One Thousand and One Nights

by Richard Burton

  252 Lit. wrath; affliction which chokes; in Hindustani it means simply anger.

  253 i.e. Heaven forbid I be touched by a strange man.

  254 Used for fuel and other purposes, such as making “doss stick.”

  255 Arab “Yaftah’Allah” the offer being insufficient. The rascal is greedy as a Badaw and moreover he is a liar, which the Badawi is not.

  256 The third of the four great Moslem schools of Theology, taking its name from the Imam al-Sháfi’í (Mohammed ibn Idrís) who died in Egypt A.H. 204, and lies buried near Cairo. (Sale’s Prel. Disc. sect. viii.)

  257 The Moslem form of Cabbala, or transcendental philosophy of the Hebrews.

  258 Arab. “Bakh” the word used by the Apostle to Ali his son-in-law. It is the Latin “Euge.”

  259 Readers, who read for amusement, will do well to “skip” the fadaises of this highly educated young woman.

  260 There are three Persian Kings of this name (Artaxerxes)

  which means “Flour and milk,” or “high lion.” The text alludes to

  Ardeshir Babegan, so called because he married the daughter of

  Babak the shepherd, founder of the Sassanides in A.D. 202. See

  D,Herberot, and the Dabistan.

  261 Alluding to the proverb, “Folk follow their King’s faith,”

  “Cujus regio ejus religio” etc.

  262 Second Abbaside, A.H. 136-158 (=754-775).

  263 The celebrated companion of Mohammed who succeeded Abu Bakr in the Caliphate (A.H. 13-23=634-644). The Sunnis know him as Al-Adil the Just, and the Shiahs detest him for his usurpation, his austerity and harshness. It is said that he laughed once and wept once. The laugh was caused by recollecting how he ate his dough-gods (the idols of the Hanifah tribe) in The Ignorance. The tears were drawn by remembering how he buried alive his baby daughter who, while the grave was being dug, patted away the dust from his hair and beard. Omar was doubtless a great man, but he is one of the most ungenial figures in Moslem history which does not abound in genialities. To me he suggests a Puritan, a Covenanter of the sourest and narrowest type; and I cannot wonder that the Persians abhor him, and abuse him on all occasions.

  264 The austere Caliph Omar whose scourge was more feared than the sword was the - author of the celebrated saying “Consult them (feminines) and do clear contrary-wise.”

  265 Our “honour amongst thieves.”

  266 The sixth successor of Mohammed and founder of the Banu Umayyah or Ommiades, called the “sons of the little mother” from their eponymus (A.H. 41-60=661-680). For his Badawi wife Maysun, and her abuse of her husband, see Pilgrimage iii. 262.

  267 Shaykh of the noble tribe, or rather nation, Banu Tamím and a notable of the day, surnamed, no one knows why, “Sire of the Sea.”

  268 This is essential for cleanliness in hot lands: however much the bath may be used, the body-pile and lower hair, if submitted to a microscope, will show more or less sordes adherent. The axilla-hair is plucked because if shaved the growing pile causes itching and the depilatories are held deleterious. At first vellication is painful but the skin becomes used to it. The pecten is shaved either without or after using depilatories, of which more presently. The body-pile is removed by “Takhfíf”; the Libán Shámi (Syrian incense), a fir- gum imported from Scio, is melted and allowed to cool in the form of a pledget. This is passed over the face and all the down adhering to it is pulled up by the roots (Burckhardt No. 420). Not a few Anglo-Indians have adopted these precautions

  269 This Caliph was a tall, fair, handsome man of awe-inspiring aspect. Omar used to look at him and say, “This is the Cæsar of the Arabs,” while his wife called him a “fatted ass.”

  270 The saying is attributed to Abraham when “exercised” by the unkindly temper of Sarah; “woman is made hard and crooked like a rib;” and the modern addition is, “whoso would straighten her, breaketh her.”

  271 i.e. “When ready and in erection.”

  272 “And do first (before going in to your wives) some act which may be profitable unto your souls” or, for you: soul’s good. (Koran, chaps. ii. 223.) Hence Ahnaf makes this prayer.

  273 It was popularly said that “Truth-speaking left Omar without a friend.” Entitled “The Just” he was murdered by Abu Lúlúah, alias Fírúz, a (Magian ?) slave of Al-Maghírah for denying him justice.

  274 Governor of Bassorah under the first four Caliphs. See

  D’Herbelot s.v. “Aschári.”

  275 Ziyad bin Abi Sufyan, illegitimate brother of the Caliph

  Mu’awiyah afterwards governor of Bassorah, Cufa and Al-Hijaz.

