Текст книги "Literary History of the Arabs "

Автор книги: Reynolds Nicholson

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Omitting the great manuals of Moslem Jurisprudence, which are without literary interest in the larger sense, we may pause for a moment at the name of al-Máwardí, a Sháfi‘ite lawyer, who wrote a well-known treatise on politics—the Kitábu ’l-Aḥkám al-Sulṭániyya, or 'Book of the Principles of Government.' His standpoint is purely theoretical. Thus he lays down that the Caliph should be Máwardí õ 1058 a.d.). elected by the body of learned, pious, and orthodox divines, and that the people must leave the administration of the State to the Caliph absolutely, as being its representative. Máwardí lived at Baghdád during the period of Buwayhid ascendancy, a period described by Sir W. Muir in the following words: "The pages of our annalists are now almost entirely occupied with the political events of the day, in the guidance of which the Caliphs had seldom any concern, and which therefore need no mention here."631 Under the ‘Abbásid dynasty the mystical doctrines of the Ṣúfís were systematised and expounded. Some of the most important Arabic works of reference on Ṣúfiism are the Qútu ’l-Qulúb, or 'Food of Hearts,' by Abú Ṭálib al-Makkí Arabic authorities on Ṣúfiism. (õ 996 a.d.); the Kitábu ’l-Ta‘arruf li-Madhhabi ahli ’l-Taṣawwuf, or 'Book of Enquiry as to the Religion of the Súfís,' by Muḥammad b. Isḥáq al-Kalábádhí (õ  circa1000 a.d.); the Ṭabaqátu ’l-Ṣúfiyya, or 'Classes of the Ṣúfís,' by Abú ‘Abd al-Raḥmán al-Sulamí (õ 1021 a.d.); the Ḥilyatu ’l-Awliyá, or 'Adornment of the Saints,' by Abú Nu‘aym al-Iṣfahání (õ 1038 a.d.); the Risálatu ’l-Qushayriyya, or 'Qushayrite Tract,' by Abu ’l-Qásim al-Qushayrí of Naysábúr (õ 1074 a.d.); the Iḥyá’u ‘Ulúm al-Dín, or 'Revivification of the Religious Sciences,' by Ghazálí (õ 1111 a.d.); and the ‘Awárifu ’l-Ma‘árif, or 'Bounties of Knowledge,' by Shihábu ’l-Dín Abú Ḥafṣ ‘Umar al-Suhrawardí (õ 1234 a.d.)—a list which might easily be extended. In Dogmatic Ghazálí (õ 1111 a.d.). Theology there is none to compare with Abú Ḥámid al-Ghazálí, surnamed 'the Proof of Islam' ( Ḥujjatu ’l-Islám). He is a figure of such towering importance that some detailed account of his life and opinions must be inserted in a book like this, which professes to illustrate the history of Muḥammadan thought. Here, however, we shall only give an outline of his biography in order to pave the way for discussion of his intellectual achievements and his far-reaching influence.

