Tag Archives: Uzbek Names

Mahtab

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  • Origin: Persian مهتاب
  • Meaning: “moonlight.”
  • Gender: Female, unisex in Southeast Asia
  • Pron: MAH-tawb

The name is from the Persian word, مهتاب (mahtab), meaning “moonlight.” It is a poetic female name that has spread throughout the Persianate world. It is occasionally used on males in Southeast Asia.

Notable Bearers

  • Mahtab Singh (1782-1813), was the first wife of Ranjit Singh, founder of the Sikh Empire.
  • Mehtab Kadın (1830-1888) (Turkish form), was the name of the consort of Sultan Abdulmejid I of the Ottoman Empire.
  • Mahtob Mahmoody (b. 1979): Iranian-American author and daughter of Betty Mahmoody, whose story inspired Not Without My Daughter (1991), starring Sally Field.

Its Turkish form of Mehtap was among the top 100 girls’ Turkish names between 1980-1993, and peaked at # 58 in 1983.

International Variations

  • Mehtəb (Azeri)
  • Mahtob Маҳтоб (Tajik, Uzbek)
  • Mahitab (Turkish – Ottoman)
  • Mehtap (Turkmen, Turkish)

Sources

Zubaidah, Zubayda

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  • Origin: Arabic زُبَيْدَة (Arabic)
  • Usage: Arabic-speaking world, most of the Islamic world
  • Gender: Female
  • Meaning: “little butterball.”

The name is derived from the Arabic rootز-ب- د (z-b-d), which pertains to “cream, foam, butter,” along with the Arabic feminine diminutive suffix, roughly translating to “little cream” or “little butter,” having the same sense as “cream of the crop.”

This was the sobriquet of Zubaidah bint Ja’far (766–831), the wife of Harun al-Rashid. Borne as Sukhainah or Amat al-‘Aziz, she was known for her construction of wells and reservoirs along the pilgramage routes to Mecca and is featured in The Thousand and One Nights. Her life was later the inspiration behind the character of Zobeide in the German opera Abu Hassan by Carl Maria von Weber.

The Turkish form of the name, Zübeyde, was borne by an Ottoman princess, the daughter of Sultan Ahmed II, who lived from 1728 to 1756. It was also carried by Zübeyde Hanım (1856–1923), the mother of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. The name appeared in the Top 100 most popular female names in Turkey between 1980 and 1986, peaking at #70 in 1981

It is also the name of an asteroid.

Other forms include

  • Zübeydə (Azeri)
  • Zubejda (Bosnian)
  • Zobeide (German, literary)
  • Zoubida (Maghrebi Arabic)
  • Zubaida Зөбаида (Tatar)
  • Zübeyde (Turkish)
  • Zubayda (Uzbek)

Sources