اِمْرَأَتَانِtwo women

Example sentences

• خَرَجَتْ اِمْرَأَتَانِ وَمَعَهُمَا صَبِيَّانِ

  Two women went out with two boys.

  اِمْرَأَتَانِ — two women. This is the dual form, a shape English lacks: instead of adding a separate 'two', Arabic builds 'exactly two' right into the ending of the noun. It is the doer of the going-out, so it takes the naming case, and its dual ending is also what retroactively tells you the singular-looking verb before it actually had two subjects.

  From: Stories of Prophetic Judgments →