calculation based on semantic content. It is certainly true that a terminology which is
based on semantic quantification does lend itself to subjective definitions and delinea-
tions. After all, quanta defined in linguistic terminology as ‘semes,’ ‘sememes,’ ‘ar-
chisemes’ and ‘semantic units’ are all units of qualification, rather than quantification.^99
These operate above the lexico-grammatical level of the text to bring about the significa-
tion of meaning. Thus, a terminology of semantics is generally employed to communicate
something about a lexeme’s meaning on an abstract level, and as such multiple ‘semantic
features,’ or ‘content figures,’^100 can be attributed to a lexeme while not actually finding
graphical representation in the form of the lexeme itself.^101 The ‘lexicogrammar,’ to bor-
row a term from Halliday,^102 forms a continuum between morphology and lexical units
(vocabulary) that is used to facilitate semogenesis, but semogenesis is not explicitly rep-
resented quantitatively in the lexicogrammar. Semogenesis is accomplished on a level
(^99) See D. Geeraerts, "Componential Analysis," (^) The Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics (ed. R.E.
Asher; vol. 2; Oxford: Pergamon Press, 1994) 648-50, for a convenient definition and history of the first
three terms. Regarding ‘semantic units’ T.C. Potts, Structures and Categories for the Representation of
Meaning (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994) 251, has said that their “implicit criterion ... is
that an expression A is a semantic unit in an expression B just in case a further expression C, being the
same meaning as A, may be substituted for A ... salva veritate.” None of these terms defines a quantifiable
unit that is always graphically expressed in the text. The term ‘sememe’ is a possible exception, the earliest
usage for which was “einfach für die Lexikalische Bedeutung eines Morphems” according to W. Abraham,
Terminologie zur neueren Linguistik (vol. 2; Tübingen: Max Niemeyer, 1988) 747. However, the subse-
quent development of this term towards a more narrow meaning negates its usefulness in the present study. 100
The terminology employed here is as broad and inclusive as possible. Both of the terms ‘semantic fea-
tures’ and ‘content figures’ are used by linguists to refer to a lexeme’s particular set of semantic values. See
O. Durcot and T. Todorov, Encyclopedic Dictionary of the Sciences of Language (Baltimore: The John
Hopkins University Press, 1979) 265. 101
See S.A. Groom, Linguistic Analysis of Biblical Hebrew (Cumbria: Paternoster Press, 2003) 111. Se-
mantic features are “not considered as signifieds themselves, since there is no signifier that corresponds to
them” (O. Durcot and T. Todorov, 102 Encyclopedic Dictionary, 265).
M.A.K. Halliday, Functional Grammar, 7.