# الف ليلة وليلة One Thousand and One Nights - type of language



## clevermizo

This question comes out of the previous thread:

After reading الف ليلة وليلة a bit, I've noticed that the language is sometimes "colloquial-sounding" or contains colloquialisms (mostly when people are speaking)- but can it really be considered colloquial writing? The language seems undeniably fuSHa most of the time. But maybe I'm judging that by today's standards. Is the consensus that the stories are a colloquial work?


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## WadiH

I think many of the stories were passed down in colloquial form.  When they were put down in writing, an effort was made to rewrite them in standard, written Arabic, but many colloquialisms and colloquial usages crept in, especially since the compilers were by no means the most literate of scholars.  I don't think that's a bad thing; I'm usually thrilled to find such relics of the old spoken tongue that give us a tiny glimpse into what the language might have sounded like centuries ago.


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## clevermizo

I just want to share some things I've been finding in my readings. The Thousand and One Nights is not a _high_ text by any means, but I think these items show that perhaps MSA is a bit more narrow in word choice than perhaps what was once more acceptable in writing. Some are also predecessors of common colloquial expressions.

What's interesting about all of these word choices is that the text is quite old - so even if it isn't so "Classical", someone was saying something like ليش for _why_ hundreds and hundreds of years ago, which provides a neat bit of continuity for Arabic expressions. 

_why_:   commonly لأيّ شيء rather than لماذا or لما
_
where_: sometimes appearing as وأين where the و seems unnecessary.
_
what_: commonly in dialogue appearing as أي شيء rather than ما or ماذا
_
before/in front of_: commonly قدام and I have not noticed an single use of أمام so far. 
_
come_: commonly جاء rarely أتى except in the sense of "bring" (أتى بشيء)
_
leave_: commonly راح, however also commonly خرج. Whenever I see the verb راح it almost always means to _leave_ and not just to go. I believe in the Classical lexicon this is perfectly acceptable (say, in لسان العرب), but I believe that خرج is preferred in MSA because راح may sound too colloquial. I don't know if that is accurate or not, but that is my impression. Anyway, _go _in the text is usually given by ذهب.
_
future tense:_ I have found at least one instance of رائح being used as a future tense particle - this is in a conversation among some animals (the structure is رائح أفعل شيئا, I forget the specific example). 
_
pluperfect tense_: I have found the structure كان فعل to be very common, and without the قد which seems stylistically important in MSA (كان قد فعل). 
_
conditional irrealis_: I have found كان فعل also used in conditionals to mean "would have done X" - i.e., لو فعل كذا، كان فعل كذا. I don't know if this is considered acceptable in MSA or not.

_see_: Interestingly, I was expecting to see use of شاف but I don't! I see رأى everywhere. The only descendant of Arabic that still uses رأى to my knowledge is the Maltese language. 

_nominal negation_: I find the Classical ما هو، ما هي etc. to be very common, rather than ليس. This is even Qur'anic, so it is hardly "dialectal" but I'm curious as to whether modern writers would use it or prefer ليس. 

_do_: عمل and فعل seem to be complete synonyms are used interchangeably (وعملت ما أمرها به or وفعلت ما أمرها به), with the exception that the مصدر of the former (عمل) means "work". I think that the relegation of عمل to the sense of "work" in MSA is quite recent, no?


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## suma

Hi, I have a copy of Alf Laila wa Laila at home as well; although I haven't read it is some years. However most of the citations you give I think are acceptable expamples of MSA. See my comments below in red. 

Also remember that Alf Laila predates MSA by hundreds of years, so perhaps your examples were regarded as acceptable and standard at the time of the text's composition, whereas the Modern Standard (MSA) rejects such usage.


clevermizo said:


