SAYF B. ḎĪ YAZAN AND THE BOOK OF THE HISTORY OF THE NILEAuthor(s): HARRY T. NORRISReviewed work(s):Source: Quaderni di Studi Arabi, Vol. 7 (1989), pp. 125-151Published by: Istituto per l'Oriente C. A. NallinoStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25802657 .Accessed: 10/12/2011 16:59

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HARRY T. NORRIS

SAYF B. DIYAZAN AND THE BOOK OF THE HISTORY OF THE NILE 1

Sira Sa'biyya is claimed to be the 'folk epic' of the Arabic-speaking peoples. In a sense they are, collectively, the 'Folk epics' of the entire Muslim umma, since many of their themes, their characters, their weaponry and their heroic exploits share both substance, colour and imagery with the

sagas of widely differing Asian and African and some European peoples. Danuta Madeyska, in a paper (as yet unpublished), which was

discussed at the Cairo conference on Arabic Sira held in January, 1985, eritided The language and structure of the sirat', stressed the predominandy bedouin character of the earlier Siyar. Antar, Hildliyya and al-7xr Sdlim. These, in her view, differed, thematically, from the so-called Mamlak Siyar

composed between the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries, Sayf b. Dt Yazan

amongst them. The early group were more realistic. Mythical and magical elements in them were subdued. In the Mamluk age, an atmosphere of a

fairyland pervaded everything. The hero was, at times, a prince, or a ruler

who had lost his throne. Intelligence and astuteness were highly esteemed.

Religious intolerance or total commitment emerge and dominate the hero's

quests. To cite Danuta Madeyska, 'Those of other faiths are painted in the blackest colours, and concomitantly all means leading to the spread of Islam are permissable, even if these involve breaking its own laws'. To comment in this wise is to generalise. It is certainly the case in this Sira, Sirat faris al

Yaman al-malik Sayf b. Dt Yazan al-batal al-karrdr wa 'l-jaris al-migwar sahib al-bat$

wa'l-iqtidar al-ma'ruf bxl-gazawat al-maShura. Fascinating are the paradoxes and

the incidental details that are contained within it; monarchy versus

monarchy, Sayf balances Sayf, Sam versus Ham. Islam is confronted by star

1 An earlier version of this article formed the basis of a seminar held in the Department of

the Near and Middle East, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, 1988. It was presented in a paper, and briefly discussed, at the International Conference on l'Oralite Africaine, held in Algiers between the 12th and the 15th March, 1989. That

paper and talk stressed the African orality of parts of the Sirat Sayf as we now have in

textual form. In this article much greater weight is placed on literary elements and a

special emphasis upon borrowings from Arabic geographical and non-geographical texts

and comparisons with late medieval literature in Europe.

QSA, 7 (1989)

and fire worship and not specifically by Christianity. Muslim and pagan

magic and talismanic power are relentlessly pitted, the one against the

other. The stakes are high; the control of the waters of the Nile. The obstacles

that confront the hero king are of superhuman dimensions, his allies and

foes giants or sorcerers, or Amazon beauties of formidable military

accomplishment. A number dwell in a city of Amazons. Such are the deeds

demanded of Wah? al-Falah. Only in the status, and ultimately, after his

conversion, in the very name, of the great Yemenite freedom fighter, Sayf b.

Di Yazan, the liberator of Qahtan and the invader of Kd?, will a divine destiny

guarantee him a prize of great price, the Book of history of the Nile. It is

protected by rulers and sorcerers of Africa at its source which lies near the

Mountain of the Moon.

The first romance of Sayfb. Dt Yazan.

Heroic tales of the exploits of Sayf, also named Aba Murra and

Ma'dikarib, were current as early as the beginning of the eighth century

amongst Yemenite story tellers and men of letters, foremost amongst them

Wahb b. Munabbih (d. 732), though it should also be said that the

presumably earlier Ahbar of the Yemenite, 'Ubayd b. Sarya al-Gurhumi, who was a contemporary of Mu'awiya do not mention him. There appear to be two streams of heroic narrative, one Arab and especially Yemenite, the other

Persian though partly Arab. Both narratives are combined in the extended

story of Sayf in the Sira al-Nabawyya by Ibn Ishaq (d. 768) and by Ibn HiSam

(d. 833). One can probably safely assume that the missing and early work

attributed to HiSam b. Muhammad b. al-Sa'ib al-Kalbi -mentioned by Ibn al

Nadim in his Fihrist- entitled Kitab al-Yaman wa amr Sayf reflected, as do the

reports of Tabari (d. 923), some blending or a fusion of the Arabo-Persian

cycles of oral tales which were by then centuries old. The post-Islamic Yemenite Arabic cycles, based on the fragments

which conclude the text of Kitab al-Tigan 2, are principally concerned with

the mission of 'Abd al-Muttalib to this Yemenite king, who was subservient to Chosroes and who all but ruled in his name. Sayf had read about a prophet

who was to come, in ancient scriptures and in hidden texts to which he had access. The Prophet Muhammad's grandfather explains to him, with joy, how all had now been fulfilled. Sayf, old in years and aware of his

imminent mortality, indeed before that year was out, expresses his great concern for the safety of the Prophet and the threat to him from the Jews, in

particular. He predicts that Yatrib will be the capital of the Prophet and he

2 See the Arabic text of Kitab al Tigan Ji muWkHimyar, San'a' edition, published by Markaz al dirasat wa'l-abhat al-Yamaniyya, no date, pp. 317-321.

