ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 2036 http://www.s-gabriel.org/2036 ************************************ From: "Brian M. Scott" 9 May 2000 Greetings from the Academy of S. Gabriel! You asked whether would be an authentic 12th century Arabic name suitable for use both in North Africa and in Moorish Spain. , or in more precise transliteration , is most familiar as the given name of , the Berber leader responsible for the invasion and rapid conquest of Spain in the early 8th century. [1, 2] It continued in use in al-Andalus (Moorish Spain), though a very preliminary assessment of the available data suggests that it may gradually have become less common. [3] Unfortunately we do not have any information on its frequency in North Africa in your period. Although <`Azi:z> is now used as an Arabic masculine name, we have been unable to find any period examples. [4] We suspect that the modern name is derived from the name <`Abd al-`Azi:z> 'servant of the Invincible' (i.e., God). This name is fairly frequent in our data from al-Andalus, and we also have several non-European examples from the 8th - 10th centuries (which is the latest date for which we have good sources). [3, 5] It is pronounced roughly \AHB-d@l @-ZEEZ\, where \@\ stands for the sound spelled in and . [6] So far as we can tell, would be an excellent choice for your period, especially the earlier part of it. [7] Juliana de Luna, Maridonna Benvenuti, Ottavio, Alison MacDermot, and Arval Benicoeur also contributed to this letter. We hope that it has been useful; if you have any further questions, please don't hesitate to write again. For the Academy, Talan Gwynek 9 May 2000 ===== References and Notes: [1] stands for a with a dot under it; this is the usual Roman-letter transcription of the Arabic letter . Its pronunciation is somewhat different from that of English , but the difference is not easily described. It is best acquired by imitating a native speaker of Arabic. Arabic distinguishes between vowels of short and long duration; the long vowels are indicated in Roman transcription by a following colon. The letter stands for a sound similar to \k\ in but made further back in the throat. [2] Grand Larousse Encyclope/dique en dix volumes (Paris: Librairie Larousse, 1960-1964); s.n. . [3] Juliana de Luna, 'Andalusian Names' (WWW: J. Mittleman, 2000). http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/juliana/andalusia/ [4] Baker, Mona. 'Common Names in the Arab World', s.n. <`Azi:z>. In Patrick Hanks and Flavia Hodges, _A Dictionary of First Names_ (New York: Oxford University Press, 1990). [5] Dodge, Baynard. The Fihirst of al-Nadim (New York: Columbia University Press, 1970), Vol. II, pp. 938-939. [6] The <`> that occurs twice in this name stands for the Arabic letter <`ayn>. Its effect on the pronunciation is very noticeable to a native speaker but is difficult to describe; for a rough first approximation it can be ignored. [7] It is also much less likely than to recall the name of the modern Iraqi politician Tariq Aziz, a brief biography of whom can be found on the Web at http://www.medea.be/en/index328.htm