This appendix contains marginal additions – especially poetry – that cannot be properly handled in footnotes to the main text and yet deserve to be edited and studied. The order of these marginalia presented below corresponds with the order of the biographies in IAU’s work.
AII.1
Poem added by a copyist on the title page of MS B (fol. 1a).1
By some scholar, on the diseases of which physicians died, though each of them was skilled in the knowledge of them:
Hippocrates passed away, struck with hemiplegia;Plato died, suffering from pleurisy(?).2Aristotle died of consumption;likewise that Galen of theirs, suffering from an intestinal illness.neither instruments nor his Canon5 availed him.O you who hold fast to medicine to be cured by it,relying on it, enthralled by it:Medicine is no medicine, unless it is the word of Himwho says to the non-existent: ‘Be!’, and it is.6
AII.2.1
Marginal verses in MS R (fol. 83a) referring to al-Kindī’s remarks about the poem in Ch. 10.1.10. The copyist does not indicate the origin of this fragment, but the anecdote can be found in al-Ibshīhī’s Mustaṭraf. Al-Kindī, upon listening to the fourfold rhetorical division that begins with ‘Four things from you’ (fa-fī arbaʿ minnī …), recited an epigram containing a fivefold taqsīm with a similar opening (fa-fī khamsah minnī …). al-Kindī considered that it was more eloquent because the five parts correspond with the five senses.7
I [i.e. the copyist] say: I [i.e., al-Kindī] have seen a division (taqsīm) that is better and more excellent than this one; Muḥammad ibn Ṣāliḥ ibn ʿAbd Allāh,8 who was related to ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib, peace be upon him, said:
Five things in you are sweet to five things in me:your saliva in my mouth, so good to sip,Your face in my eye, your touch in my hand,your speech in my ear, your scent in my nose.You may see that this is better that the first [epigram] because the author’s intention is to use a rhetorical division (taqsīm) and he does it according to the five senses, but God knows better!
AII.2.2
In margin of MS R (fol. 83b) there are some anecdotes to illustrate IAU’s comment on al-Kindī’s miserliness in Ch. 10.1.12. Some of these stories can be found in al-Jāḥiẓ’s Book of Misers (K. al-Bukhalāʾ), which has a section on al-Kindī.9
I [i.e. the copyist] say: the miserliness of the shaykh [al-Kindī] and his shameful deeds are illustrated by what Ibn Shākir al-Kutubī reports in his History:10
One day one of the female servants of his mother came to [al-Kindī’s] house with an empty jug and said: ‘Your mother wants you to give her fresh water.’ He replied: ‘Go back, fill the jug in her house and bring it back.’ When she returned, he asked her to empty the jug, and when she did so he filled it with water from a cooling amphora.11 When she left, he said: ‘We took from her an essence without quality and gave her an essence with quality’.12 [al-Kutubī] also reports that al-Kindī used to eat dates and give their pits to a wet-nurse of his to whom he would say: ‘Content yourself with the sweetness that they have preserved’.13 And ʿAmr Ibn Maymūn14 said: ‘One day, when I was having lunch at al-Kindī’s house, a neighbour came by and I invited him to join us, but the man said: “By God, I have already eaten!” To which al-Kindī replied, “After ‘by God!’ there is nothing more to say!”, thus effectively pinning the man’s hands behind his back: if he moved to eat with him, he would be an unbeliever.’15 End of quote.
AII.2.3
In margin of MS R (fol. 83b), an anecdote condemning al-Kindī’s ideas, next to Ch. 10.1.12.16
ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Yaḥyā ibn Khāqān17 said: ‘I have never seen al-Kindī alive, but I saw him in dreams as he has been described. I asked him: “What has God done with you?” ’ Al-Kindī replied:
As soon as He saw me He said: «Depart to that which you had rejected as lies!»18
May God save us from His wrath! Al-Kindī died in 281 [894–895].
AII.2.4
Marginal verses in MS R (fol. 83b) copied next to the poem in Ch. 10.1.13 and given as an additional example of al-Kindī’s poetry.
[al-Kindī] also said, describing a qaṣīdah:19
The wind, in its course, would fall short of its extent,arrows would be unable to strike as it does.Camel drivers and singers have plundered its beautyso that mounts and wine are moved on by means of it.
AII.3.1
Gloss of the poem of Ibn Shibl al-Baghdādī in Ch. 10.51.2 in MS R (fol. 98a), quoting a poem by al-Buḥturī.
