Re: Vowel variations in Arabic

Yusuf B Gursey wrote: 
Harlan Messinger wrote:

How about the one in Jordan? I know that that's a /u/ in Arabic; I 

again it's from the Bible, greek `o Iordane:s

arabic uses al-'urdunn

thought it would be from the Hebrew, but isn't that a patax /a/? And
while in English we write "Kuwait", why is it "Koweït" in French?

perhaps because <u> represents [u"] in french.,

They ordinarily use "ou" for /u/ in their own language and for transcriptions from other languages--Ouagadougou, Arabie Saoudite, Djibouti. On the other hand, they keep "u" in Tunisie and pronounce it /y/ instead of /u/.

Is "Khartoum" from the French? If so, why would English have taken its spelling from French? Were the French ever in power there?
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