126

bids farewell to those in the mission of the Hashimites. He is generous with his gifts when the hour comes for their departure. Little else has a detailed treatment in Wahb's narrative, apart from the description of the assassination of Sayf himself at the hands of his Ethiopian guard who are armed with

spears. It is noteworthy that, in the Muqaddima, Ibn HaldQn is interested

almost exclusively with this alleged mission of 'Abd al-Muttalib. The other cycle of stories, of which we have knowledge, would appear

to draw to some degree upon pre-Islamic and post-Islamic Persian heroic sources.

According to Professor Raymond Nicholson,

the disastrous failure of this expedition (against Mecca) which took place in the

year of the Elephant (570 A.D.), did not at once free Yemen from the Abyssinian

yoke. The sons of Abraha, Yaksum and Masruq, bore heavily on the Arabs.

Seeing no help among his own people, a noble Himyarite named Sayf b. Dhi

Yazan resolved to seek foreign intervention. His choice lay between the Byzantine and Persian empires, and he first betook himself to Constantinople. Disappointed there, he induced the Arab king of Hira, who was under Persian suzerainty, to

present him at the court of Mada'in (Ctesiphon). How he won audience of the

Sasanian monarch, Nushirwan, surnamed the Just, and tempted him by an

ingenious trick to raise a force of eight hundred condemned felons, who were set

free and shipped to Yemen under the command of an agreed general; how they

literally 'burned their boats' and, drawing courage from despair, routed the

Abyssinian host and made Yemen a satrapy of Persian -this forms an almost most

epic narrative, which I have omitted here... because it belongs to Persian rather

than to Arabian literary history, being probably based, as Noldeke has suggested, on traditions handed down by the Persian conquerors who settled in Yemen to

their aristocratic descendants whom the Arabs called al-Abnd (the Sons) or Banu'l

Ahrdr (Sons of the Noble) 3.

However important this source, the fact remains that Arab folk epic material, showing, if anything Greek inspiration rather than Persian, is also

present in the narratives. One recalls Wahriz, the unequalled master of the

bow, like an Arab Ulysses, half-blind, and clearly a prototype for other blind

archers in later Arabic Sira (for example Wizr b. Gabir in Sirat 'Antar). He

shoots MasrQq, the Ethiopian elephant rider, at the third attempt, when

MasrQq is now seated upon a mule. He slays him by aiming at a ruby on his

forehead. Such a story may be matched in the later tales of Abu Zayd al

Hilali and his comrades. They all exemplify the triple elevation or

debasement theme that underpins many an Arabian bedouin tale both oral

and in the Kitab al-Tigan. The Persian story of the wandering freedom-fighter

king and his mercenaries continued to be told for centuries. Long before the

time of NaSwan b. Sa'id al-Himyari (d. 1177), Sayf s fleet was already sailing

3 R. Nicholson, A Literary History of the Arabs, Cambridge University Press, 1969, p. 29.

127

to the coasts of Africa in the verses of the Yemenite poets whom he quotes in

his book, Sams al-'Ulum. From a romance elaborated from tales of the wars

which followed the pre-Islamic Ethiopian occupation of Arabia, and the

early wars between Sam and Ham, there was now a possibility to export certain thematic elements within it and to apply these to rulers, peoples and

kingdoms situated deep within the heart of the African continent itself.

Relations between Egypt and Ethiopia in the late Middle Ages.

Egypt, (Fustat in particular) almost as soon as the Arab conquest took

place, more especially via story-tellers of Coptic Egypt of Nubia, became a

channel whereby South Arabian oral folk epic and story were to be diffused

throughout extensive areas of the African continent. Egypt was the land

where the Sirat Sayf was later composed 4. Here is Mamluk Egypt, with its

obsession with the talismanic, the astrological, the magical, the starry horizons of heaven, the restless adventurer. Sharing something of its

substance with the One Thousand and One Nights, to the tale of Hasan of Basra to

which it is drawn in specific episodes and in certain details, there are

numerous references to Egyptian towns, names of provinces, or names of

dramatis persona. Rudi Paret, in his classic study, Sirat Saif ibn Dhi Jazan, Ein

Arabischer Volksroman, Hannover, 1924, has indexed and commentated upon such names. They include, Cairo, Aswan, AsyQt, Ahnas, Hulwan,

Damanhur, Manfalut, Ahmim, Giza, Balaq, Aba Sir, Samannad, Dimyat; and even one Pharaonic name, Ramsis (Rameses). The evidence from such

toponymic content is convincing. Many other names, fanciful though they

4 Elements of Sirat Sayf have been found incorporated

in folk-tales recorded in Xauen, Morocco, and Tilimsan, in Algeria. E.W. Lane became aware of textual versions in Cairo and reports the same in his Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians, 1836. He alludes to the Sira in the notes to his translation of the One Thousand and One Nights, more especially

where he discusses the tale of Hasan of Basra. Francisco Marcos Marin in his Poesta Narrativa Arabe y Epica Hispdnica, Elementos Arabes en los Origenes de la Epica Hispanica, Madrid, summarizes the content as:

&rat SayfibnDi Yazan Se trata de un principe del Yemen, hijo de madre esclava, que lo abandona al nacer. Es criado por una gacela. Al Ilegar a la juventud recluta un ejercito a cuyo frente pronto llega a ser un heroe. El fondo historico es la expulsion de los abisinios de la Arabia Meridional. Este hecho, con la ayuda del rey persa Kosroes, tuvo lugar hacia la fecha del nacimiento de

Muhammad. La sira es de los ss. XIV-XV (h. 1372?). Un anacronismo evidente consiste en hacer a Sayf musulman, frente a los paganos abisinios. El nombre del aun no nacido, Muhammad es reemplazado en la formula: No

hay mas que un Dios y Muhammad es su profeta por el nombre de Abraham.

