XIV. Tales of Official Life from the “Tadhkira” of Ibn Hamdun, etc.

H. F. Amedroz

doi:10.1017/S0035869X00080540

XIV. Tales of Official Life from the “Tadhkira” of Ibn Hamdun, etc.

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 March 2011

H. F. Amedroz

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Huge miscellaneous collections of anecdotes, compiled on no very apparent method, were much to Moslem taste. One of these is the of Ibn Ḥamdūn, a large anthological work divided into fifty Bāb, the headings of which foreshadow imperfectly their contents. The author's life is given by Ibn (de SI. Eng., iii, 90) and by Brockelmann (Gesch. Arab. Lit., i, 280). There is also a notice of him in the Wafi bil-Wafayāt of al-Ṣafadi (Paris, Ar. 5860, 236a), where he is described as a man of culture and of good birth, and as the composer of the on “Adab, Nawādir and a work of large dimensions, extending to twelve volumes, and very well known. Further, that the author was intimate with the Caliph Mustanjid and often conversed with him; that he owed to him his appointment to the Dīwān al-Zimām, his first official post having been that of ‘Āriḍ to the troops, under Muqtafi; and that he was amiable in character and socially pleasant. Certain stories, however, in his work being deemed by the Caliph to be reflections on his government, he was arrested in his office and imprisoned until his death in 572 A.H. In the same MS., at fol. 236b, is a notice of his brother, also named Muḥammad, but with the ‘laqab’ of Abu Naṣr (that of the former being Abu-1-Ma‘āli); that he served as clerk in the Dīwān from the year 513 A.H. until his death in 545 A.H.; and that he composed a volume of “Rasā'il” and a history.

Type: Articles
Information: Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 40 , Issue 2 , April 1908 , pp. 409 - 470

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0035869X00080540 [Opens in a new window]
Copyright: Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1908

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^{page 410 note 1} A permanently existing body is unaffected by this consideration, and I commend the publication of the to future Trustees of the “E. J. W. Gibb Memorial,” when the shall have been disposed of (see p. 17, supra). The may contain some 400,000 words.

^{page 411 note 1} Mentioned only incidentally by Ṭabari, (iii, 651),Google Scholar he is noticed in the ‘Umdat al-Ṭālib, lith., p. 280, B.M. add. 7355, 100a. Born in 158 A.H., he was brought up at the Caliph's Court. He attempted a rising, but was imprisoned, and, when released, went into hiding at Baṣra, where he was discovered, blind, and left unmolested by Mutawakkil, whose grief at his death, following on that of Isḥhaq al-Mauṣili in 235 A.II., is mentioned on the authority of the Kitāb (see v, 127). The author of the last-mentioned work gives a notice of ‘Īsa b. Zaid in his Maqātil al-Ṭālibiyyīn, lith. Teheran, 1307, pp. 212–15, and relates how he escaped from his detention in the house of al-Faḍl b. al-Rabī‘, and evaded strenuous efforts to recapture him. But he makes no mention of his revolt.

^{page 413 note 1} Mentioned Ṭab. iii, 606,Google Scholar as excepted from the general banishment of the Alides from Baghdad by ‘Abd Allah in this passage should be read ‘Ubaid-Allah, see ‘Umdat al-Ṭālib, lith., 354, 1. 11, where al- ‘Abbas is described as

^{page 414 note 1}

^{page 414 note 2} Persian See Johnson, Pers. Diet.

^{page 415 note 1}

^{page 415 note 2} Ibn Eng. iii, 388; ii, 123; and iv, 163, n. 2.Google Scholar

^{page 416 note 1} Ibn Eng. iii, 249.Google Scholar

^{page 416 note 2} (From the Paris, Ar. 3482, fol. 6b. This episode is given briefty, at the end of the vizier's life, by Ibn supra.)

^{page 417 note 1} In Or. 3179 is inserted between the words in xx, 47, 1. 11.

^{page 417 note 2} Trans. Margoliouth, D. S., “ Umayyads and Abbasids,” p. 236.Google Scholar

^{page 418 note 1} The highest talent has been exercised on these lines. One authority suggests in place of which contrasts with ‘silent,’ whilst noticing the inconvenience of the feminine plural. Another avoids the inconvenience by substituting and thus making all concerned feminine, being applicable to both sexes.

