סַסְגּוֹנִי (sasgoni) — multicolored, variegated

Etymology

The word סַסְגּוֹנִי illustrates how Modern Hebrew revived ancient Aramaic words by reinterpreting them, and how accidents of linguistic history — including a brief confusion with a disease name — could delay a word's adoption for decades. Modern Hebrew has three standard words for "multicolored": צִבְעוֹנִי, רַבְגּוֹנִי, and סַסְגּוֹנִי. Before any of these existed, the language had nothing — and the competition to fill the gap produced dozens of failed proposals.

The first modern suggestion came from lexicographer Yehuda Leib Ben-Ze'ev (1807), who recommended using the words אָמוּץ and בָּרֻד. Various Haskalah writers used these forms, and by 1869 the phrase "בגדי צבעונין" (from Rashi's Talmud commentary) appeared in the Hebrew press for multicolored garments. The 1880s and 1890s brought a torrent of new suggestions in the newspaper Ha-Tzfira: "מנומר" (speckled), "בלולה" (mixed), "חום" (of uncertain application), and others were all proposed and debated. In 1895, writer Elhanan Leib Levinsky used the word סַסְגּוֹנִי in Ha-Melitz without explanation, trusting readers to infer its meaning from context. Competition continued into the 20th century: the 1927 Lazare-Tortsiner German-Hebrew dictionary lists many candidates including חָטֹב, הָטֹב, בָּרוֹם, מְגֻוָּן, and רַב-גְּוָנִים. In 1931 the Vaad HaLashon photography terminology committee settled on מְגֻוָּן and צִבְעוֹנִי.

The source of סַסְגּוֹנִי is the Aramaic Targum (translation of the Bible), where it translates the obscure biblical word תחש (takhash) — an unidentified animal whose skin was used in the Tabernacle. The Talmud (Shabbat 28a) discusses what kind of creature the תחש was and therefore also debates what סַסְגּוֹן means. The rabbis interpreted it as a compound of שָׁשׁ (rejoiced) and גָוֶן (color), meaning "it rejoiced in its colors" — i.e., it was multicolored. This folk etymology explains why Levinsky and others felt comfortable using the word to mean "multicolored." But modern scholarship shows the folk etymology is wrong.

Professor Nicholas Sims-Williams of London demonstrated (in a paper published around the time the column was written) that the word is in fact a Persian compound: סַס (worm/insect) + גָוָון (color) = "worm-color" or "insect-dye." This is confirmed by the Syriac Peshitta (Aramaic Bible translation), which uses "sasaguna" also to translate the word שָׁנִי (scarlet/crimson) — which is famously a dye produced from insects (the Kermes or Coccus ilicis worm). The word's true original meaning was crimson, the color of insect dye.

The word disappeared from Hebrew usage after Levinsky's 1895 use because writers began using סַסְגּוֹנִית as a Hebrew name for scarlet fever (scarlatina). Only after Dr. Aharon Mazia established that scarlet fever should be called שָׁנִית did the term סַסְגּוֹנִי become available again for its modern sense — and it reappeared from 1928 onward.

Key Quotes

"מכל המודעות הרבות משכה עיני עליה מודעה אחת גדולה ססגונית, ועליה כתוב באותיות גדולות לאמר: ׳נשף חשק בגן האצילים״ — Elhanan Leib Levinsky, Ha-Melitz, 1895

Timeline

• Talmudic era: סַסְגּוֹן appears in the Aramaic Targum as translation of biblical תחש; discussed in Talmud Shabbat 28a
• 1807: Ben-Ze'ev proposes אמוץ and ברוד for "multicolored"
• 1869: "בגדי צבעונין" phrase (from Rashi) used in Hebrew press
• 1880s–1890s: Debate in Ha-Tzfira over many competing words (מנומר, בלולה, etc.)
• 1895: Levinsky uses סַסְגּוֹנִי in Ha-Melitz — first modern use
• Late 19th–early 20th century: The word drops out of "multicolored" use because it is appropriated for "scarlet fever"
• 1914: צִבְעוֹנִי begins appearing in Hebrew press
• 1919: Abraham Kahana proposes צִבְעִי in his Russian-Hebrew dictionary
• 1920: רַבְגּוֹנִי appears in Palestinian Hebrew press
• 1928: סַסְגּוֹנִי begins its comeback for "multicolored" after שָׁנִית is established for scarlet fever
• 1931: Vaad HaLashon photography committee officially endorses מְגֻוָּן and צִבְעוֹנִי
• Recent: Prof. Nicholas Sims-Williams identifies the Persian etymology (סס + גוון = worm-color)

Related Words

• צִבְעוֹנִי — colorful, multicolored; one of the three surviving words for this concept
• רַבְגּוֹנִי — multicolored (literally "many-colored"); the third of the trio
• תחש — the unidentified biblical animal whose skin the word originally described
• שָׁנִי — scarlet/crimson; the dye made from insects, which shares the word's true etymology
• שָׁנִית — scarlet fever; the modern Hebrew name that freed סַסְגּוֹנִי for its current use