ARABIC LANGUAGE AND LITERA TURE. The Arabic language forms a branch of the South-Semitie tongues, and with the tion of Aramaic (q.v.) is the only Semitie speceh to be called a living tongue. is still spoken in Palestine, Syria, _Mesopotamia. Arabia, Egypt, northern Africa, and Slalta and it is more or less understood in all countries into which Mohammedanism has penetrated. We inay distinguish between the so-called (a) classieal Arabic of the old poets. the Koran and the schools; (b) the :Middle-Arabic of the post classical period; and (e) Mothmrn Arabic, which is subdivided into the following chief dialects: (1) of Syria and Palestine; (2) of Egypt; GD of Ah•sopotamia ' - (4) of Oman and Zanzibar; (5) of Tunis, Morocco and Algiers; (6) of Malta; and (7) the Mehri in South Arabia, the ancient form of which is preserved in the Minivan and Sabfean hiscriptimis (see MI N.EA NS : SAB.EANS). The distinguishing features of the language arc an exceedingly extensive vocabulary complicated grammatical forms. The Ara bic alphabet. which is derived through time Naba tlean(see NABAT-EANS ) from the ancient Aramaic script, consists of twenty-eight characters. of which eleven, however, arc merely distinguished by diacritical points placed above or beneath. so that there are only seventeen distinct characters used. The direction of the writing is from right to left. • Arabic literature may lx' broadly divided into two periods, time first containing time Arabic na tional literature. extending to the close of the Ommiad dynasty, c.750 A.D., and the second eon the Islamic literature 10 Arabic. In the r period four subdivisions may be noted: (a) c.750 to e.1000, when literary activity reached its height; (h) e.1000-c.1258. the post-classical period; (e) e.1255-1517, the period of decline and decay; and (d) 1517 to the present time. Noth ing has survived earlier than the time of Mo hammed except in verse, in which the pn-Islamic Arabs attained a high degree of primfieieney. They had poetical tournaments. and the poets vied with each other at such annual fairs as that held at Okaz (Ar., 'N60 , near :Mecca. The subjects
treated were tribal strifes. vengeance. love, friendship. and hospitality. The most celebrated of these are those called I1tea/if/0i, comprising the poems of Annul Tarafah. "/.chair. La bid, Am• ibn Kulthum. Antarab and al-Harith. though. according to some collectors, Nahighah and Asha take the place of the last two. Frag ments of time productiens of more than two hun dred pre-lsiamic poets, among whom were Jews and Christbus, were collected in the tenth ern tury. The largest collections are the IhinitiRab Of Abut Tammam (540)1 tlam Kilub a7•.tp1oint (Book of Songs) of Alm al-Faraj al-Isfahani 4V,67). and the •«mharot ask`fir rob of Alm Zaid (tenth century). A new period began with :Mohammed (571-632). The Koran. which gave birth to a religion and which founded the greatest politico-religious system of the Middle Ages, sons dominated all branehes of intellectual activity. The earliest products of this dominn Dna were grammar and lexicography. the neces sary instruments for the excgesis of the Koran. Schools were founded in Basra. Chifa. and Ba dad. where the sciences were studied. especially by Persian Mohammedans. Such a one was the first grammarian of Basra. Abd al-Rahman ibn llormuzd (c.730). Among the noteworthy gram marians and lexicographers may be mentioned: Alm al-Walid al-Duali (eighth century), the in ventor of the diacritical points; al-Khalil, the founder of Arabic metrics and the author of the first Arabic lexicon, Aim(' (796), author of an extensive grammar (trans lated into (;erman by Jahn, Berlin, 1894) ; lbn Duraid (d.934), author of the lexicon 01-dam hara1e; Ismail lint Abbad al-Sahib (1993). author of the lexicon al-ilithit; lbn Mukarrain (d.1311), author of an extensive lexicon. Lisa,/ a/-•.lrub; al-Zamakhshari (11143), author of a grammar a/-.1/ fonsol, and a lexicon .tssiis: awl 1bn Malik (d.1273), who wrote a grammar in one thousand verses under the title Kitab iya h.