Es una sira evidentemente egipcia. Tienen gran importancia la magia y los encantamientos y hay muchos elementos flokloricos egipcios. Es una obra popular, con yuxtaposicion de tendencia que son de un Islam de buena ley y de elementos numerosos de autentico paganismo que no pueden entrar en simbiosis con los principios musulmanes. Por ello es una fiel imagen del alma popular musulmana del

bajo valle del Nilo a fines del Medievo.

128

are in some cases, a few from Persia and lands beyond, reflect the

cosmopolitan nature of the Mamlak age. One name, al-Qasr al-Ablaq (located in Damascus), supplies evidence for the chronology of the composition. This

castle was built by Baybars between 1313-1314 A.D., thus effectively dating the core of the narrative Sira, as it now is, as having been composed no

earlier than the fourteenth century. However, the best key to the approximate dating of the works as a

whole, and the reason for its creation, is to be found in its principal enemy, its anti-hero, though not the most wicked of its villains. Rudi Paret drew

attention to this during its writings in the twenties, and so too have Drs Fu'ad

Hasanayn, 'Abd al-Magid 'Abidin, Farflq HQrSd, Sawqi 'Abd al-Hakim, and

others, in more recent times 5. This is the person of Sayfa Ar'ad, who ruled

Ethiopia between 1344-1372 A.D. He is the contemporary king at the heart of

the story. He is its pivot, Ham personified, the pagan potentate. Nonetheless,

despite the textually-based arguments of FarQq Harsid, it is to be doubted

whether a convincing conflict betwixt Sam and Ham is entirely to be found

in the Sira.

It is not difficult to argue a case, on these lines, from numerous

passages, some of the verses which contrast the sons of Ham with those of

Sam, and obviously the story-tellers have found ample source material in

early verse about the expedition against Mecca by Abraha and the excesses

that were commited in Arabia by his successors. The curse of the Lord on

Noah's son, Ham, for neglect of his father's honour and dignity, is also

found historical literature. Sawqi 'Abd al-Hakim quotes two examples from

the Sira in the following passage from his Mawsu'at al-Folklor wa'l-Asatlr al

'Arabiyya, (Dar al-'Awda, Beirut, 1982, pages 411 and 412):

_o,A__>?

1_uSj'ja I 'js> dJL)I JUL>3 JLo Cl*

jo-?l J_S L*lj

5 See in particular, FarQq HOrshid's introdution to his abbreviated version of the Sirat Sayf,

published by Dar al-SurOq, 1402/1982, pp. 9-23, Turayya Mancp, Sayf b. Di Yazan, bayn al

haqiqa wa'l-ustura, published by Dar al4iurriyya, Baghdad, 1980, in particular pp. 221-240

and Sawqi 'Abd al-Hakim, Mawsu'at al-Folklar wa'l-asatir al-arabiyya, Beirut, 1982, pp. 412^13.

129

Sayf b. Di Yazan, the 'Sword of Islam', was selected for artistic purpose and weight or for some symbolic reason, as well as to bolster any ethnic

partisanship or Islamic sentiment. The lineage of Sayf b. Di Yazan, as given in the Sira, reveals him to be a distant kinsman of Sayf Ar'ad in much the

same manner as Diyab and al-Zanati Halifa are shown to be distandy related

in the Sirat Bant Hilal. Through the Tubba', Hassan, and through Himyar,

Sayf, the Yemenite, is, by a spurious lineage, as his opponent, proclaimed a

descendant of Ka?, the son of Ham, the brother of Sam, son of Noah.

Sayfa Ar'ad was one of the kings of Ethiopia at a time when relations

between Egypt and Christian Ethiopia, which was regarded as a distant ally of the Crusaders, were at their bitterest. Muslim kingdoms around Ethiopia, and Coptic clergy, were pawns in a power game which included the control

and denial of the waters of the Nile as the ultimate weapon of deterrant.

When the MamlQk Sultan, al-Nasir Muhammad b. Qala'Qn began a

persecution of the Copts and destroyed churches, 'Amda Syon I (1313-44 A.D.) father of Sayfa Ar'ad, the virtual founder of the Abyssinian State, sent

envoys to Cairo in 1321 to persuade the Sultan to change his policy. If he

refused, then he threatened to take similar measures against the course of

the Nile. In the event, he carried out his threat against the vassal Muslim states which rapidly declined under his onslaughts. Between 1332 and 1338

the Muslim of Ifat sent an embassy under 'Abdallah al-Zaila'i to Cairo to

request the Sultan of Egypt, al-Nasir Muhammad, to intervene with the

Abyssinian. The Sultan asked the Coptic Patriarch to write a letter to the

Negus. 'Amda Syon continued to expand at the expense of the Muslim mini

kingdoms. His successor Sayfa Ar'ad (1344-72) continued this process and he

assumed the role of the protector of the patriarchate of Alexandria. When the

Amir, SayhUn, the tutor of Sultan, al-Malik al-Salih, persecuted the Christians

and imprisoned the Patriarch Marcos in 1352, Sayfa Ar'ad retaliated by

seizing Egyptian merchants in his dominions, killing a number and

forcing others to convert to Christianity. Al-Nasir Hasan (1361), a puppet Bahri

Sultan at the time, asked the Patriarch to intervene once more. An embassy of bishops was sent to the Negus who was so delighted by them that he

pressed them to stay. According to Qalqa&tndi, the Patriarch intervened also

130

in the early years of the reign of Barqdq (1382-98) and it is possible that both accounts refer to the same episode. Relations improved during the reign of Dawit I. In 1387 he sent an embassy to the court of BarqQq, laden with gifts, though under the Negus, Yeshaq the situation rapidly declined. This Negus, (according to Aba'l-Mahasin), in 1323, annoyed at the closure of the Church

of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, massacred Muslims, destroyed their

mosques and raided the Jabarta. The Mamlak Sultan, Barsabay,

contemplated taking reprisals on the Patriarch and the Copts though, in the

event, he declined to do so 6. It is not hard to see all these events as having

shaped the plot of part of the Sira. What is puzzling is why this duo, Sayf Ar'ad and Sayf b. D* Yazan, should have been especially selected.

