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(a.), “[literary] criticism”, in modern Arabic, al-naḳd al-adabī , in mediaeval times most commonly used in the construct naḳd al-s̲h̲iʿr “criticism of poetry”. The critic is nāḳid (pl. nuḳḳād or naḳada ) or, more rarely, naḳḳād ; the form VIII verbal noun intiḳād is a synonym of naḳd . The term originated in the figurative use ( mad̲j̲āz ) of naḳd in the sense of “assaying (coins) and separating the good from the bad” (for the mad̲j̲āz character, see al-Zamak̲h̲s̲h̲arī. Asās al-balāg̲h̲a , Beirut n.d., col. 469c, and for an extended analogy between assayer and critic, see al-Tawḥīdī, al-Muḳ…

(a.), verbal noun of the form III verb bālag̲h̲a ( fī ), with the two related meanings of “to do the utmost [in s.th.]” and “to overdo [s.th.]”), technical term in (a) grammar (“intensiveness”) and (b) literary theory (“emphasis” and, more particularly, “hyperbole”). (a) In grammar. Already in Sībawayh, the term mubālag̲h̲a is used to denote the intensive meaning of a number of morphemes and syntagmas (see G. Troupeau, Lexique-index du Kitāb de Sībawayhi , Paris 1976, 41). Most consistently it is henceforth applied to the intensive participles of the forms faʿūl , faʿʿāl …

(a.), a rhetorical figure mostly translated “antithesis” and consisting in the inclusion, in a verse or colon, of words of opposite meaning, as in ḥulamāʾu fi ’l-nādī id̲h̲ā mā d̲j̲iʾtahum — d̲j̲uhalāʾu yawma ʿad̲j̲ād̲j̲at in wa-liḳāʾi “restrained in the tribal council, when you come to them,—unrestrained on the day of a dust-cloud and battle” (Zuhayr). Synonymous terms are muṭābaḳa and, especially in earlier theorists, muṭābaḳ (from ṭābaḳtu bayna ’l-s̲h̲ayʾayn “I made the two things congruent” [see Ibn al-Muʿtazz, Badīʿ, 36]). From the same root one also finds taṭbīḳ …

al-Kindī al-Mawṣilī, Abu ’l-Ḥasan (d. 362/972-3 according to Yāḳūt, Irs̲h̲ād, iv, 185, and Ibn al-ʿAdīm, Bug̲h̲ya , ix, 435; other dates are also given), Arab poet and anthologist, particularly famous for his descriptive poetry ( awṣāf ). He was born in Mawṣil, where his father apprenticed him to the clothes-menders/jobbing tailors ( raffāʾūn ), hence his nickname, which is, however, not yet used by the contemporary source Ibn al-Nadīm ( Fihrist , 169). In spite of his lowly occupation he tried his hand at poetry, and al-Bāk̲h̲arzī lists him a…

, the seventeenth letter of the Arabic alphabet, numerical value: 900 The transliteration /ẓ/ reflects an urban/sedentary pronunciation as “emphatic” (pharyngealised) /z/. Sībawayh (d. 177/793 [ q.v.]), however, describes the sound as an “emphatic” voiced interdental, thus /ḏ̣/ (iv, 436), and this is the way it is pronounced in those dialects, mainly Bedouin, that have preserved the interdentals. There is, however, an additional complication: with ¶ very few exceptions (in Northern Yemen, see Behnstedt, 5), all modern dialects of Arabic have coalesced the sou…

1. In older Arab society. Tattooing was a custom among women in pre-Islamic times. The parts of the body mentioned as recipients are the hand ([ ẓāhir al-] yad ), the wrist ( miʿṣam ), the arm ( d̲h̲irāʿ ), the posterior ( ist ) and the gums ( lit̲h̲a ). The motifs used are not mentioned; going by modern-day tattooing in Islamic countries they were probably abstract designs. The tattoo was created by pricking ( g̲h̲araza ) the skin with a needle ( ibra , misalla ) or—more specifically—with a tattooing needle ( mīs̲h̲am , pl. mawās̲h̲im , see Lewin, Vocabulay , 471), so that a trace ( at̲h̲ar …

(a.), an adjective meaning “wild, desolate, uninhabited” ( al-dār al-waḥs̲h̲ ( a) “the desolate abode”, both with and without gender agreement), but more frequently a collective noun meaning “wild animals”. The relative adjective (and the singulative) is waḥs̲h̲ī the “wild ass” ( recte “onager”) is thus either ḥimār al-waḥs̲h̲ or al-ḥimār al-waḥs̲h̲ī . The most common plural is wuḥūs̲h̲ “kinds of wild animals”, as one typically finds it in the title of the kutub al-wuḥūs̲h̲ , lexicographical studies dealing with wild animals (name of the male and …

