Mulignan

The origin of the AE word "mulignan" is not directly linked to the italian word "melanzana" (eggplant).
"Melanzana" is the standard italian word for "eggplant" but every region and even every town in the same region has its own dialect form(s).
I wanted to go further and made a little research and here is what I found.

"Melanzana" comes from the low-latin "melangolus" or"merongolus" from the arab "bâdindgiân". It is possible to find the same name in old french "mélangène" even if the current french word for "eggplant" is "aubergine".

As you can see from these examples, all the words are similar. We can assume that the AE word "mulignan"
was imported to the US by italian immigrants coming from a southern region but nothing tells us if it was Sicily or Napoli.

I hope this helped.

According to the different regions, one can find these forms of the italian word "melanzana":

"buligname" Abruzzo
"malangiana" Calabria
"marangiana" Puglia
"marignanu" Umbria
"melangiàne" Puglia
"mulingiana", "milinciana" Sicilia
"mulignana" Napoli

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