> _why_: commonly لأيّ شيء rather than لماذا or لما
> Are you saying it's written as ليش  and not  لأيّ شيء ? That would be dialectal, but if written the latter way I'd say that's just an acceptable MSA variant.
> 
> _where_: sometimes appearing as وأين where the و seems unnecessary.  Acceptable MSA.
> 
> _what_: commonly in dialogue appearing as أي شيء rather than ما or ماذا   An example from the text would help. I doubt if the text said "what is that?"  أي شيء  would be used.
> 
> _before/in front of_: commonly قدام and I have not noticed an single use of أمام so far. Acceptable MSA
> 
> _come_: commonly جاء rarely أتى except in the sense of "bring" (أتى بشيء)  absolutely accetable.
> 
> _leave_: commonly راح, however also commonly خرج. Whenever I see the verb راح it almost always means to _leave_ and not just to go. I believe in the Classical lexicon this is perfectly acceptable (say, in لسان العرب), but I believe that خرج is preferred in MSA because راح may sound too colloquial.
> In the sense of leave (i.e. to depart) then raa7a is accetable MSA, whereas kharaja is more akin to exited (the building) or left (and went outdoors).
> I don't know if that is accurate or not, but that is my impression. Anyway, _go _in the text is usually given by ذهب.
> 
> _future tense:_ I have found at least one instance of رائح being used as a future tense particle - this is in a conversation among some animals (the structure is رائح أفعل شيئا, I forget the specific example).  I agree this sounds more dialectal, although I could be wrong.
> 
> All the others below sound to me like acceptable MSA.
> 
> _pluperfect tense_: I have found the structure كان فعل to be very common, and without the قد which seems stylistically important in MSA (كان قد فعل).
> 
> _conditional irrealis_: I have found كان فعل also used in conditionals to mean "would have done X" - i.e., لو فعل كذا، كان فعل كذا. I don't know if this is considered acceptable in MSA or not.
> 
> _see_: Interestingly, I was expecting to see use of شاف but I don't! I see رأى everywhere. The only descendant of Arabic that still uses رأى to my knowledge is the Maltese language.
> 
> _nominal negation_: I find the Classical ما هو، ما هي etc. to be very common, rather than ليس. This is even Qur'anic, so it is hardly "dialectal" but I'm curious as to whether modern writers would use it or prefer ليس.
> 
> _do_: عمل and فعل seem to be complete synonyms are used interchangeably (وعملت ما أمرها به or وفعلت ما أمرها به), with the exception that the مصدر of the former (عمل) means "work". I think that the relegation of عمل to the sense of "work" in MSA is quite recent, no?


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## clevermizo

> Also remember that Alf Laila predates MSA by hundreds of years, so perhaps your examples were regarded as acceptable and standard at the time of the text's composition, whereas the Modern Standard (MSA) rejects such usage.



I grant this. What I'm curious is how MSA has become possibly more "narrow" in terms of its allowable usage. This makes certain expressions seem "more dialectal" even though perhaps at one time they were fine and proper in writing.

Now, specifically:

لأي شيء is written exactly as such. 

It's interesting to hear a lot of these are acceptable MSA, because I was under the impression they were not. That's actually a good thing - that MSA is not so limiting in its vocabulary.

As for أي شيء, I find this is used exactly in the sense of "what?":

ما سبب ذلك وأي شيء أحزنك
_What is the reason for that and what has saddened you?
_(حكاية علاء الدين)
I feel as though أي شيء and ما are being used equivalently. Perhaps this use of أي شيء is also acceptable MSA.

وقال أي شيء هذا الطعام الوحش
_And he said, what is this savage(?) food?
_اليلة 22

فقال له الوزير في أي شيء تتفكر
_And the vizier said to him, about what are you thinking?_
الليلة 25

 وقالت له: أي شيء تريد أن تفعل معه؟
_ِِAnd she said unto him, what do you want to do with him?
_الليلة 47
ِ
ِAnd perhaps one of the more telling:

فقال له: يا شيخ إبراهيم أي شيء هذا؟
_And he said unto him, Sheikh Ibrahim, what is this?_
الليلة 49

Are these uses considered acceptable MSA? Is it acceptable, but with the translation "what thing"? In other words, "What thing is this?" is how we would translate the last one? Or "What thing do you wish to do with him?" ما of course is used everywhere in the text as well. Perhaps since اي شيء and ما are both use in the text, we can't really say that they are completely the same stylistically?

Also, you do think then, that the structure كان فعل is acceptable MSA? Because everywhere this has come up in the forums, it seems as though people prefer كان قد فعل. I find كان قد فعل used in the text only as an emphatic form of كان فعل.


