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(Banū) or Midrārids , minor Berber dynasty which was established in Sid̲j̲ilmās(s)a [ q.v.] and which enjoyed relative independence until its final collapse in 366/976-7. The history of this dynasty can be briefly outlined, thanks to al-Bakrī [ q.v.], who lived in the 5th/11th century and thus possessed quite recent information in order to write the chapter that he devotes to it ( Mug̲h̲rib , 148 ff., Fr. tr. 282 ff.), before Ibn ʿId̲h̲ārī (7th-8th/13th-14th century [ q.v.]), Ibn Ḵh̲aldūn (8th/14th century [ q.v.]) and several historians of the Mag̲h̲rib and Mas̲h̲riḳ were abl…

, nickname of the Arab poet D̲j̲arwal b. Aws , who traced back his genealogy sometimes to the ʿAbs, sometimes to the D̲h̲uhl, but who, in reality, was probably the natural son of a woman named al-Ḍarrāʾ; his nickname probably derives from his ugliness and appears to signify “deformed”. He belonged to the muk̲h̲aḍramūn [ q.v.], and Ibn Sallām places him in the second class of the poets of the d̲j̲āhiliyya since he is regarded as the rāwī of Zuhayr b. Abī Sulmā [ q.v.], he must have been born about forty years before the hid̲j̲ra , and his earliest poetic activities pro…

, muḥammad b. abi ’l-k̲h̲aṭṭāb , adīb of the end of the 3rd/9th or of the beginning of the 4th/10th century, and known only as the author of the Ḏj̲amharat ashʿār al-ʿArab (ed. Būlāḳ 1308/1890). No personal details about the author can be derived from this collection, and the only relevant data are two isnād s, one (p. 13) going back to al-Hayt̲h̲am b. ʿAdī (d. ca. 206/821 [ q.v.]) through two intermediaries, and the other (p. 14) going back to Ibn al-Aʿrābī (d. 231/846 [ q.v.]) through one intermediary; these isnāds would thus allow us to date the Ḏj̲amhara approximatel…

, Ḏj̲uwayra , Ḏj̲uwayriyya or Ḥārit̲h̲a b. al-Ḥad̲j̲d̲j̲ād̲j̲ (or again Ḥanẓala b. al-S̲h̲arḳī , which was more probably, however, the name of Abu ’l-Ṭamaḥān al-Ḳayni, see S̲h̲iʿr , 229), pre-Islamic poet of al-Ḥīra, contemporary of al-Mund̲h̲ir b. Māʾ al-Samāʾ (about 506-554 A.D.), who put him in the charge of his horses. The expression d̲j̲ārun ka-d̲j̲ārl Abī Duʾād , which appears in a line of Ḳays b. Zuhayr and has become proverbial, gave rise to several traditions showing Abū Duʾād as the “protégé” of a noble and generous d̲j̲ār, who is either al-Mund̲h̲ir, al-Ḥarit̲h̲ b. Ḥamm…

(also called Yuʿfur and Yaʿfir) b. ʿAbd al-Aswad al-Tamīmī, Abu ’l-Ḏj̲arrāḥ, pre-Islamic Arab poet who lived probably at the end of the 6th century A.D. He is said to have travelled about among the tribes, composing eulogies or satires in verse, and was for some time the companion of al-Nuʿmān b. al-Mund̲h̲ir. He is sometimes called al-Aʿs̲h̲ā of the Banū Nahs̲h̲al, because he was night-blind, but he lost his sight at the end of his life, which is thought to have been extremely long. Of the poems which have come down to us, the most celebrated are a ḳaṣīda in dāl dating p…

is the usual appellative of the great-grandson of the Caliph Abū Bakr, ʿAbd Allāh b. Muḥammad (= Abū ʿAtīk) b. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān b. Abī Bakr . All that is known of him is that, after al-Ḥasan and al-Ḥusayn, he married, among others, Umm Isḥāḳ, the daughter of Ṭalḥa b. ʿUbayd Allāh. He led an idle existence in Medina, dividing his time between meetings with poets such as ʿUmar b. Abī Rabīʿa [ q.v.] or Kut̲h̲ayyir ʿAzza [ q.v.] and seeking the company of wits such as As̲h̲ʿab [ q.v.] or musicians and singers like Ibn ʿĀʾis̲h̲a [ q.v.]. Being a member of the Ḳurays̲h̲ī aristocracy, he was able in…

