Quran Root Words > Root ʾ-y-y
The Arabic root أ ي ي (ʾ-y-y) occurs 382 times in the Quran, and every one of those occurrences is the same word: ءَايَة (āya). It is number 15 of the 1,642 roots in the Quranic Arabic Corpus by frequency.
What the root ʾ-y-y means
The corpus dictionary gives no gloss for this root's words, so the meaning here comes from the word-by-word glosses of the MASAQ dataset, which most often render ءَايَة (āya) as "a sign".
The middle letter of ʾ-y-y is the weak letter ي. In a root like this, called hollow, the middle letter is often not written as a consonant and turns into a long vowel instead. The Quran's only word from this root is ءَايَة (āya).
One letter of ʾ-y-y is a hamza, the glottal stop. Arabic writes a hamza on a seat chosen by the vowels around it (أ, إ, ؤ, ئ, or ء on its own); in ءَايَة (āya) it is written ء.
Every word from the root ʾ-y-y in the Quran
The Quran uses one word from ʾ-y-y. The table gives its spelling as the corpus writes it, its type, its meaning and its count. The Quran uses no verb from ʾ-y-y: all 382 occurrences are nouns, adjectives or participles.
| Arabic | Transliteration | Word type | Meaning | Occurrences |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ءَايَة | āya | Noun | "a sign" | 382 |
| أ ي ي | ʾ-y-y | All words from ʾ-y-y | 382 |
Meanings in quotation marks are MASAQ word-by-word glosses, the others the corpus dictionary's, and the word types follow the dictionary. Every count on this page is a lemma count from the Quranic Arabic Corpus, version 0.4. We compared this count, the root total of 382, with the corpus's own dictionary entry for ʾ-y-y, and it matches.
The root ʾ-y-y in the verses of the Quran
Words from ʾ-y-y appear in 353 verses spread over 59 of the Quran's 114 suras. Sura 6 has the most of them, 27 verses. Below are the shortest verses in which the root's most frequent words occur, with the word marked. The text is the Uthmani text of Tanzil, and each reference opens the verse on quran.com with translations.
ءَايَة (āya), 382 times
تِلْكَ ءَايَٰتُ ٱلْكِتَٰبِ ٱلْمُبِينِ
Quran 26:2; word-by-word gloss of the marked word: "(are the) verses"
تِلْكَ ءَايَٰتُ ٱلْكِتَٰبِ ٱلْحَكِيمِ
Quran 31:2; word-by-word gloss of the marked word: "(are) verses"
لِنُرِيَكَ مِنْ ءَايَٰتِنَا ٱلْكُبْرَى
Quran 20:23; word-by-word gloss of the marked word: "our signs"
Learning the words of ʾ-y-y
ءَايَة (āya), no. 26 with 382, is on our list of the 100 most common Quran words, which counts it the same way. The root ʾ-y-y is one of the 1,642 roots you can search in our Quran root word explorer; for the rest of the language, see our Arabic learning resources by level.
Frequently asked questions
How many times is the root ʾ-y-y used in the Quran?
382 times, always as the same word, ءَايَة (āya), according to the Quranic Arabic Corpus.
What does the Arabic root أ ي ي (ʾ-y-y) mean?
The corpus dictionary gives no gloss for this root's words, so the meaning here comes from the word-by-word glosses of the MASAQ dataset, which most often render ءَايَة (āya) as "a sign". The root gives the Quran one word only.
Does the Quran use a verb from the root ʾ-y-y?
No. All 382 occurrences of ʾ-y-y in the Quran are nouns, adjectives or participles; the most frequent is ءَايَة (āya).