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تِنِّينٌ تنين ونى [in Hebr. 165] A great serpent; (K;) a kind of serpent, (Lth, T, S, M,) one of the greatest of serpents, (Lth, T,) or like the greatest thereof: (M:) it is related that a company of soldiers, on the shore of the Sea of Syria, saw a cloud divide upon the sea, and then rise, and they saw the tail of the تنّين in a state of commotion in the fringe of the cloud: it is also related that a cloud carries the تنّين to the country of Yájooj and Májooj [or Gog and Magog], and casts it down there, and they assemble thereupon, and eat its flesh: (T:) [these stories are fanciful accounts of the natural phenomenon called a water-spout, to which this name is applied by the Arabs in the present day: but the word is generally understood to mean a dragon: and a great sea-monster;] an aquatic animal, great in make, terrible in appearance, long and broad in the body, large in the head, having very glistening eyes, wide mouth and inside, and many teeth: it swallows many animals; the animals of the land and of the sea fear it; and when it moves, the sea becomes agitated with waves by reason of its great strength: in its first state, it is a malignant serpent, that eats what it sees of the beasts of the land; and when its mischief becomes great, God sends an angel that carries it away, and throws it to Yájooj and Májooj: it is related of one that was seen to fall, that it was found to be about two leagues in length, of a colour like that of the leopard, with scales like those of a fish, two great fins in form like those of a fish, a head like a great hill, resembling the head of a man, two long and great ears, and two round eyes; and from its neck branched forth six other necks, every one of them nearly twenty cubits long, and every one of them having a head like that of the serpent. (Kzw.) [Golius thinks it to mean The shark (“carcharias”).] ― -b2- Hence, التِّنِّينُ is (assumed tropical:) A certain نَجْم [or constellation; the constellation of the Dragon]; thus named as being likened to the serpent so called; (M;) a constellation containing thirty-one stars within the figure; among which are those called الرَّاقِصُ and العَوَائِذُ and الرُّبَعُ and الذِّئْبَانِ &c. (Kzw, TA. *) ― -b3- [Also, app., (assumed tropical:) A certain imaginary figure in the heavens, extending along the line of the nodes of a planet, which are called the dragon's head and the dragon's tail, in Arabic الجَوْزَهَرُ (from the Persian گَوْزِهْرْ), or الجَوْزَاهَرَانِ, and also العُقْدَتَانِ, and, to distinguish each from the other, الرَّأْسُ وَالذَّنَبُ: this line is supposed by Golius to be meant by the following description; but I incline to regard it as the result of a confusion of a description of this line with a description of the zodiacal light, a phenomenon supposed to have been unnoticed by the Arabs:] a slight whiteness in the sky, (Lth, T, K,) not an asterism, (Lth, T,) the body of which is in six signs of the zodiac, and the tail, which is slender, black, and twisted, in the seventh sign: it changes place like the planets; is called in Persian هَشْتَنْبَرْ, (Lth, T, K,) [app. a mistranscription of هَسْتَبُرْ,] in astrological computation; and is inauspicious: (Lth, T:) accord. to J, a certain place in the sky; which is a correct explanation, though said in the K to be a mistake. (TA.)

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