Chapter VII: Feasting and Merrymaking (2)

"The sun went down upon me while I sat there; and at length there came two handsome young men on asses, and they knocked at the door, and when they were admitted, I entered with them; the master of the house thinking that I was their companion, and they imagining that I was one of his friends. A repast was brought up, and we ate, and washed our hands, and were perfumed. The master of the house then said to the two young men, 'Have ye any desire that I should call such a one?' (mentioning a woman's name). They answered, 'If thou wilt grant us the favour, well:'--so he called for her, and she came, and lo, she was the maiden whom I had seen before, and who had abused me. A servant-maid preceded her, bearing her lute, which she placed in her lap. Wine was then brought, and she sang, while we drank, and shook with delight. 'Whose air is that?' they asked. She answered, 'My master Mukháriḳ's.' She then sang another air, which she said was also mine; while they drank by pints; she looking aside and doubtfully at me until I lost my patience, and called out to her to do her best: but in attempting to do so, singing a third air, she overstrained her voice, and I said, 'Thou hast made a mistake:'--upon which she threw the lute from her lap in anger, so that she nearly broke it, saying, 'Take it thyself, and let us hear thee.' I answered, 'Well;' and, having taken it and tuned it perfectly, sang the first of the airs which she had sung before me; whereupon all of them sprang upon their feet and kissed my head. I then sang the second air, and the third; and their reason almost fled with ecstasy.

"The master of the house, after asking his guests and being told by them that they knew me not, came to me, and, kissing my hand, said, 'By Allah, my master, who art thou?' I answered, 'By Allah, I am the singer Mukháriḳ.'--'And for what purpose,' said he, kissing both my hands, 'camest thou hither?' I replied, 'As a spunger;'--and related what had happened with respect to the maiden: whereupon he looked towards his two companions and said to them, 'Tell me, by Allah, do ye not know that I gave for that girl thirty thousand dirhems, and have refused to sell her?' They answered, 'It is so.' Then said he, 'I take you as witnesses that I have given her to him.'--'And we,' said the two friends, 'will pay thee two-thirds of her price.' So he put me in possession of the girl, and in the evening when I departed, he presented me also with rich dresses and other gifts, with all of which I went away; and as I passed the places where the maiden had abused me, I said to her, 'Repeat thy words to me;' but she could not for shame. Holding the girl's hand, I went with her immediately to the Khaleefeh, whom I found in anger at my long absence; but when I related my story to him he was surprised, and laughed, and ordered that the master of the house and his two friends should be brought before him, that he might requite them; to the former he gave forty thousand dirhems; to each of his two friends, thirty thousand; and to me a hundred thousand; and I kissed his feet and departed."[209]

It is particularly necessary for the Arab musician that he have a retentive memory, well stocked with choice pieces of poetry and with facetious or pleasant anecdotes, interspersed with songs; and that he have a ready wit, aided by dramatic talent, to employ these materials with good effect. If to such qualifications he adds fair attainments in the difficult rules of grammar, a degree of eloquence, comic humour, and good temper, and is not surpassed by many in his art, he is sure to be a general favourite. Very few Muslims of the higher classes have condescended to study music, because they would have been despised by their inferiors for doing so; or because they themselves have despised or condemned the art. Ibraheem, the son of the Khaleefeh El-Mahdee, and competitor of El-Ma-moon, was a remarkable exception: he is said to have been an excellent musician and a good singer.

In the houses of the wealthy, the vocal and instrumental performers were usually (as is the case in many houses in the present age) domestic female slaves, well instructed in their art by hired male or female professors. In the "Thousand and One Nights," these slaves are commonly described as standing or sitting unveiled in the presence of male guests; but from several descriptions of musical entertainments that I have met with in Arabic works it appears that according to the more approved custom in respectable society they were concealed on such occasions behind a curtain which generally closed the front of an elevated recess. In all the houses of wealthy Arabs that I have entered, one or each of the larger saloons has an elevated closet, the front of which is closed by a screen of wooden lattice-work to serve as an orchestra for the domestic or hired female singers and instrumental performers.