"In this year (505 a.h. = 1111 a.d.) died the Imám, who was the Ornament of the Faith and the Proof of Islam, Abú Ḥámid Life of Ghazálí according to the Shadharátu ’l-Dhahab. Muḥammad ... of Ṭús, the Sháfi‘ite. His death took place on the 14th of the Latter Jumádá at Ṭábarán, a village near Ṭús. He was then fifty-five years of age. Ghazzálí is equivalent to Ghazzál, like ‘Aṭṭárí (for ‘Aṭṭár) and Khabbází (for Khabbáz), in the dialect of the people of Khurásán632: so it is stated by the author of the ‘Ibar.633 Al-Isnawí says in his Ṭabaqát634:—Ghazzálí is an Imám by whose name breasts are dilated and souls are revived, and in whose literary productions the ink-horn exults and the paper quivers with joy; and at the hearing thereof voices are hushed and heads are bowed. He was born at Ṭús in the year 450 a.h. = 1058-1059 a.d. His father used to spin wool ( yaghzilu ’l-ṣúf) and sell it in his shop. On his deathbed he committed his two sons, Ghazzálí himself and his brother Aḥmad, to the care of a pious Ṣúfí, who taught them writing and educated them until the money left him by their father was all spent. 'Then,' says Ghazzálí, 'we went to the college to learn divinity ( fiqh) so that we might gain our livelihood.' After studying there for some time he journeyed to Abú Naṣr al-Ismá‘ílí in Jurján, then to the Imámu ’l-Ḥaramayn635 at Naysábúr, under whom he studied with such assiduity that he became the best scholastic of his contemporaries ( ṣára anẓara ahli zamánihi), and he lectured ex cathedrâin his master's lifetime, and wrote books.... And on the death of his master he set out for the Camp636 and presented himself to the Niẓámu ’l-Mulk, whose assembly was the alighting-place of the learned and the destination of the leading divines and savants; and there, as was due to his high merit, he enjoyed the society of the principal doctors, and disputed with his opponents and rebutted them in spite of their eminence. So the Niẓámu ’l-Mulk inclined to him and showed him great honour, and his name flew through the world. Then, in the year '84 (1091 a.d.) he was called to a professorship in the Niẓámiyya College at Baghdád, where a splendid reception awaited him. His words reached far and wide, and his influence soon exceeded that of the Emírs and Viziers. But at last his lofty spirit recoiled from worldly vanities. He gave himself up to devotion and dervishhood, and set out, in the year '88 (1095 a.d.), for the Ḥijáz.637 On his return from the Pilgrimage he journeyed to Damascus and made his abode there for ten years in the minaret of the Congregational Mosque, and composed several works, of which the Iḥyáis said to be one. Then, after visiting Jerusalem and Alexandria, he returned to his home at Ṭús, intent on writing and worship and constant recitation of the Koran and dissemination of knowledge and avoidance of intercourse with men. The Vizier Fakhru ’l-Mulk,638 son of the Niẓámu ’l-Mulk, came to see him, and urged him by every means in his power to accept a professorship in the Niẓámiyya College at Naysábúr.639 Ghazzálí consented, but after teaching for a time, resigned the appointment and returned to end his days in his native town."

Besides his magnum opus, the already-mentioned Iḥyá, in which he expounds theology and the ethics of religion from His principal works. the standpoint of the moderate Ṣúfí school, Ghazálí wrote a great number of important works, such as the Munqidh mina ’l-Ḍalál, or 'Deliverer from Error,' a sort of 'Apologia pro Vitâ Suâ'; the Kímiyá’u ’l-Sa‘ádat, or 'Alchemy of Happiness,' which was originally written in Persian; and the Taháfutu ’l-Falásifa, or 'Collapse of the Philosophers,' a polemical treatise designed to refute and destroy the doctrines of Moslem philosophy. This work called forth a rejoinder from the celebrated Ibn Rushd (Averroes), who died at Morocco in 1198-1199 a.d.

Here we may notice two valuable works on the history of religion, both of which are generally known as Kitábu ’l-Milal wa-’l-Niḥal,640 that is to say, 'The Book of Religions and Sects,' by Ibn Ḥazm of Cordova (õ 1064 a.d.) and Abu ’l-Fatḥ al-Shahrastání (õ 1153 a.d.). Shahrastání's 'Book of Religions and Sects.' Ibn Ḥazm we shall meet with again in the chapter which deals specially with the history and literature of the Spanish Moslems. Shahrastání, as he is named after his birthplace, belonged to the opposite extremity of the Muḥammadan Empire, being a native of Khurásán, the huge Eastern province bounded by the Oxus. Cureton, who edited the Arabic text of the Kitábu ’l-Milal wa-’l-Niḥal(London, 1842-1846), gives the following outline of its contents:—

After five introductory chapters, the author proceeds to arrange his book into two great divisions; the one comprising the Religious, the other the Philosophical Sects. The former of these contains an account of the various Sects of the followers of Muḥammad, and likewise of those to whom a true revelation had been made (the Ahlu ’l-Kitáb, or 'People of the Scripture'), that is, Jews and Christians; and of those who had a doubtful or pretended revelation ( man lahú shubhatu ’l-Kitáb), such as the Magi and the Manichæans. The second division comprises an account of the philosophical opinions of the Sabæans (Ṣábians), which are mainly set forth in a very interesting dialogue between a Sabæan and an orthodox Muḥammadan; of the tenets of various Greek Philosophers and some of the Fathers of the Christian Church; and also of the Muḥammadan doctors, more particularly of the system of Ibn Síná or Avicenna, which the author explains at considerable length. The work terminates with an account of the tenets of the Arabs before the commencement of Islamism, and of the religion of the people of India.

