Quranic root
رأس
r · ʾ · s
The root centers on gathering and rising: the head is the gathered or elevated upper part, and this develops into meanings of prominence, leadership, priority, and beginnings.
From the bodily head and the uppermost point, Classical Arabic extends the root to chiefs, principal or essential parts, beginnings, things that rise ahead, and related figurative constructions.
- Maqāyīs · row 1935
- Lane · entry 21965
- 1
- Quran-attested forms
- 2
- Quran senses
- 18
- Quran occurrences
Forms in the Quran
The forms this root actually takes in the Quran. Select one to jump to its senses and examples.
رَأْس
raʾs
- Part of speech
- Noun
- Quran occurrences
- 18 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.
The head of a human or animal; the bodily upper part.
Quranic occurrences use the singular and plural with possessive pronouns and in constructions involving shaving, raising, bowing, grasping, or having something poured over the head. The plural also occurs in the image of the heads of devils.
- Lane · entry 21965
- Mufradāt · row 518
Selected Quran examples
The principal sum or capital of property.
A specialized construction meaning the principal of a loan or property; the Quranic occurrence at 2:279 is the plural in this capital/principal sense.
- Lane · entry 21965
Selected Quran examples
Quran 2:279word 12
“(is)”
Occurrences in the Quran
Every place this root appears, in Quran order. The first few are shown here.
- 2:196رُءُوسَكُمْyour heads
- 2:196رَّأْسِهِۦhis head
- 2:279رُءُوسُ(is)
- 5:6بِرُءُوسِكُمْyour heads
- 7:150بِرَأْسِby head
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 47 Classical meanings
رَأَسَ
To hit or hurt someone on the head.
The verb may take the head as the object of striking, including striking it with a staff.
- Lane · entry 21961
رَأَسَ
To be affected or overcome by a head ailment.
Also used of having a complaint or illness of the head, including the disease called بِرْسَام.
- Lane · entry 21961
رَأَسَ
To be or become head, chief, commander, ruler, or superior over people; to be high in rank or condition.
The construction may occur with a people or with عَلَى indicating authority over them.
- Lane · entry 21961
رَأَسَ
To strive for or desire headship or command.
A conventional figurative use with رِئَاسَةٌ as the desired position.
- Lane · entry 21961
رَأَّسَ
Of a lizard, to turn or come forth with its head foremost toward an adversary or from its hole.
The head-first orientation is contrasted with coming forth tail-first.
- Lane · entry 21962
رَأَّسَ
To make or appoint someone head, chief, commander, or ruler over a group.
The causative appointment construction takes the person appointed as its object.
- Lane · entry 21962
- Lane · entry 21963
تَرَأَّسَ
To become or be made head, chief, commander, or ruler over people.
Used with عَلَى or عَلَيْهِمْ for assuming or receiving authority over a group.
- Lane · entry 21963
اِرْتَأَسَ
To become mounted or fixed upon the head of something.
The lexical image is of an object settling onto or becoming fixed on a head, including the point of a spear.
- Lane · entry 21964
اِرْتَأَسَ
To take someone by the neck and lower the head toward the ground.
A transitive physical construction illustrated with a named person.
- Lane · entry 21964
اِرْتَأَسَ
To occupy or divert someone so as to draw away their attention.
A figurative extension associated with the preceding act of taking or lowering someone by the head.
- Lane · entry 21964
رَأْس
The highest, uppermost, or top part of a thing, including the upper part of a mountain or valley.
This is the spatial extension from the bodily head; a valley's upper part may be called its head.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
To kiss someone's head, expressed metonymically as reaching or striking the head.
A conventional metonymical phrase rather than a literal act of striking.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
To turn away from someone, pay no attention to them, or hold a bad opinion of them.
An idiomatic expression literally framed as being shot by someone into the head.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
One after another or in close succession.
Used in expressions describing births or other events occurring head after head.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
Uniform, of one way, mode, or manner.
Occurs in a construction meaning to make a thing one-headed, hence consistent or of a single pattern.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
An individual animal counted as one head of livestock.
Used as a counting unit for sheep, goats, and other beasts.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
A bulb or head of garlic.
The cloves are treated as subdivisions of the garlic head.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
The extremity, end, or last part of a thing.
This is a spatial extension of the head as the terminal or foremost part.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
A headland, cape, or promontory.
A geographical projection or extremity is named by the head term.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
The hilt or pommel of a sword.
