PRE-ISLAMIC POETRY The origins of Arabian poetry can only be guessed at. Poets to whom the earliest pieces are attributed already exhibit a fully developed art. Their poems are couched in elaborate metres, of which 16 in all were recognized when the metrical system was eventually standardized in the 8th century by Khalil ibn Ahmad (q.v.). The historical development of these metres from a simple iambic measure has yet to be elucidated; some were possibly of recent introduction, due to foreign influences, in Khalil's time. In all the verse is divided into equally-balanced halves, and the same rhyme is retained at the end of each verse throughout the poem. The rule that every verse should form an organic whole gives a certain jerkiness to the poem, making it easy to displace lines and to extract choice passages for inclusion in anthologies. The poetic language was that of the desert Arabs, somewhat standardized and amplified by dialect variations. This language became, under the influence of the Koran, the standard language of all later Arabic literature, and its excessive richness led in time to the compilation of commentaries and lexicons.
In form and content the poems fall into two groups. On the one hand are the occasional poems, of from two to 20 lines, called out principally by the emotions of war or revenge. Praise of his own tribe and satire of its enemies were indeed the original functions of the primitive poet (sha`ir, i.e., "kenner" or medi cineman). An important place is taken by elegies, for which a number of poetesses, notably Khansa (q.v.), are specially famed. Distinct from these poems is the elaborate ode (qasida) of from 6o to i oo lines. In this form there is a regular scheme, which is followed whatever the subject of the poem. In the opening verses (called the nasib) the poet is supposed to be on a journey. He halts with his companions at a deserted camping-ground, whose mouldering traces recall the memory of an ancient passion, and tells of his love and the sorrow of parting. After this section he continues his journey and describes his camel or horse, comparing it to some wild animal of the desert. The natural descriptions or accounts of the chase introduced in this connection often form the most attractive part of the poem. His journey at last leads up to the occasion of the poem, which may be praise of his tribe or of his own gallantry, descriptions of camp or desert life (such as a storm), or most frequently panegyric of some patron in whose honour the poem has been composed, and from whom the poet expects a reward. It may well occasion surprise that a volume of poetry so uniform, so artistic within its limits, and of a metrical regularity rarely violated in spite of the complex metres, should have been produced by the poverty-stricken and predatory inhabitants of a barren country.
Transmission.—The oral transmission of these compositions over a period of from i 5o to 25o years, or even longer, was car ried out by a class of professional reciters (rawis), amongst whom many of the most famous poets were numbered. The powers of memory with which the reciters are credited are re markable, but even on the most favourable view it must be allowed that the poems thus preserved were liable to suffer mutilations, omissions and transpositions. The divergences in the text of many ancient poems are very great, and frequently portions of different poems are found pieced together. Unfor tunately several of the most famous rawis, especially two of those who first undertook the writing down of the early poems in the 8th century, Hammad ar-Rawiya (q.v.) and Khalaf al Ahmar, are suspected of dealing in the most arbitrary manner with their material, and roundly declared to be clever forgers. On these and other grounds the authenticity of much so-called pre-Islamic poetry is open to serious question, and some scholars even reject the whole or all but a small portion outright.' Diwans.—The poems attributed to the early bards have come down to us in two kinds of collections. We have on the one hand many diwans, or collected poetical works, of individual poets, and in particular of all the principal bards, Amru'ul-Qais, Tarafa, Zuhair, Nabigha, `Alqama, A`sha and Labid (see under each separately, and below under Mu`allaqat). In addition the diwans 'See Ahlwardt, Bemerkungen fiber die Aechtheit der alten Arabischen Gedichte (Greifswald 1872) ; Lyall, Introduction to the Mufaddaliyat (see below) ; Margoliouth in Journal of Royal Asiatic Society, July and (in Arabic) Taha Husain, Fi'l-adab al-jahili (Cairo, 1927).
