Al-Khawwas
An occupational family name from khūṣ, the leaf of the date palm: the khawwāṣ is the man who plaits palm-leaf into mats and baskets or sells it. Not to be confused with al-khawāṣṣ, the elite, from kh-ṣ-ṣ — one doubled letter apart, and a different root.
- Type
- Occupational name
- Sense
- One who plaits or sells palm-leaf (khūṣ)
- Root
- kh-w-ṣ (not kh-ṣ-ṣ)
The word
Al-Khawwas (al-khawwāṣ) is built on kh-w-ṣ. Lisān al-ʿArab gives al-khūṣ as the leaf of the date palm, a single leaf being khūṣa; the khawwāṣ is the man whose trade is the khūṣ — plaiting it into mats, baskets and fans, and selling it. It is a craft of the oasis before it is a craft of the town: the material grows on the trees the cultivator tends, and the plaiting is done where the palms are. Among the gardens of the Qaṭīf oasis the name has its natural setting.
Khawwāṣ and khawāṣṣ
The name is easily misread. Al-khawāṣṣ — the same letters, with the doubling moved from the w to the ṣ — is the plural of khāṣṣa, from kh-ṣ-ṣ: in Lisān al-khāṣṣa is the opposite of al-ʿāmma, what is set apart from the common, and a man's khāṣṣa are those he singles out as his own. Nothing connects the two words but the page they are written on. Al-Khawwāṣ, the family name, is the palm-leaf and nothing else; it does not mean "of the elite", and nothing in it sets one family apart from another.
Bearing the name
An occupational family name records what an ancestor did, as the name was applied to him — not a lineage. It attaches to no tribe, and two families bearing it need have no connection to one another beyond the word itself.
Sources
- ابن منظور، لسان العرب، 711هـ — مادة: خوص، ومادة: خصص
This page is an educational, historical reference compiled from published sources. It is not an authority on lineage. Where sources differ, we report the difference without taking a position. Corrections are welcome via our contact page.
Last reviewed: 2026-09-17