Ibn Khālawayh

It is widely claimed that Arabic has five hundred words for “lion.” The first to make this claim and back it up with an authoritative list was the grammarian Ibn Khālawayh, who spent most of his career in Aleppo, Syria. He was born in Iran, and although Arabic was a second language to him, he was recognized as one of the greatest authorities on Arabic grammar and lexicography in the 10th century CE. His best-known text was Not in the Speech of the Arabs, in which his long list of lion names first appeared as a chapter.