Meaning
In Moroccan Arabic, shhal is a question word meaning ‘how much’ or ‘how many’. With prices it commonly appears after b-, as in bshhal, ‘for how much?’ or ‘how much does it cost?’.
How it is used
Peace Corps Morocco gives shhal a dedicated grammar explanation for ‘how many / how much’, including patterns with d or mn and the common price construction bshhal. The same material uses it in hotel, post-office and site-visit questions.
Examples
- “Shhal d l-wqt?”
- “Bshhal had l-qamija?”
- “Shhal can ask about an amount, number, duration or price depending on the noun and construction.”
Tone and register
Neutral and practical in ordinary information questions; politeness comes from the full request and interaction rather than from shhal alone.
Visitor guidance
Learn shhal as a flexible quantity question rather than only as a market phrase. Countable and uncountable nouns can take different constructions, and price questions commonly use the prefixed form bshhal.
Cultural context
Maperla publishes shhal at Morocco scope because the supporting Moroccan Arabic curriculum teaches it as general Darija grammar. Latin spellings vary; chhal and scholarly-style šḥal are common representations of the same searchable form.
Places represented
Open the reviewed place guide for each regional sense carried by this canonical entry.