English word for arabic words

1. ^ The dictionaries used to compile the list are these: Centre National de Ressources Textuelles et Lexicales: Etymologies, Online Etymology Dictionary, Random House Dictionary, Concise Oxford English Dictionary, American Heritage Dictionary, Collins English Dictionary, Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, Arabismen im Deutschen: lexikalische Transferenzen vom Arabischen ins Deutsche, by Raja Tazi (year 1998), A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles (a.k.a. «NED») (published in pieces between 1888 and 1928), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English (year 1921) by Ernest Weekley. Footnotes for individual words have supplementary other references. The most frequently cited of the supplementary references is Glossaire des mots espagnols et portugais dérivés de l’arabe (year 1869) by Reinhart Dozy.
2. ^ ^{a b} References for the medieval Arabic sources and medieval Latin borrowings of those plant names are as follows. Ones marked «(F)» go to the French dictionary at Centre National de Ressources Textuelles et Lexicales, ones marked «(R)» go to Random House Dictionary, and other references are identified with terse labels: Berberis(R), انبرباريس anbarbārīs = Berberis(Ibn Sina), امبرباريس ambarbārīs = Berberis(Ibn Al-Baitar), الأمبرباريس al-ambarbārīs is also called البرباريس al-barbārīs Archived 29 October 2013 at the Wayback Machine(Fairuzabadi’s dictionary), Galen uses name «Oxyacantha» for Berberis(John Gerarde), Arabic amiberberis = Latin Berberis(Matthaeus Silvaticus), Berberis is frequent in Constantinus Africanus (Constantinus Africanus was the introducer of plantname Berberis into medieval Latin), Berberis(Raja Tazi 1998), Barberry(Skeat 1888);; Cakile(Henri Lammens 1890), Cakile(Pierre Guigues 1905), Kakile Serapionis(John Gerarde 1597), Chakile(Serapion the Younger, medieval Latin);; for Carthamus see Carthamin;; Cuscute(F), Cuscuta (Etimología), spelled كشوث kushūth in Ibn al-Baitar;; Doronicum(F), Doronicum(R), spelled درونج dorūnaj in Ibn al-Baitar;; Garingal & Galanga(F), Galingale & Galanga(NED);; Musa(Devic), Musa(Alphita), موز mauz(Ibn al-Baitar), Muse #4 and Musa(NED);; Nuphar (nénuphar)(F), Nénuphar(Lammens);; Ribès(Pierre Guigues 1903 in preface to translation of Najm al-Din Mahmud (died 1330)), Ribes(Lammens 1890), the meaning of late medieval Latin ribes was Rheum ribes – e.g. e.g. – and the medieval Arabic ريباس rībās had the very same meaning – e.g. ;; Senna(F), Senna(R), Séné(Lammens), Sene in Alphita, السنى al-sanā and السني al-senī in Ibn al-Baitar;; Taraxacum(Skeat), Ataraxacon(Alphita), Taraxacum(R);; Usnea(F), Usnea(R), Usnee(Simon of Genoa), Usnée(Lammens);; alkekengi(F), alkekengi(R);; azedarach(F), azedarach(Garland Cannon), azadarach + azedarach(Matthaeus Silvaticus anno 1317), azedarach produced Azadirachta;; béhen(Devic, year 1876), Behemen = behen = behem says Matthaeus Silvaticus (year 1317); this name is بهمن behmen | bahman in Ibn al-Baitar and Ibn Sina;; bellerica(Yule), bellerica(Devic), beliligi = belirici = bellerici(Simon of Genoa), بليلج belīlej in Ibn al-Baitar;; chebula(Yule), kebulus = chebulae(Alphita), chébule(Devic);; cheiranthe(Devic), keiri(NED), خيري kheīrī(Ibn al-Awwam);; cubeba(F), cubeba(R);; emblic(Yule), emblic(Devic), emblic(Serapion the Younger);; harmala(Tazi), harmale(Devic), harmala(other), harmala(more details);; (Salsola) kali(F), kali = a marine littoral plant, an Arabic name(Simon of Genoa year 1292 in Latin, also in Matthaeus Silvaticus);; mahaleb(F), mahaleb(Ibn al-Awwam), mahaleb(Matthaeus Silvaticus year 1317);; mathil->metel(other), metel(Devic), nux methel(Serapion the Younger), جوز ماثل jūz māthil(Ibn Sina);; mezereum(R), mézéréon(Devic), mezereon(Alphita: see editor’s footnote quoting Matthaeus Silvaticus and John Gerarde), spelled مازريون māzarīūn in Ibn Sina and Ibn al-Baitar;; sambac(Devic), zambacca(synonyms of Petrus de Abano, died c. 1316), sambacus(Simon of Genoa), زنبق = دهن الياسمين (zanbaq in Lisan al-Arab);; sebesten(other), sebesten(Devic), sebesten(Alphita) (sebesten in late medieval Latin referred to Cordia myxa, not Cordia sebestena, and the medieval Arabic سبستان sebestān was Cordia myxa);; turpeth(F), turpeth(R);; zedoaria(F), zedoaria(R);; zérumbet(F), zerumbet is from medieval Latin zurumbet | zurumbeth | zerumbet which is from Arabic زرنباد zurunbād | zarunbād. The great majority of the above plant names can be seen in Latin in the late-13th-century medical-botany dictionary Synonyma Medicinae by Simon of Genoa (online) and in the mid-15th-century Latin medical-botany dictionary called the Alphita (online); and the few that are not in either of those two dictionaries can be seen in Latin in the book on medicaments by Serapion the Younger circa 1300 (online). None of the names are found in Latin in early medieval or classical Latin botany or medicine books — partially excepting a complication over the name harmala, and excepting galanga and zedoaria because they have Latin records beginning in the 9th or 10th centuries. In other words nearly all the names were introduced to Latin in the later-medieval period, specifically from the late 11th through late 13th centuries. Most early Latin users lived in Italy. All of the names, without exception, are in the Arabic-to-Latin medical translations of Constantinus Africanus (died c. 1087) and/or Gerardus Cremonensis (died c. 1187) and/or Serapion the Younger (dated later 13th century Latin). The Arabic predecessors of the great majority of the names can be seen in Arabic as entries in Part Two of The Canon of Medicine of Ibn Sina, dated about 1025 in Arabic, which became a widely circulated book in Latin medical circles in the 13th and 14th centuries: an Arabic copy is at DDC.AUB.edu.lb. All of the Arabic predecessor plant-names without exception, and usually with better descriptions of the plants (compared to Ibn Sina’s descriptions), are in Ibn al-Baitar’s Comprehensive Book of Simple Medicines and Foods, dated about 1245, which was not translated to Latin in the medieval era but was published in the 19th century in German, French, and Arabic – an Arabic copy is at Al-Mostafa.com and at AlWaraq.net.
3. ^ «Les Noms Arabes Dans Sérapion, Liber de Simplici Medicina«, by Pierre Guigues, published in 1905 in Journal Asiatique, Series X, tome V, pages 473–546, continued in tome VI, pages 49–112.
4. ^ Analysis of herbal medicine plant-names by Martin Levey reported by him in «Chapter III: Botanonymy» in his 1973 book Early Arabic Pharmacology: An Introduction.
5. ^ Each discussed in Etymologisches Wörterbuch der botanischen Pflanzennamen, by Helmut Genaust, year 1996. Another Arabic botanical name introduced by Prospero Alpini from Egypt was Sesban meaning Sesbania sesban from synonymous Arabic سيسبان saīsabān | saīsbān (Lammens 1890; Ibn al-Baitar). The Latin botanical Abrus is the parent of the chemical name Abrin; see abrine @ CNRTL.fr. The Arabic لبلاب lablāb means any kind of climbing and twisting plant. The Latin and English Lablab is a certain vigorously climbing and twisting bean plant. Prospero Alpini called the plant in Latin phaseolus niger lablab = «lablab black bean». Prospero Alpini published his De Plantis Aegypti in 1592. It was republished in 1640 with supplements by other botanists – De Plantis Aegypti, 1640. De Plantis Exoticis by Prospero Alpini (died 1617) was published in 1639 – ref.
6. ^ A list of 43 of Forsskål’s Latinized Arabic fish names is at Baheyeldin.com/linguistics. Forsskål was a student of Arabic language as well as of taxonomy. His published journals contain the underlying Arabic names as well as his Latinizations of them (downloadable from links at the Wikipedia Peter Forsskål page).
7. ^ Most of those miscellaneous botanical names are discussed in Etymologisches Wörterbuch der botanischen Pflanzennamen, by Helmut Genaust, year 1996. About half of them are in Dictionnaire Étymologique Des Mots Français D’Origine Orientale, by L. Marcel Devic, year 1876. The following are supplemental notes. The names argel and seyal were introduced to scientific botany nomenclature from الحرجل harjel and سيال seyāl in the early 19th century by the botanist Delile, who had visited North Africa. Retama comes from an old Spanish name for broom bushes and the Spanish name is from medieval Arabic رتم ratam with the same meaning – ref, ref. Acerola is from tropical New World Spanish acerola = «acerola cherry» which is from medieval Spanish and Portuguese acerola | azerola | azarola = «azarole hawthorn» which is from medieval Arabic الزعرور al-zoʿrūr = «azarole hawthorn» – ref, ref. Alchimilla appears in 16th century Europe with the same core meaning as today’s Alchemilla (e.g.). Reporters on Alchemilla agree it is from Arabic although they do not agree on how.
