שַׁמָּה shammâh — ruin
Translated in the KJV as astonishment, desolate, waste, wonderful thing.
from H8074; ruin; by implication, consternation.
shammâh in each stem
Niph'al
Simple · passive — the plain action; the subject has it done to them
Perfect (qatal) 1
נָשַׁ֣מָּה Zech 7:14 Perfect (qatal), 3rd person feminine singular
But I scattered them with a whirlwind among all the nations whom they knew not. Thus the land was desolate after them, that no man passed through nor returned: for they laid the pleasant land desolate.
What the stems mean
A Hebrew verb is its root letters set into a pattern. The pattern — the binyan — is the grammar's way of saying three things at once: whether the action is simple, intensive or causative, and whether its subject is active, passive or reflexive. That is why one Hebrew word can need six English ones. All seven binyanim, explained ›