Root · 22 in the Quran · 103 in 15 texts of the library
ربع (root rb)
الراء والباء والعين أصول ثلاثة أحدها جزء من أربعة أشياء والآخر الإقامة والثالث الإشالة والرفع فأما الأول
Ibn Fāris, Maqāyīs al-lugha
The family of the root
Patterns computed · our dataThe words of ر ب ع that our sources attest: the root's letters in green, the added letters in gold.
64 words8 verbs5 verbal nouns9 participles5 places and instruments5 intensives and elatives20 other nouns7 plurals5 relatives and abstracts
- أَرْبَعfour
- أَرْبَعَة—
- رَابِعfourth
- أَرْبَعِين—
- رُبَاعfour and four
The whole family8 groups, by pattern; tap a pattern to see what it does
Verbs8رَبَعَهُمَ · رَبَّعَ · رَابَعَ
The root as an action: the bare Form I, and the Forms made by adding letters before, inside or after the root.grammar →
Form I vowels: فَعَلَ يَفْعَلُ (a – a; the imperfect from Lane's “aor.”)
Verbal nouns5تَرْبِيع · رَبْع · رُبُوع
The action itself, named as a noun (maṣdar).grammar →
- تَرْبِيعquadrangle; plazaautoForm II · Lane: inf. n.library ×1Lane
- رَبْعhow ample, or spacious, is the place of alighting, or abode, of the sons of …LaneForm I · Lane: inf. n.LaneIbn Fāris
- رُبُوعterritory; inhabited areaautoForm I · Lane: inf. n.library ×1Lane
- إِرْبَاعForm IV · Lane: inf. n.Lane
- رِبَاعَةnone will act vigorously in the office of head, or chief, of the people, …LaneForm I · Lane: inf. n.Lane
Participles9رَابِع · مُرَبَّع · مَرْبُوع
The one who does it, and the one it is done to.grammar →
Place, time and instrument5مَرْبَع · مَرْبَعَة · مِرْبَاع
Where or when it happens, and what it is done with: the m- nouns.grammar →
- مَرْبَعmeadow; pastureautonoun of place or timelibrary ×1LaneIbn Fāris
- مَرْبَعَةnoun of place (with -a)LaneIbn Fāris
- مِرْبَاعnoun of instrumentLaneIbn Fāris
- مِرْبَعnoun of instrumentLaneIbn Fāris
- مِرْبَعَةstaff, or small staff, of which two men take hold of the two ends in order …Lanenoun of instrumentLaneIbn Fāris
Intensives, qualities and the elative5أَرْبَع · رَبِيع · رُبَيِّع
The quality carried far, held as a trait, or compared.grammar →
Other nouns20أَرْبَعَة · رُبُع · رُبَاع
Nouns on other patterns; their meaning is learned word by word.grammar →
Plurals7أَرْبَعِين · أَرْبِعَاء · أَرِْبعَة
Broken plurals rebuild the word on a new pattern; sound plurals add an ending.grammar →
Relative and abstract5أَرْبِعَاوِيّ · تَرْبِيعِيّ · رُبَاعِيّ
-iyy relates a thing to its source; -iyya makes an abstract noun.grammar →
- أَرْبِعَاوِيّWednesdayLanerelative adjective (-iyy)Lane
- تَرْبِيعِيّquadratic; squareautorelative adjective (-iyy)library ×1
- رُبَاعِيّboy four spans in heightLanerelative adjective (-iyy)Lane
- رِبْعِيَّةabstract noun (-iyya)Lane
- رِبْعِيّrelative adjective (-iyy)Lane
Reference
Why this shape?What each of the 26 patterns does
What each pattern does. The pattern gives a tendency, not a rule: many words have drifted into meanings of their own.
The pattern machinePour the root into a pattern; see whether the word exists
Choose a pattern; the root's letters pour into it. Then see whether the word exists in our sources. The machine makes shapes; only usage makes words.
- Attested: مَرْبَعَة, noun of place (with -a) (Lane, Ibn Fāris)
Place noun with -a. The place noun with the feminine -a. Sometimes it is only a variant of mafʿal; often it names the place where a thing is found in abundance (maʾsada, 'a place full of lions'). So maktab is the place of writing, and maktaba, where writings are gathered: a library, a bookshop. Our summary AI
But: maktaba is not in our classical dictionaries for k-t-b: Lane and al-Jawharī give maktab ('a school'), none gives maktaba. Its sense of 'library, bookshop' fits the pattern of abundance, but that is our reading of the pattern, not a classical entry. Many mafʿala words are single items of usage (maqbara 'cemetery'), which the grammarians call heard, not formed by rule.
