The name which, used by Ptolemy and Pliny in a
more confined, by Ammianus and Procopius in a larger, sense,
has been derived, ridiculously, from Sarah, the wife of
Abraham, obscurely from the village of Saraka, Stephan. de Urbibus,) more plausibly from the Arabic words, which
signify a thievish character, or Oriental situation,
(Hottinger, Hist. Oriental. l. i. c. i. p. 7, 8. Pocock,
Specimen, p. 33, 35. Asseman. Bibliot. Orient. tom. iv. p.
567.) Yet the last and most popular of these etymologies is
refuted by Ptolemy, (Arabia, p. 2, 18, in Hudson, tom. iv.,)
who expressly remarks the western and southern position of
the Saracens, then an obscure tribe on the borders of Egypt.
The appellation cannot therefore allude to any national
character; and, since it was imposed by strangers, it must
be found, not in the Arabic, but in a foreign language.
Stephan. de Urbibus,) more plausibly from the Arabic words, which
signify a thievish character, or Oriental situation,
(Hottinger, Hist. Oriental. l. i. c. i. p. 7, 8. Pocock,
Specimen, p. 33, 35. Asseman. Bibliot. Orient. tom. iv. p.
567.) Yet the last and most popular of these etymologies is
refuted by Ptolemy, (Arabia, p. 2, 18, in Hudson, tom. iv.,)
who expressly remarks the western and southern position of
the Saracens, then an obscure tribe on the borders of Egypt.
The appellation cannot therefore allude to any national
character; and, since it was imposed by strangers, it must
be found, not in the Arabic, but in a foreign language.