# ثمة



## tashmillions

Hello,

I'm having trouble translating ثمة from this sentence, and therefore can't understand the sentence as a whole.

اعترف الطواقم الدبلوماسية في الولايات المتحدة على أن ثمة خطأ 
I do not understand what على أن is doing in the sentence either.

My attempt :

Diplomatic groups in the US admitted however....


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## barkoosh

على أن should be بأن since اعترف requires بـ as a preposition, but preposition mix-up is very common in Arabic.

ثمّة is the same as هناك, "there".

So it's "admitted that there's a mistake".


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## tashmillions

Thank you very much


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## ayed

_"...admitted such a mistake..."_


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## إسكندراني

ayed said:


> _"...admitted such a mistake..."_


This would be
هكذا خطأ


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## aurelien.demarest

،السلام عليكم ورحمة الله وبركاته

I saw that we could say َثَمَة or َثَم are they totally interchangeable or are there particular rules?
Example:
لو ذهبت إلى روما سأمكث ثَمَّةَ أسبوعا
لو ذهبت إلى روما سأمكث ثَمَّ أسبوعا

شكرا سلفا
أوريليان


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## rayloom

They are interchangeable. There was some debate on their usage, الرازي considers that thammata refers to تأنيث البقعة. There was some debate on whether thammata refers للقريب while thamma refers للبعيد, but in the literature both seem to have the same meaning.


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## aurelien.demarest

Interesting  
Thank you for the clarification Rayloom.

Aurélien


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## aurelien.demarest

Sorry another question.. you're talking about literature but is it also used colloquially?


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## rayloom

aurelien.demarest said:


> Sorry another question.. you're talking about literature but is it also used colloquially?



Only in certain Maghrebi dialects, mostly Tunisian.


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## aurelien.demarest

مفهوم شكر لك


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## Hemza

Hello Aurélien,

Actually, both ثمة and ثم are widely used in the Maghreb. In Mauritania, Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia, it means "there" (like "là" or "là-bas" in French) or "there is" (il y a/il n'y a pas) according to the context. In Libya, it used to be used but it faded out and had been replaced by هناك and في if I'm not wrong.


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## aurelien.demarest

Merci Hemza! À bientôt


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## Hemza

Hello,
For "there isn't", which form is correct?

ليس ثم/ثمة (on the model of ليس هناك)
لا ثم/ثمة (on the model of لا يوجد)

I guess the first proposition is the correct one since ثم/ثمة isn't a verb like وجد but I'm not sure.

Thank you.


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## cherine

Yes, it's ليس ثمة.


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## Hemza

Thank you Cherine .


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