The grammarians on this pattern (4)
ما يكون مفعلة لازمة لها الهاء والفتحة … وذلك إذا أردت أن تكثر الشيء بالمكان، وذلك قولك: أرض مسبعة، ومأسدة
Chapter on what is mafʿala, with the -a and the a-vowel always: that is when you mean that a thing abounds in a place, as you say 'a land of many beasts of prey (masbaʿa), of many lions (maʾsada)' AI
Sībawayh (d. c. 180/796), al-Kitāb, ed. ʿAbd al-Salām Hārūn, 3rd ed. (Cairo: al-Khānjī, 1988), 4:94 · OpenITI line 21027–21028 ↗ · on this site · OpenITI RELEASE v2025.1.9, CC BY-NC-SA 4.0
و نحو المظنة و المقبرة فتحا و ضما ليس بقياس
and words like maẓinna and maqbara (with a or u) are not by rule AI
Ibn al-Ḥājib (d. 646/1249), al-Shāfiya fī ʿilm al-taṣrīf, ed. Ḥasan Aḥmad al-ʿUthmān (Mecca: al-Maktaba al-Makkiyya, 1995), 1:30 · OpenITI line 223 ↗ · on this site · OpenITI RELEASE v2025.1.9, CC BY-NC-SA 4.0
- “designate the place where the object signified by the noun from which they are formed, is found in large numbers or quantities” Wright, Grammar I, §247, p. 148 ↗ · on nouns of abundance, maf'ala · 3rd ed. (Cambridge, 1896) · public domain
- “Nouns of time and place not unfrequently take the feminine form” Wright, Grammar I, §225, p. 128 ↗ · on maf'ala as a variant of maf'al · 3rd ed. (Cambridge, 1896) · public domain
About thisWhat “attested” means here; the sources
Attested means found in our data: the Quranic Arabic Corpus (lemmas, verb Forms, participles, verbal nouns, plurals), the library's words (automatic analysis), Lane's Lexicon (his headwords, the Forms he numbers, the verbal nouns and plurals he names) and Ibn Fāris's entry. Nothing is generated for this list. Meanings are Lane's first gloss in his entry, or else the analyser's gloss (“auto”). Vowelling follows the corpus, then Lane, then the analyser; verbs are given in the regular perfect. Lane's Lexicon thins out after qāf, and a few of his entries cover several roots at once: those roots show no Lane. The patterns, written with ف ع ل, are computed by us.
The dictionaries
Ibn Fāris · 395الراء والباء والعين أصول ثلاثة أحدها جزء من أربعة أشياء والآخر الإقامة والثالث الإشالة والرفع فأما الأول فالربع من الشيء يقال ربعت القوم أربعهم إذا أخذت ربع أموالهم وربعتهم أربعهم إذا كنت لهم رابعا والمرباع من هذا وهو شي
Ibn Fāris (d. 395/1004), Maqāyīs al-Lugha. Seeks each root's original sense (aṣl).
The same letters, turned
The same three letters in all six orders. Choose one.
ر ب ع
الراء والباء والعين أصول ثلاثة أحدها جزء من أربعة أشياء والآخر الإقامة والثالث الإشالة والرفع
r-b-ʿ: three roots, one of them being a part of four things, another being residing, and the third being hoisting and raising up. AI
Do these six share one core meaning?
Reference
About thisal-Khalīl, Ibn Jinnī, Ibn Fāris; the counts across the dictionary
al-Khalīl (d. c. 170/786), Kitāb al-ʿAyn, as transmitted by al-Layth: a two-letter word “turns in two ways”, a three-letter word “in six ways” (masdūsa), four letters in 24, five in 120; “its used forms are written down and its unused ones dropped” (line 975 ↗). The dictionary is built on this: each chapter takes a set of letters and names which orders are used (mustaʿmal) and which unused (muhmal). The ring shows that verdict, from the chapter heading as edited (documented in the text; how much of the book is al-Khalīl's own is disputed).
A reported total. al-Suyūṭī transmits, from Ḥamza al-Iṣfahānī, that al-Khalīl put the possible forms, used and unused, of two to five letters at 12,305,412 (al-Muzhir, line 1347 ↗). It is reported, not found in the ʿAyn. It equals exactly the arrangements of 2 to 5 different letters out of 28 (756 + 19,656 + 491,400 + 11,793,600); the breakdown printed beside it is corrupt, and al-Zubaydī's count, given next, differs (6,659,400).
Ibn Jinnī (d. 392/1002), al-Khaṣāʾiṣ, names the greater derivation (al-ishtiqāq al-akbar): bind a three-letter root and its six orders to one meaning, and bring stray members back “by the subtlety of the craft and interpretation” (line 7536 ↗). He says himself that it does not hold for every root (line 167 ↗; line 7603 ↗).