The fact remains that Sayf Ar'ad's father, 'Amda Syon was a far

greater threat to Mamluk Egypt and to Islam in general. Significantly, he it was who became identified with Trester John' in Europe. Where Ethiopia's king appears in Romance literature, the threat that he made to divert the

Nile's course is mentioned as well as disastrous expeditions to the interior of

Africa and elsewhere, elements of which suggest some influence from the

story of Abraha's repulse from Mecca by divinely sent heavenly squadrons. In all these instances it is 'Amda Syon who is the ruler of Ethiopia and of

gold rich black Africa in general. He appears for example in Orlando Furioso

by Ariosto. Francis M. Rogers in his The Quest for Eastern Christians,

University of Minnesota Press, 1962, pages 106-7 remarks:

The first edition of Ariosto's poem was printed in Ferrara in 1516. Its story of

Astolfo's journey on his hippogriff across North Africa from West to east and

thence to Ethiopia appeared at the appropriate moment to sustain interest in this

imaginary land. An excerpt from the William Stewart translation of the expanded version first published in 1532 follows:

In Ethiopia's realm Senapus reigns, Whose sceptre is the cross; of cities brave, Of men, of gold possest, and broad domains, Which the Red Sea's extremest waters lave.

A faith well nigh like ours that king maintains, Which man from his primaeval doom may save.

Here, save I err in What their rites require, The swarthy people are baptized with fire.

It hardly seems necessary to add that Ariosto himself employed no adjective, and

most certainly not the Italian, equivalent of "swarthy". He proceeds to a description of the castle and then to this explanation:

6 The conflict between Egypt and Ethiopia during this period are conveniently summarised byj. Spencer Trimingham, Islam in Ethiofna, Oxford University Press, 1952,

pp. 48-76. He furnishes full sources for the history of this conflict.

131

The soldan, king of the Egyptian land, Plays tribute to this sovereign, as his head,

They say, since having Nile at his command

He may divert the stream for other bed.

Hence, with its district upon either hand, Forthwith might Cairo lack its daily bread.

Senapus him his Nubian tribes proclaim; We Priest and Prester John the sovereign name.

The episode of Astolfo's visit to Ethiopia has won wide acclaim as the most

beautiful in European literature which the legend of an Ethiopian monarch

named Prester John inspired.. Its astonishing accuracy in detail can only be

explained by the supposition of meticulous study on the part of its author. For

Astolfo's route and for the name "Senapo", Ariosto followed a fourteenth-century Genoese tradition. Senapo, as such competent scholars as Cerulli and Crawford

affirm, is a deformation of the regnal name of an emperor whose reign extended

from 1314 to 1344: 'Amda Seyon I. His regnal name of Gabra Masqal (in Arabic

'Abd aksalib) meant "slave of the cross". The Arabic version appeared as "Senap" on the Angelino Dulcert world map of 1339.

Years after publications of Ariosto's poems, Tasso in the Gerusalemme

Liberata (Jerusalem Delivered) reintroduced Senapo, and Alexander

Cunningham Robertson thus presented him to English readers:

Senapo once filled Ethiopia's throne, And still, perhaps, endures his prosperous reign: This potentate the laws of Mary's Son

Observes, and these observe the swarthy men

He rules

One would like to find other reasons why this title of Sayf, whose name incidentally appears in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales (composed in about

1386), should have a central importance in the Sira and have such a special importance in Cairo in the latter half of the fourteenth century.

Chaucer, who mentions a certain Algarsayf, as a hero, in his Squire's Tale, may not be enterely irrelevant. Dorothee Metlitzki has shown in her

book, The matter of Araby in Medieval England (Yale University Press, 1977,

page 79), that his name relates to the stars, to Sayf to Sayf al-Oabbdr 'the Sword of the Powerful one', three central stars in Orion which were considered as

forming a sword hanging at the giant's waist. All stars in the constellation are listed as sons or children of al-gabbar, also called al-gawza' in the Muslim

Almagest of Ptolemy. Melitzki writes, 'Algarsayf is one of two brothers and of

three royal children, two brothers and a sister, whose lives, it would seem, are to be completed by the addition of two maidens and a knight. The

structural design of twos and threes in which Algarsyf is a lodestar seems to

132

reflect an astronomical pattern of numbers which Chaucer deliberately wove into the "knotte" of his tale\

The Sirat Sayf reflects a similar balance, a kindred game based upon the stars, which had been a feature of certain Yemenite stories since the days of the heroic marches in the galaxies by the Tubba's in the Kitab al-Tigan. The balance between relations, stars and heroic quests places the &rat Sayf within the whole family of siyar. At the same time, it brings some aspects of its folk

epic construction into close comparison with such border-line siyar as 'Umar b. al-Nu'man (included within the One Thousand and One Nights) and The

Squire's Tale. Haldeen Braddy remarks in regard to the Oriental sources that

appear to have influenced its content7:

As for the incident of Algarsif s winning Theodora by help of "the steede of brass"

(1.666), similar incidents have already been noted in the Arabian Nights and the

Cleomades. The identity of the "strange knyght" (1.89) is a more difficult

question. Perhaps he is not really the ambassador of the "Kying of Arabe and of

Inde" (1.110), but the King'own son, as this disguise is a common literary motif.