I say [i.e. the copyist]: Ibn Shibl took this motif from al-Buḥturī’s poem [?],20 the beginning of which is:21
Slowly, revolving sphere!…22[?] In this poem the author follows the method of the philosopher-sages. This23 is taken from al-Buḥturī’s verse in the aforementioned poem:
We have high hopesthat we cherish, but short lives.
AII.3.2
Marginal gloss in MS R (fol. 98b), referring to the elegy for Ibn Shibl’s brother in Ch. 10.51.3.
This motif was taken from the [following] verses of Maḥmūd al-Warrāq:24
A man would like to last forever; but hecan be certain that what lasts forever is extinction.Whenever he spends a day, that day spends part of him,and when an evening falls, the evening spends him.25The more his body increases, the more his life decreases:There is no growth when life decreases.Day and night: nothing remains with them,nor do they, after all things have gone, last forever.
AII.3.3
Also referring to the elegy for Ibn Shibl’s brother in Ch. 10.51.3 there are two verses from al-Maʿarrī copied in the margin of MS R (fol. 98b).26
If Gabriel were to fly away from Time for the remainderof his life, he would not be able to go outside of Time.27They have asserted that the celestial spheres are subject to decay:If this be true, then impurity is like purity.
AII.4
Verses from Ibn Hāniʾ copied in MS R (fol. 98b), in the margin of section Ch. 10.51.2.28
The shining stars will perish though they rise,as will the two light-givers, sun and moon.Though they may appear, where they rise, to beneatly strung, they will surely be scattered,And though the revolving sphere travels with them at night,it will surely surrender them and be split asunder.
AII.5
Marginal addition in MS R (fol. 107a) from Barhebraeus’ Mukhtaṣar,29 with a story of Awḥad al-Zamān’s conversion to Islam that differs from the one given by IAU in Ch. 10.66.5.30
It is said that the reason behind Awḥad al-Zamān’s conversion to Islam was the illness of certain Seljuq king. [The physician] was summoned from Baghdad and he travelled to [the court], he treated the king until he was cured and was rewarded with copious presents, including money, riding beasts, clothing, and other precious gifts. When he returned to Iraq, loaded with riches beyond measure and garbed in beautiful apparel, he heard that Ibn Aflaḥ31 had lampooned him with these verses:32
We have a Jewish physician whose stupidityis apparent from his mouth when he speaks.He wanders bewilderedly (yatīh) – a dog is above him in status –as if he were still wandering in the wilderness (al-tīh).Upon hearing that, Awḥad al-Zamān knew that he would not be shown respect for the graces bestowed upon him unless he embraced Islam. He strengthened his resolve about it, but then he realized that his grown-up daughters had not converted and that they would not inherit from him when he died. Awḥad al-Zamān implored the caliph to be magnanimous and allow his daughters [to receive] his wealth, even if they had kept their faith. The caliph agreed to that and once he was reassured, [Awḥad al-Zamān] publicly professed his conversion and continued teaching and tending the sick happily. But fate turned its back on him when he aged. His brilliance faded and was struck by diseases that his medical knowledge was unable to fight, suffering a degree of pain that neither his body nor his heart were able to endure: he lost his sight, he lost his hearing, he contracted leprosy – may God save us from the vicissitudes of fortune, restrictions and monetary distress! When [Awḥad al-Zamān] felt his death close, he prescribed that his [testamentary] executor had his tombstone engraved with these words: ‘This is the tomb of Awḥad al-Zamān Abū l-Barakāt, one who is a lesson to others (dhī l-ʿibar),33 the author of the Lessons in Wisdom (ṣāḥib al-muʿtabar).’34
End [of the quote, from] Abū l-Faraj Ibn al-ʿIbrī.
AII.6
A riddle epigram copied after the colophon of MS Sb (fol. 186b), which corresponds with the end of Ch. 10.68 (section on Abū l-Qāsim Hibat Allāh ibn al-Faḍl, also known as Ibn al-Qaṭṭān). It is apparently on some insect or other. The word after ‘a riddle’, perhaps giving the solution, is smudged and illegible.35
A riddle:
One you see walking on six,but if it stands up, it stands on four.It eats while the king (?) is in …,it sits with the lion in one place;36It drinks the blood of all mankindand does not respond when called.