Ibn Fāris (d. 395/1004) gives each root its own aṣl and treats a rearranged word as maqlūb, “turned round”, and so not a root of its own: “j-b-dh is not a root, because it is a single word, turned round” (Maqāyīs, line 6147 ↗). The ring sets his aṣl for each order side by side; whether they meet is the question.
Neighbours on the ring differ by one swap of two letters.
The critique. A source quoted by al-Suyūṭī calls the greater derivation Ibn Jinnī's innovation, “not relied on in the language” (al-Muzhir, line 6159 ↗).
The other axis. The root's letters also go into patterns that keep their order and change the frame: the patterns (awzān) and the verb Forms I–X.
Across Ibn Fāris's dictionary. Of the 2,300 possible sets of three different sound letters (no hamza, w or y), 1,021 have at least one order as an entry. How many of their six orders are entries:
- 1 of 6319
- 2 of 6218
- 3 of 6164
- 4 of 6155
- 5 of 6107
- 6 of 658
- 1 of 6148
- 2 of 6108
- 3 of 6157
- 4 of 6179
- 5 of 6111
- 6 of 643
Of the orders al-Khalīl calls used, 2,097 are entries in Ibn Fāris and 267 are not; 17 that he calls unused are entries in Ibn Fāris.
Attested here means found in our digital texts (Ibn Fāris, Lisān al-ʿArab, Lane, the Quranic Arabic Corpus), with w and y kept apart and hamza spellings merged; it is our data, not a classical verdict. English beside the Arabic is AI translation. Sources and grades: docs/research/root-permutations.md.
Letters & sound
- رrāʾtip of the tongue, near the nūn · voiced, in betweenSīb. · I. Jinnī
- بbāʾbetween the lips · voiced, stopSīb. · I. Jinnī
- عʿaynmiddle of the throat · voiced, in betweenSīb. · I. Jinnī
How each letter is made, in brief, from Sībawayh's and Ibn Jinnī's own sentences (linked); their words are under Reference.
Sharing two of its three letters (computed; kinship of form, not of meaning)
Reference
How it is madeSībawayh and Ibn Jinnī · phonetics
English throughout: AI translation of the Arabic AI
ر
ومن مخرج النون غير أنه أدخل في ظهر اللسان قليلا لانحرافه إلى اللام مخرج الراء
From the place of the nūn, except that it goes a little further onto the back of the tongue, because it leans towards the lām, is the place of the rāʾ. Sībawayh, lines 26557–26558 ↗
ومن مخرج النون غير أنه أدخل في ظهر اللسان قليلا، لانحرافه إلى اللام، مخرج الراء
From the place of the nūn, except that it goes a little further onto the back of the tongue, because it leans towards the lām, is the place of the rāʾ. Ibn Jinnī, lines 980–981 ↗
ب
ومما بين الشفتين مخرج الباء، والميم، والواو
From between the two lips is the place of the bāʾ, the mīm and the wāw. Sībawayh, line 26563 ↗
ومما بين الشفتين مخرج الباء والميم والواو
From between the two lips is the place of the bāʾ, the mīm and the wāw. Ibn Jinnī, line 986 ↗
ع
ومن أوسط الحلق مخرج العين والحاء
From the middle of the throat is the place of the ʿayn and the ḥāʾ. Sībawayh, lines 26548–26549 ↗
ومن وسط الحلق مخرج العين والحاء
From the middle of the throat is the place of the ʿayn and the ḥāʾ. Ibn Jinnī, line 970 ↗
Sībawayh, al-Kitāb (ed. Hārūn) and Ibn Jinnī, Sirr ṣināʿat al-iʿrāb; OpenITI digital texts (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0). Full credits on each letter's page.
In the Breath of the All-MercifulIbn ʿArabī · metaphysics
English throughout: AI translation of the Arabic AI
ر
Level of existence: السماء الخامسة · the fifth heaven
Divine Name: المصور · the Form-Giver (al-Muṣawwir)
Lunar mansion: الغفر · al-Ghafr
Futūḥāt ch. 198, line 64675Spheres of its simples (ch. 2): 10 line 2573 ↗
Nature (ch. 2)
المرتبة العشرية فحروفها حارة يابسة
The tenfold rank: its letters are hot and dry.
