Al-Mutawwa

The word

Al-Mutawwa (al-muṭawwaʿ) rests on ṭ-w-ʿ, the root of complying: ṭāʿa is to comply, and al-ṭawʿ is willingness, the opposite of al-karh, compulsion. Lisān al-ʿArab gives al-taṭawwuʿ as what a man does of his own accord, beyond what is laid on him as a duty, and it gives al-muṭṭawwiʿ — mutaṭawwiʿ, with the t assimilated into the ṭ — as the one who does so, who gives more than is owed. The title as the Gulf used it, for a man who taught the Qurʾān and prayer, is later than the lexicon and regional, and the classical works this reference cites do not record it. That is as far as the page goes.

Muṭawwaʿ, muṭīʿ and ṭāʾiʿ

The root gives several names that are easily run together. Al-muṭīʿ is the obedient, the one who complies; al-ṭāʾiʿ is the willing; al-muṭṭawwiʿ of the lexicon is the one who gives beyond obligation. The family name al-Muṭawwaʿ is none of these as a description of anyone: it records that an ancestor was called by a regional title, and it says nothing about the piety, the learning or the obedience of any family that bears it.

Bearing the name

A family name of this kind records a title or a form of address that was applied to an ancestor and then stayed with his descendants. It is not a lineage in itself, and it confers nothing: no one bearing it today holds an office, a rank, a religious standing or a descent by virtue of the name. It attaches to no tribe, and two families bearing it need have no connection to one another beyond the word itself.