How to Conjugate qāla (to say) in Arabic

قَالَ (qāla) means to say. It is a hollow Form I verb from the root ق و ل (q-w-l): قَالَ (qāla) in the past, يَقُولُ (yaqūlu) in the present and قُلْ (qul) as a command. The tables below give its full conjugation in all 13 persons, active and passive, vowelled, with its participles and verbal noun.

Every form of qāla on this page comes from the engine behind our Arabic verb conjugator and was checked against Wiktionary's conjugation table for قَالَ, which is also the source of its verbal nouns.

Qāla at a glance

Past tense of qāla

The past tense (al-māḍī) of qāla has two stems: qāl- before an ending that starts with a vowel (قَالَ (qāla), قَالَتْ (qālat)) and qul- before an ending that starts with a consonant (قُلْتُ (qultu), قُلْنَ (qulna)).

Present tense of qāla

The present tense (al-muḍāriʿ) of qāla has a long vowel in the stem, -qūl-, which turns short before the -na of the feminine plural: يَقُولُ (yaqūlu) but يَقُلْنَ (yaqulna).

Subjunctive and jussive of qāla

In the jussive the long vowel of the stem shortens wherever no ending follows: after لم (lam, did not) the he-form is يَقُلْ (yaqul), while the subjunctive after لن (lan, will not) keeps it, يَقُولَ (yaqūla).

Imperative of qāla

Take the prefix off the jussive تَقُلْ (taqul) and the command is قُلْ (qul): no alif is needed, because the first root letter now has a vowel. The long vowel comes back when an ending follows: قُولِي (qūlī), قُولُوا (qūlū).

Passive of qāla

In the passive the weak middle letter of qāla turns into ī in the past (قِيلَ (qīla)) and ā in the present (يُقَالُ (yuqālu)).

Participles and verbal noun of qāla

In the active participle a hamza takes the place of the weak middle letter: قَائِل (qāʾil). The passive participle keeps only the long vowel of the weak letter: مَقُول (maqūl). Form I verbal nouns follow no single pattern, and Wiktionary lists three for qāla: قَوْل (qawl), مَقَال (maqāl), مَقَالَة (maqāla). Learn them with the verb, or look them up under q-w-l in one of the dictionaries in our guide.

Why qāla conjugates this way

The middle root letter of قَالَ (qāla) is و (w), a weak letter, which is why grammars call it a hollow verb. That letter never appears as a consonant in Form I. Where the syllable stays open it becomes a long vowel (قَالَ (qāla), يَقُولُ (yaqūlu)); where a consonant ending closes it, the vowel is short (قُلْتُ (qultu), يَقُلْ (yaqul)). So qāla has two past stems, qāl- and qul-. Qāma (to stand up) and ʿāda (to return) are hollow too, and change in the same places.

Qāla in sentences

قال هذا.
He said that.
The verb: قَالَ (qāla), past, he. Source: Tatoeba sentence 11720573 by dididodo (CC BY 2.0 FR), unvowelled as published.

قالت لا.
She said no.
The verb: قَالَتْ (qālat), past, she. Source: Tatoeba sentence 11672827 by dididodo (CC BY 2.0 FR), unvowelled as published.

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