  276 The seditions in Kufah were mainly caused by the wilful nepotism of Caliph Othman bin Asákir which at last brought about his death. His main quality seems to have been personal beauty: “never was seen man or woman of fairer face than he and he was the most comely of men:” he was especially famed for beautiful teeth which in old age he bound about with gold wire. He is described as of middling stature, large- limbed, broad shouldered, fleshy of thigh and long in the fore-arm which was hairy. His face inclined to yellow and was pock-marked; his beard was full and his curly hair, which he dyed yellow, fell below his ears. He is called “writer of the Koran” from his edition of the M.S., and “Lord of the two Lights” because he married two of the Prophet’s daughters, Rukayyah and Umm Kulthum; and, according to the Shi’ahs who call him Othman-i-Lang or” limping Othman,” he vilely maltreated them. They justify his death as the act of an Ijmá’ al-Muslimín, the general consensus of Moslems which ratifies “Lynch law.” Altogether Othman is a mean figure in history.

  277 “Nár” (fire) is a word to be used delicately from its connection with Gehenna. You say, e.g. “bring me a light, a coal (bassah)” etc.; but if you say “bring me fire! “ the enemy will probably remark “He wanteth fire even before his time!” The slang expression would be “bring the sweet.” (Pilgrimage i. 121.)

  278 Omar is described as a man of fair complexion, and very ruddy, but he waxed tawny with age, when he also became bald and grey. He had little hair on the cheeks but a long mustachio with reddish ends. In stature he overtopped the people and was stout as he was tall. A popular saying of Mohammed’s is, “All (very) long men are fools save Omar, and all (very) short men are knaves save Ali.” The Persians, who abhor Omar, compare every lengthy, ungainly, longsome thing with him; they will say, “This road never ends, like the entrails of Omar.” We know little about Ali’s appearance except that he was very short and stout, broad and full-bellied with a tawny complexion and exceedingly hairy, his long beard, white as cotton, filling all the space between his shoulders. He was a “pocket. Hercules,” and incredible tales, like that about the gates of Khaybar, are told of his strength. Lastly, he was the only Caliph who bequeathed anything to literature: his “Cantiloquium” is famous and he has left more than one mystical and prophetic work. See Ockley for his “Sentences” and D’Herbelot s. D. “Ali” and “Gebr.” Ali is a noble figure in Moslem history.

  279 The emancipation from the consequences of his sins; or it may mean a holy death.

  280 Battle fought near Al-Medinah A.D. 625. The word is derived from “shad” (one). I have described the site in my Pilgrimage, (vol. ii. 227).

  281 “Haphsa” in older writers; Omar’s daughter and one of Mohammed’s wives, famous for her connection with the manuscripts of the Koran. From her were (or claimed to be) descended the Hafsites who reigned in Tunis and extended their power far and wide over the Maghrib (Mauritania), till dispossessed by the Turks.

  282 i.e. humbly without the usual strut or swim: it corresponds with the biblical walking or going softly. (I Kings xxi. 27; Isaiah xxxviii. 15, etc.)

  283 A theologian of the seventh and eighth centuries.

  284 i.e. to prepare himself by good works, especially alms-giving, for the next world.

  285 A theologian of the eighth century.

  286 Abd al-Aziz was eighth Ommiade (regn. A.H. 99=717) and the fifth of the orthodox, famed for a
piety little known to his house. His most celebrated saying was, “ Be constant in meditation on death: if thou bein straitened case ‘twill enlarge it, and if in affluence ‘twill straiten it upon thee.” He died. poisoned, it is said, in A.H 101,

  287 Abu Bakr originally called Abd al-Ka’abah (slave of the Ka’abah) took the name of Abdullah and was surnamed Abu Bakr (father of the virgin) when Mohammed, who before had married only widows, took to wife his daughter, the famous or infamous Ayishah. “Bikr” is the usual form, but “Bakr,” primarily meaning a young camel, is metaphorically applied to human youth (Lane’s Lex. s. c.). The first Caliph was a cloth-merchant, like many of the Meccan chiefs. He is described as very fair with bulging brow, deep set eyes and thin-checked, of slender build and lean loined, stooping and with the backs of his hands fleshless. He used tinctures of Henna and Katam for his beard. The Persians who hate him, call him “Pir-i-Kaftár,” the old she-hyaena, and believe that he wanders about the deserts of Arabia in perpetual rut which the males must satisfy.

  288 The second, fifth, sixth and seventh Ommiades.

  289 The mother of Omar bin Abd al-Aziz was a granddaughter of

  Omar bin al-Khattab.

