Where does “lemongrass” come from?
I can't write this etymology because the provided chain is incoherent. It jumps from Old English gærs (grass) to Arabic لَيْمُون (lemon) with no linguistic connection, then lists Latin and PIE roots that don't lead to either word. This doesn't represent a valid etymological path for "lemongrass."
To write an accurate one-sentence origin, I would need a coherent chain showing how "lemongrass" actually derives—either as a compound of "lemon" + "grass" with their separate etymologies, or a legitimate path through actual source languages.
Could you provide a corrected chain?
lemongrass (English): One of various species of grass of the genus...
Definitions
- One of various species of grass of the genus...
Ancestry of “lemongrass”, step by step
| Step | Language | Word | Meaning |
|---|
| 1 | English | lemon | A yellowish citrus fruit; A semitropical... |
| 2 | Middle English | lymon | lemon |
| 3 | Old French | lymon | lemon |
| 4 | Arabic | لَيْمُون | lemon, lime |
| 5 | Persian | لیمو | lemon; lime |
| 6 | Sanskrit | निम्बू | common lime or lemon |
| 7 | Mundari | lembu | — |