Vol. 09 · Loanwords ·South Asia ·1580s
Bazaar
from bāzār
- Meaning
- A market or marketplace.
- Source word
- bāzār
- Route into English
- Persian *bāzār* → Hindi/Urdu → Anglo-Indian → English. Also came independently from Persian via Ottoman Turkish, which is why both the Middle Eastern and Indian *bazaar* senses coexist.
- Arrived
- 1580s
From South Asia
Three centuries of British colonial contact — East India Company, Raj, military, domestic life — deposited a distinct Hindi/Urdu/Bengali/Sanskrit layer in everyday English.
English borrows.
Browse the full loanword atlas or explore another source language.