(a.) “routes and kingdoms”, name given by R. Blachère ( Extraits des principaux géographes arabes du Moyen Age , Beirut-Algiers 1934, 110-200; 2nd corrected printing by H. Darmaun, Paris 1957) to what he considered as a particular genre of Arabic geographical literature, because several works, which bear the title of Kitāb al-Masālik wa “ l-mamālik , present common characteristics. Nevertheless, not all those which, in his eyes, constitute this genre were given the title which has been retained, and furthermore, the K. al-Masālik wa ’l-mamālik which is per…

b. ʿAbd al-Malik , Umayyad prince. As the eldest son of His̲h̲ām [ q. v.], caliph from 105 to 125/724-43, he was designated heir presumptive by his father, but died prematurely, at a date variously located between 117 and 119/735-7, at about thirty years of age. Although he did not himself accede to the throne, he was the father of ʿAbd al-Raḥmān [ q.v.], known as al-Dāk̲h̲il. who fled to Spain where he restored the dynasty founded in Damascus by Muʿāwiya b. Abī Sufyān [ q.v.]. Muʿāwiya b. His̲h̲ām, who had thirteen sons, was thus the ancestor of the amīrs and caliphs wh…

, a famous singer of Medina at the time of the first Umayyads. Tradition has it that she taught herself the elements of music and singing by listening to her neighbour Sāʾib K̲h̲āt̲h̲ir [ q.v.] (d. 63/682-3). It became unanimously recognized that her great natural talent put her in a class of her own, and she founded a school where, among numerous lesser-known singers and ḳiyān , Maʿbad [ q.v.], Ibn ʿĀʾis̲h̲a [ q.v.], Ḥabāba and Sallāma received their training. Artists as great as Ibn Surayd̲j̲ [ q.v.] would come to hear her, and would accept her critical judgments, while her salo…

al-Salūlī , Arab poet of the 1st/7th century (he is said to have died after 96/715), who played a political role under the Umayyads. He was attached from 60/680 to Yazīd b. Muʿāwiya, condoled with him upon the death of his father and congratulated him at his accession. He persuaded Yazīd to proclaim his son Muʿāwiya as heir presumptive and later he was the first to greet al-Walīd b. ʿAbd al-Malik with the name of caliph (86/705). During the reign of ʿAbd al-Malik (65-86/685-…

(a.), a word probably of Berber origin meaning couscous, a culinary preparation containing semolina which is the national dish of the peoples of North Africa. It appears with the article and with a final nūn in an anecdote depicting an Oriental being advised by the Prophet, in a dream, to treat with al-kuskusūn a sick Mag̲h̲ribī; this anecdote, related by Dozy ( Suppl., s.v.) is very well known and is probably responsible for leading Moroccan scholars to adopt the form attributed to the Prophet. L. Bauer ( Wörterbuch der arabischen Umgangsprache 2, Wiesbaden 1957, 402), heard kusukson/ kusk…

b. Marzawayh (Marzōye) al-Daylamī , Abu ’l-Ḥusayn (Ibn K̲h̲allikān) or Abu ’l-Ḥasan (other sources), poet who used the Arabic language, originally a Zoroastrian but becoming a convert to Islam in 394/1004 at the hands of al-S̲h̲arīf al-Raḍī (359-406/970-1016 [ q.v.]), dying in 428/1037. The famous S̲h̲īʿī poet and naḳīb of the descendants of the Prophet took charge of the education of his protégé, into whom he inculcated not only the basic principles of S̲h̲īʿism but also the necessary skills for him to act as a secretar…

