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D̲j̲abr

(1,162 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
(A.), compulsion in marriage exercised upon one or other of the prospective partners, ¶ under conditions which vary according to the judicial schools. The right of d̲j̲abr is foreseen neither by the Ḳurʾān nor by the Sunna , and a ḥadīt̲h̲ (al-Buk̲h̲ārī, Niḳāh , bāb 42) actually declares that neither the father nor any other person may give in marriage without her consent a virgin or a woman who has already been under the authority of a husband; the Prophet himself consulted his daughter Fāṭima before giving her in m…

Muwāraba

(521 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, (a.), verbal noun from the form III wāraba , meaning “to use stratagems, to trick”, also has two rare significations, each distant from the other and apparently not reducible to a common root. In the first place, muwāraba denotes in rhetoric the ability to remedy a gaffe or an offensive phrase by repeating the expression in an attenuated form, if not radically modified, or else by trying to make the person addressed believe that he has not properly understood what has been said to him (see Mehren, Rhetorik , 123-4; Dozy, Supplément, s.v.). Secondly, the same term appears in the K. al-Mug̲h̲ri…

Amg̲h̲ar

(208 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, Berber word corresponding to the Arabic s̲h̲ayk̲h̲ [ q.v.], and meaning "an elder (by virtue of age or authority)". Among the Touareg, it applies to chief of a tribal group who acts as an intermediary between the aménokal [ q.v.] and his tribe (see Ch. de Foucauld, Dict. touareg-français , Paris 1952, iii, 1237; H. Lhote, Les Touaregs du Hoggar , Paris 1944, 157-8), or even to the chief of a confederation (cf. H. Bissuel, Les Touaregs de l’Ouest Algiers 1888, 23). In Kabylia (see A. Hanoteau and A. Letourneau, La Kabylie et les coutumes kabyles 2 , Paris 1893, ii, 9) …

al-Dilāʾ

(1,299 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, an ancient place in the Middle Atlas region of Morocco which owed its existence to the foundation in the last quarter of the 10th/16th century of a zāwiya [ q.v.], a “cultural” centre meant for teaching the Islamic sciences and Arab letters, and at the same time spreading the doctrine of the S̲h̲ād̲h̲iliyya [ q.v.] order, more precisely the branch known as the D̲j̲azūliyya [see al-d̲j̲azūlī , abū ʿabd allāh muḥammad ], and also sheltering the needy and travellers. In 1048/1638, the zāwiya dilāʾiyya or bakriyya (from the founder’s name, S̲h̲ayk̲h̲ Abū Bakr …

Layl and Nahār

(3,054 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
(Ar.), two antithetical terms which designate respectively night and day, but do not have exactly the same status and are not parallel. Layl is treated as a collective noun without dual (except in poetry where the use of this incorrect form is justified by the requirements of metre), or plural; it possesses, as would be expected, a noun of unity, laylatun “one night”, of which the plural layāl in and the seldom used diminutive luyayliyatun , are something of an embarrassment to philologists, who are inclined to consider them as formed either on * layliyatun or on * laylātun . Nahār

al-Nawfalī

(933 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, the nisba of a Hās̲h̲imite family of ak̲h̲bārīs who transmitted from father to son traditions of a historical character. On the death of Yazīd (I) b. Muʿāwiya (64/683 [ q.v.]), ʿUbayd Allāh b. Ziyād [ q.v.] was confirmed in his office of governor of ʿIrāḳ by the Basrans, who nevertheless speedily retracted this when they learnt that the Kūfans had stoned his emissaries. It was at this point that Baṣra designated as its governor ʿAbd ¶ Allāh b. al-Ḥārit̲h̲ b. Nawfal b. ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib b. Hās̲h̲im, whose grandfather and father had been Companions …

Abū Miḥd̲j̲an

(370 words)

Author(s): Rhodokanakis, N. | Pellat, Ch.
ʿAbd Allāh (or Mālik or ʿAmr ) b. Ḥabīb , Arab poet of the Thaḳīf tribe, counted as one of the muk̲h̲aḍramūn . After taking part in the defence of al-Ṭāʾif against Muḥammad, when he wounded with an arrow a son of Abū Bakr (in 8/630), he was converted in 9/631-2 and fought at al-Ḳādisiyya. The story goes that, in order to take part in this battle, he escaped first from his escort (for ʿUmar had banished him to Ḥaḍawḍa, see Goldziher, Abhandl ., i), then managed to obtain provisional liberty, thanks to the wife of Saʿd b. Abī Waḳḳāṣ; Saʿd had imprisoned him…

