"We can inspect the vocabulary of two languages for similarities of terms. Detecting similarities means that there was some movement of the mental templates that  produced or designated these particular artifacts, we also recognize that these templates were usually carried by people."

In a nut shell, we are investigating the phenomenon of cultural contact .

The conundrum:

According to British historians there is no evidence that any Arab had traveled as far as England in the 8th century. Arabic was not studied in Christian Europe before the late eleventh century. The Qur'an was not translated into Latin until the twelfth century.

However, in the first part of the 8th century, both Arabs and Saxons were engaged simultaneously in a struggle against a common foe: The Frankish tribes headed by Charles Martel in Gaul. 

Some historians have advanced the possibility of an encounter between Arabs and the Saxons during one of the Arab forays into the Rhone-Saône Valley; and there are some indications that they pushed North where they settled in regions as far as the banks of the Weser river (north-western Germany) and Alpine Islam in the western areas of Switzerland in 736 A.D. (4 years after the battle of Poitiers )

Moreover, half a century later, a written report dated 786 A.D.  addressed to Pope Hadrian, by Bishop Georgius of Ostia (the Papal legate to England) records the decrees of two synods he had just attended in Mercia and Northumbria in England. The list of decrees reads unremarkably until the ninth item, which voices a stern warning against  following the Saracen (Muslim) eating habits in Ramadan among the Anglo-Saxons. (see Item IX ; Nono capite in the attached jpeg below )
 

This raises the following question: Why does the author address the idea of Muslim eating habits during the fasting month of Ramadan where food and drink may only be consumed between dusk and dawn?  Whatever is the case, it would seem that discussing tenets of Islam and warning against following them among the Anglo-Saxon assembled clerics was quite extraordinary and is out of sync with the prevailing perception among British historians who adamantly profess the absence of any contact between the Arabs and the Anglo-Saxons at this early date (300 years before the Crusades.)

The answers to these questions involve one of the forgotten pages of European history. Toward the endeavor of exploring the possibility of cultural contact between the Anglo-Saxons and the Arabs, our Odyssey of the "Reed" resumes by offering 5 riddles from the Anglo-Saxon lands. The central theme of these riddles revolves around generic terms synonymous to "Reed" in English. 

Remember, the Anglo-Saxon language is a group of dialects, also known as Old English. It was spoken between the 5th and 12th centuries by peoples of Saxon origin who invaded and settled in central and southern England in the 5th–7th centuries. 

These terms were purposely selected because they don't share any affinities with the rest of the other Indo-European languages (i.e.. Latin, Greek, Slavic, or Sanskrit etc.) Nor with any Afro Asiatic languages including the Hebrew/Aramaic; a sister Semitic language to Arabic.

In general, to ascertain a cultural contact between unrelated languages, any detected similarities or correspondences are required to recur systematically in a fairly large set of pertinent synonymous. This rigorous verification method becomes persuasive, for it is extremely unlikely that shared systematic patterns would result from chance. This is especially more convincing if they also share some peculiar traits. For example, the Old English initial letter Hr a frequent consonant combination  in Old English was lost in the transition to Middle English reduced to  initial  r  in Modern English such as the case of Hreod ----> reed )

The following 5 English generic terms are those we shall endeavor to investigate regarding their connection with Classical Arabic cognate terms: Wood, hay, shoot (sprout), grass and finally reed. 

It is obvious that the words shown in the above chart show remarkable similarities among the Germanic languages. Similarities between languages are often not just coincidences, but are systematic.  In this paradigm of 5 synonymous words for "reed". we can acertain with great confidence that they all correspond systematically with each other. 

Now, what about expanding this comparison to the Classical Arabic (an unrelated language) which is the subject matter for this third episode entitled: 

1st Riddle- - Wood: A tree, applied to object made of trees, or their branches or reeds.
 

ETYMOLOGY:Middle English wode, from Old English wudu

A well known Arabic term designating wood or timber. The term in question was frequently used to refer to the Pulpit, Staff and the wooden Bowl of the Prophet Muhammad (SA`ws).

It is also used to designate a well known Arabic musical string instrument with four to seven chords introduced by the Arabs in Spain and Western Europe in the 8th century A.D.

This cognate Arabic term for "wood or stick" was mentioned in a famous saying often mentioned in the Fiqh (Islamic Law) in reference to the rigorous ethical requirements for the office of a Qadiy (a judge).

 
 

2nd Riddle-  Hay: Grass or other plants, such as clover or alfalfa, cut and dried for fodder.

ETYMOLOGY:Middle English, from Old English: hieg.
 
 

In Arabic,  the cognate term for the English "Hay" is sometimes distinguished from grass.  The common meaning of hay ( i.e. dried fodder or plants turning yellow) in Arabic, cognates with the Old Saxon (Old English) term pronounced "Hieg, Hig".

A derivative of this Old English term is currently the name of a famous Dutch city renown for being the seat of  the Permanent Court of Arbitration established in 1899 in the Netherlands .  The pronunciation of which is your direct clue to the right Arabic cognate term for the English Hay.

In Arabic, another term is used for green herbage which in turn cognates with the rest of the Germanic dialects (hey, hooi, hooi, hewi, hoi and hawi). These terms, unlike the Old English, mean also: green herbage.   This Arabic cognate term for herbage , at its roots, has the meaning of life in Arabic and its spelling is your second clue to arrive at the correct answer. 
 
 

3rd Riddle - Shoot:a young branch, a sprout which shoots out from the main stock of a tree, a plant, etc.

ETYMOLOGY:Middle English, shotefrom Old English: sceat
 
 

A cognate Arabic term used to designate " young offshoots of a plant ' is mentioned in the Qur'an,  in the last verse of Suwrat al-Fath; from an Arabic verb with the meaning: to put forth, to sprout.  Like its cognate "shoot" in Old English, the Arabic also has a direct derivative term designating "a bout of shooting arrows.
 
 

4th Riddle - Grass: 1a. The grass family. b. The members of the grass family considered as a group. 2. Any of various plants having slender leaves characteristic of the grass family. 3. An expanse of ground, such as a lawn, covered with grass or similar plants. 4. Grazing land; pasture.

ETYMOLOGY:Middle English gras, from Old English: græs.
 
 

The Arabic cognate term for the English term for "grass" refers to a kind of grass for pasture. From an Arabic verb which conveys the meaning of:  planting or sticking something in the ground.
 
 

5th Riddle - Reed: 1a. Any of various tall perennial grasses, especially of the genera Phragmites or Arundo, having hollow stems, broad leaves, and large plume like terminal panicles. b. The stalk of any of these plants. c. A collection of these stalks: reed for making baskets.

ETYMOLOGY: Middle English rede, from Old English: hreod.
 
 

The cognate Arabic term for the same Old English term "Hreod" ("reed") was also well known to the people of Iraq. The term refers to the bundle of reeds which are laid upon rafts on the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. The term is originally from the Arabic Nabathean. It also could refer to a roof or a fence made of "reeds".  The verb in Arabic in the Lisan al-`Arab means to curve or bend "reeds"  in the form of an arch. 
 
 

Can you name the corresponding Arabic cognate term for each riddle? Remember, your best clues come from the earliest form of spelling of the  word in the Old English language. Make no mistake, the similarities are uncanny.

Therein lies the answer starring at you, hidden in the eye of the sun.