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## suma

As far as I know all those exapmples are acceptable MSA, although some do sound a bit stilted and flowery; but I guess that's the intention. 

كان فعل  and  كان قد فعل  both mean he had done, he had ...(written, eaten, etc.). Although the first one seems less frequent, or perhaps used more commonly with muDaari3 to mean he used to .... or he was ....


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## COF

[Moderator's Note: Merged with a previous thread]
I find pre-Islamic Arabia quite interesting, and for me it has a sort of mystical appeal, I guess. As far as I'm aware, the One Thousand and One Nights tales could be considered literature that is from pre-Islamic Arabia?

What type of Arabic were the tales written in? As far as I'm aware, the bulk of the tales were written around the same time as the Qur'an was composed, so I'm guessing that they're written in a form of Arabic that is quite close to Classical Arabic or MSA?

Would a speaker of MSA be able to read any pre-Islamic Arabic literature, or did growing dominance of Islam cause a significant change in the language?

Thanks


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## المعتصم

Hi every one..



COF said:


> I find pre-Islamic Arabia quite interesting, and for me it has a sort of mystical appeal, I guess. As far as I'm aware, the One Thousand and One Nights tales could be considered literature that is from pre-Islamic Arabia?
> What type of Arabic were the tales written in? As far as I'm aware, the bulk of the tales were written around the same time as the Qur'an was composed, so I'm guessing that they're written in a form of Arabic that is quite close to Classical Arabic or MSA?



In fact, arabs didn't make all  these stories,
they have Indian and Persian roots, but arabs added to them some things and stories. Besides, these stories were translated among the  3Abasi times,(I mean four centuries after revelation of Islam started) until that time Arabic didn't change from what it was before Islam.
Standard Arabic was spoken more freely by arabs thousand years ago than now, there are just one form of arabic (excluding dialects)



COF said:


> Would a speaker of MSA be able to read any pre-Islamic Arabic literature, or did growing dominance of Islam cause a significant change in the language?
> 
> Thanks



if the text is written in modern Arabic way(7arakaat & dots), he will probably read it. 
So that is the only change that happened to Arabic.

welcome,,


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## hiba

Hi there

The tales of 1001 Nights (sources include Hazar Afsanah (Persian: Thousand tales) and other stories from China, India, Egypt, the Arabian peninsula, and Greece) have been orally circulated since the 9th century but weren't transcribed into Arabic until the 13th century in Damascus. The Arabic that it is written in is actually colloquial Shami/Syrian Arabic rather than MSA. It's not up to standards of good "literary" Arabic.

Galland translated this manuscript (13th cen) into French and published it in Paris in 1704. It was then that  the separations/divisions of the "nights" were added, along with the most famous tales (Alladin, Sindbad, Ali Baba), by Galland, after having been influenced by Hanna Diab. The Sindbad stories were possibly created around 1100's- 1200s, and Ali Baba, and the Forty theives was fairly widespread in Italy in the Middle Ages. 

Keep in mind that the manuscripts of 1001 Nights have a whole historical development.. it doesn't come from one source and many people have added to it and changed it with their translations throughout the centuries.

If you are interested in pre-Islamic literature then you will have to look into poets like Imru al-Qays and al-Khansa. Poetry is at the center of the Arabic lit tradition (jahiliyya poetry and the Quran (rhymed prose) make up the canon)


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## clevermizo

COF said:


> I find pre-Islamic Arabia quite interesting, and for me it has a sort of mystical appeal, I guess. As far as I'm aware, the One Thousand and One Nights tales could be considered literature that is from pre-Islamic Arabia?


Some of the tales may have their roots in Arabia, but it's of Persian origin as others have noted. Some of the tales may have their origin in pre-Islamic tales, but the text as a whole (if it can be considered such) is definitely not pre-Islamic.


> What type of Arabic were the tales written in?


The grammar is that of standard/Classical Arabic.


> As far as I'm aware, the bulk of the tales were written around the same time as the Qur'an was composed, so I'm guessing that they're written in a form of Arabic that is quite close to Classical Arabic or MSA?


I didn't know that, but remember that 'standard' or Classical Arabic has been the standard written language among Arabic speakers as well as throughout the region due to the influence of Islam for centuries, and is the basis of "modern standard" Arabic. It is that, not just "quite close."

