Quranic root
خيل
kh · y · l
A semantic orientation of movement accompanied by changing appearance or coloration: what is imagined, appears, or displays a sign, and by extension prideful movement and horses.
The root develops from the image or changing appearance perceived in the mind or in visible phenomena. This includes imagining and seeming, signs shown by clouds, variegated color, prideful gait, and the traditional association of horses with proud movement.
- Maqāyīs · row 1685
- Mufradāt · row 450
- 3
- Quran-attested forms
- 4
- Quran senses
- 9
- Quran occurrences
Forms in the Quran
The forms this root actually takes in the Quran. Select one to jump to its senses and examples.
خَيَّلَ
khayyala
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form II
- Form
- II
- 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 be made to seem or appear; to be imagined as having a particular quality or movement.
Quranic passive construction: the thing is presented to the perceiver as seeming a certain way, without asserting that the appearance is real.
- Lane · entry 20453
- Mufradāt · row 450
Selected Quran examples
Quran 20:66word 7
“seemed”
مُخْتَالٌ
mukhtālun
- Part of speech
- Adjective · substantivized adjective
- Quran occurrences
- 3 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.
Self-conceited, vain, or proud in bearing.
Describes a person characterized by pride arising from a fancied excellence in himself or by an affected proud manner of walking.
- Lane · entry 20485
- Mufradāt · row 450
Selected Quran examples
خَيْلٌ
khaylun
- Part of speech
- Noun · collective noun
- Quran occurrences
- 5 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.
Horses; the horse kind collectively.
Used as a collective noun for Arabian and other horses, including both males and females.
- Lane · entry 20462
- Mufradāt · row 450
Selected Quran examples
Quran 3:14word 13
“and [the] horses”
Quran 8:60word 9
“horses”
Quran 16:8word 1
“And horses”
Quran 59:6word 11
“horses”
Horsemen or cavalry.
A Quranic metonymic use in which خيل denotes riders mounted on horses rather than the animals themselves.
- Lane · entry 20462
- Mufradāt · row 450
Selected Quran examples
Quran 17:64word 8
“with your cavalry”
Occurrences in the Quran
Every place this root appears, in Quran order. The first few are shown here.
- 3:14وَٱلْخَيْلِand [the] horses
- 4:36مُخْتَالًۭا[a] proud
- 8:60ٱلْخَيْلِhorses
- 16:8وَٱلْخَيْلَAnd horses
- 17:64بِخَيْلِكَwith your cavalry
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 48 Classical meanings
خَالَ
To think, suppose, surmise, or fancy something; occasionally, to know or opine it.
A verb of opinion that may govern a subject and predicate, like ظنّ.
- Lane · entry 20452
- Lane · entry 20460
خَالَ
To limp, halt, or be slightly lame.
Said especially of a horse or similar beast.
- Lane · entry 20452
- Lane · entry 20460
- Lane · entry 20475
تَخْيِيلٌ
The imaging of a thing in the mind; fancying or forming a mental image of it.
Includes active imagining and the related passive notion of something becoming imaged or seeming to the perceiver.
- Lane · entry 20453
- Lane · entry 20456
- Lane · entry 20481
خَيَّلَ
To place an image or scarecrow near an animal in order to frighten away a predator.
Especially an image placed near a young camel or other young animal so that a wolf will not approach it.
- Lane · entry 20453
- Lane · entry 20470
خَيَّلَ
To perceive in someone an indication of goodness; hence, to recognize, understand, or select him on that basis.
The lexical use concerns discerning an inward or real state through an outward sign, not merely imagining it.
- Lane · entry 20453
- Lane · entry 20456
خَيَّلَ عَلَيْهِ
To convey doubt, suspicion, or an impression of uncertainty to someone; to make a matter dubious to him.
A transitive construction with the person affected by the doubt.
- Lane · entry 20453
- Lane · entry 20456
خَيَّلَتِ السَّمَاءُ
Of the sky or clouds, to become clouded or show signs that rain is approaching, sometimes with thunder and lightning before rain.
The expression can indicate preparation for rain or a promise of rain without asserting that rain has yet fallen.
- Lane · entry 20453
- Lane · entry 20455
- Lane · entry 20456
- Lane · entry 20459
- Lane · entry 20479
- Lane · entry 20480
خَيَّلَ
To become cowardly or weak-hearted in battle; to hold back from a group through cowardice.
