Quranic root
قصص
q · ṣ · ṣ
The root centers on following or tracing something step by step.
From tracing a physical track develop the senses of recounting events in their sequence and of requiting an act with a matching act. Cutting and leveling are also attested branches, especially in descriptions of hair and other material.
- Maqāyīs · row 3786
- Mufradāt · row 1184
- 3
- Quran-attested forms
- 5
- Quran senses
- 30
- Quran occurrences
Forms in the Quran
The forms this root actually takes in the Quran. Select one to jump to its senses and examples.
قَصَّ
qaṣṣa
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form I
- Form
- I
- Quran occurrences
- 20 occurrences
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 follow or retrace a track, footprint, or course.
Used with an object or construction referring to a trace, footsteps, or someone being followed; the Quran also uses the imperative in this sense.
- Lane · entry 8376
- Mufradāt · row 1184
Selected Quran examples
Quran 28:11word 3
“Follow him”
To relate, recount, or narrate an account in its proper sequence.
Used for relating news, stories, accounts, or events, often with عَلَى marking the person to whom the account is related.
- Lane · entry 8376
- Mufradāt · row 1184
Selected Quran examples
Quran 12:3word 2
“relate”
قَصَصٌ
qaṣaṣun
- Part of speech
- Noun
- Quran occurrences
- 6 occurrences
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
Following or retracing a track or course.
A verbal-noun use describing the act of following traces; the Quran applies it to retracing a route or footsteps.
- Lane · entry 8376
- Mufradāt · row 1184
Selected Quran examples
Quran 18:64word 9
“retracing”
A narrative, story, or connected account.
Refers to events or reports followed and recounted in sequence; the Quran uses it for narratives presented as true or instructive.
- Lane · entry 8376
- Mufradāt · row 1184
Selected Quran examples
Quran 12:111word 4
“their stories”
قِصَاصٌ
qiṣāṣun
- Part of speech
- Noun
- Quran occurrences
- 4 occurrences
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
Legal retaliation by matching a killing or injury with a corresponding penalty.
In Quranic usage, the term denotes prescribed retribution for homicide or bodily injury, including like-for-like killing or wounding.
- Lane · entry 8392
- Mufradāt · row 1184
Selected Quran examples
Quran 2:179word 3
“the legal retribution”
Quran 5:45word 16
“(is) retribution”
Occurrences in the Quran
Every place this root appears, in Quran order. The first few are shown here.
- 2:178ٱلْقِصَاصُ(is) the legal retribution
- 2:179ٱلْقِصَاصِthe legal retribution
- 2:194قِصَاصٌۭ ۚ(is) legal retribution
- 3:62ٱلْقَصَصُthe narration
- 4:164قَصَصْنَـٰهُمْWe (have) mentioned them
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
قَصَّ
To cut, clip, shear, pare, or cut off material.
Applied especially to hair, wool, plumage, nails, cloth ends, and similar material; it can also refer to cutting off an extremity.
- Lane · entry 8376
قَصَّ
To diminish, deduct, or reduce.
A figurative use, including reducing an account or deduction from the account of sins.
- Lane · entry 8376
قَصَّصَ، مُقَصَّصٌ
To plaster or build with gypsum; plastered with gypsum.
Applied to houses, tombs, and, adjectivally, to a city or other structure treated with gypsum.
- Lane · entry 8377
- Lane · entry 8403
قَاصَّ
To retaliate against someone by killing, wounding, or mutilating him in like measure.
The subject may be the relative of a slain or injured person; the construction expresses making the offender quit or even with the injured party.
- Lane · entry 8378
قَاصَّ
To settle accounts with someone by offsetting reciprocal debts or claims.
A generalized, figurative extension of matching one obligation against another.
- Lane · entry 8378
أَقَصَّ
To retaliate for one person against another.
Used of a governor or other authority imposing a like wound or killing on behalf of the injured or slain party.
- Lane · entry 8379
أَقَصَّ
To authorize someone to retaliate against oneself.
The authorized retaliation may involve killing, mutilation, beating, or wounding.
- Lane · entry 8379
أَقَصَّ
To bring someone near death, or to become near the point of death.
The causative construction describes beating or weakening someone until death is near; the intransitive use describes reaching that condition and possibly escaping it.
- Lane · entry 8379
تَقَصَّصَ
To preserve someone's speech or discourse in memory.
Applied to retaining another person's words or discourse accurately.