That said, the rhetoric of Alf Layla is "lower register" as it is popular literature. As such, I find certain manners of expression which although are Classical in grammatical form, hint of dialectal influence or are the precursors of what would be modern dialectal forms.


> Would a speaker of MSA


There's no such thing.


> be able to read any pre-Islamic Arabic literature, or did growing dominance of Islam cause a significant change in the language?


Misread this the first time around. If you mean an Arabic native speaker - I'm not sure how easy Jahiliyya is to read. Any thoughts, others?

At first, I glossed over and thought you meant Alf Layla. Any literate native speaker of Arabic can read Alf Layla with ease I imagine. I find it pretty easy as a learner.


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## suma

1001 Nights is written in Standard Literary Arabic albeit the vocabulary and style are somewhat simplified, but that makes it great reading material for learners.
Sort of like reading the great folk tales, fairy tales, and childrens books in the Anglo world.


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## clevermizo

hiba said:


> The Arabic that it is written in is actually colloquial Shami/Syrian Arabic rather than MSA. It's not up to standards of good "literary" Arabic.



It's not high register, but I patently disagree with this statement (even though I'm sure you mean the "Shami" dialect of 1000 years ago, which I'm sure can barely be characterized due to lack of recorded material). What makes you think the grammar is in dialect?


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## Mahaodeh

COF said:


> I find pre-Islamic Arabia quite interesting, and for me it has a sort of mystical appeal, I guess. As far as I'm aware, the One Thousand and One Nights tales could be considered literature that is from pre-Islamic Arabia?


Not by a long shot, it may have some influence but it has just as much Persian and Indian influence as well as Islamic (although it can't be considered Islamic due to the extensive mention of witchcraft, fantasy and vulgar expressions). I also wouldn't call it literature except in the sense that it was _written_ at some point in time. It's not exactly what someone studying Arabic literature would study; throughout the six years of high school, it was not even mentioned in any text book we studied and no one even wondered why.


COF said:


> What type of Arabic were the tales written in?


Formal Arabic, of a rather low caliber.


COF said:


> As far as I'm aware, the bulk of the tales were written around the same time as the Qur'an was composed


As mentioned earlier, it didn't exist before the ninth century. It started out as tales told by حكواتي أو راوي which is a traditional story-teller in coffee shops that entertained people with fantasy tales. In the 13th century it began to be written but it doesn't have one single writer; and I doubt the writers were anything more than folk story-tellers.


COF said:


> Would a speaker of MSA be able to read any pre-Islamic Arabic literature, or did growing dominance of Islam cause a significant change in the language?


Definitely. We read it all the time, we quote verses of pre-Islamic peotery and expression in our daily lives. Islam did not really change the language, it actually preserved it. Had it not been for Islam we probably would not understand it (or each other for that matter).


clevermizo said:


> There's no such thing.


I disagree. Even if I agree with you that there is no _native_ fus7a speaker, that does not mean that there is _no fus7a speaker_ at all. If you can read, write and understand it, and you can pronounce all the letter and words, then why can't you speak it? But I think you mean that _there is no such thing as a native fus7a speaker_ 


clevermizo said:


> Misread this the first time around. If you mean an Arabic native speaker - I'm not sure how easy Jahiliyya is to read. Any thoughts, others?


How hard do you think this is for an Arabic speaker:


أيها الناس، اسمعوا وعوا، وإذا سمعتم فانتفعوا، إنه مَن عاش مات، ومَن مات فات، وكل ما هو آتٍ آتٍ. إن في السماء لخبرًا، وإن في الأرض لعِبَرًا. ليلٌ داجٍ، ونهارٌ ساجٍ، وسماءٌ ذات أبراجٍ، وأرضٌ ذات فجاجٍ، وبحارٌ ذات أمواجٍ. ما لي أرى الناس يذهبون ولايرجعون؟ أرضوا بالمقام فأقاموا أم تُرِكوا هناك فناموا؟​

That is the beginning of Qass ibn Sa3ida's sermon in the 3ukaaTH souq before Islam. Poetry may be a little harder because it's poetry, but I've often enjoyed it with no problems.

Of course, I'm not aware of any literature surviving any earlier than the third century, so I wouldn't know how similar or different the language during the time of Christ as an example.


