Текст книги "Literary History of the Arabs "

Автор книги: Reynolds Nicholson

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It was the lust of conquest even more than missionary zeal that caused the Arabs to invade Syria and Persia and to settle on foreign soil, where they lived as soldiers at the expense of the native population whom they inevitably regarded as an inferior race. If the latter thought to win The non-Arabian Moslems. respect by embracing the religion of their conquerors, they found themselves sadly mistaken. The new converts were attached as clients ( Mawálí, sing. Mawlá) to an Arab tribe: they could not become Moslems on any other footing. Far from obtaining the equal rights which they coveted, and which, according to the principles of Islam, they should have enjoyed, the Mawálíwere treated by their aristocratic patrons with contempt, and had to submit to every kind of social degradation, while instead of being exempted from the capitation-tax paid by non-Moslems, they still remained liable to the ever-increasing exactions of Government officials. And these 'Clients,' be it remembered, were not ignorant serfs, but men whose culture was acknowledged by the Arabs themselves—men who formed the backbone of the influential learned class and ardently prosecuted those studies, Divinity and Jurisprudence, which were then held in highest esteem. Here was a situation full of danger. Against Shí‘ites and Khárijites the Umayyads might claim with some show of reason to represent the cause of law and order, if not of Islam; against the bitter cry of the oppressed Mawálíthey had no argument save the sword.

We have referred above to the universal belief of Moslems in a Messiah and to the extraordinary influence of that belief on their religious and political history. No Presages of the Revolution. wonder that in this unhappy epoch thousands of people, utterly disgusted with life as they found it, should have indulged in visions of 'a good time coming,' which was expected to coincide with the end of the first century of the Hijra. Mysterious predictions, dark sayings attributed to Muḥammad himself, prophecies of war and deliverance floated to and fro. Men pored over apocryphal books, and asked whether the days of confusion and slaughter ( al-harj), which, it is known, shall herald the appearance of the Mahdí, had not actually begun.

The final struggle was short and decisive. When it closed, the Umayyads and with them the dominion of the Arabs had passed away. Alike in politics and literature, the Persian race asserted its supremacy. We shall now relate the story of this Revolution as briefly as possible, leaving the results to be considered in a new chapter.

While the Shí‘ite missionaries ( du‘át, sing. dá‘í) were actively engaged in canvassing for their party, which, as we The ‘Abbásids. have seen, recognised in ‘Alí and his descendants the only legitimate successors to Muḥammad, another branch of the Prophet's family—the ‘Abbásids—had entered the field with the secret intention of turning the labours of the ‘Alids to their own advantage. From their ancestor, ‘Abbás, the Prophet's uncle, they inherited those qualities of caution, duplicity, and worldly wisdom which ensure success in political intrigue. ‘Abdulláh, the son of ‘Abbás, devoted his talents to theology and interpretation of the Koran. He "passes for one of the strongest pillars of religious tradition; but, in the eyes of unprejudiced European research, he is only a crafty liar." His descendants "lived in deep retirement in Ḥumayma, a little place to the south of the Dead Sea, seemingly far withdrawn from the world, but which, on account of its proximity to the route by which Syrian pilgrims went to Mecca, afforded opportunities for communication with the remotest lands of Islam. From this centre they carried on ‘Abbásid propaganda in Khurásán. the propaganda in their own behalf with the utmost skill. They had genius enough to see that the best soil for their efforts was the distant Khurásán—that is, the extensive north-eastern provinces of the old Persian Empire."472 These countries were inhabited by a brave and high-spirited people who in consequence of their intolerable sufferings under the Umayyad tyranny, the devastation of their homes and the almost servile condition to which they had been reduced, were eager to join in any desperate enterprise that gave them hope of relief. Moreover, the Arabs in Khurásán were already to a large extent Persianised: they had Persian wives, wore trousers, drank wine, and kept the festivals of Nawrúz and Mihrgán; while the Persian language was generally understood and even spoken among them.473 Many interesting details as to the methods of the ‘Abbásid emissaries will be found in Van Vloten's admirable work.474 Starting from Kúfa, the residence of the Grand Master who directed the whole agitation, they went to and fro in the guise of merchants or pilgrims, cunningly adapting their doctrine to the intelligence of those whom they sought to enlist. Like the Shí‘ites, they canvassed for 'the House of the Prophet,' an ambiguous expression which might equally well be applied to the descendants of ‘Alí or of ‘Abbás, as is shown by the following table:—

