__NOTOC__ The following English words have been acquired either directly from Arabic or else indirectly by passing from Arabic into other languages and then into English. Most entered one or more of the Romance languages before entering English.
To qualify for this list, a word must be reported in etymology dictionaries as having descended from Arabic. A handful of dictionaries has been used as the source for the list.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. Words associated with the Islamic religion are omitted; for Islamic words, see Glossary of Islam. Archaic and rare words are also omitted. A bigger listing including many words very rarely seen in English is available at Wiktionary dictionary.
Loanwords listed in alphabetical order List of English words of Arabic origin (A-B) List of English words of Arabic origin (C-F) List of English words of Arabic origin (G-J) List of English words of Arabic origin (K-M) List of English words of Arabic origin (N-S) List of English words of Arabic origin (T-Z) List of English words of Arabic origin: Addenda for certain specialist vocabularies
T tabla (percussion instrument in music of India) طبلة tabla (), drum. English tabla is from Hindi/Urdu tabla, which is from Persian tabla = "small drum", Persian tabl = "drum", and Arabic tabl. The Persian is from the Arabic. Tabl in Arabic has been the usual word for drum (noun and verb) since the beginning of written records.Tabl = "drum" is a common word in medieval Arabic. As one reflection of that, in the 14th-century dictionary of Fairuzabadi, normal definitions of well-known words were given by the notation م denoting "well-known (definition unnecessary)", and طبل tabl was so given – Baheth.info. In Arabic dictionaries today, another written form of the noun is طبلة tabla. But that is not in medieval and early modern Arabic dictionaries. In some Urdu dictionaries, طبل tabl is one of the words for a drum – e.g. in [httpxact&display=utf8 Platts' Urdu-English Dictionary year 1884].
tabby عتابية / ʿattābiyya The English term tabby originally referred to "striped silk taffeta", from the French word tabis, meaning "a rich watered silk". This can be further traced to the Middle French atabis (14th century), which stemmed from the Arabic term عتابية / ʿattābiyya. This word is a reference to the Attabiya district of Baghdad, noted for its striped cloth and silk; itself named after the Umayyad governor of Mecca Attab ibn Asid. Such silk cloth became popular in the Muslim world and spread to England, where the word "tabby" became commonly used in the 17th and 18th centuries. Use of the term tabby cat for a cat with a striped coat began in the 1690s, and was shortened to tabby in 1774. The notion that tabby indicates a female cat may be due to the feminine proper name Tabby as a nickname of "Tabitha".
tahini طحينة tahīna (), tahini. Derives from the Arabic verb for "grind" and is related to tahīn = "flour". The written Arabic tahīna is pronounced "taheeny" in Levantine Arabic. The word entered English directly from Levantine Arabic around year 1900, although tahini was rarely eaten in English-speaking countries until around 1970.Definition of tahini | Dictionary.com
talc طلق (), mica and talc. Common in medieval Arabic. Documented in Latin alchemy from around 1200 onward, meaning mica and talc. Uncommon in the Latinate languages until the later 16th century. In all European languages today.Talq = "mica or talc" is in Arabic writings by Al-Jahiz (died 869), Yahya ibn Sarafyun (died before 900), Al-Razi (died circa 930), Al-Masudi (died 956), Ibn Sina (died 1037), a servant of emir Ibn Badis (died c. 1062), Ibn Al-Baitar (died 1248), and others – Ref, Ref, Ref (page 24 footnote #170). The word is in Latin in the early 13th century in two alchemy books that were translated and derived from Arabic: the Liber de Aluminibus et Salibus and the Liber Luminis Luminum – Ref (section §69), Ref (appendix III). The influential Latin alchemist Pseudo-Geber, who was influenced by Arabic literature, used the word in Latin around 1300 spelled talc | talck | talk in Latin. He was not the only late medieval Latin alchemist who used it. Late medieval Latin alchemy examples are at Ref, Ref, Ref. Latin talk is also in the medical book of Ibn Sina in late 12th century Arabic-to-Latin translation (Ref). But the word is uncommon in late medieval Latin (e.g. it is not in the extensive medieval Latin glossaries of Du Cange and Niermeyer) and the earliest known attestations in the vernacular Western languages come relatively late: Spanish = 1492, German = 1526, Italian = 1550, French = 1553, English talcum = 1558, English talc = 1582 – Ref, ref, ref. The writings of Paracelsus (died 1541) increased the circulation of the word in 16th-century Europe. The 16th century Latin talk | talcum meant mica and talc (e.g.), (e.g.).Definition of talc | Dictionary.com
