Quranic root
دمدم
d · m · d · m
The root centers on covering or overlying a thing by coating it, with associated ideas of making a surface even and, in the reduplicated form, overwhelming or enveloping something destructively.
From coating and covering come uses for plastering, sealing, leveling, and closing over. Figurative extensions include being covered with fat or ugliness, while دَمْدَمَ develops an intensive sense of crushing or enveloping with punishment and destruction.
- Maqāyīs · row 1817
- Mufradāt · row 483
- 1
- Quran-attested forms
- 2
- Quran senses
- 1
- Quran occurrences
Forms in the Quran
The forms this root actually takes in the Quran. Select one to jump to its senses and examples.
دَمْدَمَ
damdama
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form I
- Form
- I
- Quran occurrences
- 1 occurrence
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
To crush and destroy utterly; to inflict a complete, overwhelming punishment.
In the Quranic construction دَمْدَمَ عَلَيْهِمْ, the action is directed against a group collectively and is explained as crushing or destroying them, or causing punishment to encompass them universally.
- Lane · entry 1187
- Mufradāt · row 483
Selected Quran examples
Quran 91:14word 3
“So destroyed”
To agitate or disquiet, including through an angry assault or angry speech.
Alternative explanations of the Quranic construction describe the action as agitating them, making the earth quake with them, being angry with them, or speaking to them in anger.
- Lane · entry 1187
- Mufradāt · row 483
Occurrences in the Quran
Every place this root appears, in Quran order. The first few are shown here.
- 91:14فَدَمْدَمَSo destroyed
Broader Classical Arabic meanings
Recorded for this root in the Classical lexicons beyond its Quran usage. These are secondary to the Quran senses above.
Show 32 Classical meanings
دَمَّ
To smear, coat, or plaster a thing or surface with a substance; to apply a coating or medicinal liniment, including to the exterior of the eye; also to plaster a house or chamber and tar a ship.
The coating may be dye, plaster, mud, quicklime, tar, or a medicinal preparation.
- Lane · entry 1187
دُمَّ
To be covered or heavily laden with fat; of a face, to appear suffused with beauty.
The fat-related use is applied to animals and the appearance-related use to a face.
- Lane · entry 1187
دُمَّتْ بِغُلَامٍ
In an idiomatic expression, for a woman to bear a boy.
The lexical analysis and vocalization of the expression are reported as tentative in the source.
- Lane · entry 1187
دَمَّ
To level ground and to cover, fill, or bury something beneath earth made even.
The use includes closing a jerboa's hole with extracted earth and leveling earth over buried things or truffles.
- Lane · entry 1187
دَمَّ
To strike or beat, especially the head or back, with the effect of breaking it or without that result.
The object may be the head or back, and the implement may be a brick, stick, staff, or stone.
- Lane · entry 1187
دَمَّ
Of a stallion, to mount or leap a mare.
This is an equine mating construction.
- Lane · entry 1187
دَمَّ
To hasten or proceed quickly.
- Lane · entry 1187
دَمَّ
To be or become foul, ugly, or contemptible in appearance.
- Lane · entry 1187
دَمَّ
To do evil or act badly.
- Lane · entry 1187
أَدَمَّ
To do what is bad, evil, abominable, or foul.
This is the Form IV derived verb.
- Lane · entry 1189
أَدَمَّ
To have a child or offspring born with an ugly or otherwise contemptible appearance.
This is a distinct Form IV use from doing evil.
- Lane · entry 1189
دَمْدَمَ
To smear or cover something thoroughly, heavily, or energetically.
The source notes that the cited context may properly represent دَمَّمَ rather than the reduplicated form; the meaning is retained as a reported lexical attribution to دَمْدَمَ.
- Lane · entry 1190
دُمَّةٌ
A way, course, mode, or manner of acting or conducting oneself.
- Lane · entry 1193
دُمَّةٌ
A certain game.
- Lane · entry 1193
دِمَّةٌ
A lodging-place or nightly resting-place for sheep or goats.
The term is associated with a place befouled by urine and dung; variant readings are reported in the source.
- Lane · entry 1194
دِمَّةٌ
A piece of animal dung.
The term is explained as arising from the object's smallness or contemptibility.
- Lane · entry 1194
دِمَّةٌ
A louse or a small ant.
The alternatives are connected in the source with the creature's small size.
- Lane · entry 1194
دِمَّةٌ
A short and contemptible man.
This is a figurative extension associated with smallness.
- Lane · entry 1194
دِمَّةٌ
A cat.
- Lane · entry 1194
دَمِمٌ
Blood or biestings used to seal the crevices of a stone cooking-pot.
The substance is applied to stop the cracks in the pot.
- Lane · entry 1195
دِمَامٌ
A substance used for smearing or coating, especially a medicinal liniment, collyrium, or eye application.
It may be dye, glue for arrow feathers, blood, or a preparation applied to the forehead, eyes, gums, or face.
- Lane · entry 1198
دِمَامٌ
Clouds containing no water.
This is a figurative extension of the smearing or coating sense.
- Lane · entry 1198
دَمِيمٌ
Of a cooking-pot, smeared or coated with spleen, liver, blood, or biestings after being repaired.
- Lane · entry 1199
دَمِيمٌ
Foul, ugly, contemptible, or displeasing to the eye in appearance; specifically, ugly and small in body.
The source distinguishes this appearance-related adjective from ذَمِيمٌ, which concerns disposition.
- Lane · entry 1199
دَمَّامٌ
One who repairs cooking-pots by cementing or sealing them.
- Lane · entry 1201
دَامَّاءُ
A jerboa's hole, especially one whose entrance is stopped with the earth it has extracted; also that collected earth.
The term may refer to the hole itself, one of its holes, or the earth used to close it.
- Lane · entry 1202
دَيْمُومٌ
A wide, level, waterless desert or featureless tract without recognizable paths or signs.
The term denotes a place in which travel continues for a long distance and there is no water or human presence to guide or encourage the traveler.
- Lane · entry 1203
دَيْمُومٌ
A land regarded as disliked, abominable, or undesirable.
This is a further use of the noun for a barren desert tract.
- Lane · entry 1203
مِدَمَّةٌ
A toothed wooden implement used to make turned earth even after ploughing or digging.
- Lane · entry 1204
مُدَمَّمٌ
Of a well, cased or lined with stones or burnt bricks.
The adjective is synonymous with a well described as constructed or lined in this manner.
- Lane · entry 1205
مَدْمُومٌ
Red.
This is an adjectival extension of being smeared or covered with color.
- Lane · entry 1206
مَدْمُومٌ
Extremely fat or full of fat; heavily laden with fat.
The adjective may describe a camel, a human being, an ass, a bull, a sheep or goat, or another beast.
- Lane · entry 1206
Cautions
Points that affect how this root should be read.
The Quranic form دَمْدَمَ is securely attested at 91:14:3. The alternative explanations of that verse include destruction, universal punishment, agitation or earthquake, and angry speech; they are presented as lexical interpretations rather than separate Quran occurrences.
The Lane source-unit inventory reports 41 primary units in its integrity metadata, while the enumerated evidence contains 40 distinct source_unit objects; no additional unit_id can be reconstructed from the packet.