of several minor poets have been edited, Lyall's edition of `Abid ibn Abras (London, 1913) deserving special mention, and one tribal diwan, that of the tribe Hudhail. Among the many poets of whom only a few pieces survive two robber-poets and outlaws, Ta'abbata Shand and Shanf ara, are specially cele brated, and the poems attributed to them, whether genuine or not, breathe in magnificent language a courage and hardihood rarely if ever equalled in any literature. Along with the work of the desert poets some interesting relics have come down of a different class of poetry. The Christian `Adi ibn Zaid, a townsman of Hira (q.v.), wrote wine-songs as well as graver verse. There were Jewish poets, of whom Samau'al ibn `Adiya is the best-known. Controversy still rages over the religious poems attributed to Umayya ibn abi's-Salt, which bear a remarkable resemblance to passages in the Koran, though Umayya rejected Mohammed's mission. Of the other poets contemporary with the Prophet, the diwan of Hassan ibn Thabit, Mohammed's "court-poet," is inter esting from that circumstance, and a panegyric addressed to him by Ka`b ibn Zuhair (known from its opening words as Banat Su`ad) is one of the most celebrated of Arabic qasidas.
Al-Mu`allaqat is the title of a group of seven pre-Islamic odes. The name signifies "the suspended," the traditional explanation being that these poems were hung up by the Arabs in or on the Ka`ba at Mecca. But this legend must be entirely rejected, as a pure fabrication based on the name, which was taken in its literal sense. The selection of the seven poems is ascribed, with much probability, to Hammad ar-Rawiya, in the 8th century A.D. His collection appears to have consisted of the same seven poems which are found in modern editions, composed respectively by Amru'ul-Qais, Tarafa, Zuhair, Labid, Antara ibn Shaddad, `Amr ibn Kulthum, and Harith ibn Hilliza, to which later scholars appended three other poems, one each of Nabigha, A`sha, and `Abid ibn Abras. The lives of these ten poets were spread over a period of more than i oo years. The earliest was Amru'ul-Qais (q.v.), regarded by many as the most illustrious of Arabian poets. He was a scion of the royal house of the tribe Kinda, which lost its power in the year 529. `Abid ibn Abras was a contemporary of Amru'ul-Qais, and belonged to the enemies of Kinda, the Banu Asad. The Mu`allaqa of `Amr hurls defiance at the king of Hira, `Amr ibn Mundhir (554-568), who was afterwards slain by the poet. The same prince is addressed by Harith in his Mteallaqa, and a few satirical verses directed against him by Tarafa have been preserved. The productive period of Antara, Zuhair and `Alqama is probably to be placed in the end of the 6th century, which is certainly the date of Nabigha (q.v.). The poem of A`sha contains an allusion to the battle of Dhu Qar, in which a Persian force was defeated by the tribe Bakr between 604 and 61o. Labid (q.v.) is the only one of the ten who em braced Islam, though his Mu`allaqa, like almost all his other poetical works, belongs to the pagan period. The Mu`allaqat represent almost every type of ancient Arabian poetry in its excellences and its weaknesses. In order rightly to appreciate them we must translate ourselves into the world of the Badawin and seek to realize the peculiar conditions of his life, together with the views and thoughts arising from these conditions. In the Mu`allaqa of Tarafa we are repelled by a long, anatomically exact description of his camel, but such a description had an extraordinary charm of its own in a society where every man was a perfect connoisseur on this subject. In the Mu`allaqas of `Amr and Harith we can read the haughty spirit of the powerful chief tains, boastfully celebrating the splendours of their tribe. The song of Zuhair contains the practical wisdom of a sober man of the world. The other poems are fairly typical examples of the customary qasida, and bring before us the various phases of Badawin life.