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## hiba

I'm referring to the original manuscript that Galland worked with to translate from Arabic to French. I haven't seen the 13th cen manuscript myself, but I learned in a class at university that it was not written in fusha, but rather it was recorded as it would have been orally transmitted. I'm sure it exists in fusha today though.


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## clevermizo

I've only read it in fus7a and assumed that was the original. I'd love to see that manuscript though!


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## Mahaodeh

I've actually read one place or the other that there is no original, it was collated during several centuries. Of course, there are some very old copies, but up to my knowledge there is no one that can be called the _original_. I've also read it in fus7a, but quite a bad fus7a.

Anyway; up to my knowledge the current dialects are not more than 500 years old, which implies that during the time the manuscript was written the spoken dialect was somewhere between fus7a and Shaami dialect.


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## WadiH

I think most of the 1001 Nights in its current form was written and/or edited in Mameluke Egypt, i.e. late Middle Ages.  The "dialectical" or vernacular features are most reminiscent of Egyptian Arabic, if I remember correctly, not Syrian, but I could be wrong.

Clevermizo is right that it is not considered "high literature" by Arabs.

Bottom line is, it's not pre-Islamic literature or anything close to it.

The best example of "pre-Islamic literature" is probably the Quran itself.  Aside from that, there are the collections of pre-Islamic poetry like المفضّليات and الأصمعيات, etc., though with such poetry one must always bear in mind that they were subject to editing and contain within them significant amounts of forged materials.



Mahaodeh said:


> Anyway; up to my knowledge the current dialects are not more than 500 years old,



How did you know that??  You should look up the relevant chapter in Ibn Khuldun.



> which implies that during the time the manuscript was written the spoken dialect was somewhere between fus7a and Shaami dialect.



No, it could be that the transcribers edited into fus7a.


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## Mahaodeh

Wadi Hanifa said:


> How did you know that?? You should look up the relevant chapter in Ibn Khuldun.


 
I didn't mean that before that there were no dialects, I meant that before that there were other or intermediate dialects - a dialect does not suddenly appear, it goes through many stages until it reaches what we know now.



Wadi Hanifa said:


> No, it could be that the transcribers edited into fus7a.


 
From the oral version, for sure; but from the first written form, it's a 50-50 possibility, the first writer may have written in fus7a or in collequal.


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## Abu Rashid

> Anyway; up to my knowledge the current dialects are not more than 500 years old,



The existence of Maltese pretty strongly confirms that the dialects (in a similar form as they're in today) existed at least about 1000 years ago. Since Malta has had very little linguistic influence from the Arabic world for the past 1000 years, and yet their language is still very close to the dialects of Arabic from the regions where they first got Arabic from (ie. north africa).


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## WadiH

Good observation! 

Malta fell out of Muslim rule in 1091.


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## Faylasoof

COF said:


> I find pre-Islamic Arabia quite interesting, and for me it has a sort of mystical appeal, I guess....


 Hello COF, 
If you really like reading mystical writings you’ll find more of them in the Islamic era than the pre-Islamic. Most, though certainly not all, of _jahiliyyah_ poetry is to do with tribal honour, blood feuds, the abandoned campsite and _rajaz_ extolling personal bravery and valour. But for mystical and reflective writings I would read the likes of Ibn al-Arabi. 

If you venture beyond Arabic and try your hand at Persian, then just Rumi’s huge Mathnavi and the Diwan of Hafiz (_lisaan-ul-ghaib_) will keep you busy for the rest of your life.

Others have already made valuable remarks about 1001 Nights, but if I may add the following details:

The journey of 1001 Nights is complicated! Starting as oral transmissions of stories from India and Persia (_Hezaar Afsaneh_ – 1000 fables), it was finally written down in Arabic. The oldest, though incomplete, manuscript dates to the early 800s CE. 

Al-Mas’udi (_Murooj-al-Dhahab_) and Ibn al-Nadim al-Baghdadi (_al-Fihrist_), both from the 10th century, mention it and its Persian origins. Moreover, in the 11th century _Qatran e Tabrizi_ alludes to his acquaintance of these stories in his verse:

هزار ره صفت هفت خوان و رويين دژ
فرو شنيدم و خواندم من از هزار افسان

The stories of _Rooyin Dezh_ and _Haft Kh__an_ a 1000 times,
I heard and read from the Thousand Fables (_Hezaar Afsaane_)

The various manuscripts fall either in the Syrian or the Egyptian category. 

