Niqab veil.
Nisnas also nasnas, a half man, or a man split in two, of which only half is visible.
Parasang a Persian measure of length, something between three and four miles.
Pharaoh the personification of tyranny in the Qur’an and in Islamic folklore.
Qadi a Muslim judge.
Qaf a mountain at the end of the world.
Qais and Lubna Qais (c.626–89) was an early Islamic love poet whose beloved wife was unable to bear him a child. Therefore his parents forced him to divorce her. But he remained in love with her and eventually remarried her.
Qamari aloes this excellent type of aloes wood comes from India.
Al-Qarafa the cemetery area to the north and south of the Cairo Citadel. According to the twelfth-century traveller Ibn Jubayr, these cemeteries were popular with both robbers and ascetics.
Qintar a measure of weight, varying from region to region, but amounting to 100 ratls.
Qirat a small weight, also a coin, one twenty-fourth of a gold mithqal and one sixteenth of a silver dirham.
Quraish one of the great Arabian tribes and the one to which Muhammad belonged.
Rafiqa the site of an Abbasid palace in Syria.
Rak‘a in the Muslim prayer the bending of the torso from an upright position, followed by two prostrations.
Ratl a measure of weight, variable from region to region, between two and five kilograms.
Rebab a stringed instrument resembling the fiddle.
Riyal a silver coin.
Rum the Byzantine Empire.
Sabr patience or steadfastness.
Sa‘id ibn al-‘As an orphan who grew up in Syria under the protection of the early Umaiyads. Eventually he was appointed governor of Kufa which he administered harshly.
Saihun the Jaxartes or Darya, a central Asian river which flows into the Aral Sea.
Saj‘ rhymed prose.
Samannud, Sanawir and Ikhmim Towns in Egypt dating from Pharaonic times. Samannud is on the left bank of the Damietta branch of the Nile and contains the ruins of the temple of the god Onuris-Shu. Ikhmim, or Akhmim, in Upper Egypt had the reputation of being the home of Egypt’s greatest sorcerers. There were a number of monasteries in its vicinity.
Samhari spear Samhar was a celebrated maker of lances which were esteemed for their elegance.
Sarha from context, a kind of musical instrument.
Serendib Sri Lanka.
Shabbara a kind of barge with an elevated cabin, used by princes and notables.
Al-Sha‘bi a well-known expert on hadiths (sayings of the Prophet) who died in 723.
Shaddad legendary pre-Islamic king of the tribe of ‘Ad, who in myth commanded the construction of the city of ‘Iram of the Columns, intending it to rival Paradise; consequently he and his city were destroyed by God. A story of a Bedouin who rediscovered the city of ‘Iram while looking for a stray camel was inserted in The Thousand and One Nights.
Sind the delta region of the Indus in the Indian subcontinent.
Sufi Muslim mystic.
Sultani herbs it has not proved possible to determine what kind of herbs these were.
Tabuk a station on the pilgrimage route to Mecca.
Ta’if an Arabian town in the vicinity of Mecca.
Ubulla a port on the Gulf.
‘Ud lute.
‘Udul plural of ‘adl, a juristic assistant assigned to a qadi.
Umaiyad the first Islamic dynasty of caliphs. It came to power in 660 after the first four ‘Rightful Caliphs’. It was overthrown in 750 by the revolution that brought the Abbasids to power.
‘Umar ibn al-Khattab (581–644). In 634 he became the second caliph after the Prophet. He is reckoned among the Rashidun, or ‘Righteous’ caliphs.
‘Usfur bird.
‘Uthman ibn ‘Affan the third of the caliphs, he reigned from 644 to 656. Famous for his piety, he was one of the Rashidun, or ‘Righteous’ caliphs.
Wasit a town on the Tigris in what is today Iraq.
Yathrib the pre-Islamic name for Medina.
Zabaj Java or Sumatra.
Zakat alms tax.
Zamzam name of a well in Mecca.
Zanj black man or woman.
Zubaida the best-known of Harun al-Rashid’s wives.
Acknowledgements
I gratefully acknowledge the advice and corrections of Ruth Bottigheimer, Aboubakr Chraibi, Malcolm Lyons and especially Ulrich Marzolph. I am also grateful to Hugh Kennedy for providing me with access to the Arabic text of Tales of the Marvellous.
THE BEGINNING
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PENGUIN CLASSICS
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This translation first published in Penguin Classics 2014
Translation © Malcolm C. Lyons, 2014
Introduction, Further Reading and Glossary © Robert Irwin, 2014
Cover illustration by Nina Chakrabarti, after a 15th-century illumination in the Shiraz style (The Art Archive/Bodelian Libraries, Ouseley Add 176 folio 311v)
Cover design by Isabelle De Cat
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The moral right of the translator and the author of the editorial material has been asserted
ISBN: 978-0-141-39505-0
Tales of the Marvellous and News of the Strange (Hardcover Classics) Page 57