To a person acquainted with modern Arabian manners, it must appear inconsistent with truth to describe (as is often the case in the "Thousand and One Nights") such female singers as exposing their faces before strange men, unless he can discover in sober histories some evidence of their having been less strict in this respect than the generality of Arab women at the present time. I find, however, a remarkable proof that such was the case in the latter part of the ninth century of the Flight, and the beginning of the tenth: that is, about the end of the fifteenth century of our era. The famous historian Es-Suyooṭee, who flourished at this period, in his preface to a curious work on wedlock, written to correct the corrupt manners of his age, says:--"Seeing that the women of this time deck themselves with the attire of wantons, and walk in the sooḳs (or market-streets) like female warriors against the religion, and uncover their faces and hands before men to incline (men's) hearts to them by evil suggestions, and play at feasts with young men, thereby meriting the anger of the Compassionate [God], and go forth to the public baths and assemblies with various kinds of ornaments and perfumes and with conceited gait; (for the which they shall be congregated in Hell-fire, for opposing the good and on account of this their affected gait;) while to their husbands they are disobedient, behaving to them in the reverse manner, excepting when they fear to abridge their liberty of going abroad by such conduct; for they are like swine and apes in their interior nature, though like daughters of Adam in their exterior appearance; especially the women of this age; not advising their husbands in matters of religion, but the latter erring in permitting them to go out to every assembly; sisters of devils and demons, etc. etc.... I have undertaken the composition of this volume."[210] A more convincing testimony than this, I think, cannot be required.

The lute (el-´ood) is the only instrument that is generally described as used at the entertainments which we have been considering. Engravings of this and other musical instruments are given in my work on the Modern Egyptians. The Arab viol (called rabáb) was commonly used by inferior performers.

The Arab music is generally of a soft and plaintive character, and particularly that of the most refined description, which is distinguished by a peculiar system of intervals. The singer aims at distinct enunciation of the words, for this is justly admired; and delights in a trilling style. The airs of songs are commonly very short and simple, adapted to a single verse, or even to a single hemistich; but in the instrumental music there is more variety.

Scarcely less popular as an amusement and mode of passing the time is the bath, or hammám,--a favourite resort of both men and women of all classes among the Muslims who can afford the trifling expense which it requires; and (it is said) not only of human beings, but also of evil genii; on which account, as well as on that of decency, several precepts respecting it have been dictated by Moḥammad. It is frequented for the purpose of performing certain ablutions required by the religion, or by a regard for cleanliness, for its salutary effects, and for mere luxury.

The following description of a public bath will convey a sufficient notion of those in private houses, which are on a smaller scale and generally consist of only two or three chambers. The public bath comprises several apartments with mosaic or tesselated pavements, composed of white and black marble and pieces of fine red tile and sometimes other materials. The inner apartments are covered with domes, having a number of small round glazed apertures for the admission of light. The first apartment is the meslakh, or disrobing room, which has in the centre a fountain of cold water, and next the walls wide benches or platforms encased with marble. These are furnished with mattresses and cushions for the higher and middle classes, and with mats for the poorer sort. The inner division of the building, in the more regularly planned baths, occupies nearly a square: the central and chief portion of it is the principal apartment, or ḥarárah, which generally has the form of a cross. In its centre is a fountain of hot water, rising from a base encased with marble, which serves as a seat. One of the angles of the square is occupied by the beyt-owwal, or antechamber of the ḥarárah: in another is the fire over which is the boiler; and each of the other two angles is generally occupied by two small chambers, in one of which is a tank filled with warm water, which pours down from a spot in the dome; in the other, two taps side by side, one of hot and the other of cold water, with a small trough beneath, before which is a seat. The inner apartments are heated by the steam which rises from the fountain and tanks, and by the contiguity of the fire; but the beyt-owwal is not so hot as the ḥarárah, being separated from it by a door. In cold weather the bather undresses in the former, which has two or three raised seats like those of the meslakh.

