Construct state
In Afro-Asiatic languages, the first noun in a genitive phrase that consists of a possessed noun followed by a possessor noun often takes on a special morphological form, which is termed the construct state (Latin status constructus). For example, in Arabic and Hebrew, the word for "queen" standing alone is malika ملكة and malka מלכה respectively, but when the word is possessed, as in the phrase "Queen of Sheba" (literally "Sheba's Queen"; or, rather, "Queen-of Sheba"), it becomes malikat sabaʾ ملكة سبأ and malkat šəva מלכת שבא respectively, in which malikat and malkat are the construct state (possessed) form and malika and malka are the absolute (unpossessed) form.