Quranic root
سري
s · r · y
The root's clearest orientation is movement through the night—travel or passage from one point to another—with extensions to movement beneath a surface and to transmission or spread.
The verbal branch distinguishes nocturnal travel from causing or leading someone to travel by night. Related nouns name night journeys, travelers, and groups that travel at night; figurative usage describes something creeping, spreading, or extending through another thing. The stream sense reflects something that runs or passes along.
- Lane · entry 41042
- Mufradāt · row 688
- 3
- Quran-attested forms
- 5
- Quran senses
- 8
- Quran occurrences
Forms in the Quran
The forms this root actually takes in the Quran. Select one to jump to its senses and examples.
سَرَى
sarā
- 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 travel or journey by night.
An intransitive nocturnal-travel use. The Quranic form is imperfect; the dictionary headword is the perfect citation form.
- Lane · entry 41042
- Mufradāt · row 688
To pass away or go on, of the night.
Attested in the Quranic expression concerning the night as it goes away. Some interpreters understand the expression instead as referring to traveling in the night; that reading belongs to the night-travel sense.
- Lane · entry 41042
Selected Quran examples
Quran 89:4word 3
“it passes”
أَسْرَىٰ
ʾasrāā
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form IV
- Form
- IV
- 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.
To cause or lead someone to travel by night; to transport by night.
Used with بِـ for the person or group accompanying or being transported. In the Quran it describes leading a group forth by night and transporting a servant by night.
- Lane · entry 41042
- Mufradāt · row 688
Selected Quran examples
Quran 17:1word 3
“took”
Quran 11:81word 9
“So travel”
سَرِيّ
sariyy
- Part of speech
- Noun
- 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.
A stream, rivulet, or streamlet.
The Quranic term in the account of Mary; the lexical evidence includes a rivulet running toward palm trees as a possible specification.
- Lane · entry 41053
- Mufradāt · row 688
Selected Quran examples
Quran 19:24word 10
“a stream”
Elevated or noble; an alternative interpretation of the Quranic term.
An alternative reading of the expression in 19:24 connects the term with elevation or nobility rather than with a stream.
- Mufradāt · row 688
Occurrences in the Quran
Every place this root appears, in Quran order. The first few are shown here.
- 11:81فَأَسْرِSo travel
- 15:65فَأَسْرِSo travel
- 17:1أَسْرَىٰtook
- 19:24سَرِيًّۭاa stream
- 20:77أَسْرِTravel by night
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 23 Classical meanings
سَرَى
To creep or extend beneath the ground, said of the root of a tree.
A concrete extension of movement along an unseen path.
- Lane · entry 41042
سَرَى
To spread, pass into, or extend through something.
Used figuratively of poison, wine, calamity, war, anxiety, the effects of a wound, legal prohibition, or emancipation; anxiety may thereby come upon someone or pass away.
- Lane · entry 41042
سَرَى
To load goods, utensils, or furniture onto the back of a beast.
A transitive use distinct from nocturnal travel.
- Lane · entry 41042
سَرَى
To remove or pull off a garment from someone or from its place.
The usage may be transitive or describe a garment being removed; the intensified form is also reported in the source.
- Lane · entry 41042
سَرَّى
To send a military detachment against an enemy by night.
Used of an army leader dispatching a سَرِيَّة.
- Lane · entry 41043
سَرَّى
To exude sweat from the body.
A transitive Form II bodily-process use.
- Lane · entry 41043
سُرًى
Night journeying or a night journey.
Related nominal forms include سَرْيَةٌ for a single night journey and سِرَايَةٌ for the act or state of traveling by night.
- Lane · entry 41047
- Lane · entry 41049
- Lane · entry 41055
سِرْيَةٌ
A small, short, round, smooth arrowhead.
A dialectal form associated with سِرْوَةٌ; the source distinguishes it from the doubled form used for a military detachment.
- Lane · entry 41051
سِرْيَةٌ
A locust in its larval first state.
A dialectal variant of the term for the early-stage locust.
- Lane · entry 41051
سَرَاءٌ
A mountain tree whose fine wood is used for making bows.
A noun of unity is also reported for the tree.
- Lane · entry 41052
سَرِيَّةٌ
A detached portion or company of an army.
The term is conventionally associated with a group selected from an army and historically applied to groups of varying size; it was originally connected with marching by night but was also used of groups marching by day.
- Lane · entry 41054
سَرَيَانِيٌّ
Pervasive or spreading throughout.
A technical term reported in philosophical writings and identified as probably post-classical.
- Lane · entry 41056
السُّرْيَانِيَّةُ
The Syriac language.
A language name formed from the related pervasive or spreading terminology.
- Lane · entry 41057
سَرَّاءٌ
One who travels much or often by night.
An agent noun emphasizing habitual or frequent nocturnal travel.
- Lane · entry 41058
سَارٍ
A person traveling by night.
A participial noun for a nocturnal traveler.
- Lane · entry 41059
السَّارِي
A lion.
A figurative designation attributed to the lion's going about by night.
- Lane · entry 41059
سَارِيَةٌ
A party or company of people traveling by night.
Distinct from the military term سَرِيَّةٌ, though both can denote a group associated with nocturnal movement.
- Lane · entry 41060
سَارِيَةٌ
A cloud or rain cloud that comes or travels by night.
The term may refer to a night cloud, a night rain, or a cloud situated between early-morning and evening clouds.
- Lane · entry 41060
السَّارِيَاتُ
Donkeys or wild asses.
A plural usage explained by their resting little or grazing by night.
- Lane · entry 41060
سَارِيَةٌ
A column or pillar; also a mast.
A structural vertical support, including a stone or baked-brick column and a ship's mast.
- Lane · entry 41060
أَسْرَى
More or most accustomed to traveling by night.
A comparative or superlative adjective, distinct from the Form IV verb أَسْرَىٰ.
- Lane · entry 41061
مَسْرًى
A place or time of night travel; also a way or route.
The form may function as a noun of place, time, or action and may be used more broadly for a way by which one goes.
- Lane · entry 41062
الْمُتَسَرِّي
One who goes forth in or among a سَرِيَّة, a detached company.
An agent noun derived from the military-detachment sense.
- Lane · entry 41065
Cautions
Points that affect how this root should be read.
The Quranic سَرِيًّا in 19:24 has two reported interpretations in the supplied evidence: a stream or rivulet, and an alternative connection with elevation or nobility.
Some discussions offer an alternative derivation of أَسْرَىٰ from سَرَاةٌ or the related root associated with elevation or a wide tract. The displayed Form IV sense follows the direct Quranic night-transport evidence.
The Mufradat discussion of ﴿وَأَسَرُّوهُ بِضَاعَةً﴾ in يوسف 12:19 concerns the form أَسَرُّوهُ from a different root and is not assigned to this root's Quranic forms.
Unassigned or ambiguous evidence
The Mufradat row includes the expression ﴿وَأَسَرُّوهُ بِضَاعَةً﴾ [يوسف 12:19], but its consonantal root is س ر ر rather than the canonical QAC root س ر ي; it is therefore excluded from the form senses.
The alternative elevation-based interpretation of سَرِيًّا is reported through a connection with السرو and is represented as an alternative Quranic interpretation rather than as an uncontested independent root meaning.