ʿAmr b. al-Ahtam

(202 words)

Author(s): Wensinck, A.J. | Pellat, Ch.
( sinān ) b. sumayy al tamīmī al-minḳarī , an eminent Tamīmite famous for his poetic and oratorical talent, and also for his physical beauty which earned him the surname of al-Mukaḥḥal (“anointed with collyrium”). ¶ Born a few years before the hid̲j̲ra , he made his way to Medina in 9/630 with a delegation from his tribe; in 11/632, he was a follower of the prophetess Sad̲j̲āḥi [ q.v.], but he was converted to Islam and took part in the wars of conquest; he conveyed the news of the capture of Ras̲h̲ahr to ʿUmar in verse; he is said to have died in 57/676. His poe…

Ḥammāl

(693 words)

Author(s): Huart, Cl. | Pellat, Ch.
(a.) “street-porter”, “bearer”. In old towns with narrow winding streets, the use of porters is indispensable for the transport of packages, cases, furniture, etc., which elsewhere is effected by means of beasts of burden, carts or, at the present day, by motor vehicles. The most elementary equipment used by the ḥammāl is a simple rope, fairly thick, which he first ties round the object to be carried and then loops over his forehead; in this way the burden is held on the porter’s back, and he controls its lateral movement …

K̲h̲ayma

(5,810 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch. | Chelhod, J. | Bosworth, C.E.
(a.) “tent”. When the ancient poets and the writers of the Middle Ages spoke of a nomad’s tent they generally described it by the very widely-known Semitic term bayt [ q.v.], which refers to a dwelling of some kind, either permanent or temporary, and so is not without ambiguity. A more precise term is bayt s̲h̲aʿar , lit. “dwelling of hair”. But this word can also cause confusion since the ductus is the same as in bayt s̲h̲iʿr , “verse of poetry”. There is, however, less confusion in the spoken language and the expression has a typically bedouin air;…

al-Mad̲j̲d̲h̲ūb

(279 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, surname of the Moroccan holy man whose complete name is Abū Zayd ʿAbd al-Raḥmān b. ʿAyyād al-Ṣanhād̲j̲ī al-Farad̲j̲ī al-Dukkālī. He came originally from Tīṭ, in the district of Azemmūr, but lived in Fās, where one of his disciples was in particular Abū ’l-Maḥāsin Yūsuf al-Fāsī, whose great-grandson, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān b. ʿAbd al-Ḳādir [see al-Fāsī, in Suppl.] left behind a work called Ibtihād̲j̲ al-ḳulūb bi-k̲h̲abar al-s̲h̲ayk̲h̲ Abi ’l-Maḥāsin wa-s̲h̲ayk̲h̲ihi al-Mad̲j̲d̲h̲ūb (extracts ¶ in ms. Rabat 522/6; see Lévi-Provençal, Catalogue , 252). ʿAbd al…

al-ʿArd̲j̲ī

(265 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿUmar, great-grandson of the Caliph ʿUt̲h̲mān, and a poet regarded as the best of those who belonged to the Umayyad family. Of a generous but violent disposition, he tried to play a part in politics and took part in several ¶ expeditions (especially with Maslama b. ʿAbd al-Malik, against the Byzantines), but, thwarted of power, he retired to the Ḥid̲j̲āz, dividing his time between Mecca and one of his estates near al-Ṭāʾif, al-ʿArd̲j̲, from which he took his nisba . Reduced to a life of idleness, like so many of the aristocracy of the Ḥid̲j…

Miḥrāt̲h̲

(2,497 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
(a.) and its plur. maḥārīt̲h̲ are used more frequently than the doublet miḥrat̲h̲ , plur. maḥārit̲h̲ , to designate today a plough, but these terms are applied more specifically, in mediaeval literature, to the tiller, which is not equipped with wheels or a mould-board or a coulter, but consists essentially of a ploughshare, a crossbeam, a handle and a pole (or beam). Although it goes back to the earliest antiquity, this agricultural implement is still in use, without modification of note, throughout the Islamic world. While miḥrāt̲h̲ , unknown in the Ḳurʾān,…

al-Muk̲h̲tār b. ʿAwf al-Azdī, K̲h̲arid̲j̲ite agitator, also well-known by his kunya Abū Hamza

