Etymology of Barbar/Berber

MARAQ DIGAAG said:

Rendille word for human: Barbar.

In modern Somali it means youngsters.
It can also be used to mean the place where someone was raised; Apollo Wuxu ku barbaaray immigrant ghetto.
(Apollo was raised in an immigrant ghetto).

You will know there is a famous Somali city called Barbara. There is a small town in Sudan with the same name.

Ancient Cushitic were called Barbaroi.

The Egyptians apparently referred to people down there whose languages they couldn’t understand as “Barbar. I think it may come for their original Cushitic word for human or people.

The Romans later ran with the word and started calling all foreigners as Barbarians.

In the medieval times the Somalis were called the Barbaras, then overtime other black or Beber Muslims started being referred to as Berber. The Tamazight people were later erroneously referred to as “Berbers” and this is their name till this day.

If my Suugo linguistics is correct then it means ancient Somaloid gave a word to the English language.

We wuz Barbarians.

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I didn’t know that Apollo was raised in ghetto hmmm

Romans referred ancient Somalis as Barbaris while they referred northwest Africans as Berbers. Two different words with two different meanings. The Romans even mentioned our city-states and acknowledged our impressive civilizations while Berbers were pirates sabotaging the Mediterranean trade-route which is why the Romans conquered north Africa. The ancient Somalis used to collect trade from Arabia, Persia, India as far as far east and bring them to the Mediterranean sea so Somalis were the connection of trade.



The reason why the Somali peninsula was called the Barbara region is because it deprived from Berbera city. Do you know what Berbera means? It means cinnamon which is a reference to the ubiquitous maritime trade history of the Somali people.

The Somali peninsula was called Barbara region and was named after the Berbera city.

MARAQ DIGAAG said:

Rendille word for human: Barbar.

In modern Somali it means youngsters.
It can also be used to mean the place where someone was raised; Apollo Wuxu ku barbaaray immigrant ghetto.
(Apollo was raised in an immigrant ghetto).

You will know there is a famous Somali city called Barbara. There is a small town in Sudan with the same name.

Ancient Cushitic were called Barbaroi.

The Egyptians apparently referred to people down there whose languages they couldn’t understand as “Barbar. I think it may come for their original Cushitic word for human or people.

The Romans later ran with the word and started calling all foreigners as Barbarians.

In the medieval times the Somalis were called the Barbaras, then overtime other black or Beber Muslims started being referred to as Berber. The Tamazight people were later erroneously referred to as “Berbers” and this is their name till this day.

If my Suugo linguistics is correct then it means ancient Somaloid gave a word to the English language.

We wuz Barbarians.

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Isnt raise in af somaali koor, pastense kooray.

Shushue said:

I didn’t know that Apollo was raised in ghetto hmmm

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I wasn't. He was trolling.'

Grew up in a middle-class suburb.

Western etymology:

The Arabic "barbar" comes from the Greek "barbaros", which came from a Sanskrit word meaning "to stammer." It indicated a foreigner or someone whose speech could not be understood.

http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-bar3.htm

"It’s generally accepted that the original Greek bárbaros for a foreigner came from an earlier sense of the word that meant someone who stammered. That’s thought to be older than the Greek language, since Sanskrit has the root barbara-s that also means stammering; it was probably in the Proto-Indo-European language predating both. With the repeated bar-bar, it is probably imitative. The Greeks presumably thought that foreigners talked as though they were stammering.

The word was taken from Greek into Latin barbaria, a foreigner, and from there into English in the fourteenth century. Its first sense was also that of a foreigner, particularly someone who was neither Greek nor Roman nor a Christian. It was only a little later that the idea of an uncouth or uncivilised person came to the fore in English, though that derogatory sense had been present in both Latin and Greek. However, neither the Greeks nor the Romans seem to have used the word to mean savagely cruel or inhuman people.

The Barbary Coast, the old name for the countries of North Africa, comes from the same source, as does its close relative Berber for the native peoples of North Africa and their language. Both terms come immediately from the Arabic barbar, but that has been shown to derive from the Greek word. I suspect your informant knew about the link between barbarian and Berberbut not the background."

