لجين

Arabic

Etymology

Uncertain, it may be Aramaic לְגִינָא (ləgīnā, “flask, jug”) applied to a piece of silverware.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /lu.d͡ʒajn/

Noun

لُجَيْن • (lujayn) m

1. refined silver
   • a. 869, الْجَاحِظ [al-jāḥiẓ], “باب معرفة الذهب والفضة وامتحانهما [About the knowledge of gold and silver and their assessment]”, in التَبَصُّر بِٱلتِّجَارَة [at-tabaṣṣur bi-t-tijāra]‎^[1]:

     وزعموا أن خير الذهب العقيان وخير الفضة اللُّجَين، ومذاق الفضة الصافية عذبٌ، ومذاق الزيوف مرٌّ صَدِئٌ، والنبهرج من الدراهم مالحٌ جَرَسيُّ الطنين، والفضة صافية الطنين لا يشوبها صَممٌ، وهي تقطع العطش إذا مُسكت في الفم.

     It is claimed that the best gold is the native one, and the best silver the refined one. Refined silver tastes sweet, fake silver bitter and disagreeable. The phoney dirhams are salty in taste and bell-sounding, whereas pure silver has a thudless sound. It tranquilizes thirst if held in the mouth.

Declension

Declension of noun لُجَيْن (lujayn)

Singular	basic singular triptote
	Indefinite	Definite	Construct
Informal	لُجَيْن lujayn	اللُّجَيْن al-lujayn	لُجَيْن lujayn
Nominative	لُجَيْنٌ lujaynun	اللُّجَيْنُ al-lujaynu	لُجَيْنُ lujaynu
Accusative	لُجَيْنًا lujaynan	اللُّجَيْنَ al-lujayna	لُجَيْنَ lujayna
Genitive	لُجَيْنٍ lujaynin	اللُّجَيْنِ al-lujayni	لُجَيْنِ lujayni

References

• Corriente, Federico, Pereira, Christophe, Vicente, Angeles, editors (2017), Dictionnaire du faisceau dialectal arabe andalou. Perspectives phraséologiques et étymologiques (in French), Berlin: De Gruyter, →ISBN, page 1142, formally unbearable connection to Aramaic descendants of Ancient Greek ἄργυρος (árguros)
• Fraenkel, Siegmund (1886) Die aramäischen Fremdwörter im Arabischen (in German), Leiden: E. J. Brill, page 152
• Wehr, Hans (1979) “لجين”, in J. Milton Cowan, editor, A Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic, 4th edition, Ithaca, NY: Spoken Language Services, →ISBN, page 859