saraf

• (obsolete): xaraffe, xaraffo, charaff, xaraf, xaroff, xeraffo, sarraf, saraff, serof, seraff

From Urdu صراف (sarrāf) and Classical Persian صراف (sarrāf), from Arabic صَرَّاف (ṣarrāf).

• IPA^(key): /saˈɹɑːf/

saraf (plural sarafs)

1. A provider of financial services in the Middle East and in South Asia, especially (historical) during the early modern and colonial period.
   • 1598, Jan Huygen van Linschoten, translated by William Phillip, Discours of Voyages into ye Easte & West Indies, Bk. i, Ch. xxxiii, p. 66:

     There is in euery place of the street exchangers of mony, by them called Xaraffos, which are all christian Iewes.

   • 1811, Carsten Niebuhr, “Travels in Arabia”, in John Pinkerton, transl., A General Collection of Voyages and Travels..., volume X, page 71:

     He sent us to receive the money from his Saraf, or banker.

   • 1877, James Carlile McCoan, Egypt As It Is, page 115:

     The mâmour... till the recent reform appointing a Controller-General of Receipts, received the taxes from the saraffs.

   • 1897 July, Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, page 24:

     They [Armenians] prospered as our ‘Sarrafs’.

• banker, moneychanger, cashier, usurer

• shroff, Saraf

• “saraf, n.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1909.

• Afars, Safar

• IPA^(key): [ˈsaraf]
• Hyphenation: sa‧raf

From Arabic عَصَب (ʕaṣab, “nerve”) or شَرَف (šaraf, “elevated place; eminence, dignity; honour”).

• The sense in medicine was coined by Komisi Istilah to translate English nerve and Dutch nerf.

saraf (plural saraf-saraf)

1. (medicine) nerve

• sarap, syaraf

From Malay saraf, from Arabic صَرْف (ṣarf).

saraf (plural saraf-saraf)

1. (grammar, linguistics) inflection

• “saraf” in Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia, Jakarta: Agency for Language Development and Cultivation – Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology of the Republic of Indonesia, 2016.

Borrowed from Arabic صَرَّاف (ṣarrāf).

saraf m (Hebrew spelling סאראף)

1. money changer

• saraf bashi (chief banker)

• Audio (Malaysia):

  (file)

saraf (Jawi spelling سارف, plural saraf-saraf)

1. nerve (neurons with their connective tissue sheaths, blood vessels and lymphatics)

• “saraf” in Pusat Rujukan Persuratan Melayu | Malay Literary Reference Centre, Kuala Lumpur: Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka, 2017.