, Abū Marwān al-Dimas̲h̲ḳī al-Ḳibṭī , is chiefly known as one of the first advocates of free will [see Ḳadariyya ], at the same time as Maʿbad al-Ḏj̲uhanī [ q.v.]. The son of a freed slave of ʿUt̲h̲mān b. ʿAffān, he appears, like Maʿbad, to have been the disciple of a Christian from ʿIrāḳ, but he lived in Damascus where he held the position of secretary in the chancellery. Al-Ḏj̲āḥiẓ ( Bayān , iii, 29) mentions him on the same footing as Ibn al-Muḳaffaʿ, Sahl b. Hārūn and ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd, and even one so strictly orthodox as al-ʿAsḳalānī acknowledged his professional ability ( Lisān al-Mizān …

b. ʿīsā b. Manṣūr b. Muḥammad , Tād̲j̲ al-Dīn , grammarian, poet and adīb , originally from the town of Balad on the Tigris, which also had the name of Balaṭ (see Yāḳūt, i, 721), whence his nisba of al-Balaṭī, sometimes given in the diminutive form of al-Bulayṭī. Abu ’l-Fatḥ went first of all to teach in Syria, and then, when Saladin assumed power in Egypt (567/1171), he migrated to Cairo where the new sultan allotted to him a fixed stipend and appointed him to teach grammar and the Ḳurʾān in one of the mosque…

, (a.) “crow”. In view of the diversity of their meanings the Arabic words formed from the three consonants g̲h̲ , r and b cannot be traced to a single root, and it is probable that in the course of the history of the language there came about a convergence of terms with different origins; thus, g̲h̲urāb is too reminiscent of the Latin corvus for us to consider it a mere coincidence; moreover, early Arab philologists considered g̲h̲urāb to be independent, ¶ since they made to derive from it such words as g̲h̲urba , ig̲h̲tirāb , etc. which imply an idea of estrangemen…

, ʿumayla b. al-aʿzal b. k̲h̲ālīd al-ʿadawanī , a personage of the end of the D̲j̲āhiliyya, said have been the first to fix the diya or pecuniary composition for murder at 100 camels and the last to lead the pilgrims, either at the departure for ʿArafāt ( ifāḍa ) or from al-Muzdalifa to Minā ( id̲j̲āza ), since the sources disagree on this point, and the more careful authors merely use the expression dafaʿa bi ’l-nās . This man, who probably owed his kunya to this function of his, a privilege of the Ḳaysī tribe of ʿAdwān (see Ibn al-Kalbī-Caskel, Tab. 92 …

, Abū Bakr Aḥmad b. Zuhayr (= Abū K̲h̲aythama) b. Ḥarb b. S̲h̲addād al-Nasāʾī al-Bag̲h̲dādī , traditionist, genealogist, historian and poet, born at Nasāʾ in 185/801, died at Bag̲h̲dād in 279/892 (the dates 205/820 and 299/911-2 are probably too late). The son of Abū K̲h̲ayt̲h̲ama (d. 243/857), who was the author of a K. al-Musnad and a K. al-ʿIlm ( Fihrist , Cairo ed., 321), he was the pupil of Ibn Ḥanbal in ḥadīt̲h̲ and fiḳh , of Muṣʿab al-Zubayrī in genealogy, of al-Madāʾinī in history and of Muḥammad b. Sallām in literature. The Fihrist mentions among his works K. al-Muntamīn (?), K. al-Aʿrā…

, a minor Arab poet of the 1st/7th century whom Ibn Sallām ( Ṭabaḳāt , 485-9) places in the 3rd rank of Islamic poets. His genealogy varies with the different authors (Ibn al-Kalbī-Caskel, Tab. 165, no doubt provides the most accurate one), and very little is known of his life. Probably born during the earliest years of the Hid̲j̲ra , he made his appearance at the time of the battle of Ṣiffīn (37/657) as an intimate of Muʿāwiya, of whom, like most of the Tag̲h̲lib [ q.v.], he was a passionate supporter. The conflict with ʿAlī inspired him to write a number of poems, in particular…