(513 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
A native of Baṣra, he carried out part of his activity in Mecca, where he used to go in order to stir up revolt against the Umayyad caliph Marwān II b. Muḥammad [ q.v.]. At the instance of Abū ʿUbayda Muslim b. Abī Karīma, alias Karzīn, a traditionist who was the leader of the Ibāḍis of Baṣra, he became, from 128/745-6 onwards, a supporter of ʿAbd Allāh b. Yaḥyā, surnamed Ṭālib al-Ḥaḳḳ [ q.v.], whom he met in Mecca, followed to Ḥaḍramawt and recognised as Imām . When the latter decided to occupy the Holy Cities, he sent to the north an army of a thousand men…

Ḳatāda b. Diʿāma

(256 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
b. ḳatāda al-sadūsī , abu’l-k̲h̲aṭṭāb , a Successor, who was blind from birth and who became proverbial (see, e.g., Ibn Bassām, D̲h̲ak̲h̲īra . i/1, 2) for his prodigious memory and his knowledge about genealogies, lexicography, historical traditions, Ḳurʾānic exegesis and the readings, and ḥadīt̲h̲ . Of Bedouin origin, he spent his life in Baṣra, where he is said to have gone about without a guide. He was the pupil of al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī and Ibn Sīrīn, and also transmitted the Ṣaḥīfa of D̲j̲ābir b. ʿAbd Allāh (Goldziher, Muh . Stud ., ii, 10, Eng. tr. ii, 23). He…

Ayt

(230 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, a Berber word meaning “sons of”, the singular of which, w (and var.: u, aw, ǝg , ag( g), i) appears in compounds and before proper nouns. Ayt consists of a suffix of number t, a complementary element a and the radical velar sonant w palatalised as the second element of a diphthong; it is known to most of the Berber dialects, which use it either in compounds (thus: ayt - ma “sons of mother = brothers”), or before a proper noun to indicate a tribe (Ayt Izdǝg, Ayt Warayn, etc.), in the same conditions as the Arabic Banū (> Bnī ) or Awlād (> Ülǟd ); in the more evolved dialects, Ayt tends to be replaced by t…

al-Ḳubba

(829 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, Ḳubbat al-ʿĀlam , Ḳ. al-Arḍ , Ḳ. Arīn “the dome of the world, of the earth, of Arīn”, expressions used by the Islamic geographers and astronomers to denote the geographical centre of the earth ( wasaṭ al-arḍ )at the zenith of which exists the ḳubbat al-samāʾ or wasaṭ al-samāʾ ; the ḳubbat al-arḍ , defined as being equidistant from the four cardinal points or d̲j̲ihāt (see e.g. Ibn Rustih, 8, tr. Wiet, 7), is theoretically to be found at 90° from each of the poles and meridians of longitude zero and 180°, passing through the two extremi…

al-Fāsī

(1,362 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, individual nisba of the members of a prominent family of Moroccan scholars. Descended from the Ḳurays̲h̲ite clan of the Banū Fihr, originally established in Spain but settling in Fās at the end of the 10th/16th century, this family is known collectively under the name Fāsiyyūn, while the citizens of the town are called rather Ahl/Āl Fās. In view of the fact that the article ¶ al-fāsiyyūn in Volume II of the EI deals with the population of Fās in general, it has been considered useful to collect in this Supplement the basic facts relating to the members of this lin…

Iyās b. Ḳabīṣa

(593 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
al-Ṭāʾī , a pre-Islamic individual who played a certain role in the relations between Arabs and Persians, but whose biography is not absolutely clear. According to Ibn al-Kalbī-Caskel ( Ǧamharat an-nasab, Tab. 252, and ii, 361), his genealogy appears to be as follows: Iyās b. Ḳabīṣa b. Abī ʿUfr/ʿAfrā b. al-Nuʿmān b. Ḥayya b. Saʿna b. al-Ḥārit̲h̲ b. al-Ḥuwayrit̲h̲ b. Rabīʿa b. Mālik b. Safr b. Hinʾ b. ʿAmr b. al-G̲h̲awt̲h̲ b. Ṭayyiʾ (thus his nisba is to be amended in the article d̲h̲ū Ḳār ). This Arab chieftain succeeded in gaining the favour of Ḵh̲usraw Aparwīz (Kisrā Abarwīz), …