The Wiki entry is interesting.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbarian

MARAQ DIGAAG said:

In what language did Barbar mean cinnamon?

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The city Berbera is believed to be named after cinnamon and that city is famous for collecting cinnamon from India and selling it to the Romans. The Somali peninsula was named after the city Berbera just like the source I have shown above.

Believe it or not but in some Cushitic languages and even Ethio-Semitic langauges with their own meaning of Berber means spices or a mixture of spices.

MARAQ DIGAAG said:

Believed to be, by whom? I think it is guesswork, no different to mine. And im what Ethiopian or Cushitic languages does Barbar mean cinnamon?

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Amhara and sxb, it's not Barbar but Berber while other Cushitic languages just means spices like Hadiye, Sidamo, Gedeo and Kambaata.

Remember, the mediterranean sea believed the Somali peninsula was the source of cinnamon and they were the ones who provided to the romans but in reality, they collected it from India. Berbera was the most famous out of all other Somali city-states for selling cinnamon.

Anyways, my point is Berbori or Barbari derived from the Berbera city-state. The Barbarians were referred to the Berbers only who were famous for piracy and sabotaging the Mediterranean trade-route which is why the Romans conquered north Africa. This has nothing to do with the ancient Somali city-states.

MARAQ DIGAAG said:

Believed to be, by whom? I think it is guesswork, no different to mine. And im what Ethiopian or Cushitic languages does Barbar mean cinnamon?

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Ber-buh-ray is not bar-bar-ah. "Ber-buh-ray", the spice, comes from "papare", Ge'ez for "pepper"

https://www.demandafrica.com/food/ethiopian-berbere-spice-a-history/

"In Amharic, the state language of Ethiopia, ‘barbare’ means pepper or hot. Not surprisingly, berbere spice, the flavor backbone of Ethiopian cooking, gives traditional Ethiopian dishes that fiery kick. Berbere’s constituent spice is paprika (itself a ground spice made from Capsicum peppers), but the final blend could be made from up to 20 spices.

Ethiopian cooks of old were not short of kitchen experiments, and over time have added garlic, ginger, fenugreek seeds, African basil, black and white cumin, nutmeg, cinnamon, clove, cardamom, coriander seed, thyme, rosemary, turmeric and ajwain (carom seeds commonly used in Indian cooking) to the mix. This allows berbere to impart a richer, aromatic and more layered flavor to any dish it’s added to, whether Ethiopian or not.

Red Sea Route and the Silk Road: Origins of Berbere
Amharic language scholars speculate that the name ‘barbare’ came from ‘papare,’ the Ge’ez word for pepper (Ge’ez was the language of ancient Ethiopia). While that is likely lost in the mists of time, the more probable theory is that berbere came at a point in Ethiopia’s history when the independent Axumite kingdom controlled the Red Sea route to the Silk Road. The Axumites knew the secrets of the monsoon winds, and harnessed it to send their ships toward India in summer, and back again to Africa in winter.

Linking to the fabled Silk Road meant that the Axumite traders now had access to goods from China. As a result, on their journey home to Africa, Axumite galleys were loaded with black pepper, cinnamon, cardamom, ginger, nutmeg, clove and turmeric, among other exotic spices.

As these imported spices made their way to Axumite markets, locals were intrigued and experimented with whatever spices were brought back by the galleys. Over time, households developed their own mix, perfecting intensely-guarded concoctions that they handed down to the next generations. The result is a spice blend that differs from region to region, and from household to household.

As there is no universal berbere blend, so is there no universal berbere flavor profile. In general, however, berbere imparts warmth, earthiness and sweetness to dishes that use it as an ingredient, whether in powdered or paste form. In appearance, dishes also tend to be brick-red, or even deeper, depending on how much berbere was tossed into the pot."

