One thousand and one nig.., p.681
One Thousand and One Nights, page 681
239 Lane (ii. 222) first read “Múroozee” and referred it to the Murúz tribe near Herat he afterwards (iii. 748) corrected it to “Marwazee,” of the fabric of Marw (Margiana) the place now famed for “Mervousness.” As a man of Rayy (Rhages) becomes Rází (e.g. Ibn Fáris al-Razí), so a man of Marw is Marázi, not Murúzi nor Márwazi. The “Mikna’ “ was a veil forming a kind of “respirator,” defending from flies by day and from mosquitos, dews and draughts by night. Easterns are too sensible to sleep with bodies kept warm by bedding, and heads bared to catch every blast. Our grandfathers and grandmothers did well to wear bonnets-de-nuit, however ridiculous they may have looked.
240 Iblis, meaning the Despairer, is called in the Koran (chaps. xviii. 48) “One of the genii (Jinnis) who departed from the command of his Lord.” Mr. Rodwell (in loco) notes that the Satans and Jinnis represent in the Koran (ii. 32, etc.) the evil-principle and finds an admixture of the Semitic Satans and demons with the “Genii from the Persian (Babylonian ?) and Indian (Egyptian ?) mythologies.”
241 Of course she could not see his eyes when they were shut; nor is this mere Eastern inconsequence. The writer means, “had she seen them, they would have showed,” etc.
242 The eyes are supposed to grow darker under the influence of wine and sexual passion.
243 To keep off the evil eye.
244 Like Dahnash this is a fanciful P. N., fit only for a Jinni. As a rule the appellatives of Moslem “genii” end inús (oos), as Tarnús, Huliyánus, the Jewish in — nas, as Jattunas; those of the Tarsá (the “funkers” i.e. Christians) in — dús, as Sidús, and the Hindus in — tús, as Naktús (who entered the service of the Prophet Shays, or Seth, and was converted to the Faith). The King of the Genii is Malik Katshán who inhabits Mount Kaf; and to the west of him lives his son-in-law, Abd al-Rahman with 33,000 domestics: these names were given by the Apostle Mohammed. “Baktanús” is lord of three Moslem troops of the wandering Jinns, which number a total of twelve bands and extend from Sind to Europe. The Jinns, Divs, Peris (“fairies”) and other pre-Adamitic creatures were governed by seventy-two Sultans all known as Sulayman and the last I have said was Ján bin Ján. The angel Háris was sent from Heaven to chastise him, but in the pride of victory he also revolted with his followers the Jinns whilst the Peris held aloof. When he refused to bow down before Adam he and his chiefs were eternally imprisoned but the other Jinns are allowed to range over earth as a security for man’s obedience. The text gives the three orders. flyers. walkers and divers.
245 i.e. distracted (with love); the Lakab, or poetical name, of apparently a Spanish poet.
246 Nothing is more “anti-pathetic” to Easterns than lean hips and flat hinder-cheeks in women and they are right in insisting upon the characteristic difference of the male and female figure. Our modern sculptors and painters, whose study of the nude is usually most perfunctory, have often scandalised me by the lank and greyhound-like fining off of the frame, which thus becomes rather simian than human.
247 The small fine foot is a favourite with Easterns as well as Westerns. Ovid (A.A.) is not ashamed “ad teneros Oscula (not basia or suavia) ferre pedes.” Ariosto ends the august person in
Il breve, asciutto, e ritondetto piece,
(The short-sized, clean-cut, roundly-moulded foot).
And all the world over it is a sign of “blood,” i.e. the fine nervous temperament.
248 i.e. “full moons”: the French have corrupted it to
“Badoure”; we to “Badoura.” winch is worse.
249 As has been said a single drop of urine renders the clothes ceremoniously impure, hence a Stone or a handful of earth must be used after the manner of the torche-cul. Scrupulous Moslems, when squatting to make water, will prod the ground before them with the point o f stick or umbrella, so as to loosen it and prevent the spraying of the urine.
250 It is not generally known to Christians that Satan has a wife called Awwá (“Hawwá” being the Moslem Eve) and, as Adam had three sons, the Tempter has nine, viz., Zu ‘l-baysun who rules in bazars. Wassin who prevails in times of trouble. Awan who counsels kings; Haffan patron of wine-bibbers; Marrah of musicians and dancers; Masbut of news-spreaders (and newspapers ?); Dulhán who frequents places of worship and interferes with devotion. Dasim, lord of mansions and dinner tables, who prevents the Faithful saying “Bismillah” and “Inshallah,” as commanded in the Koran (xviii. 23), and Lakís, lord of Fire worshippers (Herklots, chap. xxix. sect. 4).