Used of failure to act or proceed firmly or steadily in fighting.
- Lane · entry 20453
خَايَلَ
To vie with, rival, imitate, or emulate another in pride and self-conceit.
The comparison concerns behaving as the other behaves, especially in proud bearing.
- Lane · entry 20454
أَخَالَ
To be or become dubious, confused, or vague to someone.
An intransitive construction in which a matter fails to become clear to the person concerned.
- Lane · entry 20455
- Lane · entry 20479
مَخِيلَةٌ
An indication, symptom, sign, mark, or token from which something is known or inferred.
Originally associated with a cloud thought to promise rain, and extended to signs of qualities such as goodness or nobility.
- Lane · entry 20455
- Lane · entry 20460
- Lane · entry 20479
- Lane · entry 20480
أَخَالَتِ النَّاقَةُ
Of a she-camel, to have milk in the udder and be in good bodily condition.
A figurative extension from a cloud that gives signs or hope of rain.
- Lane · entry 20455
أَخَالَتِ الأَرْضُ
Of land, to become adorned, luxuriant, mature, or blossoming with plants or herbage.
The evidence includes both becoming abundant in vegetation and having vegetation in full maturity or blossom.
- Lane · entry 20455
- Lane · entry 20456
- Lane · entry 20486
أَخَالَ السَّحَابَةَ
To watch or inspect a cloud because it is thought likely to rain; to see it as a cloud giving hope of rain.
The construction expresses observation based on an expectation of rain.
- Lane · entry 20455
- Lane · entry 20459
اِخْتَالَ
To behave or walk proudly or haughtily, with self-conceit and an affected gait.
Said of a person and also of a horse; the manner may include a slow, side-to-side or otherwise affected movement.
- Lane · entry 20454
- Lane · entry 20456
- Lane · entry 20458
- Lane · entry 20468
- Lane · entry 20476
- Lane · entry 20485
تَخَيُّلٌ
The becoming of various colors or the display of changing coloration.
Used of a landscape or other scene whose appearance is diversified in color.
- Lane · entry 20456
تَخَيَّلَ
To go on or away with penetrative energy; to act quickly.
A classical verbal extension describing energetic and rapid movement.
- Lane · entry 20456
خَيْلٌ
Gout, especially gout affecting the foot or feet.
A nominal medical usage synonymous with نقرس.
- Lane · entry 20460
خَالٌ
Lightning, understood as a sign or token of coming rain.
A nominal weather term distinct from the broader cloud and rain-sign expressions.
- Lane · entry 20460
خَالٌ
A cloud, especially one that lights, rises, or appears to promise rain.
The term has several closely related descriptions, including a cloud that may thunder or lighten, give hope of rain, or fail to fulfill that promise.
- Lane · entry 20460
خَالٌ
A liberal, bountiful, or generous man.
A figurative comparison with rain-bearing or lightening clouds.
- Lane · entry 20460
خَالٌ
Free from suspicion or from what occasions suspicion.
An adjectival description of a person or thing regarded as clear of accusation.
- Lane · entry 20460
خَالُ مَالٍ
A keeper, herder, or manager who tends cattle, camels, or other dependents well; by extension, one who regulates affairs.
May describe a pastoral manager, a guardian of a thing, or a ruler who orders the affairs of subjects.
- Lane · entry 20460
خَالٌ
An owner or possessor of a thing, including the owner of a horse.
This is distinct from the related sense of one who manages or tends property.
- Lane · entry 20460
خَالٌ
Free from an attachment of love; unattached.
A description of a person not bound by a romantic attachment.
- Lane · entry 20460
خَالٌ
A man without a wife, or a woman without a husband.
The gender and marital-status applications are separately attested in the lexical evidence.
- Lane · entry 20460
- Lane · entry 20479
خَالٌ
A mole or small blackish spot on the body, especially one resembling a dark pimple on the face.
The derived adjective may describe a person marked with many such moles.
- Lane · entry 20460
- Lane · entry 20476
خَالٌ
A soft garment or cloth of Yemeni manufacture, including a striped or colored burd; also a cloth used as a shroud.
The evidence includes an old Yemeni textile and a cloth in which a corpse is shrouded.
- Lane · entry 20460
مَخِيلَةٌ
A great banner or military ensign.
The sense is explained by comparison with a cloud that fulfills its promise of rain; it includes the banner associated with military authority.
