Al-Ablah al-Baghdādī, Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad b. Bakhtiyār (d. 579/1183), a prominent poet of the late ʿAbbāsid period. According to ʿImād al-Dīn al-Kātib (fol. 38a) and his contemporary and fellow-poet, Ibn al-Taʿāwīdhī (ʿAbd al-Sūdānī, 61, quoting from the Dīwān of Ibn al-Taʿāwīdhī), he was known as al-Muwallad. However, later accounts are somewhat garbled on this question, and no reason is ever given as to why he should have been known by such a name.

In the centuries after his death, al-Ablah (lit. ‘simple-minded’) seems to have become more widely used. Ibn Khalli…