Al-Awami

Overview

Al-Awami (al-ʿAwwāmī, also read al-ʿAwāmī) is taken as the nisba to al-ʿAwāmiyya, a settlement of the district of al-Qaṭīf on the coast the geographers call al-Khaṭṭ. The root is ʿ-w-m, and Lisān al-ʿArab gives ʿāma yaʿūmu, to swim, with ʿawwām for one who swims much, and separately al-ʿām, the year, from the same letters.

An ordinary word

ʿAwwām is a common noun and also a personal name in the older books, and al-ʿAwāmī can accordingly be a nisba to a forebear of that name, a descriptive byname from the sense of swimming, or a nisba to any of the places elsewhere built on the same root — quite apart from this coast. The form settles nothing by itself, and it should not be read as evidence of origin without a source that names the place or the man.

On sources

The root and its senses are from Lisān al-ʿArab. The classical geography this reference cites does not carry al-ʿAwāmiyya as an entry, so no history is constructed for it here; the page records the name and the district.

Bearing the name

A toponymic family name records a place an ancestor was attributed to — born there, settled there, known by it — as the name was applied to him, not a lineage. It attaches to no tribe, and two families bearing it need have no connection to one another beyond the place itself.