8. ^ In late medieval English, chamelet | chamlet was a costly fabric and was typically an import from the Near East – MED, NED. Today spelled «camlet», it is synonymous with French camelot which the French CNRTL.fr says is «from Arabic khamlāt, plural of khamla, meaning plush woollen cloth…. The stuff was made in the Orient and introduced to the Occident at the same time as the word.» The historian Wilhelm Heyd (1886) says: «The [medieval] Arabic khamla meant cloth with a long nap, cloth with a lot of plush. This is the common character of all the camlets [of the late medieval Latins]. They could be made from diverse materials…. Some were made from fine goat hair.» – Histoire du commerce du Levant au moyen-âge, Volume 2 pages 703–705, by W. Heyd, year 1886. The medieval Arabic word was also in the form khamīla. Definitions of خملة khamla | خميلة khamīla, and the plural khamlāt, taken from medieval Arabic dictionaries are in Lane’s Arabic-English Lexicon page 813 and in the Lisan al-Arab under خمل khaml Archived 29 October 2013 at the Wayback Machine.
9. ^ The English word morocco, meaning a type of leather, is a refreshed spelling of early 16th-century English maroquin, from 15th-century French maroquin meaning a soft flexible leather of goat-skin made in the country of Morocco, or similar leather made anywhere, with maroquin literally meaning «Moroccan, from Morocco». Maroquin @ NED, morocco @ NED, maroquin @ CNRTL.fr, FEW XIX.
10. ^ Fustic in the late medieval centuries was a dye from the wood of a Mediterranean tree. After the discovery of America, a better, more durable dye from a tree wood was found, and given the same name. The late medieval fustic came from the Rhus cotinus tree. «Rhus cotinus wood was treated in warm [or boiling] water; a yellow infusion was obtained which on contact with air turned into brown; with acids it becomes greenish yellow and with alkalies orange; in combination with iron salts, especially with ferrous sulphate a greenish-black was produced.» – The Art of Dyeing in the History of Mankind, by Franco Brunello, year 1973 page 382. The earliest record of the word as a dye in the Western languages is in 13th-century Spanish as «fustet», followed by 14th-century French as «fustet» and «fustel» – CNRTL.fr, DMF. Medieval Spanish had alfóstigo = «pistachio», medieval Catalan festuc = «pistachio, which were from Arabic فستق (al-)fustuq = «pistachio». Medieval Arabic additionally had fustuqī as a color name, yellow-green like the pistachio nut (e.g.), (e.g.), (e.g.). Many dictionaries today report that the Spanish dye name somehow came from this medieval Arabic word. But the proponents of this idea do not cite evidence of fustuq carrying the dye meaning in Arabic. The use of the word as a dye in medieval Arabic is not recorded under the entry for fustuq in A Dictionary of Andalusi Arabic (1997) nor under the entries for fustuq in the medieval Arabic dictionaries – Lane’s Arabic-English Lexicon, page 2395, Baheth.info Archived 29 October 2013 at the Wayback Machine. This suggests that the use of the word as a dye may have started in Spanish. From a phonetic angle the medieval Spanish and French fustet is a diminutive of the medieval Spanish and French fuste = «boards of wood, timber», which was from classical Latin fustis = «wooden stick» – DRAE, Du Cange. From the semantic angle, since most names of natural dyes referred to both the plant that produces the dye and the dye itself, fustet meaning «little pieces of wood» can plausibly beget the dye name fustet. The semantic transformation from «pistachio» to «fustic dye» is poorly understood, assuming it happened. New English Dictionary on Historical Principles (year 1901) says «the name was transferred from the pistachio [tree] to the closely allied Rhus cotinus«. But the two trees are not closely allied.
11. ^ «Carthamin» and «Carthamus» in New English Dictionary on Historical Principles (year 1893). Similarly summarized in CNRTL.fr (French) and Diccionario RAE (Spanish). For the word in medieval Arabic see قرطم @ Baheth.info Archived 29 October 2013 at the Wayback Machine (see also عصفر ʿusfur), قرطم @ Ibn al-Awwam and قرطم @ Ibn al-Baitar.