Grant said:

Ber-buh-ray is not bar-bar-ah. "Ber-buh-ray", the spice, comes from "papare", Ge'ez for "pepper"

https://www.demandafrica.com/food/ethiopian-berbere-spice-a-history/

"In Amharic, the state language of Ethiopia, ‘barbare’ means pepper or hot. Not surprisingly, berbere spice, the flavor backbone of Ethiopian cooking, gives traditional Ethiopian dishes that fiery kick. Berbere’s constituent spice is paprika (itself a ground spice made from Capsicum peppers), but the final blend could be made from up to 20 spices.

Ethiopian cooks of old were not short of kitchen experiments, and over time have added garlic, ginger, fenugreek seeds, African basil, black and white cumin, nutmeg, cinnamon, clove, cardamom, coriander seed, thyme, rosemary, turmeric and ajwain (carom seeds commonly used in Indian cooking) to the mix. This allows berbere to impart a richer, aromatic and more layered flavor to any dish it’s added to, whether Ethiopian or not.

Red Sea Route and the Silk Road: Origins of Berbere
Amharic language scholars speculate that the name ‘barbare’ came from ‘papare,’ the Ge’ez word for pepper (Ge’ez was the language of ancient Ethiopia). While that is likely lost in the mists of time, the more probable theory is that berbere came at a point in Ethiopia’s history when the independent Axumite kingdom controlled the Red Sea route to the Silk Road. The Axumites knew the secrets of the monsoon winds, and harnessed it to send their ships toward India in summer, and back again to Africa in winter.

Linking to the fabled Silk Road meant that the Axumite traders now had access to goods from China. As a result, on their journey home to Africa, Axumite galleys were loaded with black pepper, cinnamon, cardamom, ginger, nutmeg, clove and turmeric, among other exotic spices.

As these imported spices made their way to Axumite markets, locals were intrigued and experimented with whatever spices were brought back by the galleys. Over time, households developed their own mix, perfecting intensely-guarded concoctions that they handed down to the next generations. The result is a spice blend that differs from region to region, and from household to household.

As there is no universal berbere blend, so is there no universal berbere flavor profile. In general, however, berbere imparts warmth, earthiness and sweetness to dishes that use it as an ingredient, whether in powdered or paste form. In appearance, dishes also tend to be brick-red, or even deeper, depending on how much berbere was tossed into the pot."

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This article gives the pronunciation of "berbere" as "bari baray":

https://www.africanbites.com/berbere-spice/

"The word berbere means “hot” in Amharic —a spicy and flavorful spice blend. (Pronounced bari baray), somewhat of an all-purpose spice mix, widely used in Ethiopian dishes. A must have for Ethiopian cooking."

The name is thousands of years old and its first recorded use is by the Egyptians before Greek civilisation even came to prominence.

It has often been assumed — incorrectly — that the appellation originated with the ancient Greeks as a cognate of barbaros (“barbarian”). However, the first mention of the term actually dates earlier to the New Kingdom of Egypt (c. 1500 BCE), when it served as an ethnonym for the Puntites. Specifically, during the Hatshepsut expedition to Punt, the ancient Egyptians identified their Puntite counterparts as brbrta in hieroglyphic symbols. This is believed to have been an onomatopoeic imitation on the Egyptians’ part of the “bar” or “ber” sound that was apparently common in the Puntite language (cf. AECR (1976); Bowersock (2013)).

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https://landofpunt.wordpress.com


(Bowersock)

Crow said:

The name is thousands of years old and its first recorded use is by the Egyptians before Greek civilisation even came to prominence.

https://landofpunt.wordpress.com

View attachment 55210
(Bowersock)

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Barbar comes from Sanskrit, which is older than either Greek or Arabic, so that the root exists in most Indo-European languages. It meant to stammer or not be understandable. It was first used to refer to Africans by Arab authors of the medieval period in the form "al-Barbar", meaning that their language "sounded to a foreigner like bar-bar", that is, could not be understood. This is the same as Crow's meaning of the Arabic, which goes back to the original meaning "to stammer" and not to the more recent meaning of"barbarous", which has the same root but developed a different meaning later on, as it traveled from Greek, to Latin, to English..

