Note 4 — Chapter I

True, in the Arabic tongue the meaning of the words, of which the name Saracens may be compounded, will bear out the signification of an Oriental situation. But the western position of the Saracen tribe mentioned by Ptolemy, negatives the assumption of the Arabic origin of the word as applied in this sense. As Gibbon sagaciously remarks, the appellation being imposed by strangers, its meaning must be sought, not in the Arabic, but in a foreign language.