The science of grammar took its rise in the cities of Baṣra and Kúfa, which were founded not long after Muḥammad's death, and which remained the chief centres of Arabian life Grammar and philology. and thought outside the peninsula until they were eclipsed by the great ‘Abbásid capital. In both towns the population consisted of Bedouin Arabs, belonging to different tribes and speaking many different dialects, while there were also thousands of artisans and clients who spoke Persian as their mother-tongue, so that the classical idiom was peculiarly exposed to corrupting influences. If the pride and delight of the Arabs in their noble language led them to regard the maintenance of its purity as a national duty, they were equally bound by their religious convictions to take decisive measures for ensuring the correct pronunciation and interpretation of that "miracle of Divine eloquence," the Arabic Koran. To this latter motive the invention of grammar is traditionally ascribed. The inventor is related to have been Abu ’l-Aswad al-Du’ilí, who died at Baṣra during the Umayyad period. "Abu The invention of Arabic grammar. ’l-Aswad, having been asked where he had acquired the science of grammar, answered that he had learned the rudiments of it from ‘Alí b. Abí Ṭálib. It is said that he never made known any of the principles which he had received from ‘Alí till Ziyád641 sent to him the order to compose something which might serve as a guide to the public and enable them to understand the Book of God. He at first asked to be excused, but on hearing a man recite the following passage out of the Koran, anna ’lláha barí ^unmina Ll-mushrikína wa-rasúluhu,642 which last word the reader pronounced rasúlihi, he exclaimed, 'I never thought that things would have come to this.' He then returned to Ziyád and said, 'I will do what you ordered.'"643 The Baṣra school of grammarians which Abu ’l-Aswad is said to have founded is older than the rival school of Kúfa and surpassed it in fame. Its most prominent representatives were The philogists of Baṣra. Abú ‘Amr b. al-‘Alá (õ 770 a.d.), a diligent and profound student of the Koran, who on one occasion burned all his collections of old poetry, &c., and abandoned himself to devotion; Khalíl b. Aḥmad, inventor of the Arabic system of metres and author of the first Arabic lexicon (the Kitábu ’l-‘Ayn), which, however, he did not live to complete; the Persian Síbawayhi, whose Grammar, entitled 'The Book of Síbawayhi,' is universally celebrated; the great Humanists al-Aṣma‘í and Abú ‘Ubayda who flourished under Hárún al-Rashid; al-Mubarrad, about a century later, whose best-known work, the Kámil, has been edited by Professor William Wright; his contemporary al-Sukkarí, a renowned collector and critic of old Arabian poetry; and Ibn Durayd (õ 934 a.d.), a distinguished philologist, genealogist, and poet, who received a pension from the Caliph Muqtadir in recognition of his services on behalf of science, and whose principal works, in addition to the famous ode known as the Maqṣúra, are a voluminous lexicon ( al-Jamhara fi ’l-Lugha) and a treatise on the genealogies of the Arab tribes ( Kitábu ’l-Ishtiqáq).

Against these names the school of Kúfa can set al-Kisá’í, a Persian savant who was entrusted by Hárún al-Rashíd The philogists of Kúfa. with the education of his sons Amín and Ma’mún; al-Farrá (õ 822 a.d.), a pupil and compatriot of al-Kisá’í; al-Mufaḍḍal al-Ḍabbí, a favourite of the Caliph Mahdí, for whom he compiled an excellent anthology of Pre-islamic poems ( al-Mufaḍḍaliyyát), which has already been noticed644; Ibnu ’l-Sikkít, whose outspoken partiality for the House of ‘Alí b. Abí Ṭálib caused him to be brutally trampled to death by the Turkish guards of the tyrant Mutawakkil (858 a.d.); and Tha‘lab, head of the Kúfa school in his time (õ 904 a.d.), of whose rivalry with al-Mubarrad many stories are told. A contemporary, Abú Bakr b. Abi ’l-Azhar, said in one of his poems:—

"Turn to Mubarrad or to Tha‘lab, thouThat seek'st with learning to improve thy mind!Be not a fool, like mangy camel shunned:All human knowledge thou with them wilt find.The science of the whole world, East and West,In these two single doctors is combined."645

Reference has been made in a former chapter to some of the earliest Humanists, e.g., Ḥammád al-Ráwiya (õ 776 a.d.) and his slightly younger contemporary, Khalaf al-Aḥmar, to their inestimable labours in rescuing the old poetry from oblivion, and to the unscrupulous methods which they sometimes employed.646 Among their successors, who flourished in the Golden Age of Islam, under the first ‘Abbásids, the place of honour belongs to Abú ‘Ubayda (õ about 825 a.d.) and al-Asma‘í (õ about 830 a.d.).

