When some one favoured as thyself shall find her fair and fain and free;
And if she swear that parting ne’er shall break her word of constancy,
When did rose-tinted finger-tip with pacts and pledges e’er agree?
[444]. See p. 439 Grammatik des Arabischen Vulgär Dialekts von Ægyptien, by Dr. Wilhelm Spitta Bey, Leipzig, 1880. In pp. 489–493 he gives specimens of eleven Mawáwíl varying in length from four to fifteen lines. The assonance mostly attempts monorhyme: in two tetrastichs it is aa + ba, and it does not disdain alternates, ab + ab + ab.
[445]. Al-Siyuti, p. 235, from Ibn Khallikan. Our knowledge of oldest Arab verse is drawn chiefly from the Kitáb al-Aghání (Song-book) of Abu al-Faraj the Isfaháni who flourished A.H. 284–356 (= 897–967): it was printed at the Butak Press in 1868.
[446]. See Lyall loc. cit. p. 97.
[447]. His Diwán has been published with a French translation, par R. Boucher, Paris, Labitte, 1870.
[448]. I find also minor quotations from the Imám Abu al-Hasan al-Askari (of Sarra man raa) ob. A.D. 868; Ibn Makúla (murdered in A.D. 862?); Ibn Durayd (ob. A.D. 933); Al-Zahr the Poet (ob. A.D. 963); Abu Bakr al-Zubaydi (ob. A.D. 989); Kábús ibn Wushmaghir (murdered in A.D. 1012–13); Ibn Nabatah the Poet (ob. A.D. 1015); Ibn al-Sa’ati (ob. A.D. 1028); Ibn Zaydun al-Andalusi who died at Hums (Emessa, the Arab name for Seville) in A.D. 1071; Al-Mu’tasim ibn Sumadih (ob. A.D. 1091); Al-Murtaza ibn al-Shahrozuri the Sufi (ob. A.D. 1117); Ibn Sara al-Shantaráni (of Santarem) who sang of Hind and died A.D. 1123; Ibn al-Kházin (ob. A.D. 1124); Ibn Kalakis (ob. A.D. 1172); Ibn al-Ta’wizi (ob. A.D. 1188); Ibn Zabádah (ob. A.D. 1198); Bahá al-Dín Zuhayr (ob. A.D. 1249); Muwaffak al-Din Muzaffar (ob. A.D. 1266) and sundry others. Notices of Al-Utayyah (vol. i. 11), of Ibn al-Sumám (vol. i. 87) and of Ibn Sáhib al-Ishbíli, of Seville, (vol. i. 100) are deficient. The most notable point in Arabic verse is its savage satire, the language of excited “destructiveness” which characterises the Badawi: he is “keen for satire as a thirsty man for water;” and half his poetry seems to consist of foul innuendo, of lampoons, and of gross personal abuse.
[449]. If the letter preceding Wáw or Yá is moved by Fathah, they produce the diphthongs au (aw), pronounced like ou in “bout,” and ai, pronounced as i in “bite.”
[450]. For the explanation of this name and those of the following terms, see Terminal Essay, p. 261.