It was, of course, absolutely essential to the ‘Abbásids that they should be able to count on the support of the powerful Shí‘ite organisation, which, ever since the abortive The Shí‘ites join hands with the ‘Abbásids. rebellion headed by Mukhtár (see p. 218 supra) had drawn vast numbers of Persian Mawálíinto its ranks. Now, of the two main parties of the Shí‘a, viz., the Háshimites or followers of Muḥammad Ibnu ’l-Ḥanafiyya, and the Imámites, who pinned their faith to the descendants of the Prophet through his daughter Fáṭima, the former had virtually identified themselves with the ‘Abbásids, inasmuch as the Imám Abú Háshim, who died in 716 a.d., bequeathed his hereditary rights to Muḥammad b. ‘Alí, the head of the House of ‘Abbás. It only remained to hoodwink the Imámites. Accordingly the ‘Abbásid emissaries were instructed to carry on their propaganda in the name of Háshim, the common ancestor of ‘Abbás and ‘Alí. By means of this ruse they obtained a free hand in Khurásán, and made such progress that the governor of that province, Naṣr b. Sayyár, wrote to the Umayyad Caliph, Marwán, asking for reinforcements, and informing him that two hundred thousand men had sworn allegiance to Abú Muslim, the principal ‘Abbásid agent. At the foot of his letter he added these lines:—

"I see the coal's red glow beneath the embers,And 'tis about to blaze!The rubbing of two sticks enkindles fire,And out of words come frays.'Oh! is Umayya's House awake or sleeping?'I cry in sore amaze."475

We have other verses by this gallant and loyal officer in which he implores the Arab troops stationed in Khurásán, who were paralysed by tribal dissensions, to turn their swords against "a mixed rabble without religion or nobility":—

"'Death to the Arabs'—that is all their creed."476

These warnings, however, were of no avail, and on June 9th, a.d. 747, Abú Muslim displayed the black banner of the ‘Abbásids at Siqadanj, near Merv, which city he occupied a few months later. The triumphant advance of the armies of the Revolution towards Declaration of war. Damascus recalls the celebrated campaign of Cæsar, when after crossing the Rubicon he marched on Rome. Nor is Abú Muslim, though a freedman of obscure parentage—he was certainly no Arab—unworthy to be compared with the great patrician. "He united," says Nöldeke, "with an agitator's adroitness and perfect unscrupulosity in the choice of means the energy and clear outlook of a general and statesman, Abú Muslim. and even of a monarch."477 Grim, ruthless, disdaining the pleasures of ordinary men, he possessed the faculty in which Cæsar excelled of inspiring blind obedience and enthusiastic devotion. To complete the parallel, we may mention here that Abú Muslim was treacherously murdered by Manṣúr, the second Caliph of the House which he had raised to the throne, from motives exactly resembling those which Shakespeare has put in the mouth of Brutus—

"So Caesar may:Then, lest he may, prevent. And since the quarrelWill bear no colour for the thing he is,Fashion it thus: that what he is, augmented,Would run to these and these extremities;And therefore think him as a serpent's eggWhich, hatched, would as his kind grow mischievous,And kill him in the shell."

