al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma al-Malabis

al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma al-Malabis (The Arabic Dictionary of Names of Clothing) is a specialized historical and lexicographical dictionary of Arabic garment terminology compiled by the Egyptian linguist Rajab Abd al-Jawad Ibrahim al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma…. Subtitled Fi Daw al-Maajim wa-al-Nusus al-Muwaththaqah min al-Jahiliyyah hatta al-Asr al-Hadith (In the Light of Lexicons and Documented Texts from the Pre-Islamic Era to the Modern Age), the work documents the names, forms, origins, and historical development of clothing across the Arab world al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma…+1.

Background and Scope

The dictionary was compiled to expand upon earlier pioneering works on Arabic attire, notably Reinhart Dozy’s nineteenth-century Dictionnaire détaillé des noms des vêtements chez les Arabes (which contained 276 entries) and Ahmad Matlub’s Mujam al-Malabis fi Lisan al-Arab (which gathered approximately 500 entries) al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma…+1. By drawing upon a wider corpus of printed heritage texts and modern studies, Ibrahim compiled around 1,500 entries, including approximately 1,000 terms not covered in those preceding works al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma…+1.

Geographically, the work encompasses attire documented in the Arabian Peninsula, Iraq, the Levant, Egypt, the Maghreb, and al-Andalus al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma…. Chronologically, it covers garment terms from pre-Islamic times to modern times without temporal segregation, presenting classical, medieval, and contemporary usages side by side al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma…. The dictionary addresses multiple linguistic registers, incorporating Classical Arabic (fusha), Arabized terms (muarrab), unadapted loanwords (dakhil), common vernacular expressions (ammiyyah), and regional dialectal vocabulary (lahajat) al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma….

Sources

The dictionary draws upon a broad range of textual sources, categorized by the author into eleven main groups al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma…+1:

• The Quran and prophetic hadith, including Sahih al-Bukhari al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma….
• Major Arabic lexicons, primarily Ibn Manzur’s Lisan al-Arab and al-Zabidi’s Taj al-Arus, as well as al-Misbah al-Munir, Muhit al-Muhit, al-Mujam al-Kabir, and al-Mujam al-Wasit al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma….
• Classical and modern travel literature, including accounts by al-Masudi, Ibn Jubayr, Ibn Battuta, and Abu Hamid al-Gharnati, alongside Western travelers such as Marco Polo, Richard Burton, and Ludovico di Varthema al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma….
• General historical chronicles, such as works by al-Tabari, Ibn Sa'd, Ibn al-Athir, Ibn Khaldun, al-Maqrizi, and al-Maqqari al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma….
• Lexicographical studies on colloquialisms, dialect vocabulary, and common linguistic errors (lahn al-amma) al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma….
• Classical adab compilations, including works by al-Jahiz, al-Nuwayri, and al-Qalqashandi al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma….
• Treatises on Arabized and foreign loanwords, such as al-Jawaliqi’s al-Muarrah and al-Suyuti’s al-Muhadhdhab, along with bilingual and Persian dictionaries al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma….
• Specialized monographs on Islamic textiles, costumes, and fashion history, as well as the prior dictionaries of Dozy and Matlub al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma….

Method and Structure

Entries are arranged alphabetically according to the surface spelling of the word rather than reduced to its triconsonantal root, allowing direct access for non-specialist readers al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma…+1. For each entry, the author provides:

1. Complete vocalization and an explicit textual description of the word's pronunciation al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma….
2. Grammatical classification, noting whether the term is singular or plural, along with its counterpart form al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma….
3. Etymological tracing for non-Arabic terms, detailing their original language (including Persian, Aramaic, Greek, Latin, Ge'ez, Hebrew, Turkish, French, Italian, Spanish, or English), their phonetic shifts, their original meaning, and their semantic development in Arabic al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma…+1.
4. Explanations of terms derived from personal names or toponyms, such as al-attabi (after Attab ibn Asid) or al-dabiqi (after Dabiq) al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma….
5. Standard Classical Arabic equivalents for dialectal, colloquial, and borrowed garment names (such as providing al-manamah for al-bijamah, and al-mitaf for al-balto) al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma….
6. Contextual textual citations (shawahid) from poetry, hadith, travelogues, and historical chronicles to illustrate how the garment was worn, constructed, and utilized across different periods al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma….

Publication

The dictionary was completed in Cairo in January 2002 and published in a single volume by Dar al-Afaq al-Arabiyyah in 1423 AH / 2002 CE al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma…+1. The edition features an introduction by Mahmud Fahmi Hijazi of Cairo University and the Academy of the Arabic Language, and the Maghrebi entries were reviewed by the Moroccan scholar Abd al-Hadi al-Tazi al-Mujam al-Arabi li-Asma…+1.