From Proto-Afroasiatic; the source etymon has been very tentatively reconstructed as *raʿ-(“sun, god”) by Orel and Stolbova (and Militarev and Stolbova’s database based on their work),[1] connecting it to Gejirii, lii, Shaare(“sky, cloud”), Ronriʔ(“cloud”), Bidiyorāyà(“god”), and Mukulurā́(“god, sky”), and a connection with Arabicرَائِعَة(rāʔiʕa, “daylight”, literally “sun grown with vigor or height”) and Arabicرِيع(rīʕ, “high place, elevated”).[2]
^ Orel, Vladimir E., Stolbova, Olga V. (1995) “*raʿ-”, in Hamito-Semitic Etymological Dictionary: Materials for a Reconstruction (Handbuch der Orientalistik; I.18), Leiden, New York, Köln: E.J. Brill, § 2088, page 444
^ “ريع” in Edward William Lane (1863), Arabic-English Lexicon, London: Williams & Norgate, pages 1201-1202, meaning to increase, to augment, to grow stronger, to be vigorous, a high or elevated land.
^ Loprieno, Antonio (1995) Ancient Egyptian: A Linguistic Introduction, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 39