The downfall of the Umayyads was hastened by the perfidy and selfishness of the Arabs on whom they relied: the old feud between Muḍar and Yemen broke out afresh, and while the Northern group remained loyal to the dynasty, those of Yemenite stock more or less openly threw in their lot with the Revolution. We need not attempt to trace the course of the unequal contest. Everywhere the Arabs, disheartened and divided, fell an easy prey to their adversaries, and all was lost when Marwán, the last Umayyad Caliph, sustained a crushing defeat on the River Záb in Babylonia (January, a.d. 750). Meanwhile Abu ’l-‘Abbás, the head of the rival House, had already received homage as Caliph (November, 749 a.d.). In the inaugural address which he delivered in the great Mosque of Kúfa, he called Accession of Abu ’l-‘Abbás al-Saffáḥ. himself al-Saffáḥ, i.e., 'the Blood-shedder,'478 and this title has deservedly stuck to him, though it might have been assumed with no less justice by his brother Mansúr and other members of his family. All Umayyads were remorselessly hunted down and massacred in cold blood—even those who surrendered only on the strength of the most solemn pledges that they had nothing to fear. A small remnant made their escape, or managed to find shelter until the storm of fury and vengeance, which spared neither the dead nor the living,479 had blown over. One stripling, named ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán, fled to North Africa, and after meeting with many perilous adventures founded a new Umayyad dynasty in Spain.

CHAPTER VI

THE CALIPHS OF BAGHDÁD

The annals of the ‘Abbásid dynasty from the accession of Saffáḥ (a.d. 749) to the death of Musta‘ṣim, and the destruction of Baghdád by the Mongols (a.d. 1258) make a round sum of five centuries. I propose to sketch the history of this long period in three chapters, of which the first will offer a general view of the more important literary and political developments so far as is possible in the limited space at my command; the second will be devoted to the great poets, scholars, historians, philosophers, and scientists who flourished in this, the Golden Age of Muḥammadan literature; while in the third some account will be given of the chief religious movements and of the trend of religious thought.

The empire founded by the Caliph ‘Umar and administered by the Umayyads was essentially, as the reader will have gathered, a military organisation for the benefit of the paramount race. In theory, no doubt, all Moslems were equal, but in fact the Arabs alone ruled—a privilege which national pride conspired with personal interest to maintain. We have seen how the Persian Moslems asserted their right to a share in the government. The Revolution Political results of the Revolution. which enthroned the ‘Abbásids marks the beginning of a Moslem, as opposed to an Arabian, Empire. The new dynasty, owing its rise to the people of Persia, and especially of Khurásán, could exist only by establishing a balance of power between Persians and Arabs. That this policy was not permanently successful will surprise no one who considers the widely diverse characteristics of the two races, but for the next fifty years the rivals worked together in tolerable harmony, thanks to the genius of Manṣúr and the conciliatory influence of the Barmecides, by whose overthrow the alliance was virtually dissolved. In the ensuing civil war between the sons of Hárún al-Rashíd the Arabs fought on the side of Amín while the Persians supported Ma’mún, and henceforth each race began to follow an independent path. The process of separation, however, was very gradual, and long before it was completed the religious and intellectual life of both nationalities had become inseparably mingled in the full stream of Moslem civilisation.

The centre of this civilisation was the province of ‘Iráq (Babylonia), with its renowned metropolis, Baghdád, 'the The choice of a new capital. City of Peace' ( Madínatu ’l-Salám). Only here could the ‘Abbásids feel themselves at home. "Damascus, peopled by the dependants of the Omayyads, was out of the question. On the one hand it was too far from Persia, whence the power of the ‘Abbásids was chiefly derived; on the other hand it was dangerously near the Greek frontier, and from here, during the troublous reigns of the last Omayyads, hostile incursions on the part of the Christians had begun to avenge former defeats. It was also beginning to be evident that the conquests of Islam would, in the future, lie to the eastward towards Central Asia, rather than to the westward at the further expense of the Byzantines. Damascus, on the highland of Syria, lay, so to speak, dominating the Mediterranean and looking westward, but the new capital that was to supplant it must face east, be near Persia, and for the needs of commerce have water communication with the sea. Hence everything pointed to a site on either the Euphrates or the Tigris, and the ‘Abbásids were not slow to make their choice."480 After carefully examining various sites, the Caliph Manṣúr fixed on a little Persian village, on the west bank of the Tigris, called Baghdád, which, being interpreted, means Foundation of Baghdád. 'given (or 'founded') by God'; and in a.d. 762 the walls of the new city began to rise. Manṣúr laid the first brick with his own hand, and the work was pushed forward with astonishing rapidity under his personal direction by masons, architects, and surveyors, whom he gathered out of different countries, so that 'the Round City,' as he planned it, was actually finished within the short space of four years.