See below. In the Arabic usage, "al-Barbar" and its variants meant a non-Arabic speaking Muslim in Africa. There is no relation to either cinnamon or berbere. At the time of the Periplus, Berbera was probably Malao and the Muslims that caused it to be named that were still way in the future.

http://www.taneter.org/berbers.html

Grant said:

Barbar comes from Sanskrit, which is older than either Greek or Arabic, so that the root exists in most Indo-European languages. It meant to stammer or not be understandable. It was first used to refer to Africans by Arab authors of the medieval period in the form "al-Barbar", meaning that their language "sounded to a foreigner like bar-bar", that is, could not be understood. This is the same as Crow's meaning of the Arabic, which goes back to the original meaning "to stammer" and not to the more recent meaning of"barbarous", which has the same root but developed a different meaning later on, as it traveled from Greek, to Latin, to English..

See below. In the Arabic usage, "al-Barbar" and its variants meant a non-Arabic speaking Muslim in Africa. There is no relation to either cinnamon or berbere. At the time of the Periplus, Berbera was probably Malao and the Muslims that caused it to be named that were still way in the future.

http://www.taneter.org/berbers.html


View attachment 55227

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I don't know why you quoted me with your copy-paste. I already showed you that this word was being used by Egyptians to refer to us over 3000 years ago (read: before the rise of Greece). I'm talking African antiquity and you're talking medieval Indo-European for some reason.

Crow said:

I don't know why you quoted me with your copy-paste. I already showed you that this word was being used by Egyptians to refer to us over 3000 years ago (read: before the rise of Greece). I'm talking African antiquity and you're talking medieval Indo-European for some reason.

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Crow,

Your author has very little evidence. Why would the inhabitants of Punt be brbrta? If the name was language related as your author suggests, it could easily have meant the same as the Sanskrit, that is, that it was not understood.

Sanskrit dates to 2000 BCE, It is the parent of both Mycenaean Greek and Hittite, and the"proto" forms are much older. The transition of the Sanskrit "stammer" to the Latin "barbarian" has been documented above. The "stammer" meaning entered Arabic from Aramaic, which:

" used to be the principal, international language of communication throughout the ancient Near and Middle East..." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic

In the first century AD the northern Somali coast was "the far-side ports', including Berbera as probably Malao. It was not named for al-Barbar until the Arabs named it for Muslims whose language they could not understand, which was much later. Both the word and the concept are Indo-European, and older enough than the Egyptian usage to have been the source, if they are even related.

Sanskrit
संस्कृतम्
Saṃskṛtam

Saṃskṛtam in Devanagari script
Pronunciation [sə̃skr̩t̪əm] pronunciation (help·info)
Region South Asia
parts of Southeast Asia
Era c. 2nd millennium BCE – 600 BCE (Vedic Sanskrit[1]);
600 BCE – present (Classical Sanskrit)
Revival A few attempts at revival have been reported in Indian and Nepalese newspapers, but none have been confirmed to have succeeded.
Language family
Indo-European

• Indo-Iranian
  • Indo-Aryan
    • Sanskrit

Compare the Wiki:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_of_the_Berber_people

Are you claiming all Berber peoples are brbrta? How would that follow?

Grant said:

It was not named for al-Barbar until the Arabs named it for Muslims whose language they could not understand, which was much later. Both the word and the concept are Indo-European, and older enough than the Egyptian usage to have been the source, if they are even related.

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This is completely wrong. You claim that the word was used by Indo-Europeans before Egyptians but you have zero evidence. Quit being a contrarian and admit you are wrong.

It was used in 1500 BCE by Egyptians which is roughly 2000 years before Islam. This is recorded history. The word has nothing to do with Indo-European and I have provided tangible evidence for that.

The word is Afro Asiatic in origin. Why would it come from primitive Greek tribes and Aramaics? Ridiculous. Stop posting conspiratorial lies.

Crow said:

This is completely wrong. You claim that the word was used by Indo-Europeans before Egyptians but you have zero evidence. Quit being a contrarian and admit you are wrong.

