Sibawayh (Sibuyeh in Persian, سيبويه Sîbawayh in Arabic, سیبویه) was a linguist of Persian origin born ca. 760 AD in the town of Bayza (ancient Nesayak) in the Fars province of Iran.
He was one of the earliest and greatest grammarians of the Arabic language, and his phonetic description of Arabic is one of the most precise ever made, leading some to compare him with Panini. He greatly helped to spread the Arabic language in the Middle East.
Sibawayh was the first non-Arab to write on Arabic grammar and therefore the first one to explain Arabic grammar from a non-Arab perspective. Much of the impetus for this work came from the desire for non-Arab Muslims to understand the Qur'an properly and thoroughly; the Qur'an, which is composed in a poetic language that even native Arabic speakers must study with great care in order to comprehend thoroughly, is even more difficult for those who, like Sibawayh, did not grow up speaking Arabic. Additionally, because Arabic does not necessarily mark all pronounced vowel sounds, it is possible to misread a text aloud (See Short vowels in Arabic); such difficulty was particularly troublesome for Muslims, who regard the Qur'an as the literal word of God to man and as such should never be mispronounced or misread.
The name Sibawayh is derived from the Persian words سیب-بو-یه (Sib-bu-yeh) meaning "the one with an apple's scent". His full name is: ʕAmr ibn ʕUthmān ibn Qanbar - al-mulaqqab bi-"Sibawayhi". That is: "ʕAmr ibn ʕUthmān ibn Qanbar - a.k.a. Sibawayhi".
Sibawayh died in Shiraz (also in the Fars province of Iran) around 793 AD.