The same circumstances which caused the seat of empire to be transferred to Baghdád brought about a corresponding change in the whole system of government. Whereas the Umayyads had been little more than heads of a turbulent Arabian aristocracy, their successors reverted to the old type of Oriental despotism with which the Persians had been familiar since the days of Darius and Xerxes. Surrounded by a strong bodyguard of troops from Khurásán, on whose devotion they could rely, the ‘Abbásids ruled Despotic character of ‘Abbásid rule. with absolute authority over the lives and properties or their subjects, even as the Sásánian monarchs had ruled before them. Persian fashions were imitated at the court, which was thronged with the Caliph's relatives and freedmen (not to mention his womenfolk), besides a vast array of uniformed and decorated officials. Chief amongst these latter stood two personages who figure prominently in the Arabian Nights—the Vizier and the Executioner. The office of Vizier is probably of Persian origin, although in Professor De Goeje's opinion the word itself is Arabic.481 The first who bore this title in ‘Abbásid times was Abú Salama, the minister of Saffáḥ: he was called Wazíru Áli Muḥammad ⁱⁿ, 'the Vizier of Muḥammad's Family.' It The Vizier. was the duty of the Vizier to act as intermediary between the omnipotent sovereign and his people, to counsel him in affairs of State, and, above all, to keep His Majesty in good humour. He wielded enormous power, but was exposed to every sort of intrigue, and never knew when he might be interned in a dungeon or despatched in the twinkling of an eye by the grim functionary presiding over the naṭ‘, or circular carpet of leather, which lay beside the throne and served as a scaffold.

We can distinguish two periods in the history of the ‘Abbásid House: one of brilliant prosperity inaugurated by Two periods of ‘Abbásid history. Manṣúr and including the reigns of Mahdí, Hárún al-Rashíd, Ma’mún, Mu‘tasim, and Wáthiq—that is to say, nearly a hundred years in all (754-847 a.d.); the other, more than four times as long, commencing with Mutawakkil (847-861 a.d.)—a period of decline rapidly sinking, after a brief interval which gave promise of better things, into irremediable decay.482

Cruel and treacherous, like most of his family, Abú Ja‘far Manṣúr was perhaps the greatest ruler whom the ‘Abbásids Reign of Manṣúr (754-775 a.d.). produced.483 He had to fight hard for his throne. The ‘Alids, who deemed themselves the true heirs of the Prophet in virtue of their descent from Fáṭima, rose in rebellion against the usurper, surprised him in an unguarded moment, and drove him to such straits that during seven weeks he never changed his dress except for public prayers. But once more the ‘Alids proved incapable of grasping their opportunity. The leaders, Muḥammad, who was known as 'The Pure Soul' ( al-Nafs al-zakiyya), and his brother Ibráhím, fell on the battle-field. Under Mahdí Outbreaks in Persia. and Hárún members of the House of ‘Alí continued to 'come out,' but with no better success. In Eastern Persia, where strong national feelings interwove themselves with Pre-Muḥammadan religious ideas, those of Mazdak and Zoroaster in particular, the ‘Abbásids encountered a formidable opposition which proclaimed its vigour and tenacity by the successive revolts of Sinbádh the Magian (755-756 a.d.), Ustádhsís (766-768), Muqanna‘, the 'Veiled Prophet of Khurásán' (780-786), and Bábak the Khurramite (816-838).484

Manṣúr said to his son Mahdi, "O Abú ‘Abdalláh, when you sit in company, always have divines to converse with you; Manṣúr's advice to Mahdí. for Muḥammad b. Shiháb al-Zuhrí said, 'The word ḥadíth(Apostolic Tradition) is masculine: only virile men love it, and only effeminate men dislike it'; and he spoke the truth."485

