Bibliotheca Polyglotta

▪ DRS 10 (2012)#K/GB/PRT: Akk kibrīt-, kubrīt-, JP kubrētā, Syr kibrītā, Ar kibrīt, Soq kibrīt, Mhr kebrīt, Śḥr kirit, Hbr goprīt, Syr guprētā, Mand gubrutai, Gz kabarīt (forme de pl.) ‘soufre’.

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▪ Zimmern1914: 60: Akk kuprītu ‘sulphur’ prob. gave Hbr goprît and Aram guprītā, kuprītā, kebrītā, whence Ar kibrīt. According to the author, Akk kuprītu is perh. a development from Akk kupru ‘bitumen’ (> Hbr kōper, Aram kuprā > Ar kufr), which belongs to Akk kapāru ‘to wipe off; to smear on (a paint or liquid)’. According to Huehnergard2011, the latter is from Sem KPR ‘to wipe clean, polish, purify, cover’ (cf. Ar ↗kafara ‘to cover, hide’, Hbr yôm kippûr ‘Yom Kippur, day of atonement’, from kippā̈r ‘to cover over (fig.), pacify, atone, make propitiation’).
▪ »al-Kibrīt ‘sulphur’. The Ar term is derived from Akk kuprītu through Aram ku/eḇrīṯā. / The Arabs knew both sedimentary and volcanic brimstone. Muḥammad b. Aḥmad al-Tamīmī […] mentions a place where “white” brimstone was to be found on the shore of the Dead Sea and in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem […], in fact the deposits of brimstone to be found in clay, mixed with gypsum and calcium carbide, on the right bank of the river Jordan at a mile from the Dead Sea […]. Abū Dulaf al-Ḫazraǧī […] mentions already a sulphur spring on Mount Damāwand […] around which brimstone had crystalised, and this volcano showed immense deposits of brimstone. The same author […] knows also the sulphur springs of Dawraq […] in Ḫūzistān. / In general, four sorts of brimstone are distinguished: yellow, white, black and red […]. Muḥammad b. Zakariyyāʔ al-Rāzī, K. al-Asrār […], however, differentiates these even further into 1. pure, massive, yellow brimstone; 2. pure, granular, yellow brimstone; 3. white, ivory-coloured brimstone; 4. white brimstone mixed with soil; 5. black brimstone, adulterated with stones; and 6. red brimstone. Descriptions likekibrīt qāniʔ ‘bright red brimstone’, kibrīt ḏahabī ‘golden brimstone’, kibrīt ḏakar ‘male brimstone’, kibrīt baḥrī ‘brimstone of the sea’, kibrīt nahrī ‘brimstone of the river’, etc. are also found. These descriptions indicate the various modifications and qualities: brimstone deposited by springs is mostly fine-grained and yellow-white; elementary brimstone is often contaminated with bitumen, selenium and arsenic. These various descriptions, however, were of course not used by the Arabs to indicate a strict classification. / A special case was the ‘red brimstone’ (al-kibrīt al-ʔaḥmar). According to Aristotles’ Stone-book […] it shines by night over a distance of many parasangs, as long as it is left in its place of occurence. Others maintained that red brimstone was a mineral to be found in the valley of the ants, marched through by Solomon […]. These are fairy-tales. Al-Rāzī […] knew already that ‘red brimstone’ does not exist as a mineral, and this scepticism was wide-spread. Al-Ǧāḥiẓ […] remarks that ‘red brimstone’ is easier to be found than a trustworthy friend, and the caliph al-Muʕtaḍid bi-llāh (279-89/892-902) said that two things exist only in name: the phoenix (ʕanqāʔ muġrib) and al-kibrīt al-ʔaḥmar […].The solution to this enigma is that al-kibrīt al-ʔaḥmar s a pseudonym for the elixir [↗ʔiksīr], by means of which silver can be changed into gold […]. / The position of brimstone in the mineral system has been determined more than once: in Aristotles’ Stone-book, compounds of brimstone and arsenic form one group together with salts and boraxes, without a fixed classification. The authors of the Corpus Gabirianum (3rd-4th/9th-10th centuries) counted red, yellow, black and white brimstone, together with orpiment, realgar, quicksilver, camphor and ammonia among the ‘spirits’ (al-ʔarwāḥ, τά πνεύματα), as opposed by the ‘metallic bodies’ (al-ʔaǧsām) and the ‘mineral bodies’ (al-ʔaǧsād). Ibn Sīnā […] divides all minerals into four classes: the stones (al-ʔaḥǧār), the salts (al-ʔamlāḥ), the fusible bodies (al-ḏāʔibāt) and the brimstone-like ones (al-kabārīt). Brimstone has become here a general notion indicating those substances in