Arabic Authors / A Manual of Arabian History and Literature

by F. F. Arbuthnot

To return to Arab story-books. Mention must be made of 'Antar,' a Bedouin romance, which has been partially translated from the Arabic into English by Terrick Hamilton, Secretary to the British Embassy at Constantinople, and published in London (1820). Mr. Clouston, in his 'Arabian Poetry for English Readers,' Glasgow, 1881, has given an abstract of the story, with some specimens of translations from the original.

The work itself is generally supposed to have been written by Al-Asmai, the philologist and grammarian (born A.D. 740, died A.D. 831), who flourished at the court of Harun-ar-Rashid, and was a great celebrity in his time. It is probable that many of the stories told about Antar and his wonderful deeds came down orally and traditionally to Al-Asmai, who embellished them with his own imagination, aided by a wonderful knowledge of the language and idioms used by the Arabs in their desert wilds.

Antar is the hero, and Abla the heroine, of the romance. Antar himself is supposed to have lived during the sixth century A.D., and to have been the author of one of the seven famous poems suspended at Mecca, and known as the Mua'llakat. Besides this he was distinguished as a great warrior, whose deeds of daring were quite marvellous. The translator had intended to divide the work into three parts. The first ends with the marriage of Antar and Abla, to attain which many difficulties had to be overcome. The second part includes the period when Antar suspends his poem at Mecca, also a work of considerable difficulty. The third part gives the hero's travels, conquests, and death. Mr. Hamilton only translated and published the first part of the three, and the two others have not yet been done into English.

The romance of Antar, though tedious, is interesting, as it gives full details of the life of the Arabs before Muhammad's time, and even after, for the Arab life of to-day is apparently much the same as it was three thousand years ago. It appears to be an existence made up of continual wanderings, constant feud and faction, and perpetual struggles for food, independence and plunder. But in the deserts on the frontiers of Syria, Palestine, Mesopotamia and Baghdad, it is said that the various tribes are now kept much more in subjection by the Turks, owing to the introduction of the breech-loader, against which the Arab and his matchlock and his peculiar mode of warfare is somewhat powerless.

While the 'Arabian Nights' are supposed to treat more of the inhabitants of the towns, the romance of Antar deals more with the inhabitants of the desert. To the student of the Arabic language both works are interesting, as they occupy a prominent and standard place in Arabian literature, and afford much information about the manners and customs, ideas and peculiarities of an ancient and interesting race of people. It must be admitted that both Antar and the 'Arabian Nights' are so long that they rather try the patience of readers not particularly interested in them. Nowadays in England the daily press supplies such a mass of information of all sorts in connection with every branch of society, that a constant and persistent reader of our daily and weekly newspapers can find in them quite an 'Arabian Nights Entertainment' without going further afield. Indeed, the stories concerning the cures effected by certain patent medicines are as wonderful as anything one ever reads in the 'Nights' themselves.

And in addition to the realities and actualities of life, as daily told in our newspapers and law reports, many of which do certainly prove that fact is stranger than fiction, there are numerous writers who keep the public supplied with tales and stories of every kind and description. And from the great demand for such productions, whether issued as the penny dreadful, the thrilling story, or the regulation romance in three volumes, one conclusion can only be drawn, which is—that the human mind, everywhere in the East, West, North and South, is always anxious to be fed or amused with something startling or romantic, dreadful or improbable, exciting or depressing.

It is to be presumed, then, that the 'Nights' filled the vacuum in the minds of the people of that day in the East, much the same as the books and newspapers of our time satisfy the cravings of the humanities of the West, who still seem to be ever in search of something new, even if not true; something original, even if not trustworthy. Human nature appears to be much the same in all ages and at all times, and the scandals connected with high persons, the memoirs and reminiscences of celebrated ones, and the good sayings of witty ones, have always found much favour with the public generally, whether told as stories, published as books, or printed in the papers. Arabic literature abounds with biographical details and stories about celebrated and distinguished men. It was always the custom and fashion to fill their works with much information of the kind. The same fashion appears to exist in England at the present time, with this advantage, however, that we now get all the details and stories direct from the heroes themselves, and during their lifetime.

CHAPTER V.

ANECDOTES AND ANA.

In Persian literature there are three celebrated works (Sa'di's 'Gulistan,' or Rose Garden, A.D. 1258; Jawini's 'Negaristan,' or Portrait Gallery, A.D. 1334; and Jami's 'Beharistan,' or Abode of Spring, A.D. 1487, all translated by the Kama Shastra Society), containing an entertaining collection of stories, verses, and moral maxims. In Arabic literature there are many books of the same sort, and in this chapter it is proposed to give a few specimens of stories and philosophic reflections culled from various authors. This will perhaps be more interesting than a lengthened analysis of the works themselves.