Ḥayawān

(13,196 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch. | Sourdel-Thomine, J. | Elwell-Sutton, L.P. | Boratav, P.N.
“the animal kingdom”, Arabic word derived from a Semitic root (cf. Hebrew ) implying a notion of life ( ḥayāt [ q.v.]). It is attested only once in the Ḳurʾān (XXIX, 64), where it means “the true life” and is used of the other world; the dictionaries state that a spring of Paradise is also called by this name, but the most usual meaning of ḥayawān , used as a singular or a collective, is an animal or animals in general, including man, who is more precisely called al-ḥayawān al-nāṭiḳ . 1. Lexicography. The fauna of the Arabian peninsula has been covered under al-ʿarab , d̲j̲azīrat …

Ḥamza b. Bīḍ

(453 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
al-Ḥanafī al-Kūfī (the spelling Bīḍ is attested by a verse where this name rhymes with tanbīḍ al-D̲j̲āḥiẓ, Bayān , ed. Hārūn, iv, 47), is one of those Arab poets, full of wit and verve, ¶ whom the great men of the day did not take seriously but loaded with riches to gain their eulogies and escape their sarcasms, for they were quick to get the laugh on their side and, free of all scruples, did not hesitate to use blackmail. Ḥamza b. Bīḍ, who is treated by his biographers with indulgence and sympathy, is said to have succeeded in extracting from the great men whose company he frequented a million dirhams

Muṣʿab

(722 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Muṣʿab b. T̲h̲ābit b. ʿAbd Allāh b. al-Zubayr b. al-ʿAwwām al-zubayrī , Abū ʿAbd Allāh, genealogist who owes his fame to two works, the Kitāb al-Nasab al-kabīr , considered to be lost, and the Kitāb Nasab Ḳurays̲h̲ , edited by E. Lévi-Provençal, Cairo 1953. This Ḳurays̲h̲ite was born in Medina, probably in 156/773, a descendant of the Companion al-Zubayr b. al-ʿAwwām [ q.v.]. He followed the teaching of various masters, including Mālik b. Anas [ q.v.], before settling at Bag̲h̲dād where he died, at the age of 80, on 2 S̲h̲awwāl 236/8 April 851 (the Fihrist

Ḥārit̲h̲a b. Badr al-G̲h̲udānī

(399 words)

Author(s): Lammens, H. | Pellat, Ch.
poet and notable of the Tamīmī clan of the Banū G̲h̲udāna, at Baṣra. Born probably shortly before the Hid̲j̲ra, he appears while still young to have been a follower of the prophetess Sad̲j̲āḥi [ q.v.] and then, having settled in Baṣra, he fought at the battle of the Camel [see al-d̲j̲amal ] against ʿAlī, but afterwards joined his cause; however, as soon as Ziyād arrived in ʿIrāḳ in 45/666 he became a fervent supporter of the new governor, who finally entered him on the tribal pay-roll of the Ḳurays̲h̲ to increase his emolum…

Ibn Wahbūn

(456 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, Abū Muḥammad ʿAbd al-D̲j̲alīl b. Wahbūn , Arab poet of Spain, whose career was passed at the court of the master of Seville, al-Muʿtamid Ibn ʿAbbād [ q.v.]. Born at Murcia, probably about 430-40/1039-49, into a family of humble origin, he went to seek his fortune at Seville, where he was the pupil of the philologist al-Aʿlam al-S̲h̲antamarī [ q.v.] and formed a friendship with the vizier and poet Ibn ʿAmmār [ q.v.] before being admitted to the court, in circumstances which are variously reported. He then became one of the official panegyrists of al-Muʿtamid and mad…

Ḥammād ʿAd̲j̲rad

(1,001 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
(in status constructus), Arab satirical poet whose genealogy has not been exactly established; his kunya , Abū ʿUmar, would justify the following: Ḥammād b. ʿUmar b. Yūnus (rather than b. Yaḥyā or Yūnus b. ʿUmar) b. Kulayb al-Kūfī. Born at the latest at the beginning of the 2nd/8th century, this mawlā of a clan of the ʿĀmīr b. Ṣaʿṣaʿa probably owes his by-name ( ʿad̲j̲rad = completely naked) to the saying of a Bedouin. His biographers agree in declaring that he achieved fame only under the ʿAbbāsids, but they do not fail to point out th…