which wateriness has been combined with earthiness and airiness and which have then been consolidated by cold. According to al-Qazwīnī […], brimstone, together with quicksilver, pitch, naphtha etc. belongs to the viscous substances (al-ʔaǧsām al-duhniyyaẗ). / Already in the Middle Ages brimstone was an important mineral raw material. It was for instance used in bleaching. Thus the ‘brimstone of the river (al-kibrīt al-nahrī) was also called kibrīt al-qaṣṣārīn, the ‘brimstone of the bleachers’ […]. Together with bitumen, fats, oil, etc., brimstone was a component part of Greek fire [see ↗nafṭ], and from the 7th/13th century onwards it was used with salpetre and charcoal, to make gunpowder. / Brimstone was also widely used in medicine. According to Dioscurides […] brimstone avails against a cough, against pus that is stuck in the chest, and against asthma. If a woman is fumigated with brimstone, she will have a miscarriage. Leprosy, cutaneous eruptions and other skin diseases are treated with brimstone, which, if mixed with natron, dissipates itching. Finally, brimstone avails against the stings of poisonous animals, against jaundice, cold, sweat, podagra, ear-ache and deafness. […] The dawāʔ al-kibrīt is one of the important electuaries. It equals theriae and avails against fever, cough, asthma, tetanus, dropsy, against stings of poisonous animals etc. […]. / The curative property of sulphurous water is often praised: Abū Dulaf al-Ḫazraǧī […] mentions the sulphurous springs in the neighbourhood of Ḥulwān in ʕIrāq, which avail against manifold diseases. According to Aristotles’ Stone-book […] bathing in sulphurous springs is good for open wounds, tumours, itching, scabies and fever. Baths in sulphurous water avail also against trembling (↗irtiʕāš) […]. Finally, sulphurous water is curative of articular pains […], hemiplegia (↗fāliǧ […]) and elephantiasis (↗ǧuḏām […]). / To the many palliatives which were recommended for expelling vermin from houses there are always included fumigations with sulphur […], which was also used in magic as an ingredient of talismans […]. / Sulphur played a prominent part in alchemy (see al-↗kīmiyāʔ). Distillation of sulphur and the action of sulphurous vapour on metals gave occasion to many observations and conjectures. Since sulphur is liberated in the distillation of most materials, it was believed to be a fundamental part of all minerals. In particular, it was assumed that the metals consisted of quicksilver and brimstone. If the parts of both materials are in an ideal ratio to each other, gold originates […]. Sulphur is therefore also called ‘the mother of gold’ (ʔumm al-ḏahab, […]). / The alchemists invented many pseudonyms for sulphur, like ‘the yellow, red or white bride’ (al-ʕarūs al-ṣafrāʔ, etc.), ‘the red soil’ (al-turbaẗ al-ḥamrāʔ), ‘the colouring spirit’ (al-rūḥ al-ṣābiġ), ‘the saffron’ (al-zaʕfarān), ‘the divine secret’ (al-sirr al-ʔilāhī). The breath-taking smell of burning brimstone gave it the name ‘the suffocater’ (al-ḫannāq). Because brimstone combines quicksilver, it was also called ‘the fetter of the volatile’ (qayd al-ʕābiq). […]« – M. Ullmann, art. »al-Kibrīt«, in EI².
▪ Is also the plant-name ʔabū kabīr ‘asafoetida, devil’s dung’ (KBR_6 s.v. ↗KBR) related? There is no obvious semantic relation between the plant and the adj. ↗kabīr, but there is perh. one between the asafoetida herb’s fetid smell and sulfur. Given that the etymon of Ar kibrīt, Akk kuprītu, is likely to be based on Akk kupru ‘bitumen’, a relation between ʔabū kabīr and the source of kabrīt should perh. be considered.
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deriv

► ʕūd kibrīt, n., matches, a match.
► kibrīt ʔamān, n., safety matches.

► kabrata, vb. I, to coat with sulfur; to sulfurize, sulfurate; to vulcanize: denom.
► kibrītaẗ, n.f., match, matchstick: n.un.
► kibrītī, adj., sulfureous, sulfurate, sulfurous, sulfuric: nsb-adj. | ḥammām ~, n., sulfur bath; yanbūʕ ~, n., sulfur spring.
► kibrītāt, n., sulfate (chem.): neolog.
► kibrītīd, n., sulfide (chem.): neolog.
► kibrītīk: ḥāmiḍ ~, n., sulfuric acid (chem.): neolog.

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