With a pair of wooden clogs to his feet, and having a large napkin round his loins, and generally a second wound round his head like a turban, a third over his chest, and a fourth covering his back, the bather enters the ḥarárah, the heat of which causes him immediately to perspire profusely. An attendant of the bath removes from him all the napkins excepting the first; and proceeds to crack the joints of his fingers and toes, and several of the vertebrae of the back and neck; kneads his flesh, and rubs the soles of his feet with a coarse earthen rasp, and his limbs and body with a woollen bag which covers his hand as a glove; after which, the bather, if he please, plunges into one of the tanks. He is then thoroughly washed with soap and water and fibres of the palm-tree, and shaved, if he wish it, in one of the small chambers which contain the taps of hot and cold water; and returns to the beyt-owwal. Here he generally reclines upon a mattress, and takes some light refreshment, while one of the attendants rubs the soles of his feet and kneads the flesh of his body and limbs, previously to his resuming his dress. It is a common custom now to take a pipe and a cup of coffee during this period of rest.

The women are especially fond of the bath, and often have entertainments there; taking with them fruits, sweetmeats, etc., and sometimes hiring female singers to accompany them. An hour or more is occupied by the process of plaiting the hair and applying the depilatory, etc.; and generally an equal time is passed in the enjoyment of rest or recreation or refreshment. All necessary decorum is observed on these occasions by most ladies, but women of the lower orders are often seen in the bath without any covering. Some baths are appropriated solely to men; others, only to women; and others, again, to men during the forenoon, and in the afternoon to women. When the bath is appropriated to women, a napkin, or some other piece of drapery is suspended over the door to warn men from entering.

Before the time of Moḥammad, there were no public baths in Arabia; and he was so prejudiced against them, for reasons already alluded to, that he at first forbade both men and women from entering them: afterwards, however, he permitted men to do so, if for the sake of cleanliness, on the condition of their wearing a cloth; and women also on account of sickness, child-birth, etc., provided they had not convenient places for bathing in their houses. But notwithstanding this license, it is held to be a characteristic of a virtuous woman not to go to a bath even with her husband's permission: for the Prophet said, "Whatever woman enters a bath, the devil is with her." As the bath is a resort of the Jinn, prayer should not be performed in it, nor the Ḳur-án recited. The Prophet said, "All the earth is given to me as a place of prayer, and as pure, except the burial-ground and the bath." Hence also, when a person is about to enter a bath, he should offer up an ejaculatory prayer for protection against evil spirits; and should place his left foot first over the threshold. Infidels have often been obliged to distinguish themselves in the bath, by hanging a signet to the neck, or wearing anklets, etc., lest they should receive those marks of respect which should be paid only to believers.[211]

Hunting and hawking, which were common and favourite diversions of the Arabs, and especially of their kings and other great men, have now fallen into comparative disuse among this people. They are, however, still frequently practised by the Persians, and in the same manner as they are generally described in the "Thousand and One Nights."[212] The more common kinds of game are gazelles, or antelopes, hares, partridges, the species of grouse called "ḳaṭà," quails, wild geese, ducks, etc. Against all of these, the hawk is generally employed, but assisted in the capture of gazelles and hares by dogs. The usual arms of the sportsmen in mediæval times were the bow and arrow, the cross-bow, the spear, the sword and the mace. When the game is struck down but not killed by any weapon, its throat is immediately cut. If merely stunned and then left to die, its flesh is unlawful food. Hunting is allowable only for the purpose of procuring food, or to obtain the skin of an animal, or for the sake of destroying ferocious and dangerous beasts; but the rule is often disregarded. Amusement is certainly, in general, the main object of the Muslim huntsman; but he does not with this view endeavour to prolong the chase; on the contrary, he strives to take the game as quickly as possible. For this purpose nets are often employed, and the hunting party, forming what is called the circle of the chase (ḥalḳat eṣ-ṣeyd), surround the spot in which the game is found.