talisman طلسم tilsam | tilasm (), talisman. The Arabic came from Late Greek telesma = "consecration rite". Medievally in Arabic and Syriac it was used in the sense of "incantation" sometimes. Al-Masudi (died 956) and Ibn al-Awwam (died c. 1200) are examples of Arabic writers who used the word in the sense of an astrology-based talisman. An 11th-century, 400-page Arabic book about occult magic, astrology and talismans, the book entitled the Ghāyat al-Hakīm, uses the word about 200 times in the sense of a talisman, meaning an image with talismanic powers created through the guidance of astrology. The word entered astrology in the West with this meaning in the early 17th century, beginning in French. Early users in French said the word came from Arabic."Talisman" with roughly today's meaning is first recorded in French in 1592 (CNRTL.fr), in English in 1638 (NED). The word with the same meaning is in today's Italian and Spanish and arrived there from French (as reported by today's Italian and Spanish etymology dictionaries). In the Western languages for three centuries before 1638 and continuing for a while after, a "talismani" meant an Islamic prayer leader or mullah, as documented in Yule & Burnell (page 893). With regard to "talisman" with roughly today's meaning, this meaning is found in French in Joseph Scaliger in 1590s, Jacques Gaffarel in the 1620s, and Charles Sorel in the 1630s, and the more exact meaning they have for the word is an astrology-based constructed image serving as an amulet, and those three writers say the word with this meaning has come from the Arabic language. More details on the history of the word are at English Words That Are Of Arabic Etymological Ancestry: Note #137: Talisman.Definition of talisman | Dictionary.com
tamarind تمر هندي tamr hindī (literally: "Indian date") (), tamarind. Tamarinds were in use in ancient India. They were not known to the ancient Greeks and Romans. They entered medieval Latin medical practice from Arabic. In English the early records are in translations of Latin medical texts. Tamarind's medieval medical uses were various.In Latin, tamarindi occurs in the later 11th century in the Arabic-to-Latin medical translator Constantinus Africanus (ref), and the word is frequent in the writings of the 12th and 13th century medical school at Salerno in southern Italy (collected in the five-volume set Collectio Salernitana). It entered late medieval English in medical books that were influenced by the Salernitan school (see the Middle English Dictionary). In Arabic, the book on medicaments by Ibn al-Baitar (died 1248) gives brief summaries of the statements of a handful of medieval Arabic medical writers about tamr hindī – ref: pages 166–167. One of the people quoted by Ibn al-Baitar says the tamarind "grows in Yemen and India and Central Africa [Bilād al-Sūdān]". The tamarind has a large number of different names spread across the languages of Central Africa, and the tree is evidently native in Central Africa. Nevertheless Arabic medicine got introduced to the tamarind from India. Another one of the medieval commentators quoted by Ibn al-Baitar says the tamarind is used as a cuisine item in Oman. That is surely true, but other evidence indicates that tamarind's use as a cuisine item was rare among the medieval Arabs (ref, ref, ref), though it was not rare in medieval India (ref). The most commonly recorded use of the tamarind among the medieval Arabs and Latins was as a laxative (see the medical books just referenced, including Ibn al-Baitar's).Definition of tamarind | Dictionary.com
tanbur, tanbura, tambur, tambura, tambouras, tamburica, tembûr These are all long-necked plucked string musical instruments. From Arabic طنبور ṭunbūr(also ṭanbūr) (), long-necked plucked string instrument. The word occurs early and often in medieval Arabic. It was also in use in Early Medieval Aramaic.Early Medieval Aramaic has ṭnbwr = "long-necked string instrument", with records in the Syriac and Jewish Babylonian Aramaic dialects. Aramaic writing systems omit short vowels, so ṭnbwr may be read as tanbawr | tunboūr | etc. – Tnbwr @ Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon . An Arabic writer who wrote at length about the tunbūr was Al-Farabi (died 950). A 17-page extract from Al-Farabi about the tunbūr is online in Arabic in Proceedings of the Sixth International Conference of Orientalists meeting in Leiden year 1883. The records for the word tunbur | tanbur are many centuries older in Arabic and Aramaic than in Persian. In Persian the very old word for a long-necked string instrument was tar and dotar and setar – Dictionary of Music by Willi Apel, year 1969, entry under "Lute II". The English tambourine, a percussive instrument, is without any documentary evidence that would etymologically relate it. Likewise tambour = "drum" is either unrelated to tambur = "string instrument" or else the relation is poorly understood."Tabor #1" (plus "tambour", "tamboura") in NED. More etymology details about the Western word tambour | tambourine meaning drum are at English words of Arabic ancestry: Note #140: Tambour (drum), Tambourine.Definition of tamboura | Dictionary.com