ʿAdī b. al-Riḳāʿ

(167 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, Abū Duʾād ʿAdī b. Zayd b. Mālik b. ʿAdī b. al-Riḳāʿ al-ʿĀmilī , Arab poet of Syria, who was, in Damascus, the panegyrist of the Umayyads, especially of al-Walīd b. ʿAbd al-Malik (86-96/705-15), in the presence of whom he fought a poetical contest with Ḏj̲arīr; he was also the butt of attacks by al-Rāʿī. ʿAdī was celebrated for the grace of his nasīb (see especially al-Mubarrad, al-Kāmil , 85, concerning Umm al-Ḳāsim) and for the care with which he composed his poems. His poems were known in Spain at an early date ( BAH, ix, 397). He lived at least into the caliphate of Sulaymān b. ʿAbd…

ʿArīb b. Saʿd al-Kātib al-Ḳurṭubī

(396 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, an Andalusian mawlā who held various official posts (he was in particular ʿāmil of the district of Osuna in 331/943), lived in the entourage of al-Muṣḥafī [ q.v.] and Ibn Abī ʿĀmir [see al-manṣūr] and was the secretary of the Umayyad caliph al-Ḥakam II (350-66/961-76); the date of his death is not known, but is put by Pons Boigues at about 370/980. A man of wide learning, ʿArīb distinguished himself as physician and poet, but is primarily known for his work as a historian. He was in fact the author of a résumé of the Annals of al-Ṭabarī, which he continue…

Ahaggar

(755 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, a Berber word denoting (a) the members (pl. ihaggarən ) of one of the noble tribes constituting the former group of the Northern Tuaregs [ q.v.], and (b) one of these tribes (Kəl Ahaggar or Ihaggarən), inhabiting a region to which it has given the name of Ahaggar (Hoggar). In its widest sense, the Ahaggar is the group of territories under the dominion of the Kəl Ahaggar. It covers an area of about 200,000 sq. miles between lat. 21°-25° N and long. 3°-6° E. Bounded by mountain massifs (the Ahanəf to the E., the Tassili of the Ajjər to the N.-E., the Immidir to the N., the Adrar of the Ifog̲h̲as [ q.v.] an…

Nābita

(544 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, (a.), a term of Classical Arabic which means in particular “rising generation”, but one which today has acquired the pejorative sense of “bad lot, rogue” which the plural nawābit and the expression nābitat s̲h̲arr previously possessed. These meanings were noted by the mediaeval lexicographers, but one finds in Ibn al-Nadīm a section ( Fihrist , ed. Cairo, 255-7, ed. Tad̲j̲addud, 229-31) devoted to the mutakallimū ’l-mud̲j̲bira [see d̲j̲abriyya ] and to the nābitat al-ḥas̲h̲wiyya , amongst whom the main exponent was allegedly Ibn Kullāb [ q.v. in Suppl.], whilst al-Zamak̲h̲s̲h̲a…

al-Māzarī

(1,176 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad b. ʿAlī b. ʿUmar, jurist of Ifrīḳiya who was surnamed "al-Imām" on account of his learning and his renown. His nisba refers to the Sicilian town of Mazzara ( Māzar in Arabic), the native place of his family, but it is not known whether the latter had emigrated to Ifrīḳiya before his birth, which may be dated at 453/1061 since he died in Rabīʿ I 536/October 1141, at al-Mahdiyya [ q.v.], at the age of 83 lunar years. It was in this last-named town that he settled after completing his traditional studies at Sfax as a pupil of al-Lak̲h̲mī (d. 478/…

Ibn K̲h̲ayr al-Is̲h̲bīlī

(310 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, Abū Bakr Muḥammad b. K̲h̲ayr b. ʿUmar b. K̲h̲alīfa al-Lamtūnī al-Amawī , philologian and traditionist of Seville, where he was born in 502/1108. He became imām of the mosque at Cordova, and died in that city in 575/1179. Ibn K̲h̲ayr, who studied under many teachers in different regions of al-Andalus, owes his fame to the catalogue ( fahrasa [ q.v.]) of the works which he had read and of the teachers who had given him their id̲j̲āza at Seville, Cordova, Almería, Malaga, Granada, etc. This work, called Fahrasat mā rawāhu ʿan s̲h̲uyūk̲h̲i-hi min al-dawāwīn al-muṣannafa fī durūb al-ʿ…

al-Abīwardī

(231 words)

