Word Origin
The name comes from κινναβαρι (kinnabari), a Greek word most likely applied by Theophrastus to several distinct substances. Other sources say the word comes from the Persian شنگرف shangarf (زینجیفرح zinjifrah), a word of uncertain origin (also compare, Sanskrit: sugara). In Latin it was sometimes known as minium, meaning also "red lead", though both of these terms now refer specifically to lead tetroxide.
Read more about this topic: Cinnabar
Famous quotes containing the words word and/or origin:
“What studied torments, tyrant, hast for me?
What wheels, racks, fires? What flaying, boiling
In leads or oils? What old or newer torture
Must I receive, whose every word deserves
To taste of thy most worst?”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“All good poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquillity.”
—William Wordsworth (1770–1850)