AII.7
Two lines of verse at the top of an otherwise empty page of MS Sb (fol. 187a).37
I consoled my heart with being together [with a loved one] but it was of no avail.It persisted while I was resolved to cure it with abandoning [him].
Another:
Time is nothing but thus, so bear it patiently:loss of wealth or separation from a loved one.
AII.8.1
Marginal verses by Ibn Sīnā in MS R (fol. 127a), copied before the beginning of the long book-list (11.13.7.9):
Ibn Khallikān says:38 To the Raʾīs [Ibn Sīnā] are attributed the two verses quoted by al-Shahrastānī at the beginning of his book The furthest steps [in dialectical theology] (Nihāyat al-aqdām [fī ʿilm al-kalām]):39
I have roamed all those familiar spotsand made my eyes travel between those landmarks;But I saw nothing but people putting their hand, perplexed,on their chin or gnashing their teeth in regret.[Ibn Khallikān] says: ‘Sīnā’ is written with a non-punctuated sīn [i.e not shīn] vocalised with kasrah, a silent yāʾ marked with two points below, and a nūn vocalized with fatḥah and followed by an alif with hamzah (alif mamdūdāh).40
AII.8.2
Prayer copied in the margin of the biography of Ibn Sīnā (Ch. 11.13.7),41 in MS R (fol. 125a); for an illustration of the folio, see Fig. 4.6 in Volume One.42 This marginal text has been collated with the versions preserved in Istanbul MS Esat Efendi 3688 (fols. 138b–139a) and Istanbul MS Ḥamidiye 1448 (fols. 449a–449b).
This was written (?) by the Raʾīs [Ibn Sīnā] asking for forgiveness for drinking wine:
O God, Who have no associate whom I could ask from, nor a vizier whom I could bribe! I yield to Your will only, since Yours is the grace bestowed upon me. I have disobeyed You in my ignorance and You have the evidence against me. I follow the Lord of the Messengers, Muḥammad the illiterate Prophet – may God cherish him and his family; I acknowledge that this wine is illicit, and I am aware of the exemplary punishments that await their drinkers in the Afterlife according to their degrees. If You have established them as You promised to the pious, Your power will judge me and Your Preordination will requite my [deeds].
The dispositions of human natures are pulling the rein of my soul, which enjoins wrongdoing,43 towards seeking pleasure in drinking wine. This is for two reasons: First, [wine] is used as medicine in unhealthy lands to protect against the harms of pestilent airs and the seasonal changes that result from the Sun’s distance from or closeness to the earth,44 and the interaction of the material qualities in the world of coming-to-be and passing-away. Second, the abidance by the testimony given in Your Glorious Book, the wellbeing of people, and the opinion of the majority [of Muslims] show that in certain cases [wine] has been rendered lawful as long as it is used to [improve] people’s health, and to bring strength into the human frame, in accordance with the words [of Muḥammad], God bless and cherish him and his family: ‘Whoever has a sound nature has a sound religious conduct’.
If I have yielded to them immoderately and inebriation (sukr) has distracted me from gratitude (shukr), You are the One that may forgive my faults and pardon my offences. Because You are the All-Powerful, and this would be most becoming of You. and because pardon and mercy, are two attributes with which You describe Yourself.45 Forgive me, with the power You hold over me, and under the obligation of atoning for my sins. If I have trespassed Your sacred boundaries, or transgressed the prohibitions of Your law, it is because my mind was blinded. O God, fill the sight of my mental vision with that which will turn me away from what it [i.e., my sight] made easy for me and what it made to appear beautiful to my soul, according to Your words: «Beautiful for people is the love of lusts».46 Because You are the First Cause, and intermediaries have no distinction in terms of free acts, for they are, in truth, created. God, grant me a place among those who are close to the Highest Holiness and far from the depths of Hell [?].47
AII.9
These verses by Abū l-ʿAtāhiyah, copied in the margin of MS R (fol. 101b), refer to the poem of Ibn Ṣafiyyah in Ch. 10.63.3.48
By Abū l-ʿAtāhiyah, on the same motif:
When ants grow wingsin order to fly, their perdition is nigh.
AII.10
Marginal addition to the biography of Abū l-ʿAlā ibn Zuhr (Ch. 13.61.1) in MS R (fol. 144a), taken from Ibn Khallikān.49
Ibn Khallikān says:
He [Abū l-ʿAlāʾ ibn Zuhr] belonged to a family of religious scholars, generals, learned men and viziers; they all reached elevated positions, and were close to the rulers, who executed their commands.