It was used in 1500 BCE by Egyptians which is roughly 2000 years before Islam. This is recorded history. The word has nothing to do with Indo-European and I have provided tangible evidence for that.

The word is Afro Asiatic in origin. Why would it come from primitive Greek tribes and Aramaics? Ridiculous. Stop posting conspiratorial lies.

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Perhaps you should read the articles I posted ?

Nobody said it originated with Greeks and Aramaics. "Berber" originates with proto Sanskrit and was transmitted through Greek and Aramaic to Arabic.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_of_the_Berber_people

" Muslim historiography has an eponymous Barbar as the ancestor of the Berbers, "the Berbers were the descendants of Barbar, the son of Tamalla, the son of Mazigh, the son of Canaan, the son of Ham, the son of Noah" (Ibn Khaldun, The History of Ibn Khaldun, Chapter 3)."

There is no connection to the Egyptian usage and Noah was around Mount Ararat, not in Africa at all.

"Berber
The term Berber is a variation of the Greek original word barbaros ("barbarian"), earlier in history applied by Romans specifically to their northern hostile neighbors from Germania (modern Germany) and Celts, Iberians, Gauls, Goths and Thracians. The variation is a French one when spelled Berbère and English when spelled Berber. The term appeared first in the 4th century in the religious conflicts between Saint Augustine, a Numidian Berber-Roman bishop of the Catholic faith, and the Berber Donatists of the Donatism faith who were allies of the Barbarian Vandals. The Vandals migrated from Iberia (modern Spain and Portugal) where they were assailed by the Gauls allied to the Romans, and settled west of the Roman city of Carthage (in modern Tunisia) in the highlands (in modern Algeria).

Derived terms include the toponym Barbary and the animals Barb horse and Barbary duck.

The Greek term "βάρβαρος / βάρβαροι" was originally a term for all non-Greek speakers, not necessarily used derogatively. The nonsense syllables "bar-bar" have no meaning in Greek; the term implied that all languages other than Greek were a collection of nonsense syllables. The term has been variously translated as "stutterers," "stammerers," or "babblers." (Compare the widespread belief that the Dutch term Hottentot, a term for the Khoikhoi people that came generally to mean 'barbarian', originated as an onomatopoetic term.[3]) The term did in origin refer to any people of "incomprehensible speech" (cf. names for Germans), including Persia and Egypt; its connotation of uncivilized rudeness (cf. Philistine and Vandal), now the primary meaning of the term "barbarian", appears to have emerged in the Roman era or with the Migration period.

Because the Berbers were called Al-Barbar by the Arabs, the early modern Barbary seems to be a re-adoption of the name from Arabic.[citation needed] Muslim historiography has an eponymous Barbar as the ancestor of the Berbers, "the Berbers were the descendants of Barbar, the son of Tamalla, the son of Mazigh, the son of Canaan, the son of Ham, the son of Noah" (Ibn Khaldun, The History of Ibn Khaldun, Chapter 3).

Another people called Berbers by medieval Arab, ancient Greek and ancient Egyptian geographers, respectively, were the ancestors of the Somalis. Barbara, an ancient region on the northern coast of Somalia was referred to as Bilad al-Barbar (Land of the Berbers).[4][5][6]"

Here's an entire article on the Greek usage of "Barbaroi", including that in the Periplus:

http://anthromadness.blogspot.com/2015/02/the-barbaroi-of-northeast-africa.html

Grant said:

The term appeared first in the 4th century

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I stopped reading here. I don't have time to debate someone who can't read.

I will say it one last time. I have provided clear evidence that it was used nearly 2000 years before this in 1500 BCE but, for some strange reason, you keep on posting things that take place thousands of years later.

Why are you charting this convoluted path from Sanskrit (India) to Greek (Southern Europe), to Aramic/Arabic (Middle East) with a timeline that is off by millenia when the answer is right in front of you?

It's very simple. The name originates in the same place as the people in question: northeastern Africa.


Now do me a favour and stop quoting me.