Of the later manuscripts, the most “authentic” is the 14th century Syrian copy now at the Bibliotheque Nationale,  Paris. This contains roughly 300 tales and lacks some of the most familiar tales like _Aladdin_ and _Sindbad_, later accretions that can be found in the Egyptian versions that continued to acquire more and more stories throughout the Mameluke period and even during Ottoman times.

As has been said above by many, these stories were not considered “high Arabic literature”. This was perhaps due both to some of the content as well as the language. Though fus7a has been used, it is regarded as rather simple (low) and at times even grammatically incorrect! 

Besides, fus7a (of a lowish standard) you also find both _Shami_ and _Misrii_ dialects - depending on which version one has - making translations difficult. 

It was Europeans more than the Arabs who became enamoured by these stories and promoted them by translating them into their native languages. 

For English, the better known translators include Edward Lane (of _the_ Lexicon fame) and Richard Burton, the 19th century polyglot (knew 20 odd languages, with Arabic as his “first love”), explorer (rivalry with Livingston and Speke) and adventurer (visited Mecca during the Haj!). However, despite their deep knowledge of fus7a and some Arabic dialects, they (and others) were unable at times to translate properly whichever text they ended up with. Consequently, one notices deletions and even mistranslations in these works.

The best modern English translation is by Hussain Haddawy, called The Arabian Nights (Mohsin Mehdi, Editor).


Just a point or two about dialects.

Arabic dialects dialects _per se_ seem to go back to the pre-Islamic era! Many scholars seem to agree on this. At the same time there seems also to be a general agreement that there was an Arabic literary _koine_, i.e. a common literary language. Tribal dialects were even then already diverged enough to make communication unintelligible! 

Quranic reading and recitation had to confront the plethora of Arabic dialects when Islam spread, first in the Arabian peninsula and then what is now southern Iraq. The book edited by Andrew Rippin called _The Blackwell Companion to the Quran_, discusses the existence of these dialects, here. 

Just go to the link and type “dialect” in the search box. You’ll get about eight different locations where the  occurrence of these ancient dialects are discussed. 

Needless to say, the language of the Quran eventually led to _this_ “formal dialect” becoming the lingua franca amongst the different peoples, Arabs and non-Arabs. That is how our civilization began. The Quran was the first book in “_3arabbiyah”_. You of course need a common language to communicate; an essential pre-requisite for any civilization!


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## WadiH

Great stuff Faylasoof.


Faylasoof said:


> Arabic dialects dialects _per se_ seem to go back to the pre-Islamic era! Many scholars seem to agree on this. At the same time there seems also to be a general agreement that there was an Arabic literary _koine_, i.e. a common literary language. Tribal dialects were even then already diverged enough to make communication unintelligible!


I think if people were to study the state of Arabic in the Peninsula at the start of the 20th century, they would get a pretty good idea of what the state of Arabic might have been like at the dawn of Islam.  Unfortunately, I've only seen a few scholars interested in taking up this angle (e.g. Saad Al-Sowayan briefly suggested it in his study of Arabian vernacular poetry).

I would however be careful about concluding that communication was unintelligible, though I suppose "unintelligibility" is a matter of degree.


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## clevermizo

Wadi Hanifa said:


> I would however be careful about concluding that communication was unintelligible, though I suppose "unintelligibility" is a matter of degree.



Definitely. Also, in ancient times when travel may have been more difficult, lack of intelligibility could have been more exaggerated than it is now with more contact.


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## Faylasoof

Wadi Hanifa said:


> ...I would however be careful about concluding that communication was unintelligible, though I suppose "unintelligibility" is a matter of degree.


 


clevermizo said:


> Definitely. Also, in ancient times when travel may have been more difficult, lack of intelligibility could have been more exaggerated than it is now with more contact.


 
Both of you are correct in your assertions. 