Abú ‘Ubayda Ma‘mar b. al-Muthanná was of Jewish-Persian race, and maintained in his writings the cause of the Abú ‘Ubayda. Shu‘úbites against the Arab national party, for which reason he is erroneously described as a Khárijite.647 The rare expressions of the Arabic language, the history of the Arabs and their conflicts were his predominant study—"neither in heathen nor Muḥammadan times," he once boasted, "have two horses met in battle but that I possess information about them and their riders"648; yet, with all his learning, he was not always able to recite a verse without mangling it; even in reading the Koran, with the book before his eyes, he made mistakes.649 Our knowledge of Arabian antiquity is drawn, to a large extent, from the traditions collected by him which are preserved in the Kitábu ’l-Agháníand elsewhere. He left nearly two hundred works, of which a long but incomplete catalogue occurs in the Fihrist(pp. 53-54). Abú ‘Ubayda was summoned by the Caliph Aṣma‘í. Hárún al-Rashíd to Baghdád, where he became acquainted with Aṣma‘í. There was a standing feud between them, due in part to difference of character650 and in part to personal jealousies. ‘Abdu ’l-Malik b. Qurayb al-Aṣma‘í was, like his rival, a native of Baṣra. Although he may have been excelled by others of his contemporaries in certain branches of learning, none exhibited in such fine perfection the varied literary culture which at that time was so highly prized and so richly rewarded. Whereas Abú ‘Ubayda was dreaded for his sharp tongue and sarcastic humour, Aṣma‘í had all the accomplishments and graces of a courtier. Abú Nuwás, the first great poet of the ‘Abbásid period, said that Aṣma‘í was a nightingale to charm those who heard him with his melodies. In court circles, where the talk often turned on philological matters, he was a favourite guest, and the Caliph would send for him to decide any abstruse question connected with literature which no one present was able to answer. Of his numerous writings on linguistic and antiquarian themes several have come down to us, e.g., 'The Book of Camels' ( Kitábu ’l-Ibil), 'The Book of Horses' ( Kitábu ’l-Khayl), and 'The Book of the Making of Man' ( Kitábu Khalqi ’l-Insán), a treatise which shows that the Arabs of the desert had acquired a considerable knowledge of human anatomy. His work as editor, commentator, and critic of Arabian poetry forms (it has been said) the basis of nearly all that has since been written on the subject.