Ibn Diḥyah says in his book al-Muṭrib:50 Our master, that is Ibn Zuhr, was a language stronghold and a fresh-water source of medicine. He used to memorize the poetry of Dhū l-Rummah,51 which comprises one third of the Arabic lexicon, while he [i.e., Ibn Zuhr] also had a commanding knowledge of all what physicians and philosophers have said.
Often some people laid their cheeks on their hands,overcome by sleep in the morning, like me;I kept pouring wine for them and drinking what they left,until I got drunk and they were affected by what also affected me.
AII.11
Anecdote copied in the margin MS R (fol. 152a) next to the biography of al-Tamīmī (14.14), likely taken from Ibn al-Athīr’s al-Kāmil fī l-taʾrīkh.52 The poem is by al-Ḥasan ibn Bishr al-Dimashqī,53 lampooning the vizier Yaʿqūb ibn Killis.54
According to certain historian, al-ʿAzīz55 – God bless him – was a merciful king prone to pardon and this story serves as example of his mercy: There was in Egypt a poet who indulged in satire. He wrote a lampoon of the vizier Yaʿqūb ibn Killis56 and Abū Naṣr,57 the secretary of the chancellery, and behaved insolently by saying:
Say to Abū Naṣr, the secretary at the Palace,who applies himself to wrecking the rule:‘Wreck the firm bonds of the realm for the Vizier, then you’ll gainfrom him handsome praise and repute.Give, or deny, and do not fear anyone,for the master of the Palace is not in the Palace.He does not know what is meant by it,and when he knows, then what does he know?’
The vizier complained to al-ʿAzīz and recited the poem to him. [Al-ʿAzīz] replied: ‘We are together in this since we both have been lampooned, join me then in forgiving him.’ Such was his magnanimity and forgiveness; may God bless him.
AII.12
Added perpendicularly in margin of biography Ch. 15.1.4 in MS L 107a and incorporated to the main text of MS Gb (fol. 12a).58
O for the resolution of a truthful man of nobility59whose truthfulness renews his resolve among truthful people,Who jealously guards his breaths, lest they be spentwhile he wastes them on what they do not deserve!
AII.13
As a marginal addition to biography Ch. 15.11.2.1 in MS R (fol. 171b), a poem by al-Jilyānī, transcribed (rather imperfectly) by the copyist from al-Jilyānī’s Dīwān al-ḥikam wa-maydān al-kalim.60
How often can this poisoned61 body be treated with a curative antidote,when illness is part of its nature?Its natural disposition is discordant in its structure;thus what should be combined in it is fractious in it.62If it flees from phlegm, from the coldness of which one should be wary,it will be troubled by the burning of the blaze of yellow bile.If it feeds itself copiously, eating its fill will give it indigestion,but if it takes food on alternate days only, it will suffer from hunger.5 Superfluities are generated in it that beset it;when they are in commotion, it is as if it is struck by the falling sickness.63It wants to go to the privy, when the mounting superfluity is descending,or to women, while its reason’s governor is deposed.The robe of its health – its joins64 are threadbare;All its lifetime the body is being patched up.But for his delusion, a discriminating man would not turnto a site in which spot the word ‘body’ is heard.65Thus all features of defect or traits of deformityare carried and the natural disposition of the body put down.when will he reap life while death is sown?
AII.14
On right margin of the biography in Ch. 15.11.2.1 in MS R (fol. 171b), a poem by al-Jilyānī, also copied from Dīwān al-ḥikam.68
A wine glass and a pair of trousers, whenever they are togetherin a convivial gathering, and clothes that are unwrapped:69They are like two flints striking fire;see, a blaze quickly fills the sky!Smoke rises like a black night,sparks fly up like lightning in a rain shower, intermittently.But for these trousers that rouse one’s passionpeople could benefit from the wine glass, brimful.Every kind of affliction is hiding in these trousers:so fasten them, so that you may be saved from all evil!