On one occasion a poet came to Mahdí, who was then heir-apparent, at Rayy, and recited a panegyric in his honour. The prince gave him 20,000 dirhems. Thereupon the postmaster of Rayy informed Manṣúr, who wrote to his son Manṣúr and the poet. reproaching him for such extravagance. "What you should have done," he said, "was to let him wait a year at your door, and after that time bestow on him 4,000 dirhems." He then caused the poet to be arrested and brought into his presence. "You went to a heedless youth and cajoled him?" "Yes, God save the Commander of the Faithful, I went to a heedless, generous youth and cajoled him, and he suffered himself to be cajoled." "Recite your eulogy of him." The poet obeyed, not forgetting to conclude his verses with a compliment to Manṣúr. "Bravo!" cried the Caliph, "but they are not worth 20,000 dirhems. Where is the money?" On its being produced he made him a gift of 4,000 dirhems and confiscated the remainder.486

Notwithstanding irreconcilable parties—‘Alids, Persian extremists, and (we may add) Khárijites—the policy of The Barmecides. rapprochementwas on the whole extraordinarily effective. In carrying it out the Caliphs received powerful assistance from a noble and ancient Persian family, the celebrated Barmakites or Barmecides. According to Mas‘údí,487 Barmak was originally a title borne by the High Priest ( sádin) of the great Magian fire-temple at Balkh. Khálid, the son of one of these dignitaries—whence he and his descendants were called Barmakites ( Barámika)—held the most important offices of state under Saffáḥ and Manṣúr. Yaḥyá, the son of Khálid, was entrusted with the education of Hárún al-Rashíd, and on the accession of the young prince he was appointed Grand Vizier. "My Yaḥyá b. Khálid. dear father!" said the Caliph, "it is through the blessings and the good fortune which attend you, and through your excellent management, that I am seated on the throne;488 so I commit to you the direction of affairs." He then handed to him his signet-ring. Yaḥyá was distinguished (says the biographer) for wisdom, nobleness of mind, and elegance of language.489 Although he took a truly Persian delight in philosophical discussion, for which purpose freethinking scholars and eminent heretics used often to meet in his house, he was careful to observe the outward forms of piety. It may be said of the ‘Abbásids generally that, whatever they might do or think in private, they wore the official badge of Islam ostentatiously on their sleeves. The following verses which Yaḥyá addressed to his son Faḍl are very characteristic:—490

"Seek glory while 'tis day, no effort spare,And patiently the loved one's absence bear;But when the shades of night advancing slowO'er every vice a veil of darkness throw,Beguile the hours with all thy heart's delight:The day of prudent men begins at night.Many there be, esteemed of life austere,Who nightly enter on a strange career.Night o'er them keeps her sable curtain drawn,And merrily they pass from eve to dawn.Who but a fool his pleasures would exposeTo spying rivals and censorious foes?"

For seventeen years Yaḥyá and his two sons, Faḍl and Ja‘far, remained deep in Hárún's confidence and virtual rulers Fall of the Barmecides (803 a.d.). of the State until, from motives which have been variously explained, the Caliph resolved to rid himself of the whole family. The story is too well known to need repetition.491 Ja‘far alone was put to death: we may conclude, therefore, that he had specially excited the Caliph's anger; and those who ascribe the catastrophe to his romantic love-affair with Hárún's sister, ‘Abbása, are probably in the right.492 Hárún himself seems to have recognised, when it was too late, how much he owed to these great Persian barons whose tactful administration, unbounded generosity, and munificent patronage of literature have shed immortal lustre on his reign. Afterwards, if any persons spoke ill of the Barmecides in his presence, he would say (quoting the verse of Ḥuṭay’a):—493

"O slanderers, be your sire of sire bereft!494Give o'er, or fill the gap which they have left."