Belles-lettres ( Adab) and literary history are represented by a whole series of valuable works. Only a few of the most Ibnu ’l-Muqaffa‘ (õ  circa760 a.d.). important can be mentioned here, and that in a very summary manner. The Persian Rúzbih, better known as ‘Abdulláh Ibnu ’l-Muqaffa‘, who was put to death by order of the Caliph Manṣúr, made several translations from the Pehleví or Middle-Persian literature into Arabic. We possess a specimen of his powers in the famous Book of Kalíla and Dimna, which is ultimately derived from the Sanscrit Fables of Bidpai. The Arabic version is one of the oldest prose works in that language, and is justly regarded as a model of elegant style, though it has not the pungent brevity which marks true Arabian eloquence. Ibn Ibn Qutayba (õ 899 a.d.). Qutayba, whose family came from Merv, held for a time the office of Cadi at Dínawar, and lived at Baghdád in the latter half of the ninth century. We have more than once cited his 'Book of General Knowledge' ( Kitábu ’l-Ma‘árif)651 and his 'Book of Poetry and Poets,' ( Kitábu ’l-Shi‘r wa-’l-Shu‘ará), and may add here the Adabu ’l-Kátib, or 'Accomplishments of the Secretary,'652 a manual of stylistic, dealing with orthography, orthoepy, lexicography, and the like; and the ‘Uyúnu ’l-Akhbár, or 'Choice Histories,'653 a work in ten chapters, each of which is devoted to a special theme such as Government, War, Nobility, Friendship, Women, &c. ‘Amr b. Baḥr al-Jáḥiẓ of Baṣra was a celebrated Jáḥiẓ (õ 869 a.d.). freethinker, and gave his name to a sect of the Mu‘tazilites ( al-Jáḥiẓiyya).654 He composed numerous books of an anecdotal and entertaining character. Ibn Khallikán singles out as his finest and most instructive works the Kitábu ’l-Ḥayawán('Book of Animals'), and the Kitábu ’l-Bayán wa-’l-Tabyín('Book of Eloquence and Exposition'), which is a popular treatise on rhetoric. It so happens—and the fact is not altogether fortuitous—that extremely valuable contributions to the literary history of the Arabs were made by two writers connected with the Ibn ‘Abdi Rabbihi (õ 940 a.d.). Umayyad House. Ibn ‘Abdi Rabbihi of Cordova, who was descended from an enfranchised slave of the Spanish Umayyad Caliph, Hishám b. ‘Abd al-Raḥmán (788-796 a.d.), has left us a miscellaneous anthology entitled al-‘Iqd al-Faríd, or 'The Unique Necklace,' which is divided into twenty-five books, each bearing the name of a different gem, and "contains something on every subject." Though Abu ’l-Faraj ‘Alí, the Abu ’l-Faraj al-Iṣfahání (õ 967 a.d.). author of the Kitábu ’l-Aghání, was born at Iṣfahán, he was an Arab of the Arabs, being a member of the tribe Quraysh and a lineal descendant of Marwán, the last Umayyad Caliph. Coming to Baghdád, he bent all his energies to the study of Arabian antiquity, and towards the end of his life found a generous patron in al-Muhallabí, the Vizier of the Buwayhid sovereign, Mu‘izzu ’l-Dawla. His minor works are cast in the shade by his great 'Book of Songs.' This may be described as a history of all the Arabian poetry that had been set to music down to the author's time. It is based on a collection of one hundred melodies which was made for the Caliph Hárún al-Rashíd, but to these Abu ’l-Faraj has added many others chosen by himself. After giving the words and the airs attached to them, he relates the lives of the poets and musicians by whom they were composed, and takes occasion to introduce a vast quantity of historical traditions and anecdotes, including much ancient and modern verse. It is said that the Ṣáḥib Ibn ‘Abbád,655 when travelling, used to take thirty camel-loads of books about with him, but on receiving the Agháníhe contented himself with this one book and dispensed with all the rest.656 The chief man of letters of the next generation was Abú Mansúr al-Tha‘álibí (the Furrier) of Naysábúr. Tha‘álibí (õ 1037 a.d.). Notwithstanding that most of his works are unscientific compilations, designed to amuse the public rather than to impart solid instruction, his famous anthology of recent and contemporary poets—the Yatímatu ’l-Dahr, or 'Solitaire of the Time'—supplies indubitable proof of his fine scholarship and critical taste. Successive continuations of the Yatímawere written by al-Bákharzí (õ 1075 a.d.) in the Dumyatu ’l-Qaṣr, or 'Statue of the Palace'; by Abu ’l-Ma‘álí al-Ḥaẓírí (õ 1172 a.d.) in the Zínatu ’l-Dahr, or 'Ornament of the Time'; and by the favourite of Saladin, ‘Imádu ’l-Dín al-Kátib al-Iṣfahání (õ 1201 a.d.), in the Kharídatu ’l-Qaṣr, or 'Virgin Pearl of the Palace.' From the tenth century onward the study of philology proper began to decline, while on the other hand those sciences which formerly grouped themselves round philology now became independent, were cultivated with brilliant success, and in a short time reached their zenith.

The elements of History are found (1) in Pre-islamic traditions and (2) in the Ḥadíthof the Prophet, but the idea of History. historical composition on a grand scale was probably suggested to the Arabs by Persian models such as the Pehleví Khudáy-náma, or 'Book of Kings,' which Ibnu ’l-Muqaffa‘ turned into Arabic in the eighth century of our era under the title of Siyaru Mulúki ’l-‘Ajam, that is, 'The History of the Kings of Persia.'

Under the first head Hishám Ibnu ’l-Kalbí (õ 819 a.d.) and his father Muḥammad deserve particular mention as painstaking and trustworthy recorders.

Historical traditions relating to the Prophet were put in writing at an early date (see p. 247). The first biography of Muḥammad ( Síratu Rasúli ’lláh), compiled by Ibn Isḥáq, Histories of the Prophet and his Companions. who died in the reign of Manṣúr (768 a.d.), has come down to us only in the recension made by Ibn Hishám (õ 834 a.d.). This work as well as those of al-Wáqidí (õ 823 a.d.) and Ibn Sa‘d (õ 845 a.d.) have been already noticed.