AII.15
Poem by Ibn ʿUnayn70 on a young servant of Ibn al-Muṭrān called ʿUmar copied in MS R (fol. 177b) in the margin of the biography Ch. 15.23.2.1.71
I [i.e., the copyist] say: This ʿUmar is mentioned by Ibn ʿUnayn in his poem entitled ‘The Shears of Good Reputations’ (Miqrāḍ al-aʿrāḍ),72 in which he lampooned all the inhabitants of Damascus, and which opens with:
Ribs that enclose misery,eyes that burst forth with bucketfuls!In it, he turns to Ibn al-Muṭrān, the physician:
I wonder if I shall see my lord al-Muwaffaq swaggerin its73 spacious courtyards,Walking leisurely, with ʿUmar behind him,swaggering like an oryx cow in a herd!Whenever my lord looks at him,he is mad with love and shows a marvellous conceitedness.He is a motherf …;74 there are few that resemble himamong people, except that al-Raḥbī75 is a motherf … too.He claims that he with his wisdomtaught Hippocrates the art of medicine.
AII.16
Additional verses by Saʿd al-Dīn ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz written in the margin of MS R (fol. 182b), at the end of his biography (Ch. 15.35).76
From al-Maqrīzī’s History of Egypt77 I copied the following poem by this Ibrāhīm al-Sulamī:78
Metre: kāmil. Also, with variants, in a MS of Imtiḥān al-alibbāʾ li-kāffat al-aṭibbāʾ by Muwaffaq al-Dīn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn ʿAbd al-Jabbār al-Sulamī (on whom see IAU Ch. 15.34), see Dietrich, Medicinalia, 195–196 (lines 1–3, 5); for a rhymed German translation, see Bürgel, Allmacht und Mächtigkeit, 181 and idem, Ärztliches Leben und Denken, 19, For two more epigrams, added by a copyist to the opening folio of a Paris MS of Ibn Abī Uṣaybiʿah’s work, see Sanguinetti, ‘Extraits’, I, 234–236 (Arabic and French translation).
Mubarsam, from birsām, which is often translated as ‘pleurisy’. Arabic dictionaries connect it with Persian bar-sām ‘disease, swelling, or inflammation in the breast’. In the medical literature there is much confusion with sirsām or sarsām (sar-sām: Persian for ‘head inflammation’) meaning ‘severe headache’, sometimes called ‘phrenitis’. See e.g. Dols, Majnūn, 57–58, Carpentieri, ‘On the Meaning of Birsām and Sirsām’.
Ibn Sīnā (Avicenna). Compare the epigram on his death in IAU Ch. 11.35.5.
The form sajaj is not in the dictionaries (cf. sajj: ‘severe diarrhoea’). The version in Dietrich, Medicinalia has saḥjah (cf. Lisān al-ʿArab: al-saḥaj: dāʾ fī l-baṭn qāshir minhu).
al-Qānūn, Ibn Sīnā’s chief medical work.
A phrase occurring several times in the Qur’an; e.g. al-Baqarah 2:117: «When He decrees a thing He merely says, ‘Be!’, and it is».
In this anecdote these verses are attributed to ‘al-ʿAlawī’, see al-Ibshīhī, Mustaṭraf, ii:22. These verses are attributed to Ibn Ṭabāṭabā al-ʿAlawī (d. 322/934), author of ʿIyār al-shiʿr; see EAL, ‘Ibn Ṭabāṭabā’, and note to the poem in Ch. 10.1.10.
The copyist must have understood that the al-ʿAlawī mentioned in the anecdote was not Ibn Ṭabāṭaba, but Muḥammad ibn Ṣāliḥ ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-ʿAlawī (d. 252/866–867 or 255/868–869), who belonged to the Alid family; on him see Ṣafadī, Wāfī, iii:154.
See the ‘qiṣṣat al-Kindī’ in al-Jāḥiẓ, Bukhalāʾ, 81–93.
Muḥammad ibn Shākir al-Kutubī (d. 764/1363) was a Damascene historian; see EI2 art. ‘al-Kutubī’ (F. Rosenthal). Only two works by al-Kutubī have come down to us, the ʿUyūn al-tawārīkh, which has survived partially, and the Fawāt al-wafayāt. The anecdotes about al-Kindī are not in the editions of these works.
In Arabic, muzammalah is an amphora or vessel used to keep a supply of cold water either by burying it in the ground or wrapping it in isolating cloth; see Nasrallah, Annals, 450.
Cf. this anecdote in al-Ṣafadī, Wāfī, xxviii:479; al-Jāḥiẓ has the same story with al-ʿAnbarī as protagonist instead of al-Kindī, see al-Jāḥiẓ, Bukhalāʾ, 113.
Cf. this anecdote in Ṣafadī, Wāfī, xxviii:479.