, Ḳurays̲h̲ite notable of the clan of Taym b. Murra, at the end of the 6th c. A.D. He acquired such wealth from the caravan and slave trade that he possessed one of the largest fortunes in Mecca (Ps.-Ḏj̲āḥiẓ, Maḥāsin (van Vloten), 165; Ibn Rusta, 215; Masʿūdī, Murūd̲j̲ , vi, 153 ff.; Lammens, La Mecque à la veille de l’Hégire , index). He surrounded himself with unusual luxury (being nick-named ḥāsī ‘l-d̲h̲ahab , because he used to drink from a golden cup), and was the owner of the two singing-girls called "Locusts of ʿĀd" ( Ḏj̲arādatā ʿĀd ) whom he offered to Umayya b…

al-Yas̲h̲kurī , a pre-Islamic Arab poet to whom is attributed principally a ḳaṣīda which mediaeval critics regarded as the seventh of the muʿallaḳāt [ q.v.]. The information that we possess in respect of his life deserves no credence, and the poem that is the cause of his renown is in itself so suspect that Ṭāhā Ḥusayn considers it to be totally apocryphal (cf. also al-Ḏj̲āḥiẓ, Ḥayawān , iii, 449, on the questions of other verses). This ḳaṣīda, in k̲h̲afīf metre and with -āʾū rhyme (with an iḳwāʾ in one verse in -āʾī ), is said by legendary tradition to have been …

(many possible vocalisations), Abu ’l-Ḳāsim Naṣr b. Aḥmad b. al-Maʾmūn , ¶ popular poet of Baṣra, who probably died in 327/938. He made rice bread ( k̲h̲ubz aruzz ) in a shop at the Mirbad [ q.v.], where his biographers show him as surrounded by a circle of admirers who were especially attracted by his g̲h̲azal verses on boys, these being his speciality. It does not seem that he should be included in the list of those poets whose belligerence involved them in contests and controversies, nor does he seem to have been inclined, l…

b. fātik b. al-ak̲h̲ram al-asadī , Arab poet of the Umayyad period, son of the Companion of the Prophet Ḵh̲uraym al-Nāʿim, whose ḥadīt̲h̲s he has handed down. After settling at Kūfa, he composed, like many of the poets of that town g̲h̲azal poems, but also panegyrics on the Umayyad princes ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz and Bis̲h̲r, son of Marwān; although he contracted tubercular leprosy ( abraṣ ), his poetry allowed him to enjoy their intimate friendship, and this favour won him the surname of k̲h̲alīl al-k̲h̲ulafāʾ (the friend of caliphs). In some of his poems he touch…

, Abū ʿAbd Allāh or Abū ʿĪsā, son of the famous Companion of the Prophet al-Zubayr b. al-ʿAwwām [ q.v.] and brother of the anti-caliph ʿAbd Allāh b. al-Zubayr [ q.v.]. Handsome, chivalrous, generous to the utmost ¶ degree of prodigality, he resembled his older brother and the Zubayrid family only in his courage and outbursts of severity in repression. He began his military career at the outset of the caliphate of Marwān b. al-Ḥakam, with an ill-conceived expedition in Palestine. His name has gone down in history chiefly owing to his campaign, in his capa…

, mūsā b. ʿīsā b. abī ḥād̲j̲d̲j̲/ḥad̲j̲d̲j̲ād̲j̲ (?), Mālikī faḳīh , probably born between 365/975 and 368/978 at Fās into a Berber family whose nisba is impossible to reconstruct. No doubt to complete his studies, but perhaps also because of other reasons hard to discern, he went to settle in al-Ḳayrawān, where his master was in particular al-Ḳābisī (d. 403/1012 [ q.v.]). He is known to have stayed in Cordova with Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr [ q.v.] and to have profited by the chance to follow the lectures of various scholars there, which his biographers list, without however gi…

