Antarah
INTRODUCTION
In a video, The Dirham Coin didn’t even exist in Muhammad’s time? (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQXhPk28x2M 19 Feb 2020), one Muslim objected to the presentation with these words:
salim shawi 8 hours ago (edited)
Smith has claimed that the dirham was introduced after the advent of Muhammad and that it was not created until the time of ʿUmar. This is simply factually incorrect. The pre-Islamic romance poetry of ʿAntara mentions the word dirham. وَكَأَنَّ فَارَةَ تَاجِرٍ بِقَسِيمَةٍ = سَبَقَتْ عَوَارِضَهَا إِلَيْكَ مِنَ الفَمِ أَوْ رَوْضَةً أُنُفًا تَضَمَّنَ نَبْتَهَا = غَيْثٌ قَلِيلُ الدِّمْنِ لَيْسَ بِمَعْلَمِ جَادَتْ عَلَيْهِ كُلُّ بِكْرٍ ثُرَّةٍ = فَتَرَكْنَ كُلَّ حَدِيقَةٍ #كَالدِّرْهَمِ It has been recognized by both Muslim and non-Muslim philologists that the word dirham is of non-Arabic origin. For example, al-Jawālīqī (d. 1145 CE / 539 AH) states in his Al-Muʿarrab: أفي كلِّ أسواقِ العراق إتاوةٌ=وفي كلِّ ما باعَ امْرُؤٌ مَكْسُ ##د
This seems to have been borrowed from the Islamic Awareness site, “Dirham”" In The Time Of Joseph?, First Composed: 25th February 2006; Last Updated: 7th April 2006 https://www.islamic-awareness.org/quran/contrad/external/dirham which contains these references:
Smith has claimed that the dirham was introduced after the advent of Muhammad and that it was not created until the time of ʿUmar. This is simply factually incorrect. The pre-Islamic romance poetry of ʿAntara mentions the word dirham.
19. Or her mouth is as an ungrazed meadow, whose herbage the rain has guaranteed, in which there is but little dung; and which is not marked with the feet of animals.
20. Or as if it is an old wine-skin, from Azri‘at, preserved long, such as the kings of Rome preserve;
21. The first pure showers of every rain-cloud rained upon it, and left every puddle in it like a dirham;
22. Sprinkling and pouring; so that the water flows upon it every evening, and is not cut off from it.[3]
Commenting on the presence of the word dirham in ʿAntara’s poetry Arthur Jeffery says:
It was doubtless an early borrowing from the Mesopotamian area...[4]
It is clear that the pre-Islamic Arabs were aware of the dirham…
It was shown that pre-Islamic Arabs were aware of the dirham. The evidence comes from the pre-Islamic romance poetry of ‘Antara.
The two references are: W. Ahlwardt (Ed.), The Divans of The Six Ancient Arabic Poets: Ennābiga, ‘Antara, Tharafa, Zuhair, ‘Alqama And Imruulqais, 1870, Trübner & Co.: London, p. 45, XXI:21, and A. Jeffery, The Foreign Vocabulary Of The Qur’an, 1938, Oriental Institute: Baroda (India), p. 130.
Who was ‘Antarah?
Who was this pre-Islamic poet ‘Antarah? According to the Encyclopedia of Arabic Literature, volume 1 (Edited by Julie Scott Meisami and Paul Starkey, London & New York: Routledge, 1998), p. 94 (by T. Bauer), he was a poet of mixed Arab/Abyssinian heritage of the sixth century A.D.:
Antara ibn Shaddad al-Absī
(second half of sixth century CE)
Pre-Islamic poet and hero. As son of a noble bedouin and an Abyssinian slave-girl, he himself had the status of slave, and it is reported that only after he had proven his prowess in battle did his father acknowledge him to be free. The struggle to make up for his lowly birth by bravery and success in combat is more than once reflected in his poetry. He took part in the War of Dāhis between his tribe (‘Abs) and the Dhubyān. Most of his poetry is about this war and other battles, or is dedicated to the glorification of military virtues. Besides his Mu‘allaqa, his best and most important poem, only few lines could gain greater fame. The story of his life, however, which served as an example for the superiority of personal virtue over noble descent, made him a legendary figure and he became the hero of a celebrated epic
Note the word “legendary”. The actual epic is addressed by G. Canova on pp. 93-94:
‘Antar, romance of