- Lane · entry 8380
تَقَاصَّ
To make one another quit or even by reciprocal retaliation.
Used for mutual like-for-like killing or wounding.
- Lane · entry 8381
تَقَاصَّ
To settle accounts mutually by offsetting reciprocal debts or claims.
A figurative accounting use parallel to reciprocal retaliation.
- Lane · entry 8381
اِقْتَصَّ
To be cut, clipped, or shorn.
Applied to hair or similar material cut with scissors.
- Lane · entry 8382
اِقْتَصَّ، اِقْتِصَاصٌ
To retaliate, or to undergo requital by having done to one what one has done.
The matching act may be killing, mutilation, beating, or wounding; the noun denotes the resulting requital.
- Lane · entry 8382
اِسْتَقَصَّ
To seek or demand retaliation, or to ask someone to retaliate on one's behalf.
The requested retaliation is like-for-like killing or wounding.
- Lane · entry 8383
قَصٌّ، قُصَاصَةٌ
Cuttings or material cut off.
Applied especially to cuttings of hair and to the unwoven end of a garment or piece of cloth.
- Lane · entry 8384
- Lane · entry 8394
قَصٌّ
The breast, breastbone, or central sternum of a person or animal.
The term can also designate the place where breast hair grows.
- Lane · entry 8384
قَصٌّ
An inseparable adherent, in an idiomatic expression.
Applied to someone who will not separate from another, including one who denies a relationship or a due obligation.
- Lane · entry 8384
قَصٌّ، قِصٌّ
Gypsum or gypsum stone.
A dialectal lexical variant of the word for gypsum; it also occurs in descriptions of gypsum-plastered structures.
- Lane · entry 8384
قُصَّةٌ
The forelock, front hair, or a lock of hair.
May refer to the hair over the forehead, a cut fringe, or any individual lock of hair.
- Lane · entry 8387
قِصَّةٌ
A story, narrative, or written account.
The term may denote a related narrative, something written, or a report presented as an account.
- Lane · entry 8388
قِصَّةٌ
An affair, case, or matter at issue.
Used of a person's situation or a case referred to an authority; this is distinct from the narrative sense.
- Lane · entry 8388
قُصَاصُ الشَّعَرِ
The line or extremity where hair growth ends.
Used of the front, back, or circuit of the hair of the head, including the part along which scissors run.
- Lane · entry 8391
قُصَاصُ الكَفَّيْنِ
The extremities of the two hands where they meet.
Appears in an idiomatic expression describing biting those extremities.
- Lane · entry 8391
قَصِيصَةٌ
An animal used for following tracks.
Applied especially to a camel, horse, or similar animal that follows the footsteps of traveling camels.
- Lane · entry 8395
قَصِيصٌ
Remaining herbage whose trace is followed.
A term for what remains of pasture and is sought by tracking its signs.
- Mufradāt · row 1184
قَاصٌّ
A relater or storyteller who presents a story in its proper course.
The term can describe one who follows the meanings and expressions of a narrative while recounting it.
- Lane · entry 8399
قَاصٌّ
One who recites or delivers a formal discourse or sermon.
Refers specifically to delivering the discourse called خُطْبَةٌ.
- Lane · entry 8399
مِقَصٌّ
Scissors, shears, or a cutting blade.
The term may refer to a single blade or to the implement used for cutting hair and similar materials; a pair is also called مِقَصَّانِ.
- Lane · entry 8402
مَقْصُوصٌ
Cut, clipped, or shorn.
Applied to hair, forelocks, wings, and similar parts; a bird may be described as having a clipped wing.
- Lane · entry 8404
قَصْقَاصٌ
A lion.
Reported as an anomalous usage rather than a regular development of the root principle.
- Maqāyīs · row 3786
قُصْقُصَةٌ
A short man.
Reported as an anomalous usage rather than a regular development of the root principle.
- Maqāyīs · row 3786
قَصِيصٌ
A plant.
Reported as an anomalous usage rather than a regular development of the root principle.
- Maqāyīs · row 3786
Cautions
Points that affect how this root should be read.
The Form I verb and the noun قَصَصٌ share both the tracing and narrative branches; their Quranic senses are separated by grammatical form and construction rather than by unrelated roots.
Several reported classical forms are explicitly described as anomalous to the regular root pattern; they are retained separately rather than treated as ordinary developments.
The historical citation convention in the lexical evidence is not used to infer Quran locations; examples use only secure QAC word locations.