, a general and governor of the ʿAbbāsid period, a native of K̲h̲urāsān. As a supporter of ʿĪsā b. Mūsā [ q.v.] in the reign of al-Manṣūr, he was brought to Bag̲h̲dād in chains and remained in obscurity throughout the reign of al-Mahdī. He then became the confidential adviser of al-Hādī who is even said to have ordered him to kill Hārūn, and was stopped from doing so only by al-K̲h̲ayzurān’s intervention. However, on the death of al-Hādī, it was he who brought Hārūn out of prison and took part in his enthronement. T…

(a), from ṭamara , which signifies in particular “to hide”, denotes a natural or man-made cavity used for the concealment of victuals ( ṭaʿām ) or of riches ( māl ); such is the definition adopted by the ¶ LA (s.v.), which specifies that it is the plural maṭāmīr which should be applied to underground silos where grain is stored. In fact, the singular currently denotes a silo, and the plural, a group of silos garded by a ṭammār and called mərs in Morocco ( rətba in Takrūna, where the guardian is known as rattāb ; W. Marçais, Glossaire de Takroûna , v, 2408-9, with discussio…

(rather than Ḥāʾiṭ, if the position in the alphabetical order given to him by al-ʿAsḳalānī is taken into consideration), a theologian ranked among the Muʿtazilites; he was the pupil of al-Naẓẓām [ q.v.], and the teacher, in particular, of al-Faḍl al-Ḥadat̲h̲ī. Nothing is known about his life, and only his "innovations" are partly known to us. His doctrine, evolved before 232/846-7, seems to differ from Muʿtazilite teaching on the following two fundamental dogmas, which are borrowed from systems alien to Islam but which, in the…

, a famous pact concluded between several Ḳurays̲h̲ī clans a few years before the Prophet’s mission, more precisely, according to certain authorities, in D̲h̲u ’l-Ḳaʿda on the return from the war of Fid̲j̲ār [ q.v.]. The traditions concerning the events which brought it about are divergent, but can be reduced to the following outline: a merchant of Zabīd (or elsewhere, or even the poet al-Ṭamaḥān al-Ḳaysī) sells merchandise to a leading man of the clan of the Banū Sahm who proves to be a bad payer and wants to harm the merchant.…

, Abu ’l-Nad̲j̲m , commander-in-chief of the armies of the caliph al-Muʿtaḍid (279-89/892-902). He was the son of one of al-Mutawakkil’s mawālī , whose name cannot be established with certainty (Ḵh̲urr or Ḵh̲ayr?), and was first in service as an equerry to al-Muwaffaḳ, gaining from that time the favour of the future caliph al-Muʿtaḍid, who, whilst still regent after al-Muwaffaḳ’s death (Ṣafar 278/June 891), made him chief of police in Bag̲h̲dād and then, after his accession, com-mander of all th…

b. ʿUdus b. Zayd b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Dārim , Abu Nahs̲h̲al , poet and sayyid of the second half of the 6th century A.D. His name apparently appears for the first time in a tradition concerning the assassination by his brother-in-law Suwayd b. Rabīʿa b. Zayd (see Ibn al-Kalbī-Caskel, D̲j̲amhara , Tab. 60, and Register, ii, 521) of a son (or of a young brother) Mālik, of al-Mund̲h̲ir b. Māʾ al-Samāʾ, who had entrusted him to Zurāra, and the vengeance of ʿAmr b. Hind [ q.v.], in the first place on the seven sons of the murdered man and then on the Banū Ḥanẓala b. Mālik (Ibn al-Kalbī-Ca…