‘Antara ibn Shaddad is the famous pre-Islamic poet of the ‘Abs tribe, author of a renowned Mu‘allaqa; because of his dark skin he is considered one of the Arab ‘ravens’. His exploits in war and the story of his love for ‘Abla (their main features already related in Abū al-Faraj al-Isbahānī’s Kitab al-Aghānī) provided the inspiration for numerous legends from an early date. The conjunction of these legends between the eleventh and twelfth centuries CE produced a lengthy chivalrous romance, the Sirat ‘Antar, which was the subject of public recitals by professional storytellers, especially in Syria, Iraq and Egypt, where they were known as ‘anātira. The romance’s various manuscripts and printed editions feature the names of the numerous ‘authors’ to whom it has been attributed: al-Asma’ī, Abū ‘Ubayda, Yūsuf ibn Isma’īl, Ibn al-Sa’igh al-’Antarī, etc. The romance is in fact a popular work, though distinguished from the other siras by language closer to literary usage. ‘Antar is an example of the perfect knight of the Jāhiliyya; in the romance he is also the champion of Islam, and there are many references to the period of the conquests and the Crusades. Two versions of the Slrat ‘Antar, a briefer Syrian-Iraqi one and a Hijazi (Egyptian) one, have come down to us. Its characters speak in verse, whereas the rāwī’s descriptions are in rhyming prose. Four groups of stories, with numerous digressions, may be identified:
1 ‘Antar’s childhood and his love for ‘Abla;
2 his exploits in Mesopotamia, Iran, Africa, etc.;
3 his relations with the Christians;
4 the contest with his rival al-Asad al-Rahīs who eventually killed him.
The early part also contains such episodes of the Qisas al-anbiyā’ (see Legends of the Prophets) as the stories of Nimrod and Abraham. This romance drew the interest of nineteenth-century Orientalists, who saw ‘Antar as the paramount bedouin hero, the Arab Achilles. Later research from the viewpoint of comparative literature (B. Heller) has brought out themes common to the Sīra and to great epic poetry. H.T. Norris has analysed ‘Antar’s African adventures, pointing out the knowledge of Ethiopia common to the late medieval Arab world. P. Heath’s recent work seeks to trace the romance’s literary structure, moving beyond traditional approaches based on historical philology.
Note both the legendary character of the material and its late date – “between the eleventh and twelfth centuries CE”. In terms of ‘Anatarah’s poetry, this seems to have been collated by Abū al-Faraj al-Isbahānī in his Kitab al-Aghānī, about which H. Kilpatrick writes (pp. 30-32):
Abū al-Faraj al-Isbahānī
(284- c. 363/897 - c. 972)
Abu al-Faraj ‘Alī ibn al-Husayn ibn Muhammad al-Isbahānī, ‘Abbasid man of letters, historian, musicologist and poet. A descendant of the Umayyads, Abu al-Faraj grew up in Baghdad…
A Zaydī (moderate) Shī‘i by conviction, Abu al-Faraj was mainly interested in poetry, music, political and social history, genealogy and philology…
Of his twenty-five titles listed in the sources - mainly on historical, genealogical, literary and musical subjects - four have survived: …the Kitab al-Aghānī (Book of Songs), on which Abu al-Faraj spent many years, but which is incomplete… These four books are all compilations; that is, Abu al-Faraj is responsible for assembling the material, but his own voice is seldom heard, except in occasional comments. He is fairly unusual among literary compilers of this period in painstakingly mentioning isnāds…
The Kitab al-Aghānī, Abu al-Faraj’s masterpiece, is a much more complex work. Its starting point is the aim to present a correct version of the melodies of the hundred best songs chosen, it is said, for Harun al-Rashid and revised by Ishaq al-Mawsili for al-Wāthiq. Abu al-Faraj attaches to each song information about the poet and the composer, the poem from which the words were taken, the event which occasioned the poem and the circumstances in which the song was performed. The articles relating to the Hundred Songs take up about a third of the book; they are followed by a section on royal composers, caliphs and their descendants, and by a third, much longer, section of articles relating to songs chosen by Abu al-Faraj himself. In the third Cairo edition the Aghānī runs to some 9,000 pages.
Although it contains much historical material, the Aghānī is not a history. Rather, it provides a series of portraits of poets, musicians and personalities from pre-Islamic to ‘Abbasid times. The subjects, some of whom are extremely obscure, are drawn from all kinds of milieus and exhibit a great variety of behaviour; the poetry, artistic prose and anecdotes in the book provide a panorama of Arabic literature up to the end of the third/ninth century. Recurrent themes - such as the truthfulness of poetry or the permissibility of listening to music (see samā‘) - give the work a certain unity, while the juxtaposition of disparate material presents the reader with unexpected parallels and comparisons.
