nbs

Egyptian

Etymology

Put by Koehler-Baumgartner to Arabic بَلَس (balas, “fig”) / Ge'ez በለስ (bäläs, “fig; sycomore”); because the Egyptian word has been glossed to mean sycomore, but this is not done so anymore. Instead the sycomore is in Egyptian nht, and Arabic has a similar word for the Christ’s thorn jujube in نَبِق (nabiq).

Pronunciation

• (modern Egyptological) IPA^(key): /nɛbɛs/
  • Conventional anglicization: nebes

Noun

 m

1. Christ’s thorn jujube (Ziziphus spina-christi)
2. timber of the Christ’s thorn jujube
3. fruit of the Christ’s thorn jujube

Inflection

Declension of nbs (masculine)

singular	nbs
dual	nbswj
plural	nbsw

Alternative forms

Alternative hieroglyphic writings of nbs  

nbs	nbs	nbsj
[Old Kingdom]	[Old Kingdom]	[New Kingdom]

Descendants

• Old Coptic: ⲛⲟⲩⲃⲥ (noubs)

References

• Erman, Adolf, Grapow, Hermann (1928) Wörterbuch der ägyptischen Sprache‎^[1], volume 2, Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, →ISBN, pages 245.10–246.2
• Faulkner, Raymond Oliver (1962) A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, Oxford: Griffith Institute, →ISBN, page 130
• Valbelle, Dominique (2014) “Le jujubier dans la toponymie nilotique”, in Orientalia‎^[2], volume 83, number 1, pages 106–123