Abstract
Beginning with the etymological observation that the Arabic word tajir(un) “trader” is derived from the Aramaic taggara having the same meaning, I proceeded to the Accadian word tamkaru, which should be the original word of the above mentioned two words. Tamkaru is proved not to be a Sumerian word but rather is conjectured to be a derivative of a Semitic root *m-k-r, as A. Salonen maintains. However, I wish to add some reservation to this etymology, because its linguistic element (i. e. Acc. -karu/Sum. -qar/gar) has some similarity with the Hebrew gar/ger, Ugar. gr “foreigner, foreign resident”, and even with kar discussed below.
On the other hand, the Accadian word karu(m). known as a special term for “Trade Market/Colony” especially from the Cappadocian Documents of the Old Assyrian Period, means “bank, dike, harbor” as a common Accadian word found, for example, in the Hammurabian Code, written by the Sumerian ideogram KAR, and supposed to be a derivative of the Sumerian word kar(a) having the same meaning.
Trying to seek the linguistic affiliation of this word, namely Sum. kar(a), in the frame of the “Ubaidian Civilsation” and its “Dravidian Supposition”, I took, for my further study, the statent of A. L. Oppenheim that “the karu, the harbor of the city, a section outside of the town proper” as a meaningful suggestion. Consequently, I thought, as Sum, uru “city” is sometimes compared with the Dravidian *uru “village, city”, this “harbor”, Snm. kar(a), would be found, if the “Dravidian Supposition” is correct, in the Dravidian vocabularies as a correlate part of a cultural set of the Pre-Sumer Civilization.
I found, after all, that Modern Dravidian languages have many such words, from which the supposed form *kar(a/e) “bank, dike” could be extracted.
I added, as a supplement, to this short report some statements on the similarity of the said karu(m) with the so-called “karimi”, the Trade Community of much later centuries of the same area, of which some evidence was found among the Cairo Geniza Documents. This “karimi” has been supposed to be a Tamil, that is, a Dravidian word (Goitein, Basham) and on the other hand both had considerably similar functions (M. Rodinson).