  290 Brother of this Omar’s successor, Yezid II.

  291 So the Turkish proverb “The fish begins to stink at the head.”

  292 Calling to the slaves.

  293 When the “Day of Arafat” (9th of Zú’l-Hijjah) falls upon a Friday. For this Hajj al- Akbar see my Pilgrimage iii. 226. It is often confounded by writers (even by the learned M. Caussin de Perceval) with the common Pilgrimage as opposed to the Umrah, or “ Lesser Pilgrimage” (ibid. iii. 342, etc.). The latter means etymologically cohabiting with a woman in her father’s house as opposed to ‘Ars or leading her to the husband’s home: it is applied to visiting Meccah and going through all the pilgrim-rites but not at the Pilgrimage-season. Hence its title “Hajj al-Asghar” the “Lesser Hajj.” But “Umrah” is also applied to a certain ceremony between the hills Safá (a large hard rock) and Marwah (stone full of flints), which accompanies the Hajj and which I have described (ibid. iii. 344). At Meccah I also heard of two places called Al-Umrah, the Greater in the Wady Fátimah and the Lesser half way nearer the city (ibid. iii. 344).

  294 A fair specimen of the unworthy egoism which all religious systems virtually inculcate Here a pious father leaves his children miserable to save his own dirty soul.

  295 Chief of the Banú Tamín, one of the noblest of tribes, derived from Tamím, the uncle of Kuraysh (Koreish); hence the poets sang: —

  There cannot be a son nobler than Kuraysh,

  Nor an uncle nobler than Tamím.

  The high minded Tamín is contrasted with the mean-spirited Kays, who also gave rise to a tribe; and hence the saying concerning one absolutely inconsistent, “Art thou now Tamín and then Kays?”

  296 Surnamed Al-Sakafi, Governor of Al-Yaman and Irak.

  297 Tenth Ommiade (regn. A H. 105-125 = 724-743).

  298 Or “clothe thee in worn-out clothes” i.e. “Become a Fakir” or religious mendicant.

  299 This gratuitous incest in ignorance injures the tale and is as repugnant to Moslem as to Christian taste.

  300 The child is named either on the day of its birth or on that day week. The father whispers it in the right ear, often adding the Azán or prayer-call, and repeating in the left ear the “Ikámah” or Friday sentence. There are many rules for choosing names according to the week-day, the ascendant planet, the “Sortes Coranicæ,” etc.

  301 Amongst Moslems as amongst Christians there are seven deadly sins: idolatry, murder, falsely charging modest women with unchastity, robbing orphans, usury, desertion in Holy War and disobedience to parents. The difference between the two creeds is noteworthy. And the sage knows only three, intemperance, ignorance and egoism.

  302 Meaning, “It was decreed by Destiny; so it came to pass,” appropriate if not neat.

  303 The short, stout, dark, long-haired and two-bunched camel from “Bukhtar” (Bactria), the “Eastern” (Bakhtar) region on the Amu or Jayhun (Oxus) River; afterwards called Khorasan. The two-humped camel is never seen in Arabia except with northern caravans, and to speak of it would be a sore test of Badawi credulity.

  304 “Kaylúlah” is the “forty-winks” about noon: it is a Sunnat or Practice of the Prophet who said, “Make the mid-day siesta, for verily at this hour the devils sleep not.” “Aylúlain” is slumbering after morning prayers (our “beauty-sleep”), causing heaviness andid leness: “Ghaylúlah” is dozing about 9 a.m. engendering poverty and wretchedness: “Kaylúlah” (with the guttural Kaf) is sleeping before evening prayers and “Faylúlah” is slumbering after sunset — both held to be highly detrimental. (Pilgrimage ii 49.)

  305 The Biblical “Hamath” (Hightown) too well known to require description. It is still famous for the water-wheels mentioned by al-Hariri (assembly of the Banu Harám).

  306 When they say, “The levee flashes bright on the hills of

  Al-Yaman,” the allusion is to the south quarter, where

  summer-lightning is seen. Al-Yaman (always with the article) means,

  I have said, the right-hand region to one facing the rising sun and

  Al-Sham (Syria) the left-hand region.

  307 Again “he” for “she,” in delicacy and jealousy of making public the beauty or conditions of the “veiled sex.” Even public singers would hesitate to use a feminine pronoun. As will be seen however, the rule is not invariably kept and hardly ever in Badawi poetry.

  308 The normal pun on “Nuzhat al-Zaman” = Delight of the Age or Time.

  309 The reader will find in my Pilgrimage (i. 305) a sketch of the Takht-rawan or travelling-litter, in which pilgrimesses are wont to sleep.