Hárún's orthodoxy, his liberality, his victories over the Byzantine Emperor Nicephorus, and last but not least the literary brilliance of his reign have raised him in popular estimation far above all the other Caliphs: he is the Charlemagne of the East, while the entrancing pages of the Thousand and One Nightshave made his name a household word in every country of Europe. Students of Moslem history will soon discover that "the good Haroun Alraschid" was Hárún al-Rashíd (786-809 a.d.). in fact a perfidious and irascible tyrant, whose fitful amiability and real taste for music and letters hardly entitle him to be described either as a great monarch or a good man. We must grant, however, that he thoroughly understood the noble art of patronage. The poets Abú Nuwás, Abu ’l-‘Atáhiya, Di‘bil, Muslim b. Walíd, and ‘Abbás b. Aḥnaf; the musician Ibráhím of Mosul and his son Isḥáq; the philologists Abú ‘Ubayda, Aṣma‘í, and Kisá’í; the preacher Ibnu ’l-Sammák; and the historian Wáqidí—these are but a few names in the galaxy of talent which he gathered around him at Baghdád.

The fall of the Barmecides revived the spirit of racial antagonism which they had done their best to lay, and an Amín and Ma’mún (809-833 a.d.). open rupture was rendered inevitable by the short-sighted policy of Hárún with regard to the succession. He had two grown-up sons, Amín, by his wife and cousin Zubayda, and Ma’mún, whose mother was a Persian slave. It was arranged that the Caliphate should pass to Amín and after him to his brother, but that the Empire should be divided between them. Amín was to receive ‘Iráq and Syria, Ma’mún the eastern provinces, where the people would gladly welcome a ruler of their own blood. The struggle for supremacy which began almost immediately on the death of Hárún was in the main one of Persians against Arabs, and by Ma’mún's triumph the Barmecides were amply avenged.

The new Caliph was anything but orthodox. He favoured the Shí‘ite party to such an extent that he even nominated the ‘Alid, ‘Alí b. Músá b. Ja‘far al-Riḍá, as heir-apparent—a step which alienated the members of Ma’mún's heresies. his own family and led to his being temporarily deposed. He also adopted the opinions of the Mu‘tazilite sect and established an Inquisition to enforce them. Hence the Sunnite historian, Abu ’l-Maḥásin, enumerates three principal heresies of which Ma’mún was guilty: (1) His wearing of the Green ( labsu ’l-Khuḍra)495 and courting the ‘Alids and repulsing the ‘Abbásids; (2) his affirming that the Koran was created ( al-qawl bi-Khalqi ’l-Qur’án); and (3) his legalisation of the mut‘a, a loose form of marriage prevailing amongst the Shí‘ites.496 We shall see in due course how keenly and with what fruitful results Ma’mún interested himself in literature and science. Nevertheless, it cannot escape our attention that in this splendid reign there appear ominous signs of political decay. In 822 a.d. Ṭáhir, one of Ma’mún's generals, who had been appointed governor of Khurásán, omitted the customary mention of the Caliph's name from the Friday sermon ( khuṭba), thus founding the Ṭahirid Rise of independent dynasties. dynasty, which, though professing allegiance to the Caliphs, was practically independent. Ṭáhir was only the first of a long series of ambitious governors and bold adventurers who profited by the weakening authority of the Caliphs to carve out kingdoms for themselves. Moreover, the Moslems of ‘Iráq had lost their old warlike spirit: they were fine scholars and merchants, but poor soldiers. So it came about that Ma’mún's successor, the Caliph Mu‘taṣim (833-842 a.d.), took the fatal step of surrounding himself with a Prætorian Guard chiefly Turkish mercenaries introduced. composed of Turkish recruits from Transoxania. At the same time he removed his court from Baghdád sixty miles further up the Tigris to Sámarrá, which suddenly grew into a superb city of palaces and barracks—an Oriental Versailles.497 Here we may close our brief review of the first and flourishing period of the ‘Abbásid Caliphate. During the next four centuries the Caliphs come and go faster than ever, but for the most part their authority is precarious, if not purely nominal. Meanwhile, in the provinces of the Empire petty dynasties arise, only to eke out Decline of the Caliphate. an obscure and troubled existence, or powerful states are formed, which carry on the traditions of Muḥammadan culture, it may be through many generations, and in some measure restore the blessings of peace and settled government to an age surfeited with anarchy and bloodshed. Of these provincial empires we have now principally to speak, confining our view, for the most part, to the political outlines, and reserving the literary and religious aspects of the period for fuller consideration elsewhere.

