Sugar (& Braudel)

[grip at netcom.com]

On Thu, 16 Jan 1997, Ted Samsel wrote:

>   Well, we could blame the Arabs for sugar (Spanish "azucar" is close
> to the Arabic name...), but I seem to recall that Braudel did an
> extensive history of the early expansion of sugar trade. And, (ahem)
> in my historic archaeology work, many of the various tools and 
> methods used in sugar production also have names derived from the
> Arabic....
> 
Sitting on the major intersection between Europe and India, it's no 
wonder we picked up so many Arabic names for things. I suspect that a lot 
of these Arabic names can be traced back to India. When I lived in the 
Middle East, street Arabic was full of Indian (in the broad sense 
including Urdu and other Pakistani and Afghan langueages) words. For 
directions to cabbies we'd use yasaar and yameen for right and left, one of 
which is Arabic and the other, I believe, Urdu.

And of course there is alcohol and algebra...

grip