Did you know that words like Adobe and Safari  are actually Arabic? 

Of course, you already knew of the existence of so-called “loanwords” in English, meaning words which are originally French, German, Spanish, etc.

But were you actually aware that several of them also come from ARABIC?

 IN SCIENCE AND MATH:

• ALCHEMY and CHEMISTRY (الكيميـــــــــاء.)

• ALCOHOL (الكُحُـــــــــول.) 

• ALGEBRA (الجبــر: More on the eponymous founder of Algebra as an independent mathematical discipline here.)

• ALGORITHM (خوارزم: More on the eponymous founder of algorthimics here.)

• ALKALINE (القلوي: Meaning “non-acid, basic.”) 

• ALMANAC (المنــــــاخ: Literally meaning “climate”)

• AVERAGE (From Old French avarie, itself from the Arabic term عوارية, meaning “damaged goods”, from عور meaning “to lose an eye.”)

• AZIMUTH (السمــــــــت: This concept is used in several fields, such as الفلك/astronomy، هندسة الطيران/aerospace engineering، and فيزياء الكم/quantum physics.)
  

• CIPHER (صِفـــــــــــــــــــــــــــر: The term “cipher” is now mostly applied in cryptography—see الكَندي/Al-Kindi’s work.)
  

• ELIXIR (الإكسيــــــــــــــر: Something like a “syrup”—also an Arabic term, possibly borrowed from Persian.) 

• NADIR (نظيـــــــــــــر: It is the opposite of the zenith.)

• SODA (صـــــــــودا.)
  

• ZENITH (سمت الرأس: Literally the “azimuth of the head”، it is the opposite of the “nadir.”)
  

• ZERO (same as “cipher.”)

Names of many stars and constellations: 

(Altair: الطَّائـــــــــر meaning “the bird”; Betelgeuse: بيت الجــــــوزاء, meaning “the House of the Gemini”; Deneb: ذنب meaning “tail”; Fomalhaut: فم الحوت which means “the mouth of the Pisces”, Rigel: رِجـــــــل meaning “foot”, it stands for رجل الجبَّار, or the “foot of the Titan”, Vega: الواقع meaning “the Falling”, refers to النسر الواقع، meaning “the falling eagle”, etc.)

• An entirely separate post is necessary to list all of the astronomical terms which are of Arabic origin.

 TECHNICAL TERMS (ENGINEERING, MILITARY, BUSINESS, COMMODITIES, etc.)