Author(s): Brockelmann, C. | Pellat, Ch.
, Abuʾ l-Muẓaffar Muḥammad b. Aḥmad , Arab poet and genealogist, a descendant of ʿAnbasa b. Abī Sufyān (of the Umayyad lineage of the younger Muʿāwiya). He was born in Abīward (Ḵh̲urāsān), or more exactly in the village of Kawfan (not Kūḳan) near Abīward (he is therefore sometimes called al-Kawfanī), and died from poison in Iṣfahān in 507/1113 (not 557/1161-2). His philological and historico-genealogical works, notably a history of Abīward and a book on the different and identical names of the Arab tribes, are lost; but al-Kaysarānī extensively used the latter work. Of his dīwān

al-Azdī

(332 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, ismāʿīl b. isḥāḳ b. ismāʿīl b. ḥammād b. zayd , abū isḥāḳ al-ḳāḍī (199-282/814-95), Mālikī faḳīh , originally from Baṣra, who in 246/860 succeeded Sawwār b. ʿAbd Allāh as ḳāḍī of Bag̲h̲dād East. After having been removed from office in 255-6/869-70, he was restored to office, transferred to Bag̲h̲dād West in 258/871-2 and then given charge of both halves of the city from 262/876 till his death; he was then supreme ḳāḍī without having the official title, although currently described as ḳāḍīl-ḳuḍāt . He was also sent as an envoy to the Ṣaffārid who had i…

Aménokal

(311 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, the current spelling of the Berber amənūkal , meaning "any political leader not subordinate to anyone else"; it is applied to foreign rulers, to highranking European leaders, and to the male members of certain noble families; in some regions of the Sahara, the title of amənūkal is given to the chiefs of small tribal groups, but in the Ahaggar [ q.v.], it is only conferred on the overlord of a confederation of noble or subject tribes. The amənūkal must be selected from among the Ihaggarən nobles, and his nomination is submitted for approval to an assembly of the nobles a…

ʿAmr b. Maʿdīkarib

(293 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
b. ʿabd allāh al-zubaydī , abū thawr , famous Arab warrior and muk̲h̲aḍram poet. Born of a noble Yamanite family, he is depicted as a fighter of uncommon strength who, armed with his legendary sword al-Ṣamṣāma, took part in many battles during the d̲j̲āhiliyya . In 10/631, he went to Medina and was converted to Islam, without, however, making any radical change in his way of life; on the death of the Prophet, he apostatised and took part in the rebellion of al-Aswad al-ʿAnsī [ q.v.]; taken prisoner in the course of the suppression of the ridda by Abū Bakr, he was free…

al-Naḍr b. al-Ḥārit̲h̲

(530 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
b. ʿAlḳama b. Kalada b. ʿAbd Manāf b. ʿAbd al-Dār b. Ḳuṣayy, a rich Kurays̲h̲ite who, in the pre-Islamic period, carried on trade with al-Ḥīra and Persia, from where he is said to have brought back books (?) and to have brought back also one or more singing slave girls ( ḳayna [ q.v.]). He represented ʿAbd al-Dār in the group of the muṭʿimūn , i.e. the Meccans who were charged with supplying food for pilgrims, and he occupied a fairly eminent position in the town. He was a strenuous opponent of the Prophet, scoffing at him and not faili…

ʿIrāḳ

(21,303 words)

Author(s): Miquel, A. | Brice, W.C. | Sourdel, D. | Aubin, J. | Holt, P.M. | Et al.
, a sovereign State, of the Muslim religion, for the most part Arabic-speaking, situated at the eastern end of the Fertile Crescent. i.—Geography The structure of ʿIrāḳ paradoxically derives its originality from the fact that it forms part of a large geographical block of territory. From the Arabo-Syrian desert tableland which it faces along its south-western flank, it takes its general aspect and its climate. All along its frontiers on the North-East, on the other hand, it shares the orientation and ¶ relief of the folded mountain-chains of western Asia, which give it its t…