The name seems to be a corruption of ʿAmr ibn Nuhaywī who was acquainted with al-Naẓẓām and al-Kindī and appears in two anecdotes in al-Jāḥiẓ, Bukhalāʾ, 17, and 38. Ibn Nuhaywī was an official (ʿāmil) under al-Maʾmūn and son-in-law of Mūsā ibn Abī l-Faraj ibn al-Ḍaḥḥāk; see al-Tanūkhī, Nishwār al-muḥāḍarah, i:132; also van Ess, Theologie und Gesellschaft, iii:208.
See a version of this anecdote in al-Jāḥiẓ, Bukhalāʾ, 17; and, with the same wording of MS R in Ibn Nubātah, Sarḥ al-ʿuyūn, 233.
This anecdote occurs in al-Ṣafadī, Wāfī, xxviii:480.
ʿAbd al-Raḥmān was the brother of ʿUbayd Allāh ibn Yaḥyā ibn Khāqān, the vizier of al-Mutawakkil. He was associated with Ibn Ḥanbal, from whom he transmitted questions on jurisprudence (masāʾil); see al-Khaṭīb al-Baghdādī, Taʾrīkh Baghdād, x:277.
Q al-Mursalāt 77:29.
These verses can be found, attributed to al-Kindī, in Ibn Ḥamdūn, Tadhkirah, v:408; and Ibn Nubātah, Sarḥ al-ʿuyūn, 234.
The Arabic is corrupt at this point beyond any possible emendation.
Cf. al-Buḥturī, Dīwān, 959 (no. 380, verses 1 and 5 respectively).
Unfortunately, the second half of this verse is difficult, as is clear from the several variants of the words taṭarrafu (or tuṭawwifu, or taṣarrafu, or taṭarraqu) and jubārū (or khiyārū). The word jubār has nothing to do with jabr, the technical term for ‘predestination’ (it means ‘unretaliated’ among other things). But it seems that al-Buḥturī addresses the universe as if it is Destiny or Fate.
I.e., vs. 14 of Ibn Shibl’s poem, ending ‘long wishes and short terms’.
Maḥmūd ibn Ḥasan al-Warrāq (d. ca. 230/845) was a poet of the early Abbasid period who lived in Baghdad, see EI2 art. ‘al-Warrāḳ’ (G J. van Gelder). For this poem cf. Maḥmūd al-Warrāq, Dīwān, 67 (hamzah no. 2).
It is difficult to render the verb ṭawā, used three times (‘to fold, envelop’, ‘to spend, pass [time]’).
Cf. al-Maʿarrī, Luzūmiyyāt, i:374 (no. 131, verses 4–5).
Translation by R.A. Nicholson, see Nicholson, Studies in Islamic Poetry, 156. [The following line is not there.]
Ibn Hāniʾ (d. 362/973) was an Andalusī poet who worked at the court of the fourth Fatimid caliph, al-Muʿizz li-Dīn Allāh, see EI2 art. ‘Ibn Hāniʾ al-Andalusī’ (F. Dachraoui). For these verses, see. Ibn Hānī, Dīwān Ibn Hānī (ed. al-Bustānī), 168.
Barhebraeus (d. 685/1286), Ibn al-ʿIbrī in Arabic, was a member of the Syriac Orthodox Church; although he was also a physician he is mainly known by his works on history and philosophy and his translations. On this author see EI2 art. ‘Ibn al-ʿIbrī’ (J.B. Segal).
Cf. Barhebraeus, Mukhtaṣar, 210; also Ibn al-Qifṭī, Taʾrīkh al-ḥukamāʾ, 323 (conversion story), and 325 (diseases).
Abū l-Qāsim ʿAlī ibn Aflaḥ (d. 535/1141), kātib, poet, and critic. See al-ʿImād al-Iṣfahānī, Kharīdah (al-ʿIrāq), ii: 52–69, Ibn Khallikān, Wafayāt, iii:389–391, al-Ṣafadī, Wāfī, xx:435–438.
These verses are quoted by IAU in an entirely different context (Ch. 10.64.2) and attributed to Amīn al-Dawlah, who hated Awḥad al-Zamān.
This is an example of jinās since ʿibar means both ‘lessons’ and ‘tears’. Dhī l-ʿibar could be also translated as ‘a tearful one’, implying that his suffering serves as a warning example of the vicissitudes of time.
On The Lessons of Wisdom (K. al-Muʿtabar), see Ch. 10.66.9 title no. 1.