^{page 419 note 1} An addition to Ṭab. iii, 1927,Google Scholar from Ibn Miskawaih, says that Sulaimān's son, ‘Ubaid Allah, then secretary to Muwaffaq, reconciled the rival viziers. There is no later mention of al-Ḥasan b. either by Ṭabari or Ibn but in Toilers' “Fragmente aus d. ” of Ibn Sa‘īd, p. 64, he is mentioned as visiting Aḥmad b. Ṭūlūn by invitation from his exile at Raqqa, and as behaving so haughtily that Aḥmad seized an occasion of disgracing and imprisoning him, and that later he returned to Syria, where he died, and was buried at Qaṣr ‘Īsa b. A story in Yāqūt's “ al-Arīb,” ed. Margoliouth, D. S., i, 397, tells of his niggardly provision of food for guests, and how Jaḥẓa managed to profit by this peculiarity. In the same work, at p. 136, is a notice of Aḥmad, a son of Sulaimān b. Wahb, d. 285 A. H.Google Scholar

^{page 420 note 1} In xxi, 253, action is attributed to his recollection of a line of verse in the mouth of his father, Mu‘taṣim.

^{page 421 note 1} According to a story (ib., p. 45), also derived from ‘Ubaid Allah, his father's release was due to his stout-hearted reply to lines sent him by his brother, urging him to be of good cheer. These came to the knowledge of who said he would not suffer his prisons to be the grave of ‘Faraj,’ least of all to those who were in his service. According to another story (ib., p. 98), and also Or. 3180, fol. 88a, likewise derived from ‘Ubaid Allah through the vizier ‘Ali b. ‘Īsa, Sulaimān's release was the result of deathbed remorse for his past acts and to the advice given by the Qaḍi Aḥmad b. abi Duwād that he should make what amends he could by a general gaol delivery of persons detained for non-payment of fines. And the Caliph's order to this effect was carried out by (to whom Sulaimān had been secretary) in the teeth of Ibn al-Zayyāt's resistance. Moreover, the Qāḍi, on reporting the result to the Caliph, succeeded in getting the prisoners' property restored to them. In the Or. 3179, 103a, is another story of the Qāḍi's benevolent intercession with Mu‘taṣim in favour of an intended victim of his anger, and other instances are given in his life by Ibn Eng. i, 61.Google Scholar

^{page 411 note 2} Abu Marwān and a brother, when burying their father's remains, thanked Allah at being rid of him (Ṭab. iii, 1376).Google Scholar

^{page 422 note 1} He describes himself as having prayed that his fate might depend on whether or not he had been party to the murder of Najāḥ b. Salama, but this must be an error, as that event took place later, in 245 A.H. (see Ṭab. iii, 1440).Google Scholar

^{page 423 note 1} Ṭabari, (iii, 1378)Google Scholar records that at a previous date, 233 A.H., Mutawakkil had disgraced Abu-l-Wazīr, whose full name is given elsewhere as Aḥmad b. and had seized his property, and that through Abu-l-Wazīr's treachery other persons had been imprisoned and fined, one of these being Muḥammad b. ‘Abd al-Malik, brother of Mūsa b. ‘Abd al-Malik. If this Abu-1-Wazīr was identical with al-Ṣarīfīni, the superseded governor, it may be that Mūsa, in procuring his dismissal was, like Scott's Harry of the Wynd, “fighting for his own hand.” It was the appointment in 258 A. II. of a great-nephew of Abu-1-Wazīr to the in Egypt which led to the governor Aḥmad b. Ṭūlūn furthering his own independence by procuring the transfer to himself of that office, see Vollers, , Fragm., p. 16.Google Scholar

^{page 423 note 2} Despatched to Damascus against ‘Īsa b. in 257 (Ṭab. iii, 1841,Google Scholar and Vollers, , Fragm., p. 9). A story ib., p. 44, bears witness to his ability when in charge of the ‘Barīd’ in Egypt.Google Scholar

^{page 424 note 1} Sulaimān had required of him— and his voluntary act was— The two processes are identical.

^{page 425 note 1} In Ibn Sa‘īd’s narrative of Mūsa's attempt to supersede Aḥmad b. Ṭūlūn as governor of Egypt, Mūsa's secretary is called Mūsa b. ‘Ubaid Allah, but it is clear that ‘Mūsa’ should be omitted in both the passages in Vollers, , Fragm., p. 19, n. 2, and p. 20, n. 2.Google Scholar The futile expedition, which only reached Raqqa, is not noticed by Ṭabari. It is told by Ibn vii, 212, where ‘Ubaid Allah is called ‘Abd Allah.

^{page 426 note 1} This happened in 288 A.H. according to Ibn al-Jauzi in the “Muntaẓam,” Paris, Ar. 5909, 28a, where he relates how Mu'taḍid intended to appoint Aḥmad b. al-Furāt vizier, but was persuaded by Badr to prefer ‘Ubaid Allah's son, al-Qāsim; and how in doing this he foretold its evil result for Badr. Al-Qāsim had acted as deputy vizier, but the Caliph reposed more confidence in Aḥmad, whose official ability was notorious (cf. Hilāl al-Ṣābi, “Wuzarā,” pp. 187–8, 219, and 255).Google Scholar

^{page 427 note 1} So said Browning's “Patriot ”— “now instead' T is God shall repay: I am safer so.”

