In the Quranic Arabic Corpus, part-of-speech tags describe a word segment's grammatical category; examples include N for noun, V for verb, P for preposition and PRON for personal pronoun. Begin with one occurrence and its coordinates, then check the tag documentation. A linguistic annotation helps frame a grammar question, rather than supplying an independent tafsir of the ayah.

Read one annotation with its reference

  1. Locate the chapter, ayah and word coordinate and open the surrounding text.
  2. Look up unfamiliar tags in the Corpus documentation instead of inferring their meaning from the abbreviation.
  3. Record the actual form, source and one grammar question to take to a teacher or a further named reference.

Start with a small set of grammar labels

An original, researched editorial guide. Sources checked on 10 October 2026. Worked exercises are editorial suggestions; tool instructions identify their provider sources. The cover is an editorial illustration.

In the Quranic Arabic Corpus, N identifies a noun, V a verb, P a preposition and PRON a personal pronoun. These are annotation labels: they describe how the resource analyzes an Arabic word or segment. Begin with a few labels and a real passage rather than trying to memorize the entire tag list at once.

The Corpus can make a grammar question visible. A single written word may contain several segments, each with its own label. A coordinate can point to a particular word within an ayah. Understanding those two ideas makes the dense-looking annotation page much easier to approach.

Start with a few common labels

The Corpus part-of-speech documentation supplies the definitions used by its annotation system. Useful first labels are N for noun, PN for proper noun, ADJ for adjective, V for verb, P for preposition, PRON for personal pronoun and CONJ for conjunction. The documentation assigns tags to morphological segments as well as words.

Choose only the labels that occur in the example you are inspecting. If you see N and P, learn those first. A reference sheet is more useful when you can connect each abbreviation to something you have just looked at. You can add other labels when a lesson introduces them.

Keep the name of the annotation system in your notes. Different language resources can use different abbreviations or levels of analysis. A label learned from the Corpus should be checked against its own key when you return to the site, rather than treated as a universal code that every grammar book uses identically.

Understand the coordinates

A normal Quran reference such as 23:41 identifies the chapter and ayah. A word coordinate such as 23:41:4 adds a third number for the word's position in that ayah. This more detailed coordinate helps you discuss a word without copying a whole screen of annotation into your notebook.

The Corpus morphology guide uses 23:41:4 as a worked segmentation example. Its analysis identifies a prefixed conjunction, a verb and two attached pronoun segments within one written word. This illustrates why several tags can appear beside a single item on the Arabic line.

Write both levels when you bring a question to class: “Al-Mu'minun 23:41; Corpus word 4.” The teacher can find the ayah in an ordinary mushaf and then identify the word you mean. Keep any finer segment label with the resource name so that someone knows which annotation system supplied it.

A first example with Al-Fatihah

The Corpus syntax page for 1:1 displays the Arabic words with translation cues and morphological information. In its first word, the analysis distinguishes a prefixed preposition from a noun. The same page gives labels for the neighboring words, allowing you to see how a small set of terms is used in an actual passage.

For a first exercise, locate the first word and find the two labels just described. Say what each abbreviation stands for using the documentation. Then return to the Arabic line and identify the item those labels belong to. That is enough for an initial session; the full diagram can wait until the relevant grammar is familiar.

Write a note that reports what you checked: “The Corpus divides the first written word here into two annotated parts.” If you cannot yet explain the grammatical relationship, add that as a question. This preserves an accurate observation without pretending that copying the labels amounts to understanding the entire analysis.

Part of speech and additional features

After a basic tag, you may see information about person, number, gender, case or a verb's form. These are additional features within the analysis. Learn which question each feature answers with your Arabic lesson. A noun label tells you one thing about an item; a case label describes another aspect of its grammatical behavior.

Avoid reading a long annotation as a single unexplained string. Separate the basic category from the additional features and look up one unfamiliar label. If several remain unfamiliar, choose the one your current lesson needs. The site is a reference library; you can use a small portion of it without completing every page.

For vocabulary work, keep the distinction between the word's form and a dictionary grouping. A root or lemma can help organize related items, while the actual sentence supplies the setting for the form you are studying. Our vocabulary-in-context article explores that complementary task.

Turn an annotation into a lesson question

Bring a coordinate, a screenshot if helpful, and one question. “What is this attached segment doing?” gives the teacher a concrete place to begin. “Explain everything on the page” can make the session harder to focus. You can learn the whole analysis gradually as the underlying grammar becomes clearer.

If the English gloss and the annotation seem difficult to connect, keep the complete ayah open. A word-level cue and a grammatical analysis provide different information. Read the named full translation as well, then ask about the specific relationship that remains unclear. The location makes the question easier for someone else to check.

A compact annotation worksheet

  • Quran location: surah and ayah.
  • Corpus location: word coordinate, plus segment if relevant.
  • Basic tag: the abbreviation and its checked definition.
  • Other feature: one additional label to investigate.
  • Question: one sentence about what you do not yet understand.

After a lesson, add the teacher's explanation in your own words and preserve the example. Reopen it later to see whether you can identify the same structure. The goal is a growing ability to ask and answer precise language questions, with the Quran text and the annotation still connected on the page.

Corpus part-of-speech documentation — Tag meanings and segmentation were checked against the Corpus's primary linguistic documentation. The article teaches reference use, not independent tafsir.

Related reading

Continue with Arabic Root vs Lemma: A Quran Vocabulary Study Guide or How to Study Quran Vocabulary in the Full Ayah.