The Formation of Arabic Grammatical Terminology. The Case of ʾiʿrāb

The Kitāb Sībawayhi, produced in the 8th century and considered the first complete and the most representative treatise of Arabic grammar, introduces for the first time an almost full inventory of linguistic and grammatical terms. Assuming that it was not Sībawayhi himself who devised the specific terminology in its entirety, there must have been something that prompted the formation of the specialized lexicon. As summarized by Versteegh (1993), there might have been parallel ways out of which grammatical terms developed, for instance (i) out of non-technical terms, later specialized by scholars, or (ii) composed by borrowing or calquing single items as well as full concepts from a foreign model. This contribution aims at presenting an overview of the matter, gathering theories on the evolution of the grammatical model considering both internal and external perspectives. Finally, the paper focuses on one case study, presenting the hypothesis that the formation of the technical meaning of ʾiʿrāb could be traced back to a calque of the Greek hellēnismós.