^{page 427 note 2} The first two stories are given by Ibn Ḥamdūn, Or. 3179, fols. 117b and 135b, but all three appear on the earlier authority of the vizier at al-Rayy, Abu Sa‘d Manṣūr b. al-Ḥusain al-Ābi, who died 421 A.H. (Brockelmann, , i, 351) in the al-Durar fī-l- Muhāḍarāt (B.M. Or. 5769, fols. 25a, 14a, and 30a). It is to be noticed that his contemporary in the (Paris, Ar. 3482, fol. 6a), on the authority of a son of Yaḥya al-Munajjim (d. 300 A.H.), makes Abu-1-‘Ainā’s retort addressed to one Abu ‘Abd Allah b. Yaḥya al-Ṭabari, a Ṣāḥib of Mu‘izz al-Daula, but as Abu-l-‘Ainā died in 284 A.H. and is made to address Abu as ‘vizier,’ the dates do not fit.Google Scholar

^{page 427 note 3} The MS. has but the error was detected by Professor D. S. Margoliouth, who refers to the mention of him in the “Fihrist,” p. 130, 1. 18, as a State secretary. He is mentioned too as in prison, and visited by Ibn abi ‘Auf ‘al-Buzūri’ (mentioned infra) in the “Faraj ba‘d i, 62–3; as disputing with Aḥmad b. al-Furāt before ‘Ubaid Allah in Hilāl, “Wuzarā,” p. 255; and as reviled by Abu-l-‘Ainā in the latter's life by Ibn Eng. iii, 58.Google Scholar

^{page 428 note 1}

^{page 429 note 1}

^{page 429 note 2} (Paris, Ar. 3482, fol. 29a.)

^{page 429 note 3} and the sum obtained The term occurs in other passages in Hilāl, on pp. 87, 93, and 171. References to pp. 87 and 215 should be added in the Glossary, sub

^{page 430 note 1}

^{page 430 note 2} (Paris, Ar. 3482, fol. 28a.)

^{page 431 note 1} In taking leave of the house of Wahb, the career of al-Qāsim's son, al-Ḥusain, may be noticed. He was a prodigal, and when pressed by his creditors, who refused to be content with his revenue and threatened to summon him before the Qāḍi, he consulted Ibn al-Buhlūl how to save his estates. He advised him to apply to the Qāḍi, Abu ‘Umar (Muḥammad b. Yūsuf, d. 320 A.H. ), under whose jurisdiction he was as a resident on the east bank, for according to the tenets of the Māliki school of jurists, he would be enabled to pronounce his interdiction as a spendthrift, whereby the creditors' remedy would be limited to the income. The passage runs:— (Paris, Ar. 3482, fol. 84b.) Later, when he had attained the vizierate (in 319 A.H.), Mūnis argued that this episode in his career showed his unfitness to manage the revenue. He supported Muqtadir against Mūnis, but failed, and was dismissed in 320 A.H. (‘Arīb, p. 173). The “Faraj ba‘d ” i, 60, speaks of him as vizier to Muqtadir's successor, Qāhir, by whom he was put to death, says (Leyden, No. 863, fol. 171b), for heresy.

^{page 432 note 1} (Paris, Ar. 3482, fol. 118a.)

^{page 434 note 1} Appointed in 316 A.H. to the land-tax office at Ahwāz (‘Arīb., p. 138, where a note indicates that in the MS,, as also in that of Ibn Miskawaih, the name is written ‘al-Yazīdi.’ It is thus written also in the text of the ).

^{page 434 note 2} (Paris, Ar. 3482, fol. 70a.)

^{page 435 note 1} Called here

^{page 435 note 2}

^{page 436 note 1}

^{page 436 note 2} In this case also a single word sufficed to denote the practice of undertaking to squeeze from a man a definite sum,

^{page 436 note 3} (Paris, Ar. 3482, fol. 44b.) And, according to the Qāḍi Aḥmad b. abi Duwād, the property of persons executed passed, legally, failing proof of their guilt, to their heirs (Ibn Eng. i, 63).Google Scholar

^{page 437 note 1} The story was popular. Hilāl took it from the fol. 11a; it occurs in the “Kitāb ” of Ibn al-Jauzi, a work largely concerned with Ibn al-Jaṣṣāṣ (Paris, Ar. 3543, 115a), and it is quoted from the by in the (Leyden, No. 863, fol. 199a).

