One Thousand and One Nights

by Richard Burton

  10 Cufa (Kufah) being a modern place never had a “King,”

  but as the Hindu says, “ Delhi is far” it is a far cry to Loch

  Awe. Here we can hardly understand “Malik” as Governor or

  Viceroy: can it be syn. with Zъ-mбl-(moneyed)?

  11 Abd al-Malik has been before mentioned as the “Sweat of a Stone,” etc. He died recommending Al-Hajjaj to his son, Al-Walid, and one of his sayings is still remembered. “He who desireth to take a female slave for carnal-enjoyment, let him take a native of Barbary; if he need one for the sake of children, let him have a Persian; and whoso desireth one for service, let him take a Greek.” Moderns say, “If you want a brother (in arms) try a Nubian; one to get you wealth an Abyssinian and if you want an ass (for labour) a Sбwahнli, or Zanzibar negroid.”

  12 Probably suggested by the history of Antiochus and

  Stratonice, with an addition of Eastern mystery such as geomancy.

  13 Arab, “Kбrъrah”: the “water-doctor” has always been an institution in the east and he has lately revived in Europe especially at the German baths and in London.

  14 Lane makes this phrase “O brother of the Persians!” synonymous with “O Persian!” I think it means more, a Persian being generally considered “too clever by half.”

  15 The verses deal in untranslatable word-plays upon women’s names, Naomi (the blessing) Su’adб or Su’бd (the happy, which Mr. Redhouse, in Ka’ab’s Mantle-poem, happily renders Beatrice); and Juml (a sum or total) the two latter, moreover, being here fictitious.

  16 “And he (Jacob) turned from them, and said, ‘O how I am grieved for Joseph’ And his eyes became white with mourning. … (Quoth Joseph to his brethren), ‘Take this my inner garment and throw it on my father’s face and he shall recover his sight.’ . . . So, when the messenger of good tidings came (to Jacob) he threw it (the shirt) over his face and he recovered his eye-sight.” Koran, xii. 84, 93, 96. The commentators, by way of improvement, assure us that the shirt was that worn by Abraham when thrown into the fire (Koran, chaps. xvi.) by Nimrod (!). We know little concerning “Jacob’s daughters” who named the only bridge spanning the upper Jordan, and who have a curious shrine tomb near Jewish “Safe” (North of Tiberias), one of the four “Holy Cities.” The Jews ignore these “daughters of Jacob” and travellers neglect them.

  17 Easterns, I have remarked, mostly recognise the artistic truth that the animal-man is handsomer than woman and that “fair sex” is truly only of skin-colour. The same is the general-rule throughout creation, for instance the stallion compared with the mare, the cock with the hen; while there are sundry exceptions such as the Falconidae.

  18 The Badawi (who is nothing if not horsey) compares the gait of a woman who walks well (in Europe rarely seen out of Spain) with the slightly swinging walk of a thoroughbred mare, bending her graceful neck and looking from side to side at objects as she passes.

  19 Li’llбhi (darr’) al-kбil, a characteristic idiom. “Darr”=giving (rich) milk copiously and the phrase expresses admiration, “To Allah be ascribed (or Allah be praised for) his rich eloquence who said etc. Some Hebraists would render it, “Divinely (well) did he speak who said,” etc., holding “Allah” to express a superlative like “Yah” Jah) in Gen. iv. 1; x. 9. Nimrod was a hunter to the person (or presence) of Yah, i.e. mighty hunter.

  20 Hamzah and Abbбs were the famous uncles of Mohammed often noticed: Ukayl is not known; possibly it may be Akнl, a son of the fourth Caliph, Ali.

  21 The Eastern ring is rarely plain; and, its use being that of a signet, it is always in intaglio: the Egyptians invented engraving hieroglyphics on wooden stamps for marking bricks and applied the process to the ring. Moses B. C. 1491 (Exod. xxviii. 9) took two onyx-stones, and graved on them the names of the children of Israel. From this the signet ring was but a step. Herodotus mentions an emerald seal-set in gold, that of Polycrates, the work of Theodorus, son of Telecles the Samian (iii. 141). The Egyptians also were perfectly acquainted with working in cameo (anaglyph) and rilievo, as may be seen in the cavo rilievo of the finest of their hieroglyphs. The Greeks borrowed from them the cameo and applied it to gems (e.g. Tryphon’s in the Marlborough collection), and they bequeathed the art to the Romans. We read in a modern book “Cameo means an onyx, and the most famous cameo in the world is the onyx containing the Apotheosis of Augustus.” The ring is given in marriage because it was a seal — by which orders were signed (Gen. xxxviii. 18 and Esther iii. 10-12). I may note that the seal-ring of Cheops (Khufu), found in the Greatest Pyramid, was in the possession of my old friend, Doctor Abbott, of Auburn (U.S.), and was sold with his collection. It is the oldest ring in the world, and settles the Cheops-question.

