l7am لحم
Algerian Darja · noun
“l7am” (لحم) is a noun in Algerian Darja meaning meat.
Meanings
- meat
- flesh (human, animal)
Usage
Lḥem is the usual word for "meat". Without further detail, it often means lamb or mutton, the most widely eaten meat in Algeria. It is specified with a complement: lḥem bgri, "beef", lḥem lmfroum, "ground meat". The word is central in cooking, notably at Eid el-Kebir and in dishes like lḥem lḥlou, sweet meat with prunes served during Ramadan. It also refers to the flesh of the body. In everyday speech, the word is pronounced without a vowel after the initial l, hence spellings like l7am.
Example
شريت كيلو لحم باش نديرو الشربة.
chrit kilo l7am bach ndirou chorba.
“I bought a kilo of meat to make the chorba.”
How to write it in Latin letters
In Arabizi, Darija written in Latin letters, you will find “l7am” but also “lham”, “la7m”, “le7m” and “lahm”. No spelling is official: people write the sounds as they hear them.
Digits stand in for Arabic letters that have no Latin equivalent: 7 is ha (ح), a breathy h from the throat.
Type “l7am” on the Arabic keyboard
In Moroccan Darija
Spelt the same way in Arabic, the word also exists in Moroccan Darija, where it means “meat”; “flesh (of the body)”: l7em in Moroccan.
In Tunisian Derja
Spelt the same way in Arabic, the word also exists in Tunisian Derja, where it means “meat”; “flesh (of the body)”: l7am in Tunisian.