Aljamia

/alxaˈmia/ noun

Definition

A Romance language written in Arabic script, particularly Spanish or Portuguese written using Arabic characters.

Etymology

From Arabic al-jamiya, related to aljama. This term describes the actual text or language produced when Romance languages were written in Arabic script during medieval Iberia.

Kelly Says

This is one of history's most interesting linguistic experiments—scholars today study aljamia texts to understand how medieval Spanish sounded, since Arabic script was phonetic in ways Latin script wasn't. It's like having a ancient voice recording in written form!

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