  22 This habit of weeping when friends meet after long parting is customary, I have noted, amongst the American “Indians,” the Badawin of the New World; they shed tears thinking of the friends they have lost. Like most primitive people they are ever ready to weep as was Жneas or Shakespeare’s saline personage,

  “This would make a man, a man of salt

  To use his eyes for garden waterpots.”

  (King Lear, iv. 6.)

  23 Here poetical-justice is not done; in most Arab tales the two adulterous Queens would have been put to death.

  24 Pronounce Aladdin Abush-Shбmбt.

  25 Arab. “Misr,” vulg. Masr: a close connection of Misraim the “two Misrs,” Egypt, upper and lower.

  26 The Persians still call their Consuls “Shah-bander,” lit. king of the Bandar or port.

  27 Arab. “Dukhъl,” the night of going in, of seeing the bride unveiled for the first time, etcaetera.

  28 Arab. “Barsh” or “Bars,” the commonest kind. In India it is called Ma’jъn (=electuary, generally): it is made of Ganja or young leaves, buds, capsules and florets of hemp (C. saliva), poppy-seed and flowers of the thorn-apple (daiura) with milk and auger-candy, nutmegs, cloves, mace and saffron, all boiled to the consistency of treacle which hardens when cold. Several-recipes are given by Herklots (Glossary s.v. Majoon). These electuaries are usually prepared with “Charas,” or gum of hemp, collected by hand or by passing a blanket over the plant in early morning, and it is highly intoxicating. Another intoxicant is “Sabzi,” dried hemp-leaves, poppy-seed, cucumber heed, black pepper and cardamoms rubbed down in a mortar with a wooden pestle, and made drinkable by adding milk, ice-cream, etc. The Hashish of Arabia is the Hindustani Bhang, usually drunk and made as follows. Take of hemp-leaves, well washed, 3 drams black pepper 45 grains and of cloves, nutmeg and mace (which add to the intoxication) each 12 grains. Triturate in 8 ounces of water or the juice of watermelon or cucumber, strain and drink. The Egyptian Zabнbah is a preparation of hemp florets, opium and honey, much affected by the lower orders, whence the proverb: “Temper thy sorrow with Zabibah. In Al-Hijaz it is mixed with raisins (Zabнb) and smoked in the water-pipe. (Burck hardt No. 73.) Besides these there is (1) “Post” poppy-seed prepared in various ways but especially in sugared sherbets; (2) Datura (stramonium) seed, the produce of the thorn-apple breached and put into sweetmeats by dishonest confectioners; it is a dangerous intoxicant, producing spectral-visions, delirium tremens, etc., and (3) various preparations of opium especially the “Madad,” pills made up with toasted betel-leaf and smoked. Opium, however, is usually drunk in the shape of “Kusumba,” a pill placed in wet cotton and squeezed in order to strain and clean it of the cowdung and other filth with which it is adulterated.

  29 Arab. “Sikankъr” (Gr. {Greek letters}, Lat. Scincus) a lizard (S. officinalis) which, held in the hand, still acts as an aphrodisiac in the East, and which in the Middle Ages was considered a universal-medicine. In the “Adja’ib al-Hind” (Les Merveilles de l’Inde) we find a notice of a bald-headed old man who was compelled to know his wife twice a day and twice a night in consequence of having eaten a certain fish. (Chaps. Ixxviii. of the translation by M. L. Marcel Devic, from a manuscript of the tenth century, Paris Lemaire, 1878.) Europeans deride these prescrip
tions, but Easterns know better: they affect the fancy, that is the brain, and often succeed in temporarily relieving impotence. The recipes for this evil, which is incurable only when it comes from heart-affections, are innumerable in the East; and about half of every medical-work is devoted to them. Many a quack has made his fortune with a few bottles of tincture of cantharides, and a man who could discover a specific would become a millionaire in India only. The curious reader will consult for specimens the Ananga-Ranga Shastra by Koka Pandit; or the “Rujъ ‘al-Shaykh ila ‘l-Sabбh fi Kuwwati ‘l-Bбh” (the Return of the Old Man to Youth in power of Procreation) by Ahmad bin Sulaymбn known as Ibn Kamбl-Bбshб, in 139 chapters lithographed at Cairo. Of these aphrodisiacs I shall have more to say.

