قيصوم

Where it comes from

Considered a more popular variant of the likely original قَيْسُوم (qaysūm, “various plant types, southernwood”), itself interrelated with the roots ق ي س (q y s) denoting a measure or a piece and ق س م (q s m) a division, compare also the native ق و س (q w s) a bow, a piece of flexible wood. Likely semantically a loan from or conflated with Aramaic קיסמא (qismā, “a chip, a piece of wood, a branch”) and Aramaic קיס (qēs, “wood”), hence being later applied to various small trees, bushes, and shrubs. Cognates found showing similar semantic senses with Classical Syriac ܩܝܣܘܢ (qaysōn, “small piece of wood”) and Samaritan Aramaic ࠒࠉࠑࠌ (qīṣm, “wood as a material, pole; used in preference to the typical עֵץ in Samaritan scripture”) even being attested with a parallel Ṣād.