) to raise or grow (as in a parent raising a child, or someone growing a plant)
The active and passive participle of this verb is the same: مربّي (mirabbi)
So people will use مربّي only in its active participle sense. For the passive participle, they use:
متربّي (mitrabbi) well-raised
But usually for passive verbs, you would derive a passive participle from the corresponding Form 1 verb.
This has no passive participle. So you would instead use the corresponding Form 1 verb:
كتب (katab) to write
From this you would derive the appropriate passive participle, مكتوب (maktuub), "written."
اتكسف (itkasaf) to be embarrassed
This has no passive participle. So you would instead use the corresponding Form 1 verb:
كسف (kasaf) to embarrass
From this you would derive the appropriate passive participle, مكسوف (maksuuf), "embarrassed."
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