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Root מ־ל־ך: kingship

Roots Atlas 203 · שֹׁרֶשׁ מ ל ך · the kingship root
מ ל ך
m · l · kh
everything to do with reigning and the crown
8 words · 1 root · 1 verb-voices

Three consonants carry one idea: to reign. The same root gives you the king and the queen, the kingdom they rule, the act of crowning them, and the abstract quality of statehood. Notice how the political vocabulary of a whole language unfolds from one verb. Hebrew even borrows this root to mean "to advise", because a counsellor is one who helps you reign over a decision. Every word here is verified against pealim, niqqud included.

The verb across the binyanim (voices)

The same root runs through the verb system. Each binyan is a voice: it bends the one idea into active, passive, causative or reciprocal. Tap to hear.

Pa'al
לִמְלֹךְlimloch
simple active, the plain action
to reign, to rule as a king

Only the simple pa'al is lexicalized here as the everyday verb. The system also knows a hif'il "to crown / to make someone king" (לְהַמְלִיךְ) and its action-noun הַמְלָכָה appears below, but the core meaning lives in the plain pa'al "to reign".

Words born from the root

Same root letters, different noun moulds (mishkalim). The mould tells you the function: who does it, the act of doing it, or the thing produced.

① The royals: who reigns

מֶלֶךְ
melech
king
קֶטֶל
מַלְכָּה
malka
queen
קַטְלָה

② The realm: what is ruled

מַלְכוּת
malchut
kingdom, monarchy, royalty
קַטְלוּת
מְלוּכָה
melucha
monarchy (as a regime)
קְטוּלָה

③ The act: making a king

הַמְלָכָה
hamlacha
coronation, crowning
הַקְטָלָה

④ The abstract: statehood

מַמְלַכְתִּי
mamlachti
national, state- (relating to the state)
מַמְלַכְתִּיּוּת
mamlachtiut
nationhood, statesmanship

Decode it yourself

Strip the prefixes, suffixes and vowels. Three consonants remain, and the meaning lives there.