Indeed Prince Tag al-MulQk, who in the Arabian collection would thus correspond to Chaucer's "strange knyght", does not disclose to Princess Dunya his real

identity until after she has become convinced that men are loyal and true. But by far the most puzzling circumstance in the fragmentary Squire's Tale is that

Chaucer first introduces Cambalo in 1.31 as Canaceee's brother (he is called

Cambalus in 1.656) only later to state that Cambalo "...faught in lystes with the

bretheren two / For Canacee er that he myghte hire wynne" (11.668-69). Possibly a suitor named Cambalo fought the brothers Cambalo and Algarsif. Possibly, since

the "two brohers" motif occurs in the legend of Prester John, Chaucer means

merely that Cambalo rescued his sister from two knights who were brothers. But, in as much as five lines beforehand Chaucer uses win in the sense of espousal

when stating Algarsif "wan Theodora to his wif (1.664), it seems most likely that

Chaucer means that Cambalo wedded his sister Canacee.

Without pressing the point unduly, I may note the significant occurrence of the

incest motif in the cycle of romances to which the tale of Tag al-MulQk and

Princess Dunya belongs. This tale belongs to a whole series of stories concerning a

family group reminiscent of the personnel in the Squire's Tale; these personages are King Omar bin al-Nu'uman, his two sons Sharrkan and Zau al-Makan, and his

daughter Nuzhat al-Zaman. The adventures of this family comprise one hundred

and one nights, in the famous Medina Edition some four hundred pages, and

compose the longest tale in the whole Arabian collection. These adventures are

excluded from Lane's translation of the Arabian Nights because they depend

"upon incidents of a most objectionable nature", but they are duly included by the

celebrated translator Sir Richard F. Burton. The parallels between the Squire's Tale

and this Arabian analogue is unmistakable: (1) King Omar bin al-Nu'uman's

family has the same membership as Cambyuskan's; (2) Omar, like Cambyuskan, was celebrated for his victories; (3) the two remarkable sons, presumably like

7 See Haldeen Braddy, "The Genre of Chaucer's Squire's Tale", in Journal of English and German Philology, Vol. 41,1942, pp. 279-90 and especially pp. 287-8.

133

Algarsif and Cambalo, performed many brave deeds in their travels; and (4) it is a

story of incest, for Princess Nuzhat al-Zaman weds her brother Sharrkan.

Kanim and the Myth of the Yazaniyyin. Courtly and literary circules in Cairo had reasons to be thinking of

Sayf b. Di Yazan at the time too on account of events to the west of Egypt, in

the remote regions of Chad, in Kanim and Borno, for both are obliquely alluded to in the Sira through the name of TakrQr, the negro wife of Sayf, and by BarnOh, the name of wizard, who plays an important role later in the

plot of the Sira. That westerly region in Africa had become associated with the name of Sayf b. Di Yazan. The scholars of Kanim had earned a place of

respect in lettered circles in Egypt. Ibn Fadl Allah al-'Umari (d. 1349) had

spent many years in Cairo and Damascus. In his Kitab Masdlik al-absar ft mamalik al-amsar, al-'Umari wrote that the first man to establish Islam in

Kanim-Borno was Had! al-'Utmani, who claimed descent from 'Utman b. 'Affan. After his death the realm passed to the Yazani's, the descendants of

Du Yazan. Al-'Umari remarked, that Justice is upheld in their country. They follow the school of Imam Malik. They dress simply and are rigid in

religion. They have built at Fustat, in Cairo, a Malikite madrasa where their

companies of travellers lodge' 8.

During the service of Sihab al-Din Ahmad b. 'AH al-Qalqa?andi (d. 1418), in the chancellary of the Mamlak court, less happy news came from the Sahelian quarter. In his Subh al-a'Sa, the 'dawn of the night blinded one',

composed in 1412, he remarks abour Borno:

There arrived a letter from the king of BarnQ towards the end of al-Zahir BarqQq's reign in which the king mentioned that he was descended from Sayf b. Dm*

Yazan. But he did not establish the genealogy, for he said [also] that he was of

Quraysh, which is an error on their part, for Sayf b. Dhi Yazan descended from

the tubba's of the Yemen, who were Himyarites. This will be mentioned below when we speak of correspondence, in the fourth maqala [of this book], if God

wills. This lord of al-BarnQ had correspondence with the sultan's court in Egypt which will be mentioned there also, if God wills.

The ruler of al-Barnu has also received correspondence from the Sultan's which

will be mentioned there, if God wills.

He continues:

This is the text of a letter which came to al-Malik al-Zahir Aba Sa'id BarqQq. It

arrived during 794/1391-2 in charge of the ruler of BarnQ's cousin with a present. It was prompted by what is mentioned in it concerning the Arabs of Judham who

8 Corpus of early Arabic sources for West African history, translated by J.F.P. Hopkins, edited and annotated by N. Levtzion and J.F.P. Hopkins, Cambridge University Press, 1981, al 'Umari, p. 261.

134

are his neighbours. It is written on square paper with lines side by side, in a

Maghribi hand, without margin at head or side. The conclusion of the letter is

written on the verso, at the foot of the page:

"In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate... "From him who trusts in God (who is exalted), the most mighty King,

the sword of Islam ...Abu 'Amr 'Uthman the King, son of al-Hajj Idris the lamented

Amir al-Mu'minin (may God ennoble his tomb and perpetutate his descendants in

his kingship). These words come by the tongue of our Secretary, who is of our

family - without boasting:

'To the mighty King of Egypt, God's blessed land, Mother of the World:

"Upon you be peace more fragrant that pungent musk, sweeter than the water of

cloud and ocean...