  30 Alб al-Din (our old friend Aladdin) = Glory of the Faith, a name of which Mohammed who preferred the simplest, like his own, would have highly disapproved. The most grateful names to Allah are Abdallah (Allah’s Slave) and Abd al-Rahman (Slave of the Compassionate); the truest are Al-Hбrith (the gainer, “bread winner”) and Al-Hammбm (the griever); and the hatefullest are Al-Harb (witch) and Al-Murrah (bitterness, Abu Murrah being a kunyat or by-name of the Devil). Abu al-Shбmбt (pronounced Abushshбmбt)=Father of Moles, concerning which I have already given details. These names ending in -Din (faith) began with the Caliph Al-Muktadi bi-Amri ‘llah (regn. A.H. 467= 1075), who entitled his Wazir “Zahнr al-Din (Backer or Defender of the Faith) and this gave rise to the practice. It may be observed that the superstition of naming by omens is in no way obsolete.

  31 Meaning that he appeared intoxicated by the pride of his beauty as though it had been strong wine.

  32 i.e. against the evil eye.

  33 Meaning that he had been delicately reared.

  34 A traditional-saying of Mohammed.

  35 So Boccaccio’s “Capo bianco” and “Coda verde.” (Day iv.,

  Introduct.)

  36 The opening chapter is known as the “Mother of the Book” (as opposed to Yб Sнn, the “heart of the Koran”), the “Surat (chapter) of Praise,” and the “Surat of repetition” (because twice revealed?) or thanksgiving, or laudation (Ai-Masбni) and by a host of other names for which see Mr. Rodwell who, however, should not write “Fatthah” (p. xxv.) nor “Fathah” (xxvii.). The Fбtihah, which is to Al-Islam much what the “Paternoster” is to Christendom, consists of seven verses, in the usual-Saj’a or rhymed prose, and I have rendered it as follows:

  In the name of the Compassionating, the Compassionate! * Praise be to Allah who all the Worlds made * The Compassionating, the Compassionate * King of the Day of Faith! * Thee only do we adore and of Thee only do we crave aid * Guide us to the path which is straight * The path of those for whom Thy love is great, not those on whom is hate, nor they that deviate * Amen! O Lord of the World’s trine.

  My Pilgrimage (i. 285; ii. 78 and passim) will supply instances of its application; how it is recited with open hands to catch the blessing from Heaven and the palms are drawn down the face (Ibid. i. 286), and other details,

  37 i.e. when the evil eye has less effect than upon children. Strangers in Cairo often wonder to see a woman richly dressed leading by the hand a filthy little boy (rarely a girl) in rags, which at home will be changed to cloth of gold.

  38 Arab. “Asнdah” flour made consistent by boiling in water with the addition of “Same” clarified butter) and honey: more like pap than custard.

  39 Arab. “Ghбbah” = I have explained as a low-lying place where the growth is thickest and consequently animals haunt it during the noon-heats

  40 Arab. “Akkбm,” one who loads camels and has charge of the luggage. He also corresponds with the modern Mukharrij or camel-hirer (Pilgrimage i. 339), and hence the word Moucre (Moucres) which, first used by La Brocquiиre (A.D. 1432), is still the only term known to the French.

  41 i.e. I am old and can no longer travel.

  42 Taken from Al-Asma’i, the “Romance of Antar,” and the episode of the Asafir Camels.

  43 A Mystic of the twelfth century A.D. who founded the Kбdirн order (the oldest and chiefest of the four universally recognised), to which I have the honour to belong, teste my diploma (Pilgrimage, Appendix i.). Visitation is still made to his tomb at Baghdad. The Arabs (who have no hard g-letter) alter to “Jнlбn” the name of his birth-place “Gilan,” a tract between the Caspian and the Black Seas.

  44 The well-known Anglo-Indian “Mucuddum;” lit. “one placed before (or over) others”

  45 Koran xiii. 14.

  46 i.e.. his chastity: this fashion of objecting to infamous proposals is very characteristic: ruder races would use their fists.

  47 Arab. “Rбfizн”=the Shi’ah (tribe, sect) or Persian schismatics who curse the first three Caliphs: the name is taken from their own saying “Innб rafiznб-hum”=verily we have rejected them. The feeling between Sunni (the so-called orthodox) and Shi’ah is much like the Christian love between a Catholic of Cork and a Protestant from the Black North. As Al-Siyuti or any historian will show, this sect became exceedingly powerful under the later Abbaside Caliphs, many of whom conformed to it and adopted its tractices and innovations (as in the Azan or prayer-call), greatly to the scandal-of their co-religionists. Even in the present day the hatred between these representatives of Arab monotheism and Persian Guebrism continues unabated. I have given sundry instances m my Pilgrimage, e.g. how the Persians attempt to pollute the tombs of the Caliphs they abhor.

