“On the other hand, apart from the fairly copious anatomical, pathological and medical vocabulary properly belonging to the Arabic language, it has a great power of forming significant derivatives from existing roots, which, when formed, are at once intelligible. Thus there exists in Arabic a special form for the "noun of pain," wherein the first root-letter is followed by a short u and the second by a long ā (the form known to Arab grammarians as فُعال, fu‘āl), and this is the form assumed by the names of most diseases and ailments; as the already mentioned ṣudā‘ (صُداع), "a splitting headache," the "soda" of the Latino-Barbari; zukām (زُكام), "a catarrh"; judhām (جُذام), "elephantiasis," etc.”

Edward Granville Browne

1862–1926

British orientalist, professor of Arabic at Cambridge, historian of Persian literature.

In Arabic

ومن جهةٍ أخرى، فإلى جانب ما يخصّ العربيّة من مفرداتٍ وافرةٍ إلى حدٍّ ما في التشريح والأمراض والطبّ، فإنّ لها قدرةً عظيمةً على توليد مشتقّاتٍ دالّةٍ من الجذور الموجودة، تُفهَمُ حالَ صَوغِها. فللعربيّة مثلاً وزنٌ خاصّ لـ«اسم الداء»، يُضَمُّ فيه الحرفُ الأوّلُ من الجذر ويُمدّ الثاني بالألف، وهو الوزن الذي يسمّيه نُحاةُ العربِ «فُعال»، وعليه تأتي أسماء أكثر الأمراض والعلل: كالصُّداعِ والزُّكامِ والجُذام وغيرها.