Algebra comes from the Middle French "algèbre," which is derived from the Arabic "al-jabr," meaning "the reunion of broken parts," a term coined in the 9th century by the mathematician Al-Khwarizmi in his influential work on solving equations, and it has cognates in Spanish "álgebra" and Italian "algebra."
Key roots: al-jabr (Arabic: "the restoration (of broken parts)").
The full title of al-Khwārizmī's treatise was 'al-Kitāb al-Mukhtaṣar fī Ḥisāb al-Jabr wal-Muqābala' (The Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing). The word 'al-jabr' originally referred to the surgical setting of broken bones before it was applied to mathematics.