"To proceed: We sent to you our ambassador, my cousin, whose name is Idris b.

Muhammad, because of the misfortune which we and our vassal kings have

experienced. For the Arabs who are called Judham and others have snatched away some of our free people, women and children, infirm men, relations of ours, and

other Muslims. Some of these Arabs are polytheists and deviate from true religion.

They have raided the Muslims and done great slaughter among them because of

a dispute which has occurred between us and our enemies. As a result of this

dispute they have killed our king 'Amr the Martyr b. Idris, the son of our father al

Hajj Idris son of al-Hajj Ibrahim. We are the sons of Sayf b. Dhi Yazan, the father of

our tribe, the Arab, the Qurayshite; thus do we register our pedigree as handed

down by our shaykhs. These Arabs have devasted all our country, the whole of al

Barnu, up to this day. They have seized our free men and our relatives; who are

Muslims, and sold them to the slave dealers (jullab) of Egypt and Syria and others; some they have kept for their own service.

"Now God has placed the control of Egypt from the sea to Uswan in your hands.

These our people have been seized as merchandise, so pray send to all your

territory, your emirs, ministers, judges, magistrates, jurists, market overseers, that

they may look and search and discover. If they find them, let them snatch them

from their hands and put them to the test. If they say: 'We are free, we are

Muslims' believe them. Do not take them for liars. When the truth is clear to you release them. Restore them to their freedom and Islam. For certain Arabs cause

mischief in our land and do not act righteously. They are those who are ignorant of the Book of God and the Sunna of his Messenger. They embellish that which is worthless. So beware of God, fear Him, and do not abandon them to be enslaved

and sold" 9.

9 ibid., pp. 3443.

135

This persistent Kanimi tradition, and its association with the folk stories

about the light-skinned, possibly Saharan, progeny of Sayf b. D* Yazan, that is

red Yemenites, was to be repeated for centuries 10.

They are referred to again in the accounts of the famous navigator, Sihab al-Din Ahmad b. Magid, who included in his Kitab al-fawa'id fi vsul Him

al-bahr wa'l-qaxva'id (completed in 1489/90), which is close to the date when

the text of the Sirat Sayf b. Di Yazan could have assumed its near to definitive

form, brief remarks about the Yazanis of Kanim. It should also be noted that

he refers to the island of Qumr, possibly Madagascar, or to another island off

the coast of East Africa, and it will also be recalled that the geographer, Ibn

Sa'id, names several towns in its insular land mass; HafUra, Qamariyya, Dimli, to name only three. Names derived from these are known in the Sira

and figure prominently there. Gabal al-Qumr, Qaymar and its king,

QamarUn, the Camphor islands (Gaza'ir al-Kafar) and, more importantly,

Qamariyya, the slave of Sayf Ar'ad, wife of D*i Yazan and the mother and, at one point, an incestuous lover of Sayf himself:

'When you reach the place [Sufala] the island of al-Qumr falls away on your left

but the land comes to an end on your right and turns towards the west and north.

There there are deserts and inlets, the first of the darkness when the sun is in

Cancer. The land turns back from there to the land of the Kanim, which is in the

possession of the descendants of Sayf b. Dhi Yazan. They are a white people to the

south of the Sudan [who are white] on account of the distance of the sun from them

in the north, like the whiteness of the Turks and the distance of the sun from

them in the south. As for the blackness of the SQdan, it is because of their being burnt by the sun, for they are close to the Equator near to the sun all the time.

When you get beyond the Kanim you come to the land of the Wahat, which is near to the land of the Westerners. In the old days the pepper road [tariq al-fulful] was from this place*

^

1? On the claim to descent from Sayf in the earlier history of Kanim-Borno, see Dierk

Lange, "Progres de l'lslam et changement politique au Kanem du XIe au XIIIe siecle: un essai d' in terpre tationJournal of African History, XIX, 4 (1978), pp. 495-513. The claim to descent was to be repeated in the latter part of the sixteenth century by the historian, Ahmad b. FortCL See the following passage from Dierk Lange, A Sudanic Chronicle: The Borno Expedition of

Idris Alauma (1564-1516), according to the account of Ahmad b. Fortu, Franz Steiner Verlag Wiesbaden, Stuttgart, 1987 (Chapter One) (Introduction): 'When therefore we became acquaninted with that composition, chronicling the

expedition of Njimi in which he recorded its battles and events, we resolved that would do likewise for the age of our Sultan, who is the king and legist (faqih), the just, the pious, the ascetic, the god-fearing, the faithful and brave al-hajjIdris b. 'Ali b. Idris b. 'All b. Ahmad b. 'Uthman b. Idris, the

pilgrim to the sacred house of God who is descended from Ume b.

'Abd al-Jalil, and who is of the line of Sayf b. Dhi Yazan and of the pure stock of Quraysh and of the marrow of Himyar (may God bless his posterity with a great blessing for the sake of the Master of mankind Muhammad the Chosen, and his Posterity, may God bless him and them and grant them salvation. "He is sufficent for us and an excellent Trustee is He"

'

11 See Levtzion and Hopkins, op. ext., p. 367.

136

ij^j'ri-i f'^' f-*^* OJ*^?^Q~t Vu/ dSJLc^jJl pjLSJI ̂ ^1 dlLjo^-o

77i? exploits of the first Tubba' and his warn Yatrib.