There is indeed a danger to overstate the divergence of Arabic dialects at the dawn of Islam. However, it would be reasonable to assume that dialects of regions further from the Hijaz would be more diverged from it and the speech of non-Quraysh tribes living nearer Mecca would be closer to the Qurayshi dialect, the Arabic that eventually gave rise to the literary language. 

Yes, it would pay to have more works in the line of Saad Al-Sowayan’s.

In this short though very relevant entry from _The Qur’an: An Encyclopedia_ by Oliver Leaman,  there is an informative account of the Classical language and the dialects, as well as a list of references, regrettably cut off online after pg.54! The book is expensive but worth getting on loan from a library.



Wadi Hanifa said:


> ...Aside from that, there are the collections of pre-Islamic poetry like المفضّليات and الأصمعيات, etc., though with such poetry one must always bear in mind that they were subject to editing and contain within them significant amounts of forged materials.



  About the presence of forged material in pre-Islamic poetry, the name of Hammad al-rawiyyah, and others, has long been associated with this kind of activity. He is said to have forged a large number of items including the _Lamiyyat_ ascribed to the pre-Islamic poet Shanfara al-Azdi. 

There is a well-known story as to how he (Hammad) is said to have recited more than 2000 pre-Islamic poems (!) in a trial of poetical accomplishment at the court of Walid II (died 744 CE). When asked as to how he knew so much of _jahiliyyah_ poetry, his reply sounded like a convenient alibi. Apparently, he alone had access to a “book” of _jahiliyyah_ poetry compiled then and found near the Lakhimid castle at Hira!! The truth might be that he himself authored many poems that he claimed were pre-Islamic; the latter assertion giving him a special status as _jahiliyyah_ poetry continued to be cherished well after Islam was established. 

Similarly, the _jahiliyyah_ valour poetry of Antara Ibn Shaddaad al-3absii was for long revered during the early Islamic period. Here is an example of Anatara’s verse that used time and again as part of _rajaz_ battle poetry: 

ما زلت أرمیھم بثغرة نحرہ ++  و لبانه حتی تسربل بالدم

​ Anatara’s _diwan_ has remained popular over the last 1400 years! It has been examined and accepted as genuine.

The same can be said about other authentic _jahiliyyah_ poetry so there is no reason to believe the thesis of David Margoliouth (also independently supported by Taha Hussein) that _all_ of pre-Islamic is a result of later forgeries. Not that I’m suggesting anybody here is saying this. Most scholars, however, have now drawn back from this, what is now considered to be an extreme view. 

… and Wadi Hanifa you right about the Quran itself being the best example of "pre-Islamic literature"!

Just prior to or contemporaneous to the Quran a kind of "religious" poetry already seems to have emerged, and this too in no other place than the Prophet’s own house; I mean the poetry of his uncle, father-figure and protector, Abu Talib. He was a poet of no mean achievement and had already started to compose verses which were a departure from the usual _jahiliyyah_ poetry. 

The following are a few examples of Abu Talib’s verses from two editions of his _diwan_ (one edited by the modern scholar, Abd-ul-Haq al-3aanii  عبد الحق العاني, the other editors name escapes me):

اعُوذ   بِرَبّ الناس من كلّ طاعِن  ++ علینا بسوء أو مُلح بباطل
و   من كاشح یَسعیٰ لنا بمعیبَة ++  و   من مُلحِق فی الدین مالم تُحاول
​     Also composed verses in praise of his nephew, the Prophet: 

​ إنَّ   الأمينَ محمدا في قَومهِ  ++ عِندي   يفوق منازلَ الأولادِ​ لمّا   تعلَّقَ بالزِّمامِ ضَمَمْتُهُ   ++  والعِيسُ   قد قَلَّصْنَ بالأزوادِ
​ Even better, this:

أنتَ   الرسولُ رسولُ اللهِ نَعلمُهُ  ++  عليكَ   نُزِّلَ مِن ذي العِزَّة ِ الكتُبُ
​ Or this:
أنِّي على دينِ النبيِّ أحمدِ ++ يا شاهدَ الخلقِ عليَّ فاشهدِ
​ With the following verses (and the first example above), one can say that the mystical element familiar to us from later Arabic poetry was already there:

مَليكُ   الناسِ ليسَ لهُ شَريكٌ  ++  هوَ   الوهّابُ والمُبْدي المُعيدُ
ومَن   تَحتَ السَّماءِ لهُ بحقٍ  ++  ومنَ   فَوقَ السماءِ لهُ عَبيدُ
​


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## Jabir

Hello all!