251 Strong perfumes, such as musk (which we Europeans dislike and suspect), are always insisted upon in Eastern poetry, and Mohammed’s predilection for them is well known. Moreover the young and the beautiful are held (justly enough) to exhale a natural fragrance which is compared with that of the blessed in Paradise. Hence in the Mu’allakah of Imr al-Keys: —
Breathes the scent of musk when they rise to rove, *
As the Zephyr’s breath with the flavour o’clove.
It is made evident by dogs and other fine-nosed animals that every human being has his, or her, peculiar scent which varies according to age and health. Hence animals often detect the approach of death.
252 Arab. “Kahlá.” This has been explained. Mohammed is said to have been born with “Kohl’d eyes.”
253 Hawá al-’uzrí, before noticed (Night cxiv.).
254 These lines, with the Názir (eye or steward), the Hájib (Groom of the Chambers or Chamberlain) and Joseph, are also repeated from Night cxiv. For the Nazir see Al-Hariri (Nos. xiii. and xxii.)
255 The usual allusion to the Húr (Houris) from “Hangar,” the white and black of the eye shining in contrast. The Persian Magi also placed in their Heaven (Bihisht or Minu) “Huran,” or black-eyed nymphs, under the charge of the angel Zamiyád.
256 In the first hemistich, “bi-shitt ‘it wády” (by the wady-bank): in the second, “wa shatta ‘l wády” (“and my slayer” — i.e. wády act. part. of wady, killing— “hath paced away”).
257 The double entendre is from the proper names Budúr and Su’ád (Beatrice) also meaning “auspicious (or blessed) full moons.”
258 Arab. “Házir” (also Ahl al-hazer, townsmen) and Bádi, a Badawi, also called “Ahl al-Wabar,” people of the camel’s hair (tent) and A’aráb (Nomadic) as opposed to Arab (Arab settled or not). They still boast with Ibn Abbas, cousin of Mohammed, that they have kerchiefs (not turbands) for crowns, tents for houses, loops for walls, swords for scarves and poems for registers or written laws.
259 This is a peculiarity of the Jinn tribe when wearing hideous forms. It is also found in the Hindu Rakshasa.
260 Which, by the by, are small and beautifully shaped. The animal is very handy with them, as I learnt by experience when trying to “Rareyfy” one at Bayrut.
261 She being daughter of Al-Dimiryát, King of the Jinns.
Mr. W. F. Kirby has made him the subject of a pretty poem.
262 These lines have occurred in Night xxii. I give
Torrens’s version () by way of variety.
263 Arab. “Kámat Alfiyyah,” like an Alif, the first of the Arabic alphabet, the Heb. Aleph. The Arabs, I have said, took the flag or water leaf form and departed very far from the Egyptian original (we know from Plutarch that the hieroglyphic abecedarium began with “a”), which was chosen by other imitators, namely the bull’s head, and which in the cursive form, especially the Phnician, became a yoke. In numerals “Alif” denotes one or one thousand. It inherits the traditional honours of Alpha (as opposed to Omega) and in books, letters and writings generally it is placed as a monogram over the “Bismillah,” an additional testimony to the Unity. (See vol. i. .) In medićval Christianity this place of honour was occupied by the cross: none save the wildest countries have preserved it, but our vocabulary still retains Criss’ (Christ-)cross Row, for horn-book, on account of the old alphabet and nine digits disposed in the form of a Latin cross. Hence Tickell (“The Horn-book”):
—— Mortals ne’er shall know
More than contained of old the Chris’-cross Row.
264 The young man must have been a demon of chastity.
265 Arab. “Kirát” from i.e. bean, the seed of the Abrus precatorius, in weight=two to three (English) grains; and in length=one finger-breadth here; 24 being the total. The Moslem system is evidently borrowed from the Roman “as” and “uncia.”
266 Names of women.
267 Arab. “Amsa” (lit. he passed the evening) like “asbaha” (he rose in the morning) “Azhá” (he spent the forenoon) and “bata” (he spent the night), are idiomatically used for “to be in any state, to continue” without specification of time or season.
268 Lit. “my liver ;” which viscus, and not the heart, is held the seat of passion, a fancy dating from the oldest days. Theocritus says of Hercules, “In his liver Love had fixed a wound” (Idyl. xiii.). In the Anthologia “Cease, Love, to wound my liver and my heart” (lib. vii.). So Horace (Odes, i. 2); his Latin Jecur and the Persian “Jigar” being evident congeners. The idea was long prevalent and we find in Shakespeare: —
Alas, then Love may be called appetite,
No motion of the liver but the palate.