Three of the Islamised peoples near lake Chad were, and are, of the

belief that their Yemenite forbear was extremely ancient, older in fact, than

Sayf. He was the first Tubba* (tubba' al-awwal). Henri Carbou, in his La Region du Tchad et du Ouadai, Part I, 1912, Les Populations du Kanem, (page 7), remarks that the Kanembou, the Boulala and the Tubu (who are themselves, in part, Saharan), maintained an Arab origin for the Kanimi dynasty of

Muhammad Sayf Allah. The latter is mentioned in Ibn Sard's (1286/7) Kitab

cd^ugrufiyd:

'In Cimi,' there resides the sultan of Kanim, well known for his religious warfare

and charitable acts, Muhammadi of the posterity of Sayf b. Dhi Yazan. The capital of

his pagan ancestors before they adopted Islam was the town of Manan. His great

great-great grandfather (gadduhu al-mbi4) was converted to Islam by a scholar and

then Islam spread through the rest of the land of Kanim ^

^jj*ujlAj>j Cl/Mi Jj)K 11 v^*-?j> ^-o--i-> aJL^JI <JJlc13 I g ' t g

, a ^

ij <,> 11 J La3 I^ J Lg->J U jj)g ?t?a H pjtSJl q Ua-lu/ Ig ^SLs

j ?+ul) ^jojJlJ I ̂

I^o,ht?./I J^-s'<*jiSJ\ J^Jl> *<jjicCL*j>[?j ^j'j-j ^3 _j v^L.rt/

jJ^^^o^.Va,>?

<JJui Jl5^ ̂ l^i aSJ-o-o^ jl^ *A- 5 1.0.0 ^ <J^=C AjJrx Li, J^u> dULlA ^UaJLJI Ijl^J^

!2 tfcd,p.l88.

137

According to the oral tradition of the Boulala, Sayf Allah, who had

come to them via Borkou, was lineally preceded by Amr, by IsmdM, by Hdrit,

by Malik or Malik, the son of Tubba4 the first. Rene Basset, poured scorn on

this entire story. Tubba4 was not a proper name, he maintained, it was a title

adopted by the sovereigns of the Yemen, as opposed to the kingly qayl, and

the lordly aristocrat, the du. He had written to Carbou, 4les noms que vous

citez ont ete jetes pele-mele par les chroniques dont je vous parle' 13.

However, Basset was not stricdy correct. Pele-mele did not apply. In the

Ahbdr Vbayd and Kztdb al-Tigdn, Tubba* sometimes appears as a name as so do

all these other regularly quoted, names; Sayfi (spelt with a sad), 'Amr his son, and also Malik or Malik which appear in such variant as Malik Wa'il and

Malkikarib. 'Ubayd b. Sarya refers to As'ad Abu Karib al-Awsat simply as

Tubba*. Wrathful at the murder of his son Halid, As'ad marched to Medina, the city to be, (tumma anna tubba'an sara ila'l-madzna ta'iran Ji'bnihi). There he

meets the alleged murderer, Malik b. al-'Agalan al-Hazragi, who complains about the Jews and who tells As'ad, the monarch, that Halid, was the victim

of a deadly feud between his mother and his wife. Convinced, the Tubba1

relents, and he sends a man with orders to slaughter the Jews. He also gives him the task of destroying Medina. In the event this does not take place. A

Jewish elder, named Ka'b b. 'Amr predicts that the locality will be the future

refuge of a prophet from Mecca. He will be a descendant of Ismdllh. Ibrahim.

He persuades the impetuous Tubba* to stay his hand though it does not later

deter him from going to Mecca in order to raid and destroy there instead. In this repetitive story telling, and other Tubba's have the same evil intent, the

holy cities always escape and the rulers of the Yemen are told, in varied

ways, to show honour to Allah's house and His sanctuary 14. Medina is occasionally referred to in these accounts as Yatrib. In

Wahb's Kztdb al-Hgdn, at the point where Sayf b. Di Yazan listens to the

prophetic words of 4Abd al-Muttalib, Yatrib is the name for the city that is

consistently used. In the popular and condensed versions of these stories it

would appear that the first Tubba4 (Sayf) combines the characters of later

Tubba's and rulers, including Sayf b. Di Yazan. Patterned on the model of a

two-horned Yemenite king and his wazir, al Hidr, the Tubba4 is now

counselled by a wise-man named Yatrib, who beseeches his master, in

signs, to show honour to the two holy cities. It is this version of the story, for

13 Henri Carbou, La Region du Tchad et du Ouadai, Paris, 1912, Vol. 1, pp. 6-7, more especially in the latter.

14 Kitab al-Hgan, San'a' edition, op. cit., pp. 463-5.

138

example, which found favour amongst the Moriscos in al-Andalus 15. It is also to be found, at an earlier and later date, in legendary accounts of the

wanderings of the Sahrawi tribes of the Almoravids, the Gudala, the LamtQna and the MassQfa 16.

One such variation of this story of the first Tubba', or a Yemenite king who invaded Africa, though now named specifically, Ua Yazan, paired with

his wazir, Yatrib, forms the entire introductory narrative and extended

prelude, to the Mamlak or post-Mamlak Sirat Sayf. It shows Yatrib dissuading his master from destroying the holy house in Mecca, and, instead,

accepting the divine signs and dislaying honour to the holiest sanctuary of the religion of Islam which had yet to be revealed. This precedes the wars of

Da Yazan against his neighbours, his foundation of the city of Dar Hamra'

and his marriage with Qamariyya, the slave of Sayf Ar'ad, who will

subsequently cause his death yet who will also give birth to his illustrious son. Here then, is an apparent link between the ninth century Kztdb al-Tigdn, the Mamlak, or post Mamlak, Sirat Sayf and the undated Muslim African

folk epics which were diffused and which explained social, tribal and ethnic

realities amongst the peoples of Kanim and Borno.