(d. ca. 150/767, according to Sezgin, GAS, viii, 115; ca. 155/772, according to al-Ziriklī, Aʿlām 3, ix, 139), transmitter of ancient Arabic poetry and ak̲h̲bār , quoted also for lexicographical, genealogical, geographical, and historical data. There is some fluctuation in the sources between al-S̲h̲arḳī and S̲h̲arḳī as well as between al-Ḳuṭāmī ¶ and Ḳuṭāmī; in addition, there is some discussion whether Ḳaṭāmī is the correct reading. The form given here has the best authority. Both names are laḳabs , his real name being al-Walīd b. al-Ḥusayn, with the kunya …

(a.), synonymous terms in literary criticism denoting words that are uncouth and jarring to the ear due to their being archaic and/or Bedouinic (often including the criterium of cacophony). It is thus mostly used in the context of “modern” poetry [see muḥdat̲h̲ūn , in Suppl.]; and it mostly refers to single words rather than to any contextual obscurity (ʿAbd al-Ḳāhir al-D̲j̲urd̲j̲ānī says this explicitly: Dalāʾil , ed. M.M. S̲h̲ākir, Cairo 1404/1984, 44, 1. 4). It is not, however, an exclusively poetic phenomenon. Al-D̲j̲āḥiẓ speaks of s…

(a.), legal principles, legal maxims, general legal rules (sing. ḳāʿida fiḳhiyya ). These are mad̲h̲hab internal legal guidelines that are applicable to a number of particular cases in various fields of the law, whereby the legal determinations ( aḥkām ) of these cases can be derived from these principles. They reflect the logic of a school’s legal reasoning and thus impart a “scaffolding” to the “case-law” ( furūʿ ). Historically, general rules can be found already strewn throughout early furūʿ works. They were first collected by Ḥanafīs like Abu ’l-Ḥasan al-Kark̲h̲ī (d. …

, the eleventh letter of the Arabic alphabet, numerical value 8. The former variant of the letter name retains the /y/ of the original letter name (as in Hebrew zayin ), while the latter has the innovative ending –āʾ , which occurred legitimately with fāʾ (Hebr. pē ) and hāʾ (Hebr. hē ) and then spread to bāʾ (Hebr. bēt̲ ), tāʾ / t̲h̲āʾ (Hebr. tāw ), ḥāʾ / k̲h̲āʾ (Hebr. ḥēt̲ ), rāʾ (Hebr. rēs̲h̲ ), ṭā / ẓāʾ (Hebr. ṭēt̲ ), ¶ and yāʾ (Hebr. yō٤̲ ), with loss of the final consonant of the original letter name. The letter is transliterated /z/ and represents a voiced sibilant ( ḥarf al-ṣafīr …

(a.), a technical term for a rhetorical figure (alternative names, all from the same root, are d̲j̲inās [very common], mud̲j̲ānasa , mud̲j̲ānas , and tad̲j̲ānus ), variously translated as paronomasia, pun, homonymy, and alliteration. The last two terms, however, do not cover all the types that have traditionally been subsumed under this heading, while “pun” has also been used to render tawriya [ q.v.], the difference being that tawriya is a one-term pun ( double entendre). A general definition of tad̲j̲nīs would be: a pair of utterances (mostly, but no…

, name of one of the legendary extinct tribes of the Arabs, al-ʿarab al-bāʾida . These tribes are genealogically directly linked up to Biblical genealogies and thus precede the split into Northern and Southern Arabs, symbolised by the eponyms “Adnān ¶ and Ḳaḥṭān. According to one of our earliest sources, Ibn al-Kalbī [ q.v.], Ṭasm’s relationship to the other tribes (in small capitals) is as follows: (see W. Caskel, Ǧamharat an-nasab , Leiden 1966, i, 40, which see also for the vocalisation of “Immīm”; and cf. Ibn Ḥabīb, Muḥabbar , ed. I. Lichtenstädter, Ḥaydarābād 1361/1942, 384; Ibn Ḥazm, Ḏ…

