Plants with Arabic Names
Senna
السَّنا
Senna alexandrina
Senna grows wild in Arabia. It was gathered in the warehouses of Bulaq in Cairo and shipped to Marseille and Venice, so it entered Europe's pharmacies under its Arabic name – séné in French – and became the scientific name of its genus: Senna.
- Source of the name
- From an Arabic word
- From the Arabic word
- sanā
- Genus
- Senna
- Species shown
- Senna alexandrina
«السَّنا شُجَيْرَةٌ مِنَ الأَغْلاثِ تُخْلَطُ بالحِنَّاءِ فتكونُ شِبابًا لَهُ وتُقَوِّي لَوْنَه وتُسَوِّدُه.»
Wadghiri (2/330–331) dates French sene to the thirteenth century and séné to 1656, through medieval Latin; the Grand Robert's 'Arabic sanas' is one of its many misreadings. He quotes Lammens: senna 'grows wild and abundantly in Arabia, Syria and Nubia', and was exported to Europe through Egypt in very large quantities.
Its species Senna alexandrina is known as Mecca senna, and is one of the species of the genus growing in the Arabian Peninsula.
Lalithamba, CC BY 2.0
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Sources
- ابن منظور، لسان العرب ١٤/٤٠٥
- عبد العلي الودغيري، العربيّات المغتربات ٢/٣٣٠–٣٣١
- Filimban et al., Studies in the Flora of Arabia: the genus Senna, Edinburgh Journal of Botany (2014)
- هيئة الدواء المصريّة، دستور الأعشاب: Senna alexandrina (سنا مكّي)
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