مدري

ما (mā, “do not”) + أدري (ʔadri, “I know”).

• IPA^(key): /madri/

مَدْري • (madri)

1. I don't know

• ما أَدْري (mā ʔadri)
• ما أَعْرِف (mā ʔaʕrif)

Inherited from a common vernacular Arabic مَدْرِي (madrī), composed of مَا (mā, “not”) +‎ أَدْرِي (ʔadrī, “I know”), literally “I don't know”.

The further North Levantine Arabic development to مِدري (midri) has two possible explanations:

1. It may be the same assimilation exhibited by form I passive participles like مِقْلِي (miʔli, “fried”), from Arabic مَقْلِيّ (maqliyy).
2. It also accords with the general development of أَ (ʔa-, first-person prefix) to إ (ʔi-), however. This may show that the term still synchronically decomposed into a first-person verb with a fused prefix at the time that this shift occurred. (Today the form is more opaque, as North Levantine dialects can no longer productively form indicative verbs without a prefixed بِـ (bi-).)

• IPA^(key): /midri/

مِدْري • (midri)

1. (defective, transitive) I don't know, I have no idea

   Synonyms: أبصر (ʔabṣar), (Aleppo) مَا بَعْرِي (ma baʕre)

• Always takes a verbal complement or verb phrase, not a direct object.

  مِدْرِي إِسْمُو شُو هُوِّي ― midri ʔismo šu huwwe ― I don't know what his name is (not *مِدْرِي إِسْمُو ― *midri ʔismo (literally, “I don't know its name”)).

• Unlikely to be used on its own as an interjection, unlike the Aleppine مَا بَعْرِي (ma baʕre).

مِدْري • (midri)

1. or (for imprecise estimates or guesses)

   نطرتو ساعة مدري ساعتين ما كان يبين

   naṭarto sāʕa midri sāʕtēn ma kān ybayyin

   I waited for him for, I don't know, an hour, two hours, he just wouldn't show up

   ليك أنا برا وفي هيك عقص مدري برغش مدري شو المهم خلصني افتحلي أكلوني

   lēk ʔana barra w fī hēk ʕaʔṣ midri barḡaš midri šū l-muhimm ḵalliṣni ftaḥli ʔakalūni

   Listen, I'm outside and there's, I don't know, mosquitoes or gnats or something... point is, come open up, they're eating me up

   • 1964, Michel Jiha, Der Arabischen Dialekt von Bišmizzīn (overall work in German):

     mabsūṭ midri fizʿā̊n

     [مبسوط مدري فزعان]

     happy or scared, I don't know