"On the eastern frontiers of Syria," says Burckhardt, "are several places allotted for the hunting of gazelles: these places are called 'masiade' [perhaps more properly, 'maṣyedehs']. An open space in the plain, of about one mile and a half square, is enclosed on three sides by a wall of loose stones, too high for the gazelles to leap over. In different parts of this wall, gaps are purposely left, and near each gap a deep ditch is made on the outside. The enclosed space is situated near some rivulet or spring to which in summer the gazelles resort. When the hunting is to begin, many peasants assemble, and watch till they see a herd of gazelles advancing from a distance towards the enclosure, into which they drive them: the gazelles, frightened by the shouts of these people and the discharge of fire-arms, endeavour to leap over the wall, but can only effect this at the gaps, where they fall into the ditch outside, and are easily taken, sometimes by hundreds. The chief of the herd always leaps first: the others follow him one by one. The gazelles thus taken are immediately killed, and their flesh is sold to the Arabs and neighbouring Felláḥs."[213] Hunting the wild ass is among the most difficult sports of the Arabs and Persians.

FOOTNOTES:

[150] A pious Muslim generally sits at his meals with the right knee raised, after the example of the Prophet, who adopted this custom in order to avoid too comfortable a posture in eating, as tempting to unnecessary gratification.

[151] Hist. Aegypt. Compend. 180-182. (Oxon. 1800.)

[152] El-Maḳreezee's Khiṭaṭ: Account of the Khaleefehs' Palaces.

[153] Mishkát el-Maṣábeeḥ, ii. 329.

[154] Burckhardt, Notes on the Bedouins and Wahábys, 8vo. ed. i. 178, 179.

[155] Price's Retrospect of Mahom. History, ii. 229.

[156] Mishkát el-Maṣábeeḥ, ii. 339.

[157] De Sacy, Chrestomathie Arabe, i. 125-131, Arabic text.

[158] That is, a race-course for sallies of wit and eloquence on the subject of wine: the word "kumeyt" being used, in preference to more than a hundred others that might have been employed, to signify "wine," because it bears also the meaning of "a deep red horse." The book has been already quoted in these pages.

[159] His name is not mentioned in my copy; but D'Herbelot states it to have been Shems-ed-Deen Moḥammad ibn-Bedr-ed-Deen Ḥasan el-Ḳáḍee; and writes his surname "Naouagi," or "Naouahi."

[160] [Mr. Lane followed the usual custom of travellers of his day who wished to be intimate with the Egyptians, and took the name of Manṣoor Effendee. A letter from Bonomi to him, under this name, exists in the British Museum (25,658, f. 67), and has led the compilers of the Index to the Catalogue of Additions to the MSS., published in 1880, into the pardonable error of inventing an "Edward Mansoor Lane." S. L-P.]

[161] Ḳur. ii. 216.

[162] Ḳur. iv. 46.

[163] Lev. x. 9.

[164] Ḳur. v. 92.

[165] Ḥalbet el-Kumeyt, chap. ix.

[166] Ibid, khátimeh.

[167] Ḥalbet el-Kumeyt, 1. 1.

[168] Fakhr-ed-Deen, in De Sacy, Chrest. Arabe.

[169] "While tears of blood trickle from the strainer, the ewer beneath it giggles." (Eṣ-Ṣadr Ibn-El-Wekeel, quoted in the Ḥalbet el-Kumeyt, chap. xiii.)--The strainer is called "ráwooḳ."

[170] The Moḥtesib is inspector of the markets, the weights and measures, and provisions, etc.

[171] Mir-át ez-Zemán, events of the year 295.

[172] The cup, when full, was generally called "kás:" when empty, "ḳadaḥ," or "jám." The name of kás is now given to a small glass used for brandy and liqueurs, and similar to our liqueur-glass: the glass or cup used for wine is called, when so used, "koobeh:" it is the same as that used for sherbet; but in the latter case it is called "ḳulleh."