The reigns of Mutawakkil (847-861 a.d.) and his immediate successors exhibit all the well-known features of Prætorian rule. The Second ‘Abbásid Period (847-1258 a.d.). Enormous sums were lavished on the Turkish soldiery, who elected and deposed the Caliph just as they pleased, and enforced their insatiable demands by mutiny and assassination. For a short time (869-907 a.d.) matters improved under the able and energetic Muhtadí and the four Caliphs who followed him; but the Turks soon regained the upper hand. From this date every vestige of real power is centred in the Generalissimo ( Amíru ’l-Umará) who stands at the head of the army, while the once omnipotent Caliph must needs be satisfied with the empty honour of having his name stamped on the coinage and celebrated in the public prayers. The terrorism of the Turkish bodyguard was broken by the Buwayhids, a Persian dynasty, who ruled in Baghdád from 945 to 1055 a.d. Then the Seljúq supremacy began with Ṭughril Beg's entry into the capital and lasted a full century until the death of Sanjar (1157 a.d.). The Mongols who captured Baghdád in 1258 a.d. brought the pitiable farce of the Caliphate to an end.

"The empire of the Caliphs at its widest," as Stanley Lane-Poole observes in his excellent account of the Muḥammadan dynasties, Dynasties of the early ‘Abbásid Age. "extended from the Atlantic to the Indus, and from the Caspian to the cataracts of the Nile. So vast a dominion could not long be held together. The first step towards its disintegration began in Spain, where ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán, a member of the suppressed Umayyad family, was acknowledged as an independent sovereign in a.d. 755, and the ‘Abbásid Caliphate was renounced for ever. Thirty years later Idrís, a great-grandson of the Caliph ‘Alí, and therefore equally at variance with ‘Abbásids and Umayyads, founded an ‘Alid dynasty in Morocco. The rest of the North African coast was practically lost to the Caliphate when the Aghlabid governor established his authority at Qayrawán in a.d. 800."

Amongst the innumerable kingdoms which supplanted the decaying Caliphate only a few of the most important can be singled out for special notice on account of their literary or religious interest.498 To begin with Persia: in Dynasties of the Second Period. 872 a.d. Khurásán, which was then held by the Ṭáhirids, fell into the hands of Ya‘qúb b. Layth the Coppersmith ( al-Ṣaffár), founder of the Ṣaffárids, who for thirty years stretched their sway over a great part of Persia, until they were dispossessed by the Sámánids. The latter dynasty had the seat of its power in Transoxania, but during the first half of theThe Sámánids (874-999 a.d.). tenth century practically the whole of Persia submitted to the authority of Ismá‘íl and his famous successors, Naṣr II and Núḥ I. Not only did these princes warmly encourage and foster the development, which had already begun, of a national literature in the Persian language—it is enough to recall here the names of Rúdagí, the blind minstrel and poet; Daqíqí, whose fragment of a Persian Epic was afterwards incorporated by Firdawsí in his Sháhnáma; and Bal‘amí, the Vizier of Manṣúr I, who composed an abridgment of Ṭabarí's great history, which is one of the oldest prose works in Persian that have come down to us—but they extended the same favour to poets and men of learning who (though, for the most part, of Persian extraction) preferred to use the Arabic language. Thus the celebrated Rhazes (Abú Bakr al-Rází) dedicated to the Sámánid prince Abú Ṣáliḥ Manṣúr b. Isháq a treatise on medicine, which he entitled al-Kitáb al-Manṣúrí (the Book of Manṣúr) in honour of his patron. The great physician and philosopher, Abú ‘Alí b. Síná (Avicenna) relates that, having been summoned to Bukhárá by King Núḥ, the second of that name (976-997 a.d.), he obtained permission to visit the royal library. "I found there," he says, "many rooms filled with books which were arranged in cases row upon row. One room was allotted to works on Arabic philology and poetry; another to jurisprudence, and so forth, the books on each particular science having a room to themselves. I inspected the catalogue of ancient Greek authors and looked for the books which I required: I saw in this collection books of which few people have heard even the names, and which I myself have never seen either before or since."499