Qobar
noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 A dry fog or dry haze, chiefly of the upper Nile but rarely also elsewhere, which has a brownish-yellow color when slight (sometimes only perceptible from a distance) and darker yellow-grey color when thicker (sometimes obscuring the landscape and blotting out the stars). no-plural, rare
"In Ethiopia, where it is called qobar, this haze is of extraordinary density and hides all the features of the landscape beyond the distance of a mile, and conceals stars of the third magnitude even in the zenith."
Example
More examples"In Ethiopia, where it is called qobar, this haze is of extraordinary density and hides all the features of the landscape beyond the distance of a mile, and conceals stars of the third magnitude even in the zenith."
Etymology
From Ge'ez ቆባረ (ḳobarä, “darkness, blackness; fog, mist, dust”), from ቆበረ (ḳobärä, “become black, dark, or foggy”), which Antoine d'Abbadie said derives from the root ق ب ر (q b r, “bury”), because it "buries" the landscape and obscures the stars. Wolf Leslau alternatively speculated that it is "perhaps related" to Arabic كفر (kifr, “darkness of the night”) from the root ك ف ر (k f r, “conceal”).
Related phrases
More for "qobar"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.