this post was submitted on 23 Aug 2023

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TIL - "Mage" derives from Magush, the old persian name for Zoroastrian priests, which means "Fire worshipper" (en.wikipedia.org)

submitted 2 years ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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Wasn't actually today, but it's an interesting etymology. Old Arabian speaks "majus" because they lack a hard G sound, similar to Japanese lacking L sound

Also, for anyone interested, that means that the Magi who came to Jesus' birth with gifts were Zoroastrian priests

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

Old Arabian speaks “majus” because they lack a hard G sound, similar to Japanese lacking L sound

This isn't quite right. We start with Old Persian (not Arabic) maguš, pronounced like mag-ush. That gets loaned into Ancient Greek as μάγος (mágos), originally referring to Zoroastrian priests and then generally to magicians, sorcerers, and tricksters in general. This gets carried over to Latin as magus (still pronounced with a 'hard' g). The plural of this form is magi, pronounced in Antiquity as mag-ee. As we enter into the Middle Ages, some sound changes happen and most Latin pronunciations soften the G, producing something like maj-ee. At some point in Middle English, the Latin -i plural ending gets replaced with the native English -es plural, producing mages . The singular mage is then derived from that. There's also undoubtedly an influence from French, where an -age ending would always be pronounced with a soft G (ie, the word age).

Looking a bit deeper, the Bible plays a big role here, as the plural of the Greek word, μάγοι (magoi) is used in the original text of Matthew 2:1. That gets translated in the Latin Vulgate as magi, and then I'd presume a Middle English gospel translation as 'mages'. The singular 'mage' then gets derived from that.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 years ago (1 children)

We start with Old Persian (not Arabic) maguš

I didn't try to imply that we should start with arabic, or that that is the source of the current spelling, I left that arabic bit there because of the wiki page being Majus. I did try to be clear in the title: "derives from magush, the old persian name(...)".

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 years ago

Ah, my bad there, I though you were implying that the reason why the English word has a soft G is because Arabic doesn't have a hard G sound. Those are actually independent developments. Arabic actually used to have a standard hard G sound (and in Egypt it still does!), but it shifted to the J sound at some point (wanna say vaguely Middle Ages?).

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 years ago

Jinn (Arabic: جن‎, jinn) – also romanized as djinn or anglicized as genies – are invisible creatures in early religion in pre-Islamic Arabia and later in Islamic culture and beliefs. Like humans, they are accountable for their deeds, can be either believers (muslims) or unbelievers (kafir); depending on whether they accept God's guidance.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

Their temples similarly featured a blazing fire in the middle which was to be kept burning indefinitely. You can see some of these on Sassanid pre-islamic coinage although the quality of the strikes leaves something to be desired.

You can see some here: https://www.forumancientcoins.com/moonmoth/firealtar_coins.html

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

This makes me wonder who the first wanker monarch was that thought up the idea of putting the side of their face on the coin.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago

That would be Alexander The Great

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Zoroastrianism is centered around the Persian language, not Arabic. Persian is a Indo European language like Sanskrit, English, Celtic, and Russian instead of Afro-Asiatic like Arabic. That's why so n many magic associated words have the same PIE root *magh- Its root concept is to have power to enforce will.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago

This makes it even more interesting that fire mages in Dark Souls are called "pyromancers" while regular magic users still get the moniker "mage."