, Abū Yaʿḳūb Yūsuf b. Abī Bakr b. Muḥammad al-Ḵh̲wārazmi, Sirād̲j̲ al-dīn, rhétoricien influent de langue arabe. Il naquit au Ḵh̲wārazm le 3 d̲j̲umādā I 555/11 mai 1160 d’après la plupart des sources, ou en 554 selon son contemporain Yāḳūt ( Irs̲h̲ād, éd. Rifāʿī, XX, 59). Il mourut vers la fin de rad̲j̲ab 626/mi-juin 1229 à Ḳaryat al-Kindī, près d’Almālig̲h̲ au Farg̲h̲āna. Malgré la célébrité dont il bénéficiait de son vivant, les circonstances de sa vie sont obscures — sans doute en raison des troubles dus à la conquête mongole. On tr…

(a.) désigne l’énonciation de l’expression aʿūd̲h̲u bi-llāhi min...«Je me réfugie auprès de Dieu contre. . .», suivie de la mention de la chose redoutée ou détestée. Le mot istiʿād̲h̲a «chercher refuge» est souvent employé comme synonyme. L’expression, avec des variantes, est bien attestée dans le Ḳurʾān, en particulier dans les deux dernières sūras dont chacune n’est autre qu’un taʿawwud̲h̲ développé [voir al-Muʿawwid̲h̲atāni ]. L’énumération en forme de litanie de choses détestées dans la première de ces deux sūras préfigure des traits analogues dans nombre d’invocatio…

Dans la littérature arabe. La rose est de toute évidence la fleur la plus célébrée dans la poésie arabe. On la trouve naturellement dans la poésie des fleurs, des jardins et du printemps ( zahriyyāt, rawḍiyyāt et rabīʿiyyāt), mais elle apparaît également dans le décor de la poésie bachique ( k̲h̲amriyyāt), là où l’on trouve les premiers poèmes traitant de fleurs. Abū Nuwās (m. vers 198/813 [ q.v.]) garde encore le cadre bachique dans ses descriptions de fleurs, et il se pourrait que ce fût ʿAlī b. al-Ḏj̲ahm (m. en 249/863 [ q.v.]) qui ait écrit pour la première fois des morceaux de pur…

(a.), terme technique désignant une figure rhétorique (des termes alternatifs, tous issus de la même racine, sont d̲j̲inās, [très commun], mud̲j̲ānasa, mud̲j̲ānas, et tad̲j̲ānus), traduit d’une manière variable, par paronymie, jeu de mots, homonymie, ou allitération. Les deux derniers termes, cependant, ne couvrent pas toutes les variétés de figures entrant sous ce titre, alors que «jeu de mots» ait aussi été utilisé pour rendre tawriya [ q.v.], la différence étant que tawriya est un jeu de mot jouant sur l’amphibologie, le double sens d’un terme unique. Une définition générale de ta…

1. Dans la société arabe plus ancienne. Le tatouage était de coutume parmi les femmes dans les temps pré-islamiques. Les parties du corps mentionnées comme concernées sont la main ([ ẓāhir al-] yad), le poignet ( miʿṣam), le bras ( d̲h̲irāʿ), la fesse ( ist) et les gencives ( lit̲h̲a). Les motifs utilisés ne sont pas précisés; si on se réfère au tatouage de nos jours dans les pays arabes, c’étaient probablement des desseins abstraits. Le tatouage était effectué en piquant ( g̲h̲araza) la peau avec une aiguille ( ibra, misalla) ou — plus spécifiquement — avec une aiguille à tatouer ( mīs̲h̲am, pl…

, nom d’une des tribus arabes légendaires disparues, al-ʿarab al-bāʾida. Ces tribus sont reliées directement à la généalogie des lignées bibliques et précèdent donc la séparation entre Arabes du Nord et du Sud, symbolisée par les éponymes de ʿAdnān et de Kahtān. Selon l’une de nos sources les plus anciennes, Ibn al-Kalbī [ q.v.], la relation des Ṭasm avec les autres tribus (en petites majuscules) serait la suivante: (voir W. Caskel, Ǧamharat an-nasab, Leiden 1966, I, 40, à voir aussi pour la vocalisation de «Immīm»; et cf. Ibn Ḥabīb, Muḥabbar, éd. I. Lichtenstädter, Ḥaydarābād 1361/…

(a.), en droit, principes, maximes, règles générales (sing. ḳāʿida fiḳhiyyd). Ce sont des lignes directrices juridiques à l’usage interne des mad̲h̲habs que l’on peut appliquer dans un certain nombre de cas particuliers, dans plusieurs domaines du droit, et qui permettent de faire dériver, à partir de ces principes, les décisions de justice ( aḥkām) concernant ces cas. Ils reflètent la logique du raisonnement juridique d’une école et permettent ainsi d’échafauder «une revue des cas» ( furūʿ). D’un point de vue historique, on trouve déjà ces ¶ règles générales éparpillées dans le…