I'm looking forward to buy ألف ليلة وليلة to advance myself in the Arabic language, but I don't which is the best edition and normally read/recognized-as-original in the Middle East. 

The virtual shop I'm looking at shows this version:
Editor: Antwan Salahani
Publisher: Dar al-Mashriq

Is it reliable?

Can you suggest another one?

Thanks


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## suma

Alf Laila wa Laila is not that big of a deal in ME, it has received far more attention among Western orientalists.


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## إسكندراني

They'd all be about the same, I think the basic translation from Persian is the same.


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## GoldBug

A word of caution to Arabic-language students interested in this work:

The complete THOUSAND AND ONE NIGHTS is/was a huge project. Richard Burton's English translation contains 16 volumes (!!) I imagine the original Arabic rendition is about the same length.

The original Arabic, of course, uses "medieval" Arabic terms, allusions, cultural facts and arcane linguistic structures which can only really be understood by specialists. It's like trying to read the ILLIAD or the ODYSSEY in the original Greek which even modern Greeks can barely understand (an exaggeration, but still, you get my point).

Most available editions, in English or Arabic, contain "selections" of stories....not the complete work. There are also "simplified" renditions for students and perhaps this is what you should be looking for. A complete, original Arabic edition may be beyond your Arabic level and way beyond your pocketbook resources.


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## Ghabi

I think you do exaggerate, dear Goldbug. One doesn't need to be a rocket scientist ... erm, I mean specialist to read the work. The work is available on the net (here), so one can judge the level of difficulty before making a purchase.


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## GoldBug

Thanks for the information, Ghabi. Since the work is online, one could say that there's no real need to do any purchasing. One could just download and print the portions he is interested in.


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## clevermizo

GoldBug said:


> A word of caution to Arabic-language students interested in this work:
> 
> The complete THOUSAND AND ONE NIGHTS is/was a huge project. Richard Burton's English translation contains 16 volumes (!!) I imagine the original Arabic rendition is about the same length.



There's no question that the Nights are long, but it's only about 4 volumes in typical Arabic copies. My copy is 4 volumes and is unabridged. But Burton's translation is hardly a good one for the student of Arabic as it is exaggerated and reworked to say the very least. The best translation is probably the Lyons' in the Penguin Classics edition.



> The original Arabic, of course, uses "medieval" Arabic terms, allusions, cultural facts and arcane linguistic structures which can only really be understood by specialists.



I think that's nonsense, but I'm willing to look at some examples of what you're talking about. The Arabic is a low-register Fuṣħa which is readable by anyone who can read Fuṣħa, but a background in colloquial Arabic is helpful as there are many quasi-colloquial structures. The Nights were considered "low" on the grade of importance and eloquence. There may be some elusive cultural artifacts, but really it's pop fiction. It's not high literature. It is important however, for the development of _fiction_ as a genre in general, however fiction was not highly valued in Medieval Arabic (nor was in anywhere, honestly until more modern times when it became strongly developed).  I find Ibn Baṭṭūṭa much more difficult to read than Alf Layla. In its time, Alf Layla occupied the cultural space of something like a trashy romance novel or adventure story would today. 

If you're talking about critical theory, sure that can only be done by specialists. But the average student of Arabic would have no problems reading the text in my opinions, that couldn't be confronted with a consultation of a dictionary.



> Most available editions, in English or Arabic, contain "selections" of stories....not the complete work. There are also "simplified" renditions for students and perhaps this is what you should be looking for. A complete, original Arabic edition may be beyond your Arabic level and way beyond your pocketbook resources.



A complete Arabic edition is quite readily available either in print from various booksellers or online (either as based off the original Syrian or Egyptian manuscripts). It's the English editions that are largely abridged, or otherwise liberal in translation. I don't remember how much my print Arabic set cost me, but it didn't break the bank. The Lyons' Penguin Classics edition is unabridged.

There have been threads here before about Alf Layla, I suggest to the OP to search through them for more information.


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