Re: `bin' or `ibn' Ladin?

The ibn vs. bin (vs. ben) thing is actually a complex thing; roughly,
the first is the traditional romanization for Literary Arabic, the rest
render a dialectal form.

The stem of 'son' in Classical/Literary Arabic (below, simply "Arabic")
is, actually, bn-.

It is inflected as a regular noun: Nom. bnu(n), Acc. bna(n), Gen. bni(n).

However, it cannot appear in these forms in isolation. First, Arabic allows
for neither initial clusters, nor initial vowels. So, *if not preceded by
another word*, the above forms must take on (1) prothetic vowel and (2)
a glottal stop to cover the prothetic vowel, which yields
?ibnu(n)/?ibna(n)/?ibni(n).

Besides, *in the end of a sentence*, the case endings -u(n)/a(n)/i(n) must
be dropped, so the isolated form is ?ibn for all three cases.

Now, if the preceding word ends in a vowel, nothing has to be added. So
e. g. 'Abdallah, son of...' becomes ?abdu-l-la:hi-bnu-.... (vs.
?abdu-l-la:h, when isolated).

If the preceding word ends in a consonant, the prothetic vowel is added,
but the glottal stop is unnecesary. So, 'Zeid, son of...' is
zaidun-ibnu-... (vs. isolated Zaid).

With longer chains you may get e. g.:

`uTmanu-bnu-l-Hatta:bi-bni-zaidin-ibni-?abdi-l-la:h(i)

- for 'Osman, son of al-Hattab, son of Zeid, son of Abdallah'.

(syllabication: `uT.ma.nub.nul.Hat.ta.bib.ni.zai.di.nib.ni.?ab.dil...)

(first name with its apposition are in Nom., others in Gen.; 'son' in such
combinations, contrary to general rules, goes without an article).

All this was, indeed, too tricky for foreigners (the more so since
*vernacular* Arabic abandoned declensions and complex sandhi rules at an
early date). So traditional romanizations simply take each word in its
isolated form (in Nom. or Acc., when this makes any difference); thus:

Osman ibn al-Hattab ibn Zeid ibn Abd(a/u)llah

Spoken Arabic 'dialects' mostly use nouns in a form corresponding to the
literary isolated word, but also tend to delete any prothetic vowels
(since they are more tolerant to clusters). So, _bin_ and _ben_ are
forms directly borrowed from modern 'dialects'.

I hope I havent made too many mistakes in y examples ;)


Basilius