Quranic root
يبس
y · b · s
The root centers on dryness: the loss or absence of moisture.
Its basic sense develops from drying vegetation, places, and substances to firmness or hardness, and further to figurative states such as withered relations, milklessness, bodily dryness, and lack of benefit. Derived forms also express causing something to dry or describing land whose vegetation has dried.
- Maqāyīs · row 5247
- Lane · entry 17246
- Lane · entry 17259
- 2
- Quran-attested forms
- 2
- Quran senses
- 4
- Quran occurrences
Forms in the Quran
The forms this root actually takes in the Quran. Select one to jump to its senses and examples.
يَابِسٌ
yābisun
- Part of speech
- Active participle / 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.
Dry or dried up, with moisture absent.
Used substantively of a dry thing and adjectivally of dry vegetation or other things. It may describe something that has dried after being moist, while broader lexical usage also permits what is naturally dry.
- Lane · entry 17259
Selected Quran examples
Quran 6:59word 27
“dry”
Quran 12:43word 15
“dry”
يَبَسٌ
yabasun
- Part of speech
- Adjective / 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.
Dry, especially a place or passage from which water or moisture has gone.
In the Quranic construction, it describes the path through the sea after its water had departed, rather than merely a dry object or substance.
- Mufradāt · row 1623
- Lane · entry 17259
Selected Quran examples
Quran 20:77word 13
“dry”
Occurrences in the Quran
Every place this root appears, in Quran order. The first few are shown here.
View all 4 occurrencesBroader Classical Arabic meanings
Recorded for this root in the Classical lexicons beyond its Quran usage. These are secondary to the Quran senses above.
Show 26 Classical meanings
يَبِسَ
To become dry or dry up after having been moist; also to become stiff, rigid, tough, firm, or hard.
The verb is used of plants, land, and other things that lose moisture, and by extension of things that become resistant or rigid.
- Lane · entry 17246
يَبِسَ
To become costive.
A figurative bodily application of becoming dry.
- Lane · entry 17246
يَبِسَ
Of a bond or friendship, to wither and become severed; to become disunited.
A figurative application to the relationship between people.
- Lane · entry 17246
أَيْبِسْ
Be silent or cease speaking.
An imperative expression addressed to a person.
- Lane · entry 17246
يَبَّسَ
To dry something or make it dry.
The causative Form II construction.
- Lane · entry 17247
يَبَّسَ
To wither or sever a relationship or bond.
A figurative causative use applied to a relationship.
- Lane · entry 17247
يَابَسَهُ
To treat someone with dryness, hardness, or niggardliness; to deal harshly with him.
A transitive conventional construction describing harsh treatment.
- Lane · entry 17248
أَيْبَسَ
Of land, to have its plants or herbage dry up, or to become abundant in dry vegetation.
Used of land and its vegetation.
- Lane · entry 17249
أَيْبَسَ
Of a she-camel, to become milkless.
A specialized use describing the cessation of milk.
- Lane · entry 17249
أَيْبَسَ
Of people, to journey through the land, especially through dry land.
A conventional use describing travel in a waterless or barren tract.
- Lane · entry 17249
يَابِسٌ
Stiff, rigid, tough, firm, resistant to pressure, or hard.
Applied literally to hard materials such as stone and in related figurative descriptions; this is distinct from simple absence of moisture.
- Lane · entry 17259
يَابِسٌ
Palsied on one side, with that half lacking sensation and movement.
A specialized bodily description.
- Lane · entry 17259
يَابِسٌ
Costive.
A figurative bodily application of dryness.
- Lane · entry 17259
يَابِسٌ
So heavily intoxicated as not to speak.
A figurative description of a person rendered speechless by intoxication.
- Lane · entry 17259
يَابِسٌ
Of a she-ass, dry and lean.
A specialized description of an animal's condition.
- Lane · entry 17259
يَابِسٌ
Of a ewe, she-goat, or woman, having no milk or having ceased to give milk.
Applied to a female animal or woman whose milk has stopped and whose udder has become dry.
- Lane · entry 17259
يَابِسٌ
A dry duct, used for the penis.
An anatomical usage.
- Lane · entry 17259
يَابِسٌ
Of hair, so dry that water or oil produces no effect on it.
A specialized description of unusually resistant, dry hair.
- Lane · entry 17259
يَبِيسٌ
Dry sweat; also sweat generally.
A specialized bodily usage.
- Lane · entry 17259
يَابِسٌ
Of a man or woman, having little or no good, or yielding no benefit.
A figurative evaluation of a person's usefulness or benefit.
- Lane · entry 17259
يَابِسٌ
Disunion between two people; a relationship in which the bond has withered.
A figurative relational usage.
- Lane · entry 17259
يَبَاسِ
The pudendum or the anus.
An anatomical noun used as a proper-name-like expression.
- Lane · entry 17256
الأَيْبَسَانِ
The fleshless, dry, or tough parts of the shanks and related leg or ankle regions.
Applied to the exposed or fleshless parts of human or animal legs, including corresponding parts of a horse's legs.
- Maqāyīs · row 5247
- Lane · entry 17260
أَيَابِسُ
Hard things upon which swords are tested.
A plural technical application to hard testing materials.
- Lane · entry 17260
مُوبِسَةٌ
Of land, having its plants or herbage drying up or already dried.
A passive-participial description of land and its vegetation.
- Lane · entry 17261
مِيبَاسٌ
Very drying, of a wind.
A specialized description of a strongly desiccating wind.
- Lane · entry 17262
Cautions
Points that affect how this root should be read.
The historical Quran citation notation in the lexical evidence is not converted into a modern verse reference; the modern Quran examples here use only the independently supplied QAC locations.