(— al-ʿuḳad , — al-ʿuḳūd , — al-Ḳabḍa bi ’l-yad , — al-yad), dactylonomy, digital computation, the art of expressing numbers by the position of the fingers. Some indications prove that the ancient Arabs not only at times used to show their outstretched hands, bending down one or more fingers when necessary, to indicate some small numbers (see I. Goldziher, in Arabica , viii/3, 272), but also had the ability to express larger numbers by holding their fingers in a given position (see G. Levi Della Vida, in Isl ., x (1920), 243), and ¶ it is not impossible that certain gestures used by the …

(or Daḥya ) b. K̲h̲alīfa al-Kalbī , Companion of the Prophet and a somewhat mysterious character. He is traditionally represented as a rich merchant of such outstanding beauty that the Angel Gabriel took his features; and, when he arrived at Medina, all the women ( muʿṣir , see LA, root. ʿṣr ) came out to see him (Ḳurʾān, LXII, n, may be an allusion to this occurrence). There is no reason to accept the suggestion put forward by Lammens ( EI 1, s.v.) of some commercial connexion with Muḥammad; we only know that a sudden death put ¶ a stop to a projected marriage between a niece of Diḥya and …

al-Rukūniyya (al-Rakūniyya), poetess of Granada born after 530/1135, d. 589/1190-1. Ibn al-K̲h̲aṭīb ( Iḥāṭa , i, 316) and other writers praise the beauty, distinction, literary culture, wit, and poetic gifts of this woman, who was remembered in later ages above all for her love-affair with the poet Abū D̲j̲aʿfar Ibn Saʿīd of the Banū Saʿīd [see ibn saʿīd ] family. Abu D̲j̲aʿfar was the inspiration of most of her poetry which we possess. After the arrival at Granada of Abū Saʿīd ʿUt̲h̲mān, the son of the Almohad ʿAbd al-Muʾmin, sh…

b. ʿayt̲h̲ al-ʿabsī (see his genealogy in Ibn al-Kalbī D̲j̲amhara , Tab. 133), one of the personages of the interval [see fatra ] between Christ and Muḥammad who, in Islamic tradition, was considered as a prophet; he was even regarded as the first prophet to arise amongst the descendants of Ismāʿīl. He is said to have foretold the coming of Muḥammad, and the latter is said to have greeted K̲h̲ālid’s daughter, who had come to him, with these words “Here is the daughter of a prophet whom his people has lost”; popular belief even went as far as to attribute to him knowledge of Sūrat al-Ik̲h̲lāṣ ( T̲h̲im…

, al-ḍaḥḥāk b. mak̲h̲lad b. muslim b. al-ḍaḥḥāk al-s̲h̲aybānī al-baṣri , traditionist, born at Mecca in 122/740 but established subsequently at Baṣra, where he transmitted from a host of scholars (notably al-Aṣmaʿī) a large quantity of ḥadīt̲h̲s gathered by himself, and especially from several tābiʿīs or Successors. He was considered as trustworthy, and some of his ḥadīt̲h̲s were included in the great collections; his biographers assert that he never fabricated a single one, although he is said to have declared that pious men never lie so much as in …

(A., pl. g̲h̲īlān or ag̲h̲wāl ), fabulous being believed by the ancient Arabs to inhabit desert places and, assuming different forms, to lead travellers astray (sometimes, like the Bedouins, lighting fires on the hills the more easily to attract them), to fall upon them unawares and devour them; certain isolated sources (cf. al-Masʿūdī, Murūd̲j̲ , iii, 315) affirm however that it fled as soon as it was challenged; according to al-Ḏj̲āḥiẓ ( Ḥayawān , i, 309), it rode on hares, dogs and ostriches; men could kill it, but only by giving it one singl…

