This smells exactly like the sort of stuff you'd read in a nationalist-revised history textbook. Hindu Arabic is a fine way to describe it, since, as others hav

This smells exactly like the sort of stuff you'd read in a nationalist-revised history textbook. Hindu Arabic is a fine way to describe it, since, as others have mentioned, it's exactly the Arabic-writing Persians who transmitted the idea to the West. I think this naming is just as permissible as referring to the Latin alphabet as the English alphabet, which is what you just did ;) Also, the word "firangi" means foreigner in Hindi, but it also means "Frankish person". Should Englishmen in India be upset that they are being grouped with the French?