Bilqis?

I posted recently on my blog about something that I classified as a language post but it is really more of a sports post appropriate to this blog. We all wish Bilqis Abdul-Qaadir the best as she matriculates at Memphis in the fall, and she does have a local connection - Springfield. Here is the rest of my write-up:





Bilqis Abdul-Qaadir recently broke Rebecca Lobo's (Mass.) state scoring record and has been in the news as much for her attire as for her play. She is headed to Memphis in the fall and no doubt will be successful in any endeavor to which she applies herself. She seems a wonderful young lady. What really got my attention, though, was her first name. The Americanized version of her name is Bil-KEES, much as the Semitic MAL-ik becomes Ma-LEEK, but the Semitic pronunciation of Bilqis is BIL-qis, with Q pronounced as a uvular plosive stop. And what is the origin of the name Bilqis? Why, she was the Queen Of Sheba. Neither the Biblical nor Qur'anic accounts mention the queen by her first name but together the two texts provide the foundation of her story.