[50] Freytag, Arabum Proverbia, vol. i, p. 497.
[51] Hamdání, Iklíl, bk. viii, edited by D. H. Müller in S.B.W.A. (Vienna, 1881), vol. 97, p. 1037. The verses are quoted with some textual differences by Yáqút, Mu‘jam al-Buldán, ed. by Wüstenfeld, vol. iv, 387, and Ibn Hishám, p. 9.
[52] The following inscription is engraved on one of the stone cylinders described by Arnaud. "Yatha‘amar Bayyin, son of Samah‘alí Yanúf, Prince of Saba, caused the mountain Balaq to be pierced and erected the flood-gates (called) Raḥab for convenience of irrigation." I translate after D. H. Müller, loc. laud., p. 965.
[53] The words Ḥimyar and Tubba‘ do not occur at all in the older inscriptions, and very seldom even in those of a more recent date.
[54] See Koran, xviii, 82-98.
[55] Dhu ’l-Qarnayn is described as "the measurer of the earth" (Massáḥu ’l-arḍ) by Hamdání, Jazíratu ’l-‘Arab, p. 46, l. 10. If I may step for a moment outside the province of literary history to discuss the mythology of these verses, it seems to me more than probable that Dhu ’l-Qarnayn is a personification of the Sabæan divinity ‘Athtar, who represents "sweet Hesper-Phosphor, double name" (see D. H. Müller in S.B.W.A., vol. 97, p. 973 seq.). The Minæan inscriptions have "‘Athtar of the setting and ‘Athtar of the rising" (ibid., p. 1033). Moreover, in the older inscriptions ‘Athtar and Almaqa are always mentioned together; and Almaqa, which according to Hamdání is the name of Venus (al-Zuhara), was identified by Arabian archæologists with Bilqís. For qarn in the sense of 'ray' or 'beam' see Goldziher, Abhand. zur Arab. Philologie, Part I, p. 114. I think there is little doubt that Dhu ’l-Qarnayn and Bilqís may be added to the examples (ibid., p. 111 sqq.) of that peculiar conversion by which many heathen deities were enabled to maintain themselves under various disguises within the pale of Islam.
[56] The Arabic text will be found in Von Kremer's Altarabische Gedichte ueber die Volkssage von Jemen, p. 15 (No. viii, l. 6 sqq.). Ḥassán b. Thábit, the author of these lines, was contemporary with Muḥammad, to whose cause he devoted what poetical talent he possessed. In the verses immediately preceding those translated above he claims to be a descendant of Qaḥṭán.
[57] Von Kremer, Die Südarabische Sage, p. vii of the Introduction.
[58] A prose translation is given by Von Kremer, ibid., p. 78 sqq. The Arabic text which he published afterwards in Altarabische Gedichte ueber die Volkssage von Jemen, p. 18 sqq., is corrupt in some places and incorrect in others. I have followed Von Kremer's interpretation except when it seemed to me to be manifestly untenable. The reader will have no difficulty in believing that this poem was meant to be recited by a wandering minstrel to the hearers that gathered round him at nightfall. It may well be the composition of one of those professional story-tellers who flourished in the first century after the Flight, such as ‘Abíd b. Sharya (see p. [13] supra), or Yazíd b. Rabí‘a b. Mufarrigh († 688 a.d.), who is said to have invented the poems and romances of the Ḥimyarite kings (Aghání, xvii, 52).
[59] Instead of Hinwam the original has Hayyúm, for which Von Kremer reads Ahnúm. But see Hamdání, Jazíralu ’l-‘Arab, p. 193, last line and fol.