These facts are very revealing. Abū al-Faraj al-Isbahānī wrote about three hundred years after ‘Antarah, and his work involved “painstakingly mentioning isnāds” – indicating that we are dealing with the compilation of oral traditions. This mirrors the issues surrounding the Hadith literature.
Manuscript dates
This becomes further complicated when we examine the dates of the manuscripts. In the work The Divans of The Six Ancient Arabic Poets: Ennābiga, ‘Antara, Tharafa, Zuhair, ‘Alqama And Imruulqais, Ahlwardt informs us (pp. xvii, xxiv): “The MSS. employed to edit the text are… 14. Cod. Berol. Peterm. 196. Contains a collection of the poems that occur in romance ‘Antar… Date of copy 1212 (=1798 A.D.).” Indeed, all the mss. used for the various poems are very late. Obviously, the later the manuscript, the greater the opportunity for emendation, unless we have something earlier with which to compare it.
The full reference from Jeffery’s work simply demonstrates dependence on Ahlwardt: “It was doubtless an early borrowing from the Mesopotamian area, for it occurs in the old poetry, e.g. 'Antara xxi, 21 (Ahlwardt, Divans p. 45).” If we turn to The Romance of Antar: An Epitome of the First Part, Translated by Terrick Hamilton, Esq., with selections from the poetry, in Arabian Poetry For English Readers. Edited, With Introduction and Notes, by W. A. Clouston, (Glasgow: M’Laren and Son, 1881), p. 171, we read:
IT is generally believed that this celebrated Arabian Romance was composed, in the eighth century, from traditionary tales which had been long current in the East, by El-Asma’ee, a famous philologist and poet at the court of Hároon Er-Rasheed. Other authors and sources (for instance, Johainah and Abu Obeidah) are mentioned in the work, but these, according to Von Hammer, have been inserted by story-tellers in the coffeehouses. Lane, in his admirable work on the Modern Egyptians, remarks that the ’Ulamà (learned men) “in general despise the romance, and ridicule the assertion that El-Asma’ee was its author”: their opinion, however, on a question of this kind, is of little value.
Again, there is a consensus of late compilation from obviously oral traditions. With this agrees Antar, A Bedoueen Romance, Translated from the Arabic, by Terrick Hamilton, Esq. Oriental Secretary to the British Embassy at Constantinople, (London: John Murray 1819), p. ii:
The following Romance, as it may be called, was first put together, probably from traditionary tales current at the time, by Osmay, one of the eminent scholars, who adorned the courts of Haroun-al-Raschid, and of his two learned successors, Al-Amyn, and Al-Mamoun…
We find the same analysis in modern scholarship, e.g. Peter Heath, The Thirsty Sword: Sirat Àntar and the Arabic Popular Epic, (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1996), p. xvi:
The present study draws from and builds on the modern study of epic. It focuses on a popular epic from the Arabic storytelling tradition, the account of the adventures and achievements of the pre-Islamic Arab poet ‘Antara ibn Shaddad. Sirat Antar (The Life Story of ‘Antar) is one point of culmination in the rich tradition of the premodern Arabic popular epic. These popular epics (usually termed in Arabic sira sha’biyya) are works of battle and romance, primarily concerned with depicting the personal prowess and military exploits of their heroes. Pseudo-historical in tone and setting, they base many of their central characters on actual historical figures. Details of history are quickly transcended by the imaginative improvements of fiction, with the result that historical features usually reflect only general setting, atmosphere, and tone. The creators of siras may not have intended to contradict history, but they were quite willing to refashion it for their own purposes.
Sirat 'Antar purports to recount the life story of the famous pre-Islamic Arab poet and warrior 'Antara ibn Shaddad. The historical ‘Antara was a half-caste slave (his father was Arab and his mother black African) who won freedom and fame through his poetic and martial abilities and ended life as a respected member of the northern Arabian tribe of ‘Abs. The Sira builds upon the framework of ‘Antara’s life to construct its own pseudo-historical account.
CONCLUSION
So, even if there were an historical figure called Antar(ah), the reality is that the redacted historical romance is actually unhistorical – essentially apocryphal legend. All of this raises severe questions about the historical reliability of poetry ascribed to him. The late dating of manuscripts does not help. It follows that to base an argument on his supposed use of the word “dirham” is questionable at best – what hard textual evidence do we have from the general time he is said to have originated and transmitted poetry mentioning this word? The fact is, what we have is the late textual redaction of generally legendary oral material, testified by even later manuscript evidence. It follows that no historical significance can be attributed to Antarah’s alleged poetry.