I love chickpeas. I love hummus. I love falafel. Falafel comes from the Arabic falāfil, which is the plural of filfil, meaning "pepper". It's likely that this word is related to the Sanskrit pippalī (long pepper), which comes from the Sanskrit pippalam, and referred to the pipal, a fig tree native to India. Incidentally, this is the same species of tree Siddhartha Gautama was sitting underneath when he became enlightened. That's one spicy Buddha.

Our word pepper is from this same root via the Old English pipor, Latin piper and Greek peperi.

pepper [AHD]
falafel [AHD]
pipal [AHD]
pepper [Online Etymology Dictionary]
sacred fig [Wikipedia]

Labels: Arabic, Greek, Latin, Old English, Sanskrit, The Daily Hump

yummmy! I love food words.

There's a Moroccan restaurant downtown with Sublime Falafel. I always liked the stuff but now I know what it really tastes like. Talk about enlightenment.