- Lane · entry 20460
- Lane · entry 20480
خَالٌ
The office or authority of a caliphate.
A specialized extension from the banner tied for a newly appointed commander or ruler.
- Lane · entry 20460
خَالٌ
A large mountain.
A concrete nominal usage, with related figurative comparison to a large camel.
- Lane · entry 20460
خَالٌ
A large camel, especially one likened to a mountain.
A figurative or comparative application to a camel of great size.
- Lane · entry 20460
خَالٌ
A black stallion-camel.
A specialized animal term distinct from the general large-camel sense.
- Lane · entry 20460
خَالٌ
A small hill or mound.
A concrete topographical usage.
- Lane · entry 20460
خَالٌ
The bit or bridle equipment of a horse.
Reported as a dialectal form, apparently related to خَوَلٌ.
- Lane · entry 20460
خَالٌ
A particular flowering plant known in Najd.
A lexical plant name, distinct from the vegetation sense of land becoming lush.
- Lane · entry 20460
- Lane · entry 20470
خَيْلٌ
A person characterized by frequent or great lying, in a proverbial expression involving two troops of horses.
A figurative proverbial application of خيل, not the ordinary meaning of the collective noun.
- Lane · entry 20462
خَيْلِيٌّ
An equerry or attendant responsible for the supervision of horses; collectively, horse owners or attendants.
Includes the occupational noun for someone who manages or attends horses.
- Lane · entry 20467
- Lane · entry 20474
خَيَالٌ
An incorporeal image, apparition, phantom, or shadow-like form seen in sleep, a mirror, water, or the mind.
The term extends from a dream image to any subtle or imagined form resembling a shadow.
- Lane · entry 20470
- Lane · entry 20472
خَيَالٌ
In philosophy, the faculty that retains perceived sensory forms after their objects are absent.
A technical philosophical sense describing the storehouse of imagination in the brain.
- Lane · entry 20470
خَيَالٌ
The shadow of a bird seen beneath it as it rises, which it may mistake for prey.
A specialized description of a bird pouncing on its own shadow.
- Lane · entry 20470
خَيَالٌ
The visible person, body, or figure of someone seen from a distance.
A concrete extension from an image or shadow to a distant human form or aspect.
- Lane · entry 20470
خَيَالٌ
A dressed-up object set upright to make animals or birds fancy it to be a person and be frightened or decoyed.
Used as a device near sheep, goats, or a young ostrich, and distinct from a merely mental image.
- Lane · entry 20470
خَيَالٌ
An object set up in a place to mark that it is prohibited to the public and must not be approached.
A signifying object in the landscape rather than an apparition.
- Lane · entry 20470
أَخْيَلٌ
A variegated bird, identified in the evidence with birds such as the shrikrak or roller and regarded by Arabs as an ill omen.
The name is associated with the bird's contrasting or changing colors.
- Lane · entry 20476
- Mufradāt · row 450
مَخْيُولٌ
A camel whose rump has been lacerated by a bird that alighted on it.
A specialized participial description based on the bird called أَخْيَل.
- Lane · entry 20483
مَخْيُولٌ
A man whose reason has fled through fright.
A figurative usage reported as belonging to common speech.
- Lane · entry 20483
خَالٌ
A nature or innate disposition, temper, or character.
A nominal use for an inborn or natural disposition, synonymous with خُلُقٌ; in one related construction, natural disposition toward good is indicated.
- Lane · entry 20460
- Lane · entry 20479
Cautions
Points that affect how this root should be read.
خَيْلٌ is ordinarily the collective noun for horses, but Lane and the Quran-focused evidence explicitly attest a metonymic horsemen or cavalry use in 17:64.
The Lane citation written as “Kur xx.69” has not been converted into a modern verse location; the example location 20:66 comes independently from QAC.
Two Lane units preserve likely cross-root or uncertain material: the maternal-uncle sense and the empty-place sense are marked ambiguous rather than assigned confidently to this root.
Unassigned or ambiguous evidence
lane-unit:xyl:20460:g3:sub11 states a weak-heart-and-body meaning but itself says the form is most probably خَالٌّ, from another derivation.
lane-unit:xyl:20460:g4:main gives maternal uncle while explicitly referring the sense to the خول article, so its assignment to the canonical خيل root is uncertain.
lane-unit:xyl:20460:g8:main gives an empty-place sense but says it probably derives from خَلَا and therefore may belong to another root.