[FN#444] See p. 439 Grammatik des Arabischen Vulgär Dialekts von Ægyptian, 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.
[FN#445] Al-Siyuti, p. 235, from Ibn Khallikan. Our knowledge of oldest Arab verse is drawn chiefly from the Katáb al-Aghání (Song-book) of Abu al-Faraj the Isfaháni who flourished A.H. 284-356 (= 897- 967): it was printed at the Bulak Press in 1868.
[FN#446] See Lyall loc. cit. p. 97.
[FN#447] His Diwán has been published with a French translation, par R. Boucher, Paris, Labitte, 1870.
[FN#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.
[FN#449] If the letter preceding Wáw or Yá is moved by Fathah, they produce the diphthongs au (aw), pronounced like ou in “bout’” and se, pronounced as i in “bite.”
[FN#450] For the explanation of this name and those of the following terms, see Terminal Essay, p. 225.
[FN#451] This Fásilah is more accurately called sughrá, the smaller one, there is another Fásilah kubrà, the greater, consisting of four moved letters followed by a quiescent, or of a Sabab sakíl followed by a Watad majmú’. But it occurs only as a variation of a normal foot, not as an integral element in its composition, and consequently no mention of it was needed in the text.
[FN#452] It is important to keep in mind that the seemingly identical feet 10 and 6, 7 and 3, are distinguished by the relative positions of the constituting elements in either pair. For as it will be seen that Sabab and Watad are subject to different kinds of alterations it is evident that the effect of such alterations upon a foot will vary, if Sabab and Watad occupy different places with regard to each other.
[FN#453] i.e. vertical to the circumference.