Other celebrated historians of the ‘Abbásid period are the following.

Aḥmad b. Yaḥyá al-Baládhurí (õ 892 a.d.), a Persian, wrote an account of the early Muḥammadan conquests ( Kitábu Baládhurí. Futúḥi Ll-Buldán), which has been edited by De Goeje, and an immense chronicle based on genealogical principles, 'The Book of the Lineages of the Nobles' ( Kitábu Ansábi ’l-Ashráf), of which two volumes are extant.657

Abú Ḥánífa Aḥmad al-Dínawarí (õ 895 a.d.) was also of Íránian descent. His 'Book of Long Histories' ( Kitábu Dínawarí. ’l-Akhbár al-Ṭiwál) deals largely with the national legend of Persia, and is written throughout from the Persian point of view.

Ibn Wáḍiḥ al-Ya‘qúbí, a contemporary of Dínawarí, produced an excellent compendium of universal history, which Ya‘qúbí. is specially valuable because its author, being a follower of the House of ‘Alí, has preserved the ancient and unfalsified Shí‘ite tradition. His work has been edited in two volumes by Professor Houtsma (Leyden, 1883).

The Annals of Ṭabarí, edited by De Goeje and other European scholars (Leyden, 1879-1898), and the Golden Meadows658 ( Murúju ’l-Dhahab) of Mas‘údí, which Pavet de Courteille and Barbier de Meynard published with a French translation (Paris, 1861-1877), have been frequently cited in the foregoing pages; and since these two authors are not only the greatest historians of the Muḥammadan East but also (excepting, possibly, Ibn Khaldún) the most eminent of all who devoted themselves to this branch of Arabic literature, we must endeavour to make the reader more closely acquainted with them.

Abú Ja‘far Muḥammad b. Jarír was born in 838-839 a.d. at Ámul in Ṭabaristán, the mountainous province lying along Ṭabarí (838-923 a.d.). the south coast of the Caspian Sea; whence the name, Ṭabarí, by which he is usually known.659 At this time ‘Iráq was still the principal focus of Muḥammadan culture, so that a poet could say:—

"I see a man in whom the secretarial dignity is manifest,One who displays the brilliant culture of ‘Iráq."660

Thither the young Ṭabarí came to complete his education. He travelled by way of Rayy to Baghdád, visited other neighbouring towns, and extended his tour to Syria and Egypt. Although his father sent him a yearly allowance, it did not always arrive punctually, and he himself relates that on one occasion he procured bread by selling the sleeves of his shirt. Fortunately, at Baghdád he was introduced to ‘Ubaydulláh b. Yaḥyá, the Vizier of Mutawakkil, who engaged him as tutor for his son. How long he held this post is uncertain, but he was only twenty-three years of age when his patron went out of office. Fifteen years later we find him, penniless once more, in Cairo (876-877 a.d.). He soon, however, returned to Baghdád, where he passed the remainder of his life in teaching and writing. Modest, unselfish, and simple in his habits, he diffused his encyclopædic knowledge with an almost superhuman industry. During forty years, it is said, he wrote forty leaves every day. His great works are the Ta’ríkhu Ll-Rusul wa-’l-Mulúk, or 'Annals of the Apostles and the Kings,' and his Tafsír, or 'Commentary on the Koran.' Both, even in their present shape, are books of enormous extent, yet it seems likely that both were originally composed on a far larger scale and were abbreviated by the author for general use. His pupils, we are told, flatly refused to read the first editions with him, whereupon he exclaimed: "Enthusiasm for learning is dead!" The History of Ṭabarí, from the Creation to the year 302 a.h. = 915 a.d., is distinguished by "completeness of detail, accuracy, and the truly stupendous learning of its author that is revealed throughout, and that makes the Annals a vast storehouse of valuable information for the historian as well as for the student of Islam."661 It is arranged chronologically, the events being tabulated under the year (of the Muḥammadan era) in which they occurred. Moreover, it has a very peculiar form. "Each important fact is related, if possible, by an eye-witness or contemporary, whose account came down through a series of narrators to the author. If he has obtained more than one account of a fact, with more or less important modifications, through several series of narrators, he communicates them all to the reader in extenso. Thus we are enabled to consider the facts from more than one point of view, and to acquire a vivid and clear notion of them."662 According to modern ideas, Ṭabarí's compilation is not so much a history as a priceless collection of original documents placed side by side without any attempt to construct a critical and continuous narrative. At first sight one can hardly see the wood for the trees, but on closer study the essential features gradually emerge and stand out in bold relief from amidst the multitude of insignificant circumstances which lend freshness and life to the whole. Ṭabarí suffered the common fate of standard historians. His work was abridged and popularised, the isnádsor chains of authorities were suppressed, and the various parallel accounts were combined by subsequent writers into a single version.663 Of the Annals, as it left the author's hands, no entire copy exists anywhere, but many odd volumes are preserved in different parts of the world. The Leyden edition is based on these scattered MSS., which luckily comprise the whole work with the exception of a few not very serious lacunæ.

