اعطن القَوْمُ

means عَطَنَتْ إِبِلُهُمْ [The people, or party, had their camels lying down at the water after having satisfied their thirst: see 1, first sentence]. (S, K.)

-A2- اعطن الإِبِلَ He watered the camels and then made them to lie down [at the water]: (S, TA:) or he confined the camels at the water, and they lay down, after having come to it [and drunk], (K, TA,) in order that they might drink again: (TA:) this the Arabs do only in the intense heats of summer; not when the season becomes cool: (Msb:) or they do this only when the asterism of the Pleiades (الثُّرَيَّا) rises [auro- rally, i. e. about the middle of May, O. S.], and men return from the seeking after herbage to the places of waters, or of constant sources of water: they do so only on the day of the camels' coming to the water; and they cease not to do thus [when necessary] until the time of the [auroral] rising of Canopus (سُهَيْل [i. e. early in August, O. S.]), in the خَرِيف, [apparently here meaning the period of the rain so called, (see the latter of the two tables in page 1254,)] after which they do it not, but the camels come to the water and drink their draught and return from the water: (Az, TA:) or اعطن الإِبِلَ signifies he brought back the camels to the عَطَن [q. v.], waiting in expectation with them, because they did not drink the first time. (So in the CK [agreeably with what here follows; but see 1, first sentence].) And one says, اعطن الرَّجُلُ بَعِيرَهُ The man brought back his camel to the عَطَن, waiting in expectation with him, he not having drunk. (S.)