269 A marvellous touch of nature, love ousting affection; the same trait will appear in the lover and both illustrate the deep Italian saying, “Amor discende, non ascende.” The further it goes down the stronger it becomes as of grand-parent for grand-child and vice versa.
270 This tenet of the universal East is at once fact and unfact. As a generalism asserting that women’s passion is ten times greater than man’s (Pilgrimage, ii. 282), it is unfact. The world shows that while women have more philoprogenitiveness, men have more amativeness; otherwise the latter would not propose and would nurse the doll and baby. Pact, however, in low-lying lands, like Persian Mazanderan versus the Plateau; Indian Malabar compared with Marátha-land; California as opposed to Utah and especially Egypt contrasted with Arabia. In these hot damp climates the venereal requirements and reproductive powers of the female greatly exceed those of the male; and hence the dissoluteness of morals would be phenomenal, were it not obviated by seclusion, the sabre and the revolver. In cold-dry or hot-dry mountainous lands the reverse is the case; hence polygamy there prevails whilst the low countries require polyandry in either form, legal or illegal (i,e. prostitution) I have discussed this curious point of “geographical morality” (for all morality is, like conscience, both geographical and chronological), a subject so interesting to the lawgiver, the student of ethics and the anthropologist, in “The City of the Saints “ But strange and unpleasant truths progress slowly, especially in England.
271 This morning evacuation is considered, in the East, a sine quâ non of health; and old Anglo-Indians are unanimous in their opinion of the “bard fajar” (as they mispronounce the dawn-clearance). The natives of India, Hindús (pagans) and Hindís (Moslems), unlike Europeans, accustom themselves to evacuate twice a day, evening as well as morning. This may, perhaps, partly account for their mildness and effeminacy; for: —
C’est la constipation qui rend l’homme rigoureux.
The English, since the first invasion of cholera, in October, 1831, are a different race from their costive grandparents who could not dine without a “dinner-pill.” Curious to say the clyster is almost unknown to the people of Hindostan although the barbarous West Africans use it daily to “wash ‘um belly,” as the Bonney-men say. And, as Sonnini notes to propose the process in Egypt under the Beys might have cost a Frankish medico his life.
272 The Egyptian author cannot refrain from this characteristic polissonnerie; and reading it out is always followed by a roar of laughter. Even serious writers like Al- Hariri do not, as I have noted, despise the indecency.
273 “‘Long beard and little wits,” is a saying throughout the East where the Kausaj (= man with thin, short beard) is looked upon as cunning and tricksy. There is a venerable Joe Miller about a schoolmaster who, wishing to singe his long beard short, burnt it off and his face to boot: — which reminded him of the saying. A thick beard is defined as one which wholly conceals the skin; and in ceremonial ablution it must be combed out with the fingers till the water reach the roots. The Sunnat, or practice of the Prophet, was to wear the beard not longer than one hand and two fingers’ breadth. In Persian “Kúseh” (thin beard) is an insulting term opposed to “Khush-rísh,” a well-bearded man. The Iranian growth is perhaps the finest in the world, often extending to the waist; but it gives infinite trouble, requiring, for instance, a bag when travelling. The Arab beard is often composed of two tufts on the chin-sides and straggling hairs upon the cheeks; and this is a severe mortification, especially to Shaykhs and elders, who not only look upon the beard as one of man’s characteristics, but attach a religious importance to the appendage. Hence the enormity of Kamar al-Zaman’s behaviour. The Persian festival of the vernal equinox was called Kusehnishín (Thin-beard sitting). An old man with one eye paraded the streets on an ass with a crow in one hand and a scourge and fan in the other, cooling himself, flogging the bystanders and crying heat! heat! (garmá! garmá!). For other particulars see Richardson (Dissertation, p. Iii.). This is the Italian Giorno delle Vecchie, Thursday in Mid Lent, March 12 (1885), celebrating the death of Winter and the birth of Spring.
274 I quote Torrens () as these lines have occurred in
Night xxxviii.
275 Moslems have only two names for week days, Friday,
Al-Jum’ah or meeting-day, and Al-Sabt, Sabbath day, that is
Saturday. The others are known by numbers after Quaker fashion
with us, the usage of Portugal and Scandinavia.