  48 Arab. “Sakkб,” the Indian “Bihishtн” (man from Heaven):

  Each party in a caravan has one or more.

  49 These “Kirбmбt” or Saints’ miracles, which Spiritualists will readily accept, are recorded in vast numbers. Most men have half a dozen to tell, each of his “Pнr” or patron, including the Istidrбj or prodigy of chastisement. (Dabistan, iii. 274.)

  50 Great granddaughter of the Imam Hasan buried in Cairo and famed for “Kirбmбt.” Her father, governor of Al-Medinah, was imprisoned by Al-Mansur and restored to power by Al-Mahdi. She was married to a son of the Imam Ja’afar al-Sadik and lived a life of devotion in Cairo, dying in A.H. 218=824. The corpse of the Imam al-Shafi’i was carried to her house, now her mosque and mausoleum: it stood in the Darb al-Sabъa which formerly divided Old from New Cairo and is now one of the latter’s suburbs. Lane (M. E. chaps. x.) gives her name but little more. The mention of her shows that the writer of the tale or the copyist was a Cairene : Abd al-Kadir is world-known : not so the “Sitt.”

  51 Arab. “Farkh akrab” for Ukayrib, a vulgarism.

  52 The usual Egyptian irreverence: he relates his abomination as if it were a Hadis or Tradition of the Prophet with due ascription.

  53 A popular name, dim. of Zubdah cream, fresh butter, “creamkin.”

  54 Arab. “Mustahall,” “Mustahill’ and vulg. “Muhallil” (=one who renders lawful). It means a man hired for the purpose who marries pro forma and after wedding, and bedding with actual-consummation, at once divorces the woman. He is held the reverse of respectable and no wonder. Hence, probably, Mandeville’s story of the Islanders who, on the marriage-night, “make another man to lie by their wives, to have their maidenhead, for which they give great hire and much thanks. And there are certain men in every town that serve for no other thing; and they call them cadeberiz, that is to say, the fools of despair, because they believe their occupation is a dangerous one.” Burckhardt gives the proverb (No. 79), “A thousand lovers rather than one Mustahall,” the latter being generally some ugly fellow picked up in the streets and disgusting to the wife who must permit his embraces.

  55 This is a woman’s oath. not used by men.

  56 Pronounced “Yб Sнn” (chaps. xxxvi.) the “heart of the

  Koran” much used for edifying recitation. Some pious Moslems in

  Egypt repeat it as a Wazifah, or religious task, or as masses for

  the dead, and all educated men know its 83 versets by rote.

  57 Arab. “Бl-Dбъd”=the family of David, i.e. David himself, a popul
ar idiom. The prophet’s recitation of the “Mazбmir” (Psalter) worked miracles.

  58 There is a peculiar thickening of the voice in leprosy which at once betrays the hideous disease.

  59 These lines have occurred in Night clxxxiii. I quote

  Mr. Payne (in loco) by way of variety.

  60 Where the “Juzбm” (leprosy, elephantiasis, morbus sacrum, etc. etc.) is supposed first to show: the swelling would alter the shape. Lane (ii. 267) translates “her wrist which was bipartite.”

  61 Arab. “Zakariyб” (Zacharias): a play upon the term “Zakar”=the sign of “masculinity.” Zacharias, mentioned in the Koran as the educator of the Virgin Mary (chaps. iii.) and repeatedly referred to (chaps. xix. etc.), is a well-known personage amongst Moslems and his church is now the great Cathedral-Mosque of Aleppo.

  62 Arab. “ Ark al-Halбwat “ = vein of sweetness.

  63 Arab. “Futъh,” which may also mean openings, has before occurred.

  64 i.e. four times without withdrawing.

  65 i.e. a correspondence of size, concerning which many rules are given in the Ananga-Rangha Shastra which justly declares that discrepancy breeds matrimonial-troubles.

  66 Arab. “Ghurбb al-Bayn”= raven of the waste or the parting: hence the bird of Odin symbolises separation (which is also called Al-bayn). The Raven (Ghurab = Heb. Oreb and Lat. Corvus, one of the prehistoric words) is supposed to be seen abroad earlier than any other bird; and it is entitled “Abu Zajir,” father of omens, because lucky when flying towards the right and v.v. It is opposed in poetry to the (white) pigeon, the emblem of union, peace and happiness. The vulgar declare that when Mohammed hid in the cave the crow kept calling to his pursuers, “Ghбr! Ghбr!” (cavern, cavern): hence the Prophet condemned him to wear eternal-mourning and ever to repeat the traitorous words. This is the old tale of Coronis and Apollo (Ovid, lib. ii.).

  —— —— —” who blacked the raven o’er And bid him prate in his white plumes no more.”