▪ According to Fück1950, the value ‘melody’ is derived from the basic idea of a *‘deviation from the normal’ in language and speaking, whence also the other values of
laḥn in ClassAr, like ‘manner of speaking, intonation, speech, dialect’, ‘bad, incorrect Arabic, gibberish; grammatical mistake, blunder’, and ‘allusion, hint, insinuation’ (
WKAS) (for these, cf. ↗
laḥana).
▪ While [v1] ‘melody’ is attested already for pre-Isl times, Fück believed that the preponderance of [v2] ‘grammatical mistake’ which somehow overgrew most of the others (with the exception of ‘melody’), can be explained as a phenomenon of the period of
futūḥ (see ↗
laḥana). Ayoub, too, thinks that the value ‘positive/pleasant deviation’ is prior to the negative connotations, which came with linguistic normativity in the early Islamicate period.
▪ In contrast to the established view which sees the LḤN as one etymological unit, Günzburg1892 thought that »some musical terms, like
laḥn ([Grk]
liχanós) and ↗
naġam ([Grk]
neûma), were probably borrowed by […] Greeks and Arabs […] from a third people, without doubt of Sem descent.«
1
▪ Misreading Günzburg’s theory (but finding this reading more convincing), LandbergZetterstéen1942 derives
laḥn in the sense of ‘melody’ directly from Grk
liχanós ‘index, forefinger;
hence also: the string struck with the forefinger, and its note’.
2
»J’ai toujours pensé que
laḥn ‘mélodie’ et
laḥn ‘faute de grammaire’ sont deux mots de provenance différente. […]. Cette polysémie me paraît indiquer que tout ce thème LḤN peut pas provenir d’une source commune arabe. Mais déjà de bonne heure et avant l’Islam,
laḥana a pris le sens de ‘chanter’.« LandbergZetterstéen finds this etymology »assez probable« because it also shows »en même temps l’origine de la musique arabe moderne«.
3
– From the point of semantics, this theory is certainly not without some plausibility. Phonologically, however, it seems difficult to explain how
liχanós should have become
laḥn.
▪ On account of the many and partly contradictory values that
laḥn could take in ClassAr, some lexicographers counted the word among the
ʔaḍdād (for more details, cf. section DISC in entry ↗
laḥana).