سير

The “strap” sense is apparently a Middle Iranian borrowing, compare Classical Persian سیرم (sīram, sīrum, “raw deer-skins cut into thongs, used in sewing saddles; strap; the shoemaker's strap which binds the last to his knee; a hawk's leash”), سیرمان (sīrmān, “ruby; embroidered silk”). Compare a whole set of horse tack terminology clearly to potentially borrowed from Iranian at the same time: رَسَن (rasan), رَخْت (raḵt), جُلّ (jull), جُوَالَق (juwālaq), نَمَط (namaṭ), بَرْذَعَة (barḏaʕa), شِكَال (šikāl), لِجَام (lijām), شَكِيمَة (šakīma), إِبْزِيم (ʔibzīm), سَرْج (sarj), خُرْج (ḵurj) and كُرْز (kurz).

The immediate source of the Arabic term, as also of Coptic ⲥⲓⲣ (sir, “line, stripe”) if distinct from ⲥⲓⲣ (sir, “hair of an animal or woman”) inherited from Egyptian

(sr, “hair of an animal or woman”), is likely the widely used Aramaic סירא / ܣܝܪܐ (sīrā, “a woven thread or mesh; chain; cord, rope; thong, shoe-lace”). This term is commonly explained as a borrowing from Ancient Greek σειρᾱ́ (seirā́, “cord, rope”), although it could also be interpreted as clipped from סֵירוּג (sērūg), סֵרוּג (sērūg, “plaiting, strapping”) or a similar term of the same root as the source of سَرْج (sarj), which is itself however connected to Iranian. It also appears as the source of صِير (ṣīr, “a kind of small fish used in brine for a spicy paste”).

This could mean that all or most of the root س ي ر (s-y-r) related to guidance is derived from this borrowing, as transferred senses of straps by which horses are guided. Dictionnaire du faisceau dialectal arabe andalou suggests that even صَارَ (ṣāra) and the whole ص ي ر (ṣ-y-r), sometimes a variant of سَارَ (sāra, “to go, to travel”), is from this noun by differentiation. Aramaic and Hebrew סָר (sār, “to turn aside, to turn back”) which reach as far back as Imperial Aramaic and the Torah, with frequent occurrence, may indicate a Semitic basis however.

سَيْر • (sayr) m (plural سُيُور (suyūr))

1. verbal noun of سَارَ (sāra) (form I)
2. strap, strip of hide, skin thong (such as, and originally, of a horse-harness or a shoulder-strap, and modernly a belt in machinery)
   • 1850, محمد بن عمر التونسي [Muḥammad Ibn-ʿUmar at-Tūnisī ], edited by Humphrey Davies, تشحيذ الأذهان بسيرة بلاد العرب والسودان [In Darfur. An Account of the Sultanate and Its People] (Library of Arabic Literature; 15), volume II, New York: NYU Press, published 2018, →ISBN, 3.3.31, page 184:

     فيعملون اللحم قديدًا وهو المسمّى عندهم بالشراميط لأنّهم يشرمطونه أي يقطعونه سيورًا ويأكلون منه طريًّا.

     They make the meat into jerky, which they call “shreds” because they shred it, meaning they cut it into strips. Some of it they also eat undried.

3. antler of a stag

• صَيْر (ṣayr) — nonstandard

سَيَّرَ • (sayyara) II, non-past يُسَيِّرُ‎ (yusayyiru)

1. to make roll round, to set into orbital motion
2. to stripe, to make have streaks
3. to cut into strips

سِيَر • (siyar) f pl

1. plural of سِيرَة (sīra)

سِيرَ • (sīra) (form I)

1. third-person masculine singular past passive of سَارَ (sāra)

• Corriente, Federico, Pereira, Christophe, Vicente, Angeles, editors (2017), Dictionnaire du faisceau dialectal arabe andalou. Perspectives phraséologiques et étymologiques (in French), Berlin: De Gruyter, →ISBN, page 677
• Fraenkel, Siegmund (1886) Die aramäischen Fremdwörter im Arabischen (in German), Leiden: E. J. Brill, page 93
• Freytag, Georg (1833) “سير”, in Lexicon arabico-latinum praesertim ex Djeuharii Firuzabadiique et aliorum Arabum operibus adhibitis Golii quoque et aliorum libris confectum‎ (in Latin), volume 2, Halle: C. A. Schwetschke, page 382
• “syrˀ”, in The Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon Project, Cincinnati: Hebrew Union College, 1986–
• “swr”, in The Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon Project, Cincinnati: Hebrew Union College, 1986–
• Crum, Walter E. (1939) A Coptic Dictionary‎, Oxford: Clarendon Press, →ISBN, page 353b
• سير (آلات) on the Arabic Wikipedia.Wikipedia ^ar

From Arabic سَيْر (sayr).

• IPA^(key): /seːr/, [se̞ːr]

سير • (sēr) m (plural سِيُور (siyūr))

1. a belt in machinery
2. treadmill

   Alternative form: جِهاز سير (jihāz sēr)

3. traffic, passage

   Synonym: مُرُور (murūr)

From the imperative tense of Arabic سَارَ (sāra).

• IPA^(key): /siːr/

سير • (sīr) I (imperative only)

1. to go

From Arabic سَيْر (sayr).

• IPA^(key): /seːr/, [seːr]

• Audio (Ramallah)

  (file)

سير • (sēr) m

1. motion, course, progress
2. traffic

   Synonym: أزمة (ʔazme)