Etymology: The name pomegranate derives from medieval Latin pōmum "apple" and grānātum "seeded".[15] This has influenced the common name for pomegranate in many languages (e.g. granada in Spanish, Granatapfel or Grenadine in German, grenade in French, granatäpple in Swedish, pomogranà in Venetian). Mālum grānātus, using the classical Latin word for apple, gives rise to the Italian name melograno, or less commonly melagrana.[16] Perhaps stemming from the old French word for the fruit, pomme-grenade, the pomegranate was known in early English as "apple of Grenada"—a term which today survives only in heraldic blazons. This is a folk etymology, confusing Latin granatus with the name of the Spanish city of Granada, which derives from Arabic.[17] The genus name Punica refers to the Phoenicians, who were active in broadening its cultivation, partly for religious reasons. Garnet comes from Old French grenat by metathesis, from Medieval Latin granatum, here used in a different meaning: "of a dark red color". This meaning perhaps originated from pomum granatum because of the color of pomegranate pulp, or from granum in the sense of "red dye, cochineal".[18] The French term grenade for pomegranate has given its name to the military grenade.[19] Soldiers commented on the similar shape of early grenades and the name entered common usage. While most European languages have cognate names for the fruit, stemming from Latin granatum, exceptions are the Albanian term "shega" and the Portuguese term romã which is derived from Arabic ruman, and has cognates in other Semitic languages (e.g. Hebrew rimmon) and Ancient Egyptian rmn. Other local names include Persian anâr, Hindi/Urdu and Punjabi anar, anaar, Sanskrit darima, dadima, Bengali dalim, bedana, Tamil madulai, and Romanian rodie.
Posted on: Sun, 23 Jun 2013 14:45:08 +0000