^{page 437 note 2} E.g., by Sibṭ ibn al-Jauzi (B.M. Or. 4619, fol. 85a) and by (B.M. Or. 48, fol. 70a). By Ibn Ḥamdūn also (Or. 3179, 205b) the story is attributed to him, but the apple becomes a pearl (Ibn al-Jaṣṣāṣ jewels were renowned), and the sufferer is the Caliph.

^{page 438 note 1} The amount and nature of official salaries are obscure. Under Muqtadir a vizier had 5,000 dinars a month besides the revenue of certain ‘Abbasid Estates’ (Hilāl, , “Wuzarā,” 261, l. ult., and 282, 1. 8).Google Scholar The head of a Dīwān got one-tenth of this sum (ib. 177–8), and the profits of subordinate officials were often large (ib. 139–40). In the sixth century the vizier Jamāl al-Dīn al-Iṣfahāni at Mosul had an ‘Iqṭa‘’ of one-tenth of the produce of the soil, that being the usual vizier's allowance under Saljuq rule (Ibn Eng. iii, 297).Google Scholar

^{page 438 note 2} In “Das Einnahme Budget des Abbassidenreiches v. J. 306 A.H.”: Denkschr. d. phil. hist. Cl. d. W. A., Bd. xxxvi, pp. 283–362.

^{page 438 note 3} Transl. Margoliouth, D. S., “Umayyads and Abbasids,” p. 233.Google Scholar

^{page 439 note 1} IbnSa‘īd, , Vollers, , “Fragmente,” p. 37.Google Scholar

^{page 440 note 1} Except that ‘bracelet’ is inserted after

^{page 440 note 2} A full account of al-‘Umari from the “Muqaffā” of Maqrizi (Paris, AT. 2144, fol. 163 ff.) is given by Quatremère, , “Mém. sur l'Égypte,” i, 59–80.Google Scholar

^{page 441 note 1} The Baja tribe is mentioned, unfavourably, by IbnJubair, , ed. de Goeje, , 1907, pp. 70–1,Google Scholar transl. Schiaparelli, , 1906, pp. 41, 43.Google Scholar

^{page 441 note 2} Bakkār b. Qutaiba, Ibn Eng. i, 261,Google Scholar put to death by the Amīr when on his deathbed (Vollers, , Fragm., 71);Google ScholarSulaimān, Rabi‘ b., ib., Eng. i, 519;Google Scholar‘Abd al-Ḥākim, Muḥammad b., ib., Eng. ii, 598;Google Scholar and Muḥammad al-Jauhari, Ma‘mar b., mentioned Fragm. pp. 10, 38, and 59, where he accompanies Bakkār as envoy from the Amīr to his rebellious son al-‘Abbās. All, except Bakkār, were of the Shafeite school.Google Scholar

^{page 442 note 1} Ibn Eng. i, 51, nephew to al-Muzani, infra, whose tenets he exchanged for those of Abu Ḥanīfa.Google Scholar

^{page 443 note 1} Ibn Eng. i, 200.Google Scholar

^{page 443 note 2} Mentioned Fragm., p. 42, 1. 6, as in the Amīr's service, and described as impudent,

^{page 443 note 3} In Or. 3180, 121a, is a story how al-Muzani protested he would not attend on the Amīr, and answered his envoy by alleging an oath, thus:—

^{page 444 note 1} A Mūsa b. Mufliḥ was serving in Muwaffaq's campaign against the Zanj in 267 A.H. (Ṭab. iii, 2012), and was at Baghdad in 278 A.H. (ib. 2118).Google Scholar

^{page 444 note 2} Mentioned Fragm., p. 9, as slave to the mother of the Caliph Mu‘tazz, and as head of the ‘Barīd’ on the Amīr's arrival in Egypt, who probably treated him as hostile to his rule.

^{page 445 note 1} An Aḥmad b. Ismā‘īl b. ‘Ammār is mentioned (Fragm., p. 69) as brought from prison to be consulted by the Amīr as to whether it was his duty to lead his army in person to the assistance of Mu‘tamid against his brother Muwaffaq.

^{page 445 note 2} A somewhat different version of this dream and of the career of Muḥammad b. Sulaimān is given in the “Faraj ba‘d ” i, 180–2.

^{page 446 note 1} He is called by that historian Sa‘d b. Muḥammad; here, Sa'd b. ‘Ali.

^{page 448 note 1} (see Dozy, , Suppt. i, 15a).Google Scholar

^{page 448 note 2} a rare use of the word.

^{page 450 note 1} This seems to be the meaning of the text, that of the Latin translation is more obscure. The vizier al-Zainabi fell into disfavour the year following (Ibn xi, 50).