‘Alí b. Ḥusayn, a native of Baghdád, was called Mas‘údí after one of the Prophet's Companions, ‘Abdulláh b. Mas‘úd, Mas‘údí (õ 956 a.d.). to whom he traced his descent. Although we possess only a small remnant of his voluminous writings, no better proof can be desired of the vast and various erudition which he gathered not from books alone, but likewise from long travel in almost every part of Asia. Among other places, he visited Armenia, India, Ceylon, Zanzibar, and Madagascar, and he appears to have sailed in Chinese waters as well as in the Caspian Sea. "My journey," he says, "resembles that of the sun, and to me the poet's verse is applicable:—

"'We turn our steps toward each different clime,Now to the Farthest East, then West once more;Even as the sun, which stays not his advanceO'er tracts remote that no man durst explore.'"664

He spent the latter years of his life chiefly in Syria and Egypt—for he had no settled abode—compiling the great historical works,665 of which the Murúju ’l-Dhahabis an epitome. As regards the motives which urged him to write, Mas‘údí declares that he wished to follow the example of scholars and sages and to leave behind him a praiseworthy memorial and imperishable monument. He claims to have taken a wider view than his predecessors. "One who has never quitted his hearth and home, but is content with the knowledge which he can acquire concerning the history of his own part of the world, is not on the same level as one who spends his life in travel and passes his days in restless wanderings, and draws forth all manner of curious and precious information from its hidden mine."666

Mas‘údí has been named the 'the Herodotus of the Arabs,' and the comparison is not unjust.667 The Murúju ’l-Dhahab. His work, although it lacks the artistic unity which distinguishes that of the Greek historian, shows the same eager spirit of enquiry, the same open-mindedness and disposition to record without prejudice all the marvellous things that he had heard or seen, the same ripe experience and large outlook on the present as on the past. It is professedly a universal history beginning with the Creation and ending at the Caliphate of Muṭí‘, in 947 a.d., but no description can cover the immense range of topics which are discussed and the innumerable digressions with which the author delights or irritates his readers, as the case may be.668 Thus, to pick a few examples at random, we find a dissertation on tides (vol. i, p. 244); an account of the tinnínor sea-serpent ( ibid., p. 267); of pearl-fishing in the Persian Gulf ( ibid., p. 328); and of the rhinoceros ( ibid., p. 385). Mas‘údí was a keen student and critic of religious beliefs, on which subject he wrote several books.669 The Murúju ’l-Dhahabsupplies many valuable details regarding the Muḥammadan sects, and also regarding the Zoroastrians and Ṣábians. There is a particularly interesting report of a meeting which took place between Aḥmad b. Ṭúlún, the governor of Egypt (868-877 a.d.), and an aged Copt, who, after giving his views as to the source of the Nile and the construction of the Pyramids, defended his faith (Christianity) on the ground of its manifest errors and contradictions, arguing that its acceptance, in spite of these, by so many peoples and kings was decisive evidence of its truth.670 Mas‘údí's account of the Caliphs is chiefly remarkable for the characteristic anecdotes in which it abounds. Instead of putting together a methodical narrative he has thrown off a brilliant but unequal sketch of public affairs and private manners, of social life and literary history. Only considerations of space have prevented me from enriching this volume with not a few pages which are as lively and picturesque as any in Suetonius. His last work, the Kitábu ’l-Tanbíh wa-’l-Ishráf('Book of Admonition and Recension'),671 was intended to take a general survey of the field which had been more fully traversed in his previous compositions, and also to supplement them when it seemed necessary.