Chapter 12 - The Library of Iberian Resources Online

(storehouse, deposit). (27)
5) almatzem, "divisor" (Gandia), Arabic al-miqsam. Not a common term in Spain but of wide diffusion
in Islam, as far east as Persia. (28)
6) azumbre, a water measure (Novelda, Elche), Arabic al-thumn, "one-eighth." (29)
7) dula, "turn" (Gandia, Elche); also a water measure synonymous with hila (Alicante), Arabic daula.
Another term found both in the Yemen and the Sahara. (30)
8) jarique, noun, or verb jaricar, "to unite various hilas of water" bought at auction in order to irrigate
with a greater body of water and to transport it over a long distance with minimal loss (Lorca); Arabic
sharîk, "a partner." An important reminiscence of communal irrigation practices among Muslim
irrigators. (31)
9) jarro, a water measure (Lorca, Jumilla), Arabic jarra, "jug." In Lorca and Jumilla the jarro is equal
to one-half hour of water. It takes its name from the clepsydra (water clock), a vessel with a hole in the
bottom which was the standard time measure for irrigation in the North African oases and in southern
Spain. The word is frequently found in thirteenth-century Romance texts, indicating its adoption after
the conquest of Lorca and the Murcian region. (32)
10) martava, "turn" (Alicante, Novelda), Arabic martaba. (33)
11) merancho, "drainage ditch" (Murcia), Arabic marj. (34) The connection between drainage and
marjals is clear. Drainage of marshland was an operation described largely in arabisms.
12) rafa, "canal check" (Murcia), Arabic raf', "raising up." (35) An interesting example of an arabism
that describes a function different from that expressed by its common [223] Romance synonym,
parada. The canal check (often simply a board placed across a canal) serves both to stop the flow (the
meaning of parada, from panarse, to stop) in order to divert water and to raise the level (the meaning
of rafa).
13) sistar, "divisor" (Vall de Segó). Corominas has suggested a derivation from the Latin sistere (to
stop); (36) but this must be questioned because irrigation terms are usually precise as to function, and a
sistar divides water (its more usual synonym is partidor) rather than stopping it. Since the Vall de Segó
had a substantial Muslim population, it seems proper to seek a derivation from the Arabic root sh-t-r,
"to divide into two equal parts."
14) tahulla, a measure of land (Murcia) but also a measure of water equivalent to one hour (Lorca),
Arabic tahwila, "field." (37)
The foregoing data permit several generalizations concerning the frequency and function of arabisms in
the technical vocabulary of medieval irrigation: 1) The Arabic word and the arabism usually have the
same meaning. (38) Agricultural terms especially are conservative by nature and tend to retain the
original meaning so long as the use of the object is the same. 2) Romance synonyms are likely to be
literal translations of the original Arabic meaning: thus resclosa is the equivalent of açut, from sadda,
"to close"; partidor is the synonym of almatzem, from qasama, "to divide." 3) When all the synonyms
describing a single phenomenon are arabisms, there is a strong presumption that the concept or
technique was unknown or undeveloped outside of the Islamic orbit or, at any rate, was very intimately
associated with the Islamic style of irrigating: for example, the words for turn (dula, ador, martava), for
return ditch (almenara, azarbe, merancho), for cistern (safareig, aljup), and for water wheel (sinia,
noria).