A Study on Lexical Features of Bahr al-javāher

Bahr al-javāher is a Persian and Arabic dictionary with 5926 headwords in conventional medical science, compiled by Mohammad ibn Yousof Heravi. Observing the range and variety of the explicit content of Bahr al-javāher, we can consider it one of the first encyclopedias in the field. With its significant features, this book has been a reliable source for authors and researchers, but no revised edition of it is available. Therefore, its lexical and content features have been neglected, among which are: validating the definitions by referring to dozens of authoritative medical and, in some cases, non-medical sources; mentioning the opinions of doctors, scholars, and sages with a critical approach; referring to Arabic and Persian dictionaries, hadiths, and proverbs; applying Heravi dialect vocabulary; using rare Persian equivalents, novel combinations, Arabic forms, and infrequent simple and compound verbs. This article examines the content and lexical features of the Persian section of this work as an ancient Persian scientific text from the 10th century AH, and provides new points about its unidentified aspects.