Under the Ommeyyads, when less simplicity prevailed than under the first four caliphs, as town life grew more attractive, the old forms of poetry were maintained with all their artifi cial character. Three brilliant names appear in this period — Akhtal, Ferazdaq and Jarir, whose merits were a constant source of dis pute at the court. Minor poets were numerous. Many, the best known of whom was, Ajjaj and his son, Ruba (edited in 1903 by Ahlwardt and translated by him a year later), revived the rajaz, a very simple prosodic metre, used for improvisation in pre-Islamic times. With the rise of the Abbasside line and the wider diffu sion of Persian influence, a new literary period began. Bagdad was founded, and became a famous centre. The Arab gave way to the Persian in poetry, theology and law. If Arabic now became the sole language of the vast empire of the caliphs, it was written and spoken by men who were Arabs only by edu cation. Changes in the character of poetry and its subjects were soon to follow. Less and less attention was paid to the quarrels and exploits of the tribes and more to general culture and interests. Among the large group of poets, the most distinguished was Abu Nuwas, born in the heart of Susiana about 756. He prac tised every form of Arabic verse with a range and ability that gave him fame. Others of more or less prominence were Muti ibn Ayas; the blind Bashshar, ibn Burd (d. 783), ABU Dulama, Marwan (d. 797), a Jewish writer from Khurasan; Ibn al-Ahnaf, Muslim (d. 803), who at the point of death caused a rough copy of his poems to be cast into the river; Abul 'Atahiha, Di'bil (d. 850), Ibn al Mutazz, a caliph's son who was a dainty poet and wrote the first great Arabic work on rhetoric. The list could be greatly extended. The provinces claimed a full share of writers, some of whom rivaled those of the capital, names like Ismail of Bassora (d. 789). Dik-al-Jinn of Syria (d. 809), Al-Ma'arri born in Syria 973; Abu Firas, of princely family ; Al Nami of Aleppo (d. 963); Tughra'i, born at Ispahan (d. 1121), Al Wawa, of Damascus, Al Haziri of Turkish origin (d. 1235). The most famous represen tative of the provinces was Mutanabbi, Syrian (b. 905), who became so popular that 40 com mentaries were written to explain his verse. Persia had a group of poets in Arabic, among whom can be mentioned Al-Busti (971-1010), who composed in prose and verse; Al Abiwardi, poet and scholar; Al-Khayyat (1058 1123, whose (Diwan' was widely read in the Middle Ages; Al-Ghazzi (1049-1130), a Pales tinian; and the most illustrious of all Sadi (d. 1291), who wrote Arabic odes as well as his immortal 'Gulistan' And (Bustan.) Besides flourishing in Syria, Persia and Egypt, Arabic poets were found in Spain and Sicily. In rhymed prose Al-Hamadhani (968-1008) wrote his
During the dynasty of the Abbassides the science of languages was studied as zealously as poetry. The schools of Kufa and Bassora fur nished a long array of authors in Arabic, with their grammars, word-studies, philological treaties on the Koran. The Nizamiyya Uni versity of Bagdad proved a centre of research for studies in poetry, rhetoric and lexicography chiefly by scholars of Persian origin. History,
which began with works devoted to the sway of Mohammed, was soon concerned with the biography of the prophet as the tradition was more closely investigated. Early historians were Ibn Ishaq (d. 768), the great part of whose biography of Mohammed, preserved in Ibn Hisham's compilation, was translated into German by Weil, and Al-Waqidi (747-823), whose work was issued at Calcutta by von Kremer. There were many others who fol lowed in the field of history, some very cele brated. Tabari (838-923), is probably the most important; his
It is difficult to do justice to the strength and character of Arabic literature in the cen turies of its fullest blossoming. Rulers as a class vied with each other in establishing schools and colleges. Besides Bagdad, Bas sora and Kufa, Aleppo, Ispahan and Samarcand became homes of science, while Cairo, Fez and Morocco contained academies of learning, with rich libraries, the precious storehouses of knowledge for later times. 'Cordova was to Europe what Bagdad was to Asia for several centuries. Students from other parts of Europe journeyed to the Arab schools in Spain to learn. particularly medicine and mathematics. In arithmetic, geometry and astronomy the Arabs were the pathfinders of their day. Arab Spain furnished a remarkable contrast to the spectacle of comparative ignorance in the rest of Europe. In mathematics their influence was of signal character. They added the decimal system and the Arabic numerals, whose origin, however, can be traced to India; they simpli fied the trigonometry of the Greeks and widened the application of algebra. In the line of inventions and discoveries they merit much distinction,. they brought paper from Asia and were the first to employ cotton instead of silk in its manufacture. Gunpowder was known to them a century earlier than before any trace of it appeared in European history. Already in the 11th century they had the compass.