MWW 11: Цагаан

Cyrillic	цагаан
Transcription	tsagaan
IPA	[tsha.ʀa:ɴ]
Layman’s Pronunciation	tsa-GAAHNG
Translation	white
In Genghis Khan’s time it was caγan.

This time I present you with a batch of four words. In honor of Цагаан Сар (Tsagaan Sar), Mongolia’s biggest holiday, which started on February 22 and fades out over this month, all four words are related to Tsagaan Sar in some way. The first one is the first word in the name Цагаан Сар: цагаан, which means “white.” Цагаан also appears in some set phrases:

цагаан алт	white gold	platinum
цагаан архи	white alcohol	vodka
цагаан баавгай	white bear	polar bear
цагаан борз	?	mistletoe
цагаан будаа	white grain	rice (cf. хар будаа “black grain,” and шар будаа “yellow grain,” both meaning “millet”)
цагаан бурхан	white god / Buddha	smallpox
цагаан гаа	?	ginger
цагаан газар	white earth / place	plain, steppe
цагаан даавуу	white cotton	pajamas
цагаан идээ	white food	dairy products
Цагаан нуур	white lake	name of several lakes and sums throughout Mongolia
цагаан самбар	white board	whiteboard
цагаан санаа	white thought	benevolence
цагаан сэтгэл	white feeling	benevolence
цагаан толгой	white head / hill	the alphabet
цагаан тугалга		tin (cf. хар тугалга, “lead”)
цагаан хоол	white meal	vegetarian food
цагаан хоолой	white throat	windpipe
Хятадын цагаан хэрэм	China’s white fortress	The Great Wall of China

As you can see, aside from its literal meaning, it also carries connotations of goodness and purity. There are also some idiomatic phrases, like цагаан толгой and цагаан газар (I can attest that the steppe is not white where I live). Anyone want to speculate on the origin of such phrases? I assume that цагаан бурхан is a euphemism because referring to a plague literally would be taboo. And why does "white" imply "dairy" when attached to "food" but "vegetarian" when attached to "meal"?

The meaning goes much deeper than just the word цагаан though, all the way down to the element ца-. My dictionary reveals a whole bunch of words related to light or purity which begin with ца-.

цаас	paper
цагаадах	to be rehabilitated
цагаатлах	to be absolved
цайвар	light-colored
цайлган	kind-hearted
цайр	zinc
цайрах	to be pale
цайх	to turn pale, to go gray (hair)
цал	hoarfrost
цардуул	starch
цас	snow
цахилган	lightning
цахих	to strike, to flash