276 Our last night.
277 Arab. “Tayf”=phantom, the nearest approach to our “ghost,” that queer remnant of Fetishism imbedded in Christianity; the phantasma, the shade (not the soul) of tile dead. Hence the accurate Niebuhr declares, “apparitions (i.e., of the departed) are unknown in Arabia.” Haunted houses are there tenanted by Ghuls, Jinns and a host of supernatural creatures; but not by ghosts proper; and a man may live years in Arabia before he ever hears of the “Tayf.” With the Hindus it is otherwise (Pilgrimage iii. 144). Yet the ghost, the embodied fear of the dead and of death is common, in a greater or less degree, to all peoples; and, as modern Spiritualism proves, that ghost is not yet laid.
278 Mr. Payne (iii. 133) omits the lines which are ŕpropos de rein and read much like “nonsense verses.” I retain them simply because they are in the text.
279 The first two couplets are the quatrain (or octave) in
Night xxxv.
280 Arab. “Ar’ar,” the Heb. “Aroer,” which Luther and the A.
V. translate “heath.” The modern Aramaic name is “Lizzáb”
(Unexplored Syria. i. 68).
281 In the old version and the Bresl. Edit. (iii. 220) the
Princess beats the “Kahramánah,” but does not kill her.
282 ‘This is still the popular Eastern treatment of the insane.
283 Pers. “Marz-bán” = Warden of the Marches, Margrave. The foster-brother in the East is held dear as, and often dearer than, kith and kin.
284 The moderns believe most in the dawn-dream.
— Quirinus
Post mediam noctem visus, quum somnia vera.
(Horace Sat. i. 10, 33,)
285 The Bresl. Edit. (iii. 223) and Galland have “Torf:”
Lane (ii. 115) “El-Tarf.”
286 Arab. “Maghzal ;” a more favourite comparison is with a tooth pick. Both are used by Nizami and Al-Hariri, the most “elegant” of Arab writers.
287 These form a Kasídah, Ode or Elegy= rhymed couplets numbering more than thirteen: If shorter it is called a “Ghazal.” I have not thought it necessary to preserve the monorhyme.
288 Sulaymá dim. of Salmá= any beautiful woman Rabáb = the viol mostly single stringed: Tan’oum=she who is soft and gentle. These fictitious names are for his old flames.
289 i.e. wine. The distich is highly fanciful and the conceits would hardly occur to a
290 Arab. “Andam,” a term applied to Brazil-wood (also called “Bakkam”) and to “dragon’s blood,” but not, I think, to tragacanth, the “goat’s thorn,” which does not dye. Andam is often mentioned in The Nights.
291 The superior merit of the first (explorer, etc.) is a lieu commun with Arabs. So Al-Hariri in Preface quotes his predecessor: —
Justly of praise the price I pay;
The praise is his who leads the way.
292 There were two Lukmans, of whom more in a future page.
293 This symbolic action is repeatedly mentioned in The
Nights.
294 Arab. “Shakhs”=a person, primarily a dark spot. So “Sawád”=blackness, in Al-Hariri means a group of people who darken the ground by their shade.
295 The first bath after sickness, I have said, is called
“Ghusl al-Sihhah,” — the Washing of Health.
296 The words “malady” and “disease” are mostly avoided during these dialogues as ill-omened words which may bring on a relapse.
297 Solomon’s carpet of green silk which carried him and all his host through the air is a Talmudic legend generally accepted in Al-Islam though not countenanced by the Koran. chaps xxvii. When the “gnat’s wing” is mentioned, the reference is to Nimrod who, for boasting that he was lord of all, was tortured during four hundred years by a gnat sent by Allah up his ear or nostril.
298 The absolute want of morality and filial affection in the chaste young man is supposed to be caused by the violence of his passion, and he would be pardoned because he “loved much.”
299 I have noticed the geomantic process in my “History of Sindh” (chaps. vii.). It is called “Zarb al-Ram!” (strike the sand, the French say “frapper le sable”) because the rudest form is to make on the ground dots at haphazard, usually in four lines one above the other: these are counted and, if even-numbered, two are taken ( * * ); if odd one ( * ); and thus the four lines will form a scheme say * * * * * * This is repeated three times, producing the same number of figures; and then the combination is sought in an explanatory table or, if the practitioner be expert, he pronounces off-hand. The Nights speak of a “Takht Raml” or a board, like a schoolboy’s slate, upon which the dots are inked instead of points in sand. The moderns use a “Kura’h,” or oblong die, upon whose sides the dots, odd and even, are marked; and these dice are hand-thrown to form the e figure. By way of complication Geomancy is mixed up with astrology and then it becomes a most complicated kind of ariolation and an endless study. “Napoleon’s Book of Fate,” a chap-book which appeared some years ago, was Geomancy in its simplest and most ignorant shape. For the rude African form see my Mission to Dahome, i. 332, and for that of Darfour, p-69 of Shaykh Mohammed’s Voyage before quoted.