[173] Es-Suyooṭee, account of the fruits of Egypt, in his history of that country (MS.)

[174] Es-Suyooṭee.

[175] Ibid.

[176] El-Ḳazweenee, MS.

[177] Ibid.

[178] Es-Suyooṭee, ubi supra.

[179] Ibid.

[180] The Arabic names of these fruits are, tuffáḥ (vulgo, tiffáḥ), kummetrè, safarjal, mishmish, khókh, teen, jummeyz (vulgo, jemmeyz), ´eneb, nabḳ or sidr, ´onnáb (vulgo, ´annáb), ijjás or barḳooḳ, józ, lóz, bunduḳ, fustuḳ, burtuḳán, nárinj, leymoon, utrujj or turunj, kebbád, toot, zeytoon, and ḳaṣab es-sukkar.

[181] Ḥalbet el-Kumeyt, chap. xvii.; and Es-Suyooṭee, account of the flowers of Egypt, in his history of that country.

[182] Ḥalbet el-Kumeyt, chap. xvii.

[183] Ibid.

[184] Es-Suyooṭee, ubi supra.

[185] The night of the Prophet's Ascension [in dream, into Heaven].

[186] Gabriel, who accompanied the Prophet.

[187] The beast on which Moḥammad dreamed he rode from Mekkeh to Jerusalem previously to his ascension. These traditions are from Es-Suyooṭee, ubi supra.

[188] This flower is called "fághiyeh," and more commonly "temer el-ḥennà;" or, according to some, the fághiyeh is the flower produced by a slip of temer el-hennà, planted upside down, and superior to the flower of the latter planted in the natural way!

[189] Es-Suyooṭee, ubi supra.

[190] Ibid.

[191] Es-Suyooṭee.

[192] Shaḳáïḳ. The "adhriyoon," or "ádharyoon," is said to be a variety of the anemone.

[193] From the former, or from "noạmán," signifying "blood," the anemone was named "shaḳáïḳ en-noạmán."

[194] Ḥalbet el-Kumeyt, chap. xvii.

[195] Ḥalbet el-Kumeyt; Es-Suyooṭee, ubi supra; and El-Ḳazweenee.

[196] The Arabic names of these flowers are, yásameen, nisreen, zahr (or zahr nárinj), soosan, reeḥán (or ḥobaḳ), nemám, bahár, uḳḥowán, neelófar, beshneen, jullanár or julnár, khashkhásh, khiṭmee, zaạfarán, ´oṣfur, kettán, báḳillà, and lebláb, and lóz.

[197] Bán, and khiláf or khaláf. Both these names are applied to the same tree (which, according to Forskál, differs slightly from the salix Ægyptiaca of Linnæus) by the author of the Ḥalbet el-Kumeyt and by the modern Egyptians.

[198] Ḥalbet el-Kumeyt, chap. xiv.

[199] Ḥalbet el-Kumeyt, chap. xi.

[200] Mishkát el-Maṣábeeḥ, ii. 425.

[201] Ḥalbet el-Kumeyt, chap. xiv.

[202] Soft boots, worn inside the slippers or shoes.

[203] Halbet el-Kumeyt, chap. xiv.

[204] I am not sure of the orthography of this name, particularly with respect to the first and last vowels; having never found it written with the vowel points. It is sometimes written with ḥ for kh, and f for ḳ.

[205] Ḥalbet el-Kumeyt, 1.1.

[206] He was born in A.H. 125, and died in 213, or 188.

[207] He was born A.H. 150, and died in 235.

[208] Mir-át ez-Zemán, events of the year 231. He died in this year.

[209] Ḥalbet el-Kumeyt, chap. vii.

[210] Nuzhet el-Mutaämmil.

[211] Nuzhet el-Mutaämmil, section vii.

[212] See Sir John Malcolm's "Sketches in Persia," i. ch. v.

[213] Notes on the Bedouins and Wahábys, i. 220, ff.