, Abu ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Abī Bakr b. ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān b. Aḥmad b. Abī Bakr al-Ḳuḍāʿī , historian, traditionist, littérateur, and poet, belonged to a family which had its origin in Onda, the patrimony of the Ḳuḍāʾīs of Spain; he was born in Rabīʿ II 595/February 1199 at Valencia, where he passed his youth studying under the direction of several teachers whom he quotes in his Muʿd̲j̲am . For more than twenty years he was the disciple of the most learned traditionist in Spain, Abu ’l-Rabīʿ b. Sālim, who persuaded him to complete the Ṣila of Ibn B…

, Abū Muḥammad, a poet of Medina considerably less known than his brother Ismāʿīl b. Yasār [ q.v.], with the result that Yāḳūt, who devotes an article to him, calls him Mūsā b. Bas̲h̲s̲h̲ār; he gives him the nisba of al-Ḳuras̲h̲ī, as the person in question was in fact a mawlā of Ḳurays̲h̲, variously associated with the Banū Taym b. Murra, with the Banū Sahm or even with Sulaymān b. Abī K̲h̲ayt̲h̲ama al-ʿAdawī (of the ʿAdī b. Kaʿb b. Luʾayy). Since the reason for his cognomen has been forgotten, numerous explanations have b…

( or ), the nickname of a personage whom popular imagination made the hero of a few hundred jests, anecdotes and amusing stories. The oldest literary instance of this name goes back to the first half of the 3rd/9th century, in al-D̲j̲āḥiẓ, who numbers D̲j̲uḥā among others renowned for their follies ( Risāla fi ’l-Ḥakamayn , ed. Pellat, in Machriq , 1958, 431), and attributes to him futile schemes and an extraordinary tendency to make mistakes and blunders; the same author also quotes ( K. al-Big̲h̲āl , ed. Pellat, Cairo 1955, 36) a story borrowed from Abu ’l…

, Muḥammad Farīd , Syrian journalist, scholar and man of letters, was born in Damascus in 1876, of a father of Kurdish origin and a Čerkes mother. From an early age, he showed an interest in nature and in books, and it was reading which, combined with his innate curiosity and gifts of observation, made the greatest contribution to his intellectual development. Already bilingual in Turkish and Arabic, he learnt French from the Lazarist Fathers of Damascus, and this enable him t…

(Ar.), which in general means a relaxing, and then an interval of time ( e.g., the modern fatrat al-intiḳāl “period of transition”), is applied more particularly to the period separating two prophets or two successive messengers ( rasūl ); al-D̲j̲āḥiẓ ( Rasāʾil , ed. Sandūbī, Cairo 1352/1933, 133-4), in his exposition of prophetic history, uses the term fatra for the end of the period separating two prophets, making it clear that the “slackening” (of observance of the earlier prophet’s teachings) is not a “break” ( ḳaṭʿa ). Al-Masʿūdī ( Murūd̲j̲ , iii, 85) for e…

, Ibrāhīm b. ʿAlī b. Salama (b. ʿĀmir) b. Harma al-Fihrī , Abū Isḥāḳ , Arab poet of Medina, born in 90/709, who, if his genealogy is authentic, belonged to the tribe of Ḳurays̲h̲. Little is known of his life. A supporter of the ʿAlids, he attended and panegyrised ʿAbd Allāh b. al-Ḥasan [ q.v.] and al-Ḥasan b. Zayd [ q.v.], but he is said to have refrained from giving his support to Muḥammad b. ʿAbd Allāh [ q.v.] when the latter revolted against the ʿAbbāsids. The Ag̲h̲ānī names several persons for whom he had occasion to exercise his poetic gifts, but it must…

