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A Note on an Arabic Fragment of Ibn Buṭlān's The Physicians' Dinner Party from the Cairo Genizah

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2009

Colin F. Baker
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Extract

Among the Arabic fragments within the Taylor–Schechter Genizah Collection in the Cambridge University Library, I came upon a piece from Ibn Buṭlān's The Physicians' Dinner Party (Da‘wat al-’aṭibbā’): one of the earliest examples of the Arabic maqāmah. Although the Jews of Arab lands were acquainted with Arabic literature mainly in the form of scientific and philosophical texts, the discovery of our fragment from the Cairo Genizah provides further evidence that they also had some familiarity with Arabic belleslettres.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 3 , Issue 2 , July 1993 , pp. 207 - 213
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1993

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References

1 For a general survey see Khan, G. A. “The Arabic fragments in the Cambridge Genizah collections” in Manuscripts of the Middle Bast: A journal devoted to the study of handwritten materials of the Middle East, ed. Witkam, J. J. (Leiden, 1986), i, pp. 54–60Google Scholar

2 See Buṭlān, Ibn, The Physicians' Dinner Party, ed. Klein-Franke, F. (Wiesbaden, 1985), introduction, p.iGoogle Scholar.

3 See Blau, J., The Emergence and Linguistic Background of Judaeo-Arabic (Oxford, 1965), pp. 36ffGoogle Scholar.

4 Ibid., p. 38.

5 1 am grateful to the Syndics of Cambridge University Library for granting me the permission to publish the photographs of fragment T-S Ar.19.8 from the Taylor-Schechter Genizah Collection.

6 See Fenton, P., A Handlist of Judeo-Arabic Manuscripts in Leningrad: A Tentative Handlist of Judeo-Arabic Manuscripts in the Firkovic Collections, Ben-Zvi Institute, Yad Izhak Ben Zvi and the Hebrew University, Jerusalem and M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin State Public Library, Leningrad (Jerusalem, 1991), pp. 73 and 113Google Scholar.

7 See Blau, J., Emergence, p. 37Google Scholar. Further examples from the Cairo Genizah of Arabic literary texts written in Hebrew characters include Sīrat ‘Antar (T-S Ar.13.3) and ’Alflaylah wa-laylah (T-S Ar.36.68).

8 See Khan, G. A., “Arabic fragments” p. 54Google Scholar.

9 See Blau, J., Emergence, p. 38Google Scholar and Khan, G. A., “Arabic fragments”, p. 54Google Scholar.

10 See G. A. Khan, ibid., p. 54.

11 See Buṭlān, Ibn, The Physicians' Dinner Party, introduction, pp. 8–10Google Scholar.

12 See ‘Uyūn al-’anbā’ fī ṭabaqāt al-’aṭibbā’, ed. Mūller, A. (Cairo, 1882–1884), i.201Google Scholar.

13 For further examples of tanwīn ’alif, contrary to Classical Arabic usage, see Hopkins, S., Studies in the Grammar of Early Arabic Based upon Papyri Datable to before 300 A.H./912 A.D., London Oriental Series, vol. 37 (Oxford, 1984), §§170–1Google Scholar; and Blau, J., A Grammar of Christian Arabic, Corpus Scriptorum Christianorum Orientalium, vol. 276, subsidia tomus 28 (Louvain, 1967), pp. 329ffGoogle Scholar.

14 See Blau, J., Emergence, (Oxford, 1965), pp. 101–2 and 131–2Google Scholar; Blau, J., A Grammar of Christian Arabic, pp. 366ffGoogle Scholar.

15 See Blau, J., A Grammar of Christian Arabic, p. 278Google Scholar; and Hopkins, S., Studies in the Grammar of Early Arabic, §139Google Scholar.

16 See apparatus of Der Dīwān des Abū Nuwās, ed. Wagner, E., Bibliothek hlamica.zoc (Stuttgart, 1988), iii, p.312Google Scholar.

17 See ibid., p. 312.

18 See ibid., p. 312.