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Hebrew and Arabic with English (RTL scripts)
Compare two right-to-left languages against English: bound prepositions, parallel adjective placement, and crossing links when word order differs.
What this example shows
Hebrew and Arabic both run right to left. Here Hebrew sits on top, Arabic in the middle, and English below, so two related Semitic languages line up against the same translation. The diagram makes two things visible at once: how each language attaches a preposition, and where word order pulls the connectors across each other.
Bound and free prepositions
The same English “in” attaches differently in each language:
- בבית in+house
- Hebrew writes the preposition ב- as a bound prefix glued to the front of “house”, so one written word holds both.
- في in
- Arabic writes the preposition في as a separate word, so it gets its own box and its own link to English “in”.
Why the connectors cross
Arabic places an adjective after its noun, while English places it before. When the same two words appear in opposite order, the link from the noun and the link from the adjective swap sides and cross. In plain running text that reordering is hard to spot; the crossing curves point straight at it.
Working with RTL scripts
Turn on right-to-left for each Hebrew or Arabic line from the line popover, and leave the English line left to right. The tool keeps the connectors correct across the direction change, so you can mix RTL and LTR rows in one diagram. The same switch works for other right-to-left scripts.
If you add a gloss line, the labels come from the
See also
Related examples:
- Japanese, Chinese, and English word order shows crossing links from a different word-order clash.
- French clitic pronouns shows reordering inside a short clause.
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