Metre: mutaqārib. The riddle was copied, and possibly composed, by the copyist, Ibrāhīm al-Jawāliqī, in 713/1313.
Reading and interpretation unclear. Perhaps qaṣʿihī is to be emended to qaṣrihī, and the sense “It eats even when the king in his castle”. Perhaps mawḍiʿī is an irregular pausal spelling of mawḍiʿi(n), in which case the translation is ‘it sits (reading yajlisu) with the lion in one place’.
The first line has not been found elsewhere. The second (with a slight variant) is found, anonymously, in al-Balādhurī, Ansāb (ed. Zakkār and Ziriklī), iv:1013 (= ed. al-Dūrī et al., iii:74), and attributed to Abū l-Aswad (presumably al-Duʾalī, d. ca. 69/688) in al-Ibshīhī, Mustaṭraf, ii:71. It is not found in his Dīwān. It has also been attributed to ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib, see ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib, Dīwān, 29.
Cf. Ibn Khallikān, Wafayāt, ii:161 (for the poem), and ii:162 (for the orthography of the name).
Al-Shahrastānī (d. 548/1153) was an Ashʿarī theologian, see EI2 art. ‘al-S̲h̲ahrastānī’ (G. Monnot).
One does find Ibn Sīnāʾ with hamzah in the sources, but mostly it is without hamzah. Al-Zabīdī, Tāj al-ʿarūs (SYN) says: ‘Sīnā, maqṣūrah: ancestor of al-Raʾīs Abū ʿAlī ibn al-Ḥusayn …’.
Ibn Sīnā is the author of a medical work on the benefits and harms of wine, not listed by IAU; his affection for wine is reported in biographical sources and earned the condemnation of pious Muslims (Gutas, Avicenna, 209–213). This homily is not explicitly mentioned by IAU either, although it should be one of those listed under the generic title khuṭab both in the short (Ch. 11.13.3.2 no. 39) and the long bibliographies (Ch. 11.13.8 no. 63). Although it has survived in several manuscripts, this homily does not seem to have been edited (Gutas, Avicenna, 509, GPW 6.c).
Fig. 4.6 in the essay in Vol. 1 titled ‘The Textual and Manuscript Tradition of Ibn Abī Uṣaybiʿah’s ʿUyūn al-anbāʾ fī ṭabaqāt al-aṭibbāʾ’, by Igancio Sánchez.
Reference to Q Yūsuf 12:53.
Literally, to the sphaera recta (al-falak al-mustaqīm), which is the celestial sphere as appearing to the inhabitants of the equatorial region, where the celestial equator passes through the zenith; see EI2 art. ‘Falak’ (W. Hartner).
These are among the ninety-nine names given to God in Islamic tradition: al-ʿAfuww (the Forgiver) and al-Raḥmān (the Merciful).
Q Āl ʿImrān 3:14.
The last word in the three manuscripts consulted (m-ḥ-h-ḍ-m in R; m-j-h-ḍ-m in the Istanbul MSS) seems to be a mistake. The root j-h-ḍ-m exists, but the meanings associated with it do not make any sense in this context. The substantive Jahḍam means ‘someone with a big head and a round face’, and also ‘lion’; the verb tajahḍama means ‘to put on airs’; see Ibn Manẓūr, Lisān al-ʿArab, s.v. JHḌM. The Istanbul MSS read ‘in the fire al-m-j-h-ḍ-m’, whilst MS R reads ‘in the depths al-m-ḥ-h-ḍ-m’.
Abū l-ʿAtāhiyah, Dīwān, 49 (no. 44, verse 9).
Ibn Khallikān, Wafayāt, iv:434.
Ibn Diḥyah (d. 633/1235) was an Andalusian poet and anthologist, see EI2 art. ‘Ibn Diḥya’ (F. De la Granja). For this quotation cf. Ibn Diḥyah, Muṭrib, 206–207.
The remark on Dhū l-Rummah’s poetry, with it very extensive vocabulary, was also made of al-Farazdaq, see Aghānī, xxi:395.
See Ibn al-Athīr, Kāmil, ix:82.
No further information has been found about this poet.
Metre: munsariḥ. Ibn al-Athīr, Kāmil, ix:82; Barhebraeus, Mukhtaṣar, 178; al-Maqrīzī, Ittiʿāẓ, i:298.
Nizār Abū Manṣūr al-ʿAzīz bi-Allāh (344–386/955–996), was the fifth Fatimid caliph; see EI Three, ‘al-ʿAzīz bi-llāh’ (P.E. Walker).
