The Development of the Anomalous Syriac Verb eskah ‘to find

The canonically anomalous shape of Syriac verb ekah ‘to find’ is shown to result from a convergence of diachronic pressures on an intersection of phonological weak spots and morphosyntactic imbalance. The effect of the changes is a trade-off of morphosyntactic defectiveness for moderate phonological anomaly. The developmental hypothesis adopted underscores the importance both of multiple factors in diachronic change and of homeostasis in linguistic systems.