The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night Volume VI Part 20

[FN#341] I have described (Pilgrimage i. 370) the grisly spot which a Badawi will dignify by the name of Wady al-Ward=Vale of Roses.

[FN#342] Koran xiii. 3, "Of every fruit two different kinds "

i.e. large and small, black and white, sweet and sour.

[FN#343] A graft upon an almond tree, which makes its kernel s..veet and gives it an especial delicacy of favour. See Russell's (excellent) Natural History of Aleppo, p. 21.

[FN#344] So called from the flavour of the kernel it is well- known at Damascus where a favourite fruit is the dried apricot with an almond by way of kernel. There are many preparations of apricots, especially the "Mare's skin" (Jild al-fares or Kamar al-din) a paste folded into sheets and exactly resembling the article from which it takes a name. When wanted it is dissolved in water and eaten as a relish with bread or biscuit (Pilgrimage i. 289).

[FN#345] "Ante Kama takul"=the vulgarest Cairene.

[FN#346] This may be Ctesiphon, the ancient capital of the Chosroes, on the Tigris below Baghdad; and spoken of elsewhere in The Nights; especially as, in Night dclxvii., it is called Isbanir Al-Madain; Madain Kisra (the cities of Chosroes) being the Arabic name of the old dual city.

[FN#347] Koran vi. 103. The translation is Sale's which I have generally preferred, despite many imperfections: Lane renders this sentence, "The eyes see not Him, but He seeth the eyes ;"

and Mr. Rodwell, "No vision taketh in Him ( ?), but He taketh in all vision ," and (better) "No eyesight reacheth to Him."

[FN#348] Sale (sect. 1.) tells us all that was then known of these three which with Ya'uk and Nasr and the three "daughters of G.o.d," G.o.ddesses or Energies (the Hindu Saktis) Allat Al-Uzza and Manat mentioned in the Koran were the chiefs of the pre-lslamitic Pantheon. I cannot but suspect that all will be connected with old Babylonian wors.h.i.+p. Al-Baydawi (in Kor. Ixxi. 22) says of Wadd, Suwa'a, Yaghus, Ya'uk and Nasr that they were names of pious men between Adam and Noah, afterwards deified: Yaghus was the giant idol of the Mazhaj tribe at Akamah of Al-Yaman and afterwards at Najran Al-Uzza was widely wors.h.i.+pped: her idol (of the tree Semurat) belonging to Ghatafan was destroyed after the Prophet's order by Khalid bin Walid. Allat or Al-Lat is written by Poc.o.c.k (spec. 110) "Ilahat" i.e. deities in general. But Herodotus evidently refers to one G.o.d when he makes the Arabs wors.h.i.+p Dionysus as {Greek letters} and Urania as {Greek letters} and the "tashdid" in Allat would, to a Greek ear, introduce another syllable (Alilat). This was the G.o.ddess of the Kuraysh and Thakif whose temple at Taif was circuited like the Ka'abah before Mohammed destroyed it.

[FN#349] Shays (Shayth) is Ab Seth (Father Seth,) of the Hebrews, a name containing the initial and terminal letters of the Egypto- Phoenico-Hebrew Alphabet and the "Abjad" of the Arabs. Those curious about its connection with the name of Allah (El), the Zodiacal signs and with the constellations, visions but not wholly uninteresting, will consult "Unexplored Syria" (vol. i.

33).

[FN#350] The exclamation of an honest Fellah.

[FN#351] This is Antar with the Chosroe who "kissed the Absian hero between the eyes and bade him adieu, giving him as a last token a rich robe." The coa.r.s.er hand of the story-teller exaggerates everything till he makes it ridiculous.

[FN#352] The context suggests thee this is a royal form of "throwing the handkerchief;" but it does not occur elsewhere. In face, the European idea seems to have arisen from the oriental practice of sending presents in napkins or kerchiefs.

[FN#353] i.e. if the disappointed suitor attack me.

[FN#354] i.e. if ever I he tempted to deny it.

[FN#355] Arab. "Musafahah,' the Arab fas.h.i.+on of shaking hands.

The right palms are applied flat to each other; then the fingers are squeezed and the hand is raised to the forehead (Pilgrimage ii. 332).

[FN#356] A city and province of Khuzistan the old Susiana. Dasht may be either the town in Khorasan or the "forests" (dasht) belonging to Ahwaz (Ahuaz in D'Herbelot).

[FN#357] This is the contest between "Antar and the Satrap Khosrewan at the Court of Monzer." but without its tragical finish.

[FN#358] Elliptical "he rode out in great state, that is to say if greatness can truly be attributed to man," for, etc.

[FN#359] According to D'Herbelot (s.v. Rostac) it is a name given to the villages of Khorasan as "Souad" (Sawad) to those of Irak and Makhlaf to those of Al-Yaman: there is, how ever, a well- known Al-Rustak (which like Al-Bahrayn always takes the article) in the Province of Oman West of Maskat, and as it rhymes with "Irak" it does well enough. Mr. Badger calls this ancient capital of the Ya'arubah Imams "er-Rastak" (Imams of Oman).

[FN#360] i.e. a furious knight.

[FN#361] In the Mac. Edit. "Ha.s.san," which may rhyme with Nabhan, but it is a mere blunder.

[FN#362] In Cla.s.sical Arabic Irak (like Yaman, Bahrayn and Rustak) always takes the article.

[FN#363] The story-teller goes back from Kufah founded in Omar's day to the times of Abraham.

[FN#364] This manuvre has often been practiced; especially by the first Crusaders under Bohemond (Gibbon) and in late years by the Arab slavers in Eastern Intertropical Africa. After their skirmishes with the natives they quartered and "bristled" the dead like game, roasted and boiled the choice pieces and pretended to eat the flesh. The enemy, who was not afraid of death, was struck with terror by the idea of being devoured, and this seems instinctive to the undeveloped mind.