Ibn Killis was the vizier of the caliph al-ʿAzīz bi-Allāh, see EI Three, ‘Ibn Killis’ (P.E. Walker).
Ibn al-Athīr gives the name Abū Naṣr ʿAbd Allāh al-Ḥusayn al-Qayrawānī, no further information has been found about this secretary.
These verses are not found in ABHR, Müller, Riḍā, and al-Najjār. Metre: ṭawīl.
Nabāhah can also mean ‘intelligence, alertness.’
Metre basīṭ. The edition of this work by Fakhrī Ṣāliḥ Saʿīd (1975) was not accessible to us. This and the following poem are found in the manuscript of Dīwān al-ḥikam in the Bodleian Library (MS Marsh 470, fols. 142a and 144b; hereafter DḤ). This poem is introduced there with wa-qāl fī s[anat] 584 wa-hiya iʿtibāriyyah, ‘and in the year 584 [1188–1189] he composed [the following], a poem of contemplation’.
Malsūʿ, literally ‘stung (e.g. by a scorpion)’ or ‘bitten (by a snake)’.
The translation of this hemistich, with its profusion of prepositional phrases (bihi, fīhi, minhu), is not wholly certain. Taṣdīʿ (lit., ‘splitting’) is an antonym of jamʿ (‘combining’).
Maṣrūʿ.
Awṣāl, ‘joins’, ‘joints’, ‘ties’, or ‘limbs’.
There is an allusion to the ancient motif in Bedouin poetry of stopping at an abandoned campsite where the poet has once been.
Or ‘definition’?
Reading and translation of the first hemistich unclear.
Metre ṭawīl. In DḤ the poem is introduced with wa-qāla fī s[anat] 569 wa-hiya … iyyah (‘and in the year 569 [1173–1174] he composed [the following], a poem of …’). Reading and meaning of the last word are unclear.
Ishtimāl, ‘wrapping oneself in a garment’; taṣaddaʿa, ‘to be split, scattered’.
Ibn ʿUnayn (d. 630/1233) was a satirical poet from Damascus; see EI2, ‘Ibn ʿUnayn’ (Ed.).
See Müller, Lesarten, 52–53. This marginal comment with the poetry, except the fourth line, is found in Ibn Ẓāfir al-Azdī, Badāʾiʿ al-badāʾih, 403.
Metre: munsariḥ. Ibn ʿUnayn, Dīwān, 179–180. Ibn ʿUnayn (d. 630/1233) was banished by Saladin on account of this poem.
viz., of Damascus.
The verb tabaẓrama is connected by the lexicographers (al-Fīrūzābādī, Qāmūs, al-Zabīdī, Tāj al-ʿarūs, and cf. al-Thaʿālibī, Fiqh al-lughah, 231) with baẓram, ‘signet ring’ and explained, bizarrely, as ‘being stupid while wearing a signet ring, gesturing in people’s faces’. Instead, it is far more likely derived from the common expression māṣṣ/ʿāḍḍ baẓr ummik (an obscenity of the ‘motherfucker’ variety, on which see Nawas, ‘Sucker of One’s Mother’s Clitoris’). Al-Zamakhsharī, Asās, makes the connection, which is also clear from a line by Abū Tammām (… ḥir-immiyyatun yastannu fīhā l-tabaẓrumū, Dīwān, iv:422). The sense seems to be ‘to be worthy of being addressed with (the insult mentioned)’.
Identified by the editor of Ibn ʿUnayn’s Dīwān as Raḍī al-Dīn al-Raḥbī (on whom see Ch. 15.36).
Metre: sarīʿ.
Taqī al-Dīn al-Maqrīzī (d. 845/1442), the famous and prolific Egyptian historian; see EI2 art. ‘al-Maḳrīzī’ (F. Rosenthal).
I.e., Saʿd al-Dīn ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Sulamī. From the word khiṭaṭ written at the end of the poem it appears that this History of Egypt is al-Maqrīzī’s al-Mawāʿiẓ wa-l-iʿtibār, known as al-Khiṭat; but the lines have not been found in the edition of Būlāq, AH 1270 (AD 1853) or in Fuʾād Sayyid’s edition.
Reading naʾā instead of the unmetrical and incomprehensible nāda.
“To blacken the face” of something is to discredit or dishonour it; the blackness also alludes to the ink of letters.