Muways b. ʿImrān

(793 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
b. Ḏj̲umayʿ b. Ziyād al-Baṣrī , Abu ʿImrān, eminent mawlā of Baṣrā who lived in the second half of the 2nd/8th century. His name is considerably distorted in the sources and in studies, such that the variants encountered include Mūsā (by confusion with Mūsā b. ʿImrān = Moses), Muʾnis, Mawīs, etc.; furthermore, his name would not feature in history at all were it not that al-D̲j̲āḥiẓ [ q.v.] mentions him quite frequently and that he participated in the movement of politico-religious ideas which developed at Baṣra in the 2nd and 3rd/8th-9th centuries. It is under…

Mask̲h̲

(2,372 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
(a.) “metamorphosis”, that is, according to LA, s.v., “transformation of an exterior form ( ṣūra ) into a more ugly form”; the product of the metamorphosis is itself called mask̲h̲ / misk̲h̲ or masīk̲h̲ / mamsūk̲h̲ . Belief in the fact that, as a result of supernatural intervention—divine punishment in the majority of cases—humans have been transformed into animals, statutes or even into stars was as widespread, before Islam, among the Arabs as among the peoples of Antiquity whose mythologies are known to us. The growth of the conc…

Ḥabāba

(335 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, name of a singing slave-girl ( ḳayna [ q.v.]) of Medina who had learnt music and singing from the great singers of the 1st/7th century: Ibn Surayd̲j̲, Mālik, Ibn Muḥriz, Maʿbad, D̲j̲amīla, ʿAzza [ qq.v.]. Her talent, beauty and charm conquered Yazīd b. ʿAbd al-Malik, who finally became her owner in circumstances which the sources describe very variously, but at a date after his accession (S̲h̲aʿbān 101/February 720); she was originally called al-ʿĀliya and it is he who is said to have given her the name by which she has remained famous. Ḥabāba is often associated with another ḳayna of Medin…

Abū Ḥuzāba

(299 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, al-walīd b. ḥunayfa (b. Nahīk in Ṭabarī, ii, 393) al-tamīmī , a minor poet of the 1st/7th century. He was a Bedouin who settled at Baṣra and was a panegyrist, at the time of Ziyād b. Abīhi (45-53/665-72) or shordy after, of ʿAbd Allāh b. K̲h̲ālid b. Asīd, governor of Fārs. His family urged him strongly to join the circle of Yazīd b. Muʿāwiya, before the latter’s assumption of the caliphate (60/680); he finally decided to try his luck, but was not received by the prince, and he retur…

sayyidī/sīdī Muḥammad IV b. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān

(2,050 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, ʿAlawid sovereign who reigned over Morocco 1276-90/1859-73. Born probably around 1230/1815, he was appointed by his father, Mawlāy ʿAbd al-Raḥmān b. His̲h̲ām [ q.v.] as viceroy ( k̲h̲alīfa ) in Marrakesh, where he was to continue to reside after his accession to the throne and to leave behind a certain number of buildings (but less than Sīdī Muḥammad b. ʿAbd Allāh [ q.v.]). Memorable among them are the mausoleum erected in the cemetery ( rawḍa ) of Bāb al-Rubb, the conversion of the ʿArṣat al-Maʿās̲h̲ into a military quarter, the renovation of th…

Anwāʾ

(1,228 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
(a.), a system of computation among the early Arabs. The singular nawʾ , connected with the root nāʾa “to rise with difficulty, to lean, to support a load with difficulty” (cf. Ḳurʾān, xxviii, 76), denotes the acronychal setting of a star or constellation and heliacal rising of its opposite ( raḳīb ); by extension, it is applied to a period of time and, in the language of the later Middle Ages and the modern era, it has come to mean “cloud, rain, storm, tempest” (see Dozy, Suppl ., s.v.; Beaussier, s.v.; H. Wehr, Arab. Wörterbuch , s.v.), on account of the pluvial ro…

ʿAbd Allāh b. Abī Isḥāḳ

(203 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
al-Ḥaḍramī , grammarian and Ḳurʾān-reader from Baṣra, died in 117/735-6. His "exceptional" ( s̲h̲ād̲h̲d̲h̲a ) reading continued the tradition of Ibn ʿAbbās and, in turn, influenced the readings of ʿĪsā b. ʿUmar al-T̲h̲aḳafī and of Abū ʿAmr b. al-ʿAlāʾ. It seems now established that he was the earliest of the real Arab grammarians (cf. Ibrahim Mustafa, Actes du XXI Congrès des Orient., 278-9). He is said to have extended the use of inductive reasoning ( ḳiyās ) and the detail is handed down that in case of doubt he opted for the accusative ( naṣb ). Nothing else is kn…

