Pseudo-Ṯaʿālibī’s Book of Youths
In: ArabicaSearch for other papers by Adam Talib in
Current site
Google Scholar
Abstract
This article presents a critical edition and study of a 17th/18th-century poetry collection that had previously been mistaken for al-Ṯaʿālibī’s lost Kitāb al-Ġilmān. It provides a codicological analysis of Berlin MS Wetzstein II 1786 in which the poetry collection is contained and also explains and corrects long-held misconceptions regarding al-Ṯaʿālibī’s connection with the text. Finally, the article situates this poetry collection in the context of Mamluk- and Ottoman-era epigram anthologies and the critical apparatus to the edition demonstrates the key features of intertextuality and popularity that characterised these poetry collections.
Résumé
Cet article présente une édition critique accompagnée d’une étude d’un recueil de poésie des XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles que l’on avait jusque-là pris pour le Kitāb al-Ġilmān, œuvre d’al-Ṯaʿālibī disparue. Nous l’accompagnons d’une analyse codicologique du manuscrit Berlin MS Wetzstein II 1786 – qui contient ledit recueil – et nous expliquons et corrigeons l’attribution erronée de longue date à al-Ṯaʿālibī. Enfin, cette contribution situe la collection poétique aux époques mamelouke puis ottomane qui virent fleurir des anthologies épigrammatiques. L’appareil critique de l’édition fait ressortir les caractéristiques clés de l’intertextualité ainsi que la popularité qui s’attacha à ces collections poétiques.
Purchase
Buy instant access (PDF download and unlimited online access):
Institutional Login
Log in with Open Athens, Shibboleth, or your institutional credentials
Personal login
Log in with your brill.com account
-
2
Bilal Orfali, “The Works of Abū Manṣūr al-Thaʿālibī (350-429/961-1039)”, JAL, 40/3 (2009), p. 273-318.
-
4
Orfali, “The Works”, p. 314. N.B.: I translate ġilmān (sing. ġulām) here as ‘youths’ and ğawārī (sing. ğāriya) as ‘courtesans’ in line with a usage common in the field and while there is not room here to discuss the important subject of the asymmetrical sexual dynamic behind most literary representations of both hetero- and homosexual eroticism in pre-modern Arabic literature, I would like the reader less familiar with this literature and scholarship on the subject to note two essential features: the normative dynamic can be summarised as the relationship between an older adult male and (1.) a younger (generally post-pubescent) male or female who—as the terms ġulām and ğāriya indicate—occupies (2.) a subordinate social position including cases in which the ostensibly inferior partner is the adult male’s property.
-
27
See lists of these printings in Orfali, “The Works”, p. 295-6, and in the introduction to al-Ṯaʿālibī, al-Ẓarāʾif wa-l-laṭāʾif, ed. Ğād, p. 34.
-
34
MS Wetzstein II 1786, f. 1a. The title page of the Cairo manuscript reproduced as a plate on p. 40 of Ğād’s edition has the more diplomatic ğamaʿahā l-šayḫ Abū Naṣr [sic] al-Maqdisī rather than taʾlīf.
-
45
See Thomas Bauer, “„Was kann aus dem Jungen noch werden!“ Das poetische Erstlingswerk des Historikers Ibn Ḥabīb im Spiegel seiner Zeitgenossen”, in Studien zur Semistik und Arabistik. Festschrift für Hartmut Bobzin zum 60. Geburtstag, ed. Otto Jastrow, Shabo Talay, and Herta Hafenrichter, Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz, 2008, p. 19: Trotzdem scheint vor Ibn Nubāta niemand auf den Gedanken gekommen zu sein, Epigramme aus eigener Feder in einem thematisch geordneten Dīwān zusammenzufassen. Das erste Werk, das in diesem Sinne als „Epigrammdīwān“ gelten kann, ist somit al-Qaṭr an-Nubātī, doch fanden sich bald Nachahmer. Ibn Ḥabīb war einer der ersten. Şafīyaddīn al-Ḥillī folgte auf dem Fuß mit seinem Dīwān al-Maṯāliṯ wa-l-maṯānī fī l-maʿālī wa-l-maʿānī.”
-
62
Berlin MS Wetzstein II 1786, f. 67a. The last of these, epigram 61: on a youth making the pilgrimage, is also found in three other texts by or associated with al-Ṯaʿālibī: Yatīmat al-dahr fī maḥāsin ahl al-ʿaṣr, Man ġāba ʿanhu l-muṭrib, and al-Bāḫarzī’s (d. 467/1075) Dumyat al-qaṣr wa-ʿaṣrat ahl al-ʿaṣr; cf. notes on this poem in edition below.
| All Time | Past Year | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 651 | 53 | 3 |
| Full Text Views | 156 | 6 | 1 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 38 | 8 | 2 |
Pseudo-Ṯaʿālibī’s Book of Youths
In: ArabicaSearch for other papers by Adam Talib in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
Abstract
This article presents a critical edition and study of a 17th/18th-century poetry collection that had previously been mistaken for al-Ṯaʿālibī’s lost Kitāb al-Ġilmān. It provides a codicological analysis of Berlin MS Wetzstein II 1786 in which the poetry collection is contained and also explains and corrects long-held misconceptions regarding al-Ṯaʿālibī’s connection with the text. Finally, the article situates this poetry collection in the context of Mamluk- and Ottoman-era epigram anthologies and the critical apparatus to the edition demonstrates the key features of intertextuality and popularity that characterised these poetry collections.
Résumé
Cet article présente une édition critique accompagnée d’une étude d’un recueil de poésie des XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles que l’on avait jusque-là pris pour le Kitāb al-Ġilmān, œuvre d’al-Ṯaʿālibī disparue. Nous l’accompagnons d’une analyse codicologique du manuscrit Berlin MS Wetzstein II 1786 – qui contient ledit recueil – et nous expliquons et corrigeons l’attribution erronée de longue date à al-Ṯaʿālibī. Enfin, cette contribution situe la collection poétique aux époques mamelouke puis ottomane qui virent fleurir des anthologies épigrammatiques. L’appareil critique de l’édition fait ressortir les caractéristiques clés de l’intertextualité ainsi que la popularité qui s’attacha à ces collections poétiques.
| All Time | Past Year | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 651 | 53 | 3 |
| Full Text Views | 156 | 6 | 1 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 38 | 8 | 2 |