( Demnate , Demnat ), a small Berber town situated on the edge of the Great Atlas in Morocco, 120 km. east of Marrākush, at an altitude of 960 m., on a small hill overlooking the fertile valley (barley, beans) of the Oued Tassawt, the slopes of which are covered with olive-trees and vines. The town is surrounded by a rectangular wall and includes a məllāḥ (Jewish quarter); in fact almost half the population, which stands at about 4,000, consists of Jews, whose numbers however are diminishing regularly. Local trade on a large scale in oil…

or mart̲h̲āt (A., pl. marāt̲h̲ī ) “elegy”, a poem composed in Arabic (or in an Islamic language following the Arabic tradition) to lament the passing of a beloved person and to celebrate his ¶ merits; rit̲h̲āʾ , from the same root, denotes both lamentation and the corresponding literary genre. 1. In Arabic literature. The origin of the mart̲h̲iya may be found in the rhymed and rhythmic laments going with the ritual movements performed as a ritual around the funeral cortège by female relatives of the deceased, before this role bec…

(a.), pl. mukaddūn , defined by al-D̲j̲āḥiẓ ¶ ( Buk̲h̲alāʾ , ed. Ḥād̲j̲iri, 46) as a man who practices kidāʾ ( ṣāḥib al-kidāʾ ), a term often replaced at a later date by kudya or takdiya and defined as “begging”, in fact denotes a wandering beggar or vagrant who, with the help of a remarkable talent for plausible lying and a knowledge of certain effective dodges, succeeds in opening up the purses of those simple persons who allow themselves to be taken in by his eloquent but mendacious words. The different w…

, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān (b. Sayḥān) b. Arṭāt al-Muḥāribī , a minor poet of Medina who lived in the 1st/7th century, on intimate terms with the governors or members of the Umayyad aristocracy of the town—al-Walīd b. ʿUt̲h̲mān b. ʿAffān, al-Walīd b. ʿUtba b. Abī Sufyān, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān b. al-Ḥakam and al-Walīd b. ʿUḳba b. Abī Muʿayṭ; indeed he belonged to a clan which was a ḥalīf of the Banū Ḥarb b. Umayya, a fact which incidentally won him the friendship and protection of Muʿāwiya. Although we possess a number of his verses, which belong to the c…

, the seven “jurists” of Medina, to whom tradition attributes a significant role in the formation of fiḳh . J. Schacht, who was especially interested in these fuḳahāʾ , wrote ( Esquisse d’une histoire du droit musulman , Paris 1952, 28; cf. idem, An introduction to Islamic law, Oxford 1964, 31): “The Medinans ... traced back the origin of their special brand of legal teaching to a number of ancient authorities, who died in the final years of the first and the early years of the second century of the Hegira. In a later p…

, Abū Yaʿlā al-S̲h̲arīf Niẓām al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Muḥammad b. Ṣāliḥ al-ʿAbbāsī al-Hās̲h̲imī , Arab poet of the Sald̲j̲ūḳid period, a descendant of the ʿAbbāsid prince ʿĪsā b. Mūsā [ q.v.], who is named after his maternal grandfather, a certain Habbār. He was born probably in Bag̲h̲dād (though it is also said that he was born in Ād̲h̲arbayd̲j̲ān) before the middle of the 5th/11th century and followed the traditional pattern of study so thoroughly as to be included among the transmitters of ḥadīt̲h̲ , but he could not bring himself to take an interest in the…

, Abu ’l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. al-Ḥusayn , Arab writer whose activity, in the words of Brockelmann (in EI 1, s.v.) “has been undertaken outside the well-trodden paths of professional scholarship”, with the result that he has been rather neglected by biographers and copyists and that a normally well-informed writer like Ibn al-Nadīm, who has obviously not read his works, takes him ( Fihrist , 154) for a Mag̲h̲ribī and devotes to him only a short, moreover probably truncated, article. In fact, the only reliable account which is available concern…

, by-name of several persons, who may be distinguished as follows: I. Muḥammad b. ʿĀʾis̲h̲a , Abū D̲j̲aʿfar , Medinan singer of unknown father. A pupil of Maʿbad and of Malik, he was regarded as the equal if not the superior of his masters, and celebrated for his skill at launching into a performance. He was highly respected at Mecca and at Medina, but, extremely vain, he would become very angry when asked to sing. He was invited to the court of Damascus, probably by al-Walīd b. Yazīd but du…