Maḳāma

(9,755 words)

Author(s): Brockelmann, C. | Pellat, Ch.
, a purely and typically Arabic literary genre. The word is generally translated as “assembly” or “session” (Fr. “séance”), but this is an approximation which does not convey exactly the complex nature of the term. ¶ Semantic evolution of the term. The semantic study of this vocable for the period previous to the creation of the genre is complicated by the fact that the plural maḳāmāt , which is frequently used, is common to two nouns, maḳāma and maḳām [ q.v.]. Both are derived from the radical ḳ-w-m , which implies the idea of “to rise, to stand in order to p…

D̲j̲āwīd̲h̲ān K̲h̲irad

(918 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
(P.) “eternal wisdom”, the title of a kind of Iranian Fürstenspiegel whose earliest known mention, occurs in a work by al-D̲j̲āḥiẓ, now lost, containing the memorable sayings of wise men and poets (see al-Ḵh̲afād̲j̲ī, Ṭirāz , 108), the Istiṭālat al-fahm . Judging by an extract which has been preserved, this author recounts, on the authority of al-Wāḳidī, the conditions in which the Ḏj̲āwīd̲h̲ān k̲h̲irad , the spiritual testament written “just after the Flood” by the mythical king Hūs̲h̲ang [ q.v.] for his sons and successors, was allegedly rediscovered. When al-Maʾmūn was …

ʿAzza Al-Maylāʾ

(182 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, “ʿAzza with the graceful walk”, celebrated singer and lu te player of Medina, mawlāt of the Anṣār, died probably before the end of the 1st/7th century, after a long career. A pupil of Sāʾib Ḵh̲ātir and Nas̲h̲īṭ, singers of Persian origin, then of Rāʾiḳa and D̲j̲amīla [ q.v.], she in her turn numbered among her pupils such famous singers as Ibn Muḥriz and Ibn Surayd̲j̲ [ q.v.], but, unlike D̲j̲amīla. she did not form an actual school. She ¶ differed from the latter, too as regards her practice of giving recitals in aristocratie households, but she also used to receive in …

Ḳurṣān

(7,462 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch. | Imber, C.H. | Kelly, J.B.
(A.), pl. ḳarāsina and also ḳarāṣin/ḳarāṣīn , “corsair, pirate”, stems from Italian corsale , which has further given forms closer to the original but less commonly-found, such as ḳurṣāl , pl. ḳarāṣil/ ḳarāṣīl , and kursālī , pl. kursāliyya . In turn, Arabic has formed the abstract noun ḳarṣana “privateering, piracy”, still in use today, as is also ḳurṣān , sometimes conceived of as a plural. In the colloquial there is further the verb ḳarṣan “to raid, act as a pirate”, and the dialects also given to ḳurṣān the double sense of “corsair” and “boat”. This latter term was an Andalusi…

Mat̲h̲alib

(1,650 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
(a.), pl. of mat̲h̲la/uba , from the root t̲h̲.l.b ., which means “to criticise, to blame, to slander, to point out faults with the intention of being hurtful”. Although it is not a Ḳurʾānic term, it is attested from ancient times and has been used continuously until to-day to mean “faults, vices, defects, disgrace, etc.” (see further, Wehr). In earliest times and in the first centuries of Islam, it had a specialised usage, for it was broadly applied to what were regarded as subjects of shame for the tribes, the ethnic groups or even clans, rather than…

Miskīn al-Dārimī

(972 words)

Author(s): Pellat, Ch.
, the sobriquet and nisba of a poet from Tamīm of ʿIrāḳ, whose real name was Rabīʿa b. ʿĀmir b. Unayf b. S̲h̲urayḥ... b. Dārim (see his genealogy in Ibn al-Kalbī-Caskel, D̲j̲amhara , Tab. 60, and Register, ii, 409) and who lived in the 1st/7th century (Yāḳūt, Udabāʾ , xi, 132, fixes the date of his death in 89/708). The biographical notices which concern him tell us that he was very dark, handsome, courageous, and eloquent, but they give little information about his family and his offspring (he is said to have had a son called ʿUtba or ʿUḳba but Ibn Ḳutayba, S̲h̲iʿr , Cairo …
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