khebbaz خباز
Moroccan Darija · noun
“khebbaz” (خباز) is a noun in Moroccan Darija meaning baker.
Meanings
- baker
Usage
Khebbaz refers to the person who makes and sells bread. The feminine is khebbaza, the plural khebbaza or khebbazin. By extension, "l-khebbaz" is also used for the bakery itself: mchit l l-khebbaz (I went to the baker's). Do not confuse it with the ferran, the neighborhood oven where bread kneaded at home is baked. The word comes from khobz (bread). It is in common, neutral use.
Example
مشيت للخبّاز نشري الخبز
mchit l lkhebbaz nchri lkhobz
“I went to the baker's to buy bread.”
How to write it in Latin letters
In Arabizi, Darija written in Latin letters, you will find “khebbaz” but also “khabbaz”, “5ebbaz”, “khbbaz” and “5abbaz”. No spelling is official: people write the sounds as they hear them.
Digits stand in for Arabic letters that have no Latin equivalent: 5 is kha (خ), like the ch in Scottish loch.
Type “khebbaz” on the Arabic keyboard
In Tunisian Derja
Spelt the same way in Arabic, the word also exists in Tunisian Derja, where it means “baker”; “keeper of a communal oven”: khabbez in Tunisian.