Ibn ʿArabī, al-Futūḥāt al-Makkiyya, line 2582ب
Level of existence: الجن · the jinn
Divine Name: اللطيف · al-Laṭīf, the Subtle
Lunar mansion: الفرع المقدم · al-Farʿ al-Muqaddam
Futūḥāt ch. 198, line 62118Spheres of its simples (ch. 2): 10 line 2573 ↗
Nature (ch. 2)
المرتبة العشرية فحروفها حارة يابسة
The tenfold rank: its letters are hot and dry.
Ibn ʿArabī, al-Futūḥāt al-Makkiyya, line 2582ع
Level of existence: الطبيعة · Nature
Divine Name: الباطن · The Inward (al-Bāṭin)
Lunar mansion: الثريا · al-Thurayyā (the Pleiades)
Futūḥāt ch. 198, line 63825Spheres of its simples (ch. 2): 9 line 2572 ↗
Meaning by vowelal-Dabbāgh · a visionary claim about a primordial “Syriac”, not historical Syriac
English throughout: AI translation of the Arabic AI
ر
With fatḥa ـَ
فهي إشارة إلى جميع الخيرات الظاهرة والباطنة.
It is an indication of all goods, outward and inward.
With ḍamma ـُ
فهي إشارة إلى الواحد في نفسه وهو ظاهر.
It is an indication of the one in itself, and it is manifest.
With kasra ـِ
فهي إشارة إلى الشيء الذي فيه الروح وليس من بني آدم، أو إشارة إلى الروح نفسها.
It is an indication of a thing that has spirit in it but is not of the children of Adam, or an indication of the spirit itself.
ب
With fatḥa ـَ
فهي إشارة إلى الشيء الذي هو في غاية العز أو في غاية الذل.
It is an indication of the thing that is at the utmost of might or at the utmost of abasement.
With ḍamma ـُ
فهي إشارة معها قبض.
It is an indication accompanied by contraction (qabḍ).
With kasra ـِ
فهي إشارة إلى ما دخل أو هو داخل على الذات.
It is an indication of what has entered, or is entering, upon the self.
ع
With fatḥa ـَ
فهي اسم لقدوم أو رحيل.
It is a name for arrival or departure.
With ḍamma ـُ
فهي اسم للساكن في الذات التي تقوم به.
It is a name for that which dwells in the self and by which the self subsists.
With kasra ـِ
فهي اسم لخبث الذات.
It is a name for the foulness of the self.
Two-letter nucleus11 roots in Ibn Fāris’s chapterر ب
Ibn Fāris groups his roots under two-letter chapters (“the X and the Y and what makes them three”). These are the roots of this root's chapter with the core sense he gives each. Setting them side by side is our juxtaposition; he does not himself draw a shared meaning. His chapter heading, line 12394 ↗
- ربتالراء والباء والتاء ليس أصلا لكنه من باب الإبدالL12395
- ربحالراء والباء والحاء أصل واحد يدل على شف في مبايعةQ 1 · L12405
- ربخالراء والباء والخاء أصيل يدل على فترة واسترخاءL12411
- ربدالراء والباء والدال أصلان أحدهما لون من الألوان والآخر الإقامةL12413
- ربسالراء والباء والسين أصل واحد ذكره ابن دريدL12434
- ربصالراء والباء والصاد أصل واحد يدل على الانتظارQ 17 · L12439
- ربطالراء والباء والطاء أصل واحد يدل على شد وثباتQ 5 · L12455
- ربعالراء والباء والعين أصول ثلاثة أحدها جزء من أربعة أشياء والآخر الإقامة والثالث الإشالة والرفع فأما الأول فالربع من الشيءQ 22 · L12469
- ربقالراء والباء والقاف أصل واحد وهو شيء يدور بشيء كالقلادة في العنق ثم يتفرع فالربقة الخيط في العنق وفي كلامهم ربدت الضأن فربق ربق إذا أضرع الشاء فهيء الL12500
- ربلالراء والباء واللام أصل واحد يدل على تجمع وكثرة في انضمامL12510
- ربىأالراء والباء والحرف المعتل وكذلك المهموز منه يدل على أصل واحد وهو الزيادة والنماء والعلو تقولL12521
In the sister scriptsHebrew ר ב עSyriac ܪ ܒ ܥ
| Arabic | ر ب ع |
| Hebrew | ר ב ע |
| Syriac | ܪ ܒ ܥ |
| Ancient South Arabian (musnad) | 𐩧 𐩨 𐩲 |
| Phoenician | 𐤓 𐤁 𐤏 |
Letter for letter, by the regular sound correspondences of the Semitic languages (Arabic keeps several sounds the others merged). This shows how the root would be spelled; whether a related word exists is a separate question, answered in the Semitic lens. Where an Arabic sibilant (s, sh) continues two older sounds, both spellings are shown.
Reference