The sources distinguish the hilt from, or identify it with, the pommel, with some lexical uncertainty about the exact form رِيَاس.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
Either of the two nodes of a planet.
A technical astronomical expression, الرَّأْسُ وَالذَّنَبُ, literally “the head and the tail.”
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
A chief, leader, or person of authority.
A figurative nominal use synonymous with رَئِيسٌ, including a leader of a people or a group.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
The principal, essential, or foundational part of something.
Used figuratively for what is most essential, including the foundational part of a discipline or matter.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
The beginning or first part of a period, affair, or undertaking.
Used in expressions for the beginning of a month, year, affair, or speech, and for the initial stage of an undertaking.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
To begin again from the start or repeat something from its beginning.
Occurs in the idiom “from the head” when asking someone to repeat speech from the beginning.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
To be on the point of accomplishing an affair.
A figurative expression for being at the threshold or initial stage of completing one's business.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
During a person's lifetime or in their time.
The expression “on the head of so-and-so” can mark the time in which that person was alive.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَأْس
A numerous and strong company of people, an army in its own right.
A collective singular use describing a group strong enough not to need assistance.
- Lane · entry 21965
رَؤُوس
A camel retaining fat only in its head.
A specialized description of an emaciated camel.
- Lane · entry 21968
رَئِيس
One struck or injured in the head, including one whose head has been broken and its skin cleft.
This is a lexical use of the headword رَئِيسٌ distinct from its leadership sense.
- Lane · entry 21969
رَئِيس
A person affected or overcome by a head disease or complaint.
The description includes affliction by بِرْسَام or another ailment of the head.
- Lane · entry 21969
رَئِيس
A chief, leader, ruler, or person high in rank or condition.
The word may also designate the chief among animals, such as the leading dog in a chase.
- Lane · entry 21969
رَئِيس
Principal or vital parts of an animal.
In the technical expression الأعضاء الرئيسة, the listed vital organs are the heart, brain, liver, and testicles.
- Lane · entry 21969
رَأَّس
A seller of animal heads.
A specialized occupational noun; the alternative forms with و are identified as vulgar, incorrect, or post-classical by the source.
- Lane · entry 21972
رِئِّيس
One who is often made, appointed, or becomes a chief.
The intensive form expresses repeated or habitual acquisition of headship.
- Lane · entry 21973
رَائِس
A hunting bitch that seizes or springs upon the head of the quarry.
The feminine form may be used alongside the masculine form in this specialized hunting description.
- Lane · entry 21974
رَائِس
Anything elevated or rising above the adjacent parts; especially the upper part of a valley.
The plural رَوَائِسُ is used for the uppermost parts of valleys.
- Lane · entry 21974
رَائِس
A cloud that precedes the other clouds.
A figurative extension of being foremost; the source notes uncertainty about the grammatical form in one citation.
- Lane · entry 21974
أَرْأَس
Large-headed.
Applied to a man, sheep or goat, or stallion, with related forms differing in their attested animal applications.
- Lane · entry 21976
رَأْسَاء
A ewe or she-goat with a black head and face while the rest of the body is white.
A specialized animal-color description.
- Lane · entry 21976
مِرْأَس
A head strong or inclined to butt or knock against other heads.
The related plural describes heads that engage in such butting.
- Lane · entry 21977
مُرَئِّس
A lizard coming forth from its hole head foremost.
The description is opposed to مُذَنِّبٌ, one coming forth tail foremost.
- Lane · entry 21979
مُرَئِّس
The lion.
A specialized lexical designation recorded independently of the lizard description.
- Lane · entry 21979
مِرْآس
A horse that bites the heads of competing horses or takes precedence in a race.
The sources preserve both the head-biting description and the broader sense of being foremost in racing.
- Lane · entry 21980
مَرْؤُوس
One whose desire or sexual appetite is only in his head.
A specialized description of desire localized in the head, not the general passive sense of being under a chief.
- Lane · entry 21981
مَرْؤُوس
A subject or subordinate of a chief.
A figurative passive relation to a رَئِيس.
- Lane · entry 21981
مُرَائِس
One who holds back from the party to which he belongs in fighting or battle.
A specialized military or group-behavior description.
- Lane · entry 21982
Cautions
Points that affect how this root should be read.
The Quranic noun is overwhelmingly literal “head,” but 2:279 uses the established construction for principal capital.
Several Classical entries are specialized, figurative, or dialectally qualified; their usage conditions preserve those restrictions without treating them as Quranic senses.