▪ Nişanyan_22Jun2015: Ar
zuǧāǧ < Aram
zagāg ‘glazier, glass-maker’ < Aram
zgūgīṯā ‘glass’.
▪ Jeffery1938, 149-50 (on Qurʔānic
zuǧāǧaẗ): »There was some uncertainty as to the vowelling of the word, whether
zuǧāǧaẗ;
zaǧāǧaẗ or
ziǧāǧaẗ. The philologers attempt to derive it from ↗
zaǧǧa though they do not suggest how it can be explained from this root.
1
Fraenkel,
Fremdw, 64, showed that it has no verbal root in Ar, and suggested that it is the Aram זגוגיתא, Syr
zgōgīṯā meaning ʻglass’ or ʻcrystal’. The Syr word is early and quite common, and it was probably when the Arabs came to use glass that they took over the word along with the article.«
▪ Nişanyan believes that the ultimate origin of the word must be Phoenicia where glass was “invented” around 2500 BC.
▪ Is the obsol. (
ḥašīšaẗ al-)
†zaǧāǧ ‘berries; glass-vessels of the clove-tree; pellitory, wall-wort’ (Lane, Hava1899) dependent on
zuǧāǧ(aẗ) ‘glass’?