  310 In poetry it holds the place of our Zephyr; end the “Bád- i-Sabá”=Breeze o’ the morn, Is much addressed by Persian poets.

  311 Here appears the nervous, excitable, hysterical Arab temperament which is almost phrensied by the neighbourhood of a home from which he had run away.

  312 Zau al-Makan and Nuzhat al-Zaman.

  313 The idea is essentially Eastern, “A lion at home and a lamb abroad” is the popular saying.

  314 Arab. “Hubb al-Watan” (= love of birthplace, patriotism) of which the Tradition says “Min al-Imán” (=is part of man’s religion).

  315 He is supposed to speak en prince; and he yields to a prayer when he spurns a command.

  316 In such caravans each party must keep its own place under pain of getting into trouble with the watchmen and guards.

  317 Mr. Payne (ii. 109) borrows this and the next quotation from the Bull Edit. i. 386.

  318 For the expiation of inconsiderate oaths see Koran (chaps. v.). I cannot but think that Al-Islam treats perjury too lightly: all we can say is-that it improves upon Hinduism which practically seems to leave the punishment to the gods.

  319 “Kausar,” as has been said, represents the classical nectar, the Amrita of the Hindus.

  320 From Bull Edit. i. 186. The couplet in the Mac. Edit. i. 457 is very wildly applied.

  321 The “insula” of Sancho Panza.

  322 This should have assured him that he stood in no danger.

  323 Here ends the wearisome tale of the brother and sister, and the romance of chivalry begins once more with the usual Arab digressions.

  324 I have derived this word from the Persian “rang”=colour, hue, kind.

  325 Otherwise all would be superseded, like U. S. officials under a new President.

  326 Arab. “Nímshah” from the Pers. Nímchah, a “half-sword,” a long dagger worn in the belt. Richardson derives it from Namsh, being freckled (damasked).

  327 The Indian term for a tent large enough to cover a troop of cavalry.

  328 Arab. “Marhúm” a formula before noticed. It is borrowed from the Jewish, “of blessed memory” (after the name of the honoured dead, Prov. x. 17.); with the addition of “upon whom be peace,” as opposed to the imprecation, “May
the name of the wicked rot!”

  329 The speeches of the five damsels should be read only by students.

  330 i.e. Those who look for “another and a better.”

  331 The title of Caliph Abu Bakr because he bore truthful witness to the Apostle’s mission or, others say, he confirmed the “Mi’ráj” or nocturnal journey to Heaven.

  332 All this is Koranic (chaps. ii., etc.).

  333 This may have applied more than once to “hanging judges” in the Far West.

  334 A traditionist and jurisconsult of Al-Medinah in the seventh and eighth centuries.

  335 The Alexander of the Koran and Eastern legends, not to be confounded with the Alexander of Macedon. He will be noticed in a future Night.

  336 Æsop, according to the Arabs: of him or rather of the two

  Lukmans, more presently.

  337 Koran ii. 185.

  338 Mohammed.

  339 One of the Asháb or Companions of Mohammed.

  340 A noted traditionist at Cufa in the seventh century.

  341 Koran, chaps. lxxiv. I (and verse 8 follows). The Archangel Gabriel is supposed to address Mohammed and not a few divines believe this Surah (chapter) to have been first revealed. Mr. Rodwell makes it No. ii. following the Fatrah or silent interval which succeeded No. xcvi. “Clots of Blood.” See his 2nd Edit. for further details.

  342 i.e. dangerous to soul-health.

  343 In the Mac. Edit. “Abd” for “Sa’id.” The latter was a black and a native of Cufa during the first century (A.H ) and is still famous as a traditionist.

  344 Arab. “Shirk,” giving a partner to Allah, attending chiefly to Christians and idolaters and in a minor degree to Jews and Guebres. We usually English it by “polytheism,” which is clumsy and conveys a wrong idea

  345 Grandson of the Caliph Ali. He is one of the Imams

  (High-priests) of the Shi’ah school.

  346 An eminent traditionist of the eighth century (A.D.).

  347 The prayers of the Fast-month and Pilgrimage-month are often said in especial places outside the towns and cities; these are the Indian Id(Eed-)gáh. They have a screen of wall about a hundred yards long with a central prayer-niche and the normal three steps for the preacher; and each extremity is garnished with an imitation minaret. They are also called Namáz-gah and one is sketched by Herklots (Plate iii. fig. 2). The object of the trips thither in Zu’l-Ka’adah and Zu’l-Hijjah is to remind Moslems of the “Ta’aríf,” or going forth from Meccah to Mount Arafat.