• ADMIRAL (أميــــــــر الرحلة, meaning commander of the fleet, or literally “of the trip”) 

• ADOBE (الطوب: meaning a “brick.” Next time you use an Adobe Acrobat product, you will remember that Adobe is originally Arabic!)

• ALCOVE (القبة: meaning “the vault”, or “the dome”)

• AMBER (عنبر: Anbar, “ambergris.”)

• ARSENAL (Do fans of F.C. Arsenal today, including those living in the Arab world, know where the name of their favorite team came from? دار الصناعــــــــــــــــة : “manufacturing house”)

• ASSASSIN (Just like the word MAFIA, it is of Arabic origin: It either comes from “حشَّــــــــــــــاشين”, referring to the medieval sect of the same name famous for the heavy hashish consumption by its knife-wielding members, or “العسَّاسيــــــــــــــــن”, meaning “the watchmen.”)

• CALIBER (قـــــــالب: meaning “mold”) 

• CANDY (from قندي, itself from Persian for “hard candy made by boiling cane sugar”)

• CHECK (from صکّ, also from Persian meaning “letter of credit.” It would give the Chess expression “Checkmate”, from “الشيخ مات”, or “the Shaikh is dead.”)

• CORK (القورق)

• COFFEE (قهوة: For long snubbed by Europeans as the “wine of the infidels”—that is, many centuries before the age of Starbucks and instant coffee!)

• COTTON (قُطْـــــــــن)
  

• GAUZE (either from قَــــــــــزّ, meaning “silk”, or from غَــــــــزّة, “Gaza”, the Palestinian city.)

• GUITAR (just as LUTE, العود, a musical instrument known to Europeans through the Arabic قيثارة, itself possibly borrowed from a word of Ancient Greek.)

• HAZARD (الزّهر: “the dice”—Think of an Arabic TV series hazardly titled “The Dukes of Al-Azhar”…) 

• LAZULI (As in “Lapis Lazuli”, لاژورد: Arabic word for a semi-precious stone famous for its intense blue color. The Arabic word is said to come from a Persian city where the stone was mined.)

• MASCARA (Just as with the English “masquerade” and the French “mascarade“, mascara comes from the Arabic word مسخرة, an event during which people wear masks, such as carnivals.) 

• MATTRESS (مطـــــــــــــــــــرح.)

• MONSOON (موسم: Arabic for “season.”)

• MUMMY (مومياء: Originally from Persian root “موم”, meaning “wax”.)

• RACQUET (As in a “tennis racket”. Some point to an Arabic origin of Tennis. The word racket comes the Arabic word “راحـــــــة”, as in “راحـــــة اليد”, meaning the “palm of the hand.”)

• REAM (as in a “ream of paper”, it comes from Arabic رزمة, meaning a “bundle.”) 

• SAFARI (سفـــــــر: “travel”—As in Apple’s Safari web browser)

• SASH (شــــــــاش.)
  

• SATIN (زيتــــــــــــوني: “Olive-like”, perhaps related to modern Tsinkiang in Fukien province, southern China.) 

• SOFA (الصُفــــــــة)
  

• TALCUM (التلك)

SWAHILI (Comes from سواحــــــــــل: Plural of ساحــــــــــل, meaning a “coast.”)

• ZIRCON (زرقـــــــــــــون: “golden-colored.” Zirconium is a chemical element with the symbol Zr and atomic number 40)

• TARIFF (تعاريـــــــــــــــف, plural of تعريـــــــــــــــفة, meaning a “fee”, or simply تعريـــــــــــــــف, as in “بطاقــــــــة التعريـــــــــــــــف“, meaning an “identity card.”)

Finally, to close this list, it is fitting to greet everyone by saying “SO-LONG” (an English expression which, according to The Penguin Dictionary of Historical Slang, may come from the Arabic word ســـــــــــــــــــــــلام/SALAAM!)

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1000 words in English to Arabic

Here is the list of 1000 most important common words in Arabic language and their pronunciation in English.

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