is an anthology compiled by the poet Abu Tam mam (q.v.) about 836 A.D., from, it is said, the materials con tained in the library of a citizen of Hamadhan. The collection is so called from the opening book, containing poems descriptive of constancy and valour in battle, patient endurance of calamity, steadfastness in seeking vengeance, manliness under reproach and temptation, all which qualities make up the attribute called by the Arabs hamdsa. It consists of ten books, containing in all 884 poems or fragments, divided as follow: (I) Gallantry (Hamdsa), 261 pieces; (2) Dirges, 169 pieces; (3) Manners, 54 pieces; (4) The Beauty and Love of Women (Nasib), 139 pieces; (5) Satires, 8o pieces; (6) Hospitality and Panegyric, i43 pieces; (7) Mis cellaneous Descriptions, 3 pieces; (8) Journeying and Drowsi ness, 9 pieces; (9) Pleasantries, 38 pieces; (io) Dispraise of Women, 18 pieces. The first two books together make up more than half the bulk of the work. The poems are for the most part fragments selected from longer pieces, though a number are probably entire. They are taken from the works of Arab poets of all periods down to that of Abu Tammam himself, but chiefly of the poets of the pre-Islamic time and of the ist century of the Hijra (622-719). Many of the poems belong to the class of extempore or occasional utterances, as distinguished from qasidas. While the latter abound with comparisons and long descriptions, in which the skill of the poet is exhibited with much art and ingenuity, the poems of the Hamdsa are short, direct, and for the most part free from comparisons. It is due probably to the fact that Abu Tammam preferred this style of composition for his collection that he has chosen hardly anything from the works of the most famous poets. The fragments in the fourth book, however, are generally taken from the opening verses of qasidas, or alternatively from the productions of the school of erotic poetry of the early Islamic period. The worth of the Hamdsa as a store-house of ancient legend, of faithful detail re garding the usages of the pagan time and early simplicity of the Arab race, can hardly be exaggerated. The high level of excel lence which is found in its selections, both as to form and matter, is remarkable, and caused it to be said that Abu Tammam dis played higher qualities as a poet in his choice of extracts than in his own compositions. What strikes us chiefly is its exceeding truth and reality, its freedom from artificiality, the evident first hand experience which the singers possessed of all which they sang. It has the true stamp of the heroic time, of its cruelty and wantonness as of its strength and beauty.
The Mu f aldaliydt is an anthology of poems named after Mufaddal ibn Yala, of the tribe Dabba, who compiled it for the instruction of the future caliph Mandi, between 762 and 784. It has recently been edited and translated by Lyall (Oxford, 1921). Mufaddal was a careful and trustworthy collector both of texts and traditions, and is praised by all authorities on Arabian his tory and literature as in this respect greatly the superior of Hammad and Khalaf. The collection, which in its present form contains 126 pieces of verse, long and short, is of the highest importance as a record of the thought and poetic art of Arabia in the time immediately preceding the rise of Islam. Almost all the poets represented belong to the days of "the Ignorance," and though a certain number of those born in paganism accepted Islam, their work bears few marks of the new faith. The ancient virtues—hospitality to the guest and the poor, profuse expendi ture of wealth, valour in battle, faithfulness to the cause of the tribe—are the theme of praise; wine and games of chance, for bidden by Islam, are celebrated by poets who professed them selves converts; and if there is no mention of the old idolatry, there is also little spirituality in the outlook on life. The 126 pieces are distributed between 68 poets, and the work represents a gathering from the compositions of those who were called ruqillfin "those of whom little has survived," in contrast to the famous poets whose works had been collected into diwlns. At the same time many of them are extremely celebrated, and among the pieces selected by Mufaddal several reach a very high level of excellence. A remarkable feature of the work is the insertion of ten pieces by Muraqqish the Elder, a poet who is assigned to the end of the 5th century A.D. It is probable that the compiler set down all that he could gather of this ancient bard, and that his interest in him was chiefly due to his antiquity. The Mufaddaliydt differs from the Hamdsa in being a collection of complete odes, while the latter is an anthology of brilliant pas sages, selected for their interest or effectiveness. It is, of course, not the case that all the poems are complete; many are mere fragments, and even in the longest there are often gaps, but Mufaddal evidently set down all that he could collect of a poem, and did not, like Abu Tammam, pick out only the best portions. We are thus presented with a view of the literature of the age which is much more characteristic and comprehensive than that given in the Hamdsa and enables us to form a better judgment of the general level of poetic achievement.
In addition to these anthologies, numerous excerpts are con tained in the works of later compilers, notably the Book of Poetry and Poets of Ibn Qutaiba (q.v.), the `Iqd al-Farid of Ibn `Abd Rabbihi (q.v.), and the greatest work of this kind, the Kitdb al-Aghani ("Book of Songs") of Abu'l-Faraj (q.v.).