The evidence for dating the final versions of the Sirat Sayf is

inconclusive. One suspects that it is relatively recent and there are some (for

example, Professor Abdullahi Smith - see footnote 28) who would maintain

15 Anwar G. Chejne, Islam and the West, The Moriscos, State University of New York Press,

Albany, 1983, p. 109. Tubba1 is referred to as Tabi'u in the following passage although he is

clearly the same person: Tn addition to born Muslims, there were pagans who were compelled to desist from their cruelties and evil deeds in the light of extraordinary signs that foretold the coming of

Muhammad. The Story of Tabi'u shows the futility of tampering with the work of the

Almighty. Tabi'u was a king and the supposed

founder of Yathrib (Medina), who lived

just before the birth of Muhammad and who attempted to destroy the Ka'bah, destined to become the holiest shrine in Islam. Tabi'u mustered an army of some four hundred

thousand, with ten thousand wisemen to advise him. As he was about to attack the

Ka'bah, God gave him a headache and running nose. He summoned scholars,

astrologers, and physicians, but they failed to diagnose or cure his illness. Finally, an old wiseman told him that his illness arose from his intending to destroy the Ka'bah; he could be cured if he desisted. He agreed and was cured. In gratitude he built Medina and named it after Muhammad, whose coming was announced. Furthermore, Tabi'u made the confession of the faith to Islam, leaving a message written in gold for Muhammad, who received it during his flight to Medina in 622. King Tabi'u died the day Muhammad was born'.

16 A good example of it is to be read in the late thirteenth or fourteenth century Magribi work, Buyutatras al-Kubra (see my The Berbers in Arabic Literature, Longman 1982, pp. 148-9) and in the Hulal al-MawSiyya of about 1381/2, and a similar narrative is to be read in al

Sa'di's Ta'rikh al-Sidan, at a much later date. See, in particular, the Arabic text and

translation by O. Houdas, Paris, 1981, (pp. 4r5 and p. 25, Arabic text, and pp. 6-9 and 42-4 of

the French translation). Almost all the chronicles of the Berber tribes of the Sahara drew

heavily on this and other Yemenite inspired accounts of their origins. Several of these

have been selected and discussed in my Saharan Myth and Saga, Oxford Library of African

Literature, 1972.

139

that this might have taken place in the Ottoman age, when conflict with

Ethiopia might have stimulated memories of past Muslim wars against the

Christian kingdoms. There are two clues, however, which may shed light on the date of the composition, the name of its raw, Aba'l-Ma'ali, and the tide

of the Sira that is given in the work's opening page, Sirat AK'l-Amsdr wa-Sa'iq al-Nil min ard al-HabaSa ila hadihi'l-Diyar. The Sra is a Ra'iyya. There is a clear

indication of this in its lengthy final ode of two-hundred and thirteen verses

wherein Sayf's exploits are recapitulated. It is not impossible that an

inspiration for this latter came from the title of al-'Umari's, Kitab Masalik al

Absarfi marnalik al-amsar, wherein so much is said about Kanim/Borno and

Ethiopia and which was cited by al-Qalqa$andi as a major source. The stelar

tide, Sayf al-Gabbar, may also not be wholly irrelevant to the selection of this

rhyming letter (ram). Aba'l-Ma'ali is almost certainly a pseudonym (compare this with al

Asma'i and Aba 'Ubayda in the Srat 'Antar and parts of the Srat Baru Hilal) based on the name of Muhammad b. 'Abd al-Baqi who was known as Aba'l

Ma'ali. A number of legends were included in Arabic writings about the

Negus and his countrymen. These legends had a considerable effect upon the Muslim attitude towards Ethiopia. Three books in particular contain these

legends, Ibn al-Gawzi's Tanwir al-gabaS fi fadl al-Suddn wa'l-Habas', al-Suyati's

Raf Sa'n al-Hutean and Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-Baqi al-Buhari's al-Tiraz al

ManquS fi mahasin al-Hubu$ 17 The three authors differed in date. Ibn al-Gawzi was born in 510/1116 and he died in 597/1200. Al-Suyati, who describes his work as an enlarged and very superior recension of al-Gawzi, was born in

804/1402 and he died in 911/1505; while Muhammad b. 'Abd al-Baqi, also known as Aba'l-Ma'ali, died in 991/1583-4. These works cover a span of some

four hundred years. If one takes into account that the texts that they extensively quote are Ibn al-Atir (d. 1234) al-Nawawi, (d. 1277) famous traditionists such as al-Buhari (d. 870) and Muslim, (d. 875), and al-Waqidi (d. 823) and Ibn Ishaq (d. 768), it can be seen that they furnish a synthesis of

observations regarding the Ethiopians about whom the Islamic world knew

relatively little during these centuries. These texts are quite late. They are arbitrary collections of disparate

source material. The employment in isnad is de rigueur. Inconsistencies are

only occasionally noted, queried or qualified by the authors in questions. These works are laudatory epistles, in the case of al-Suyati possibly motivated

by a desire to promote the circulation of his writings in Ethiopia. There is a

strong religious stamp to all these writings which set them apart from the

^ See Carl Brockelmann, Geschichte der Arabischen Litteratur, 2 band, Berlin, 1902, p. 385, the author of al-Tiim al-ManquS Ji mabasin al-HubuS.

140

earlier observations of aUJd/iiz, Marvazi and others who sought to query the

validity of "the curse of Ham'. Yet in Aba'l-Ma'ali's work (British Museum manuscript, O.R. 4634,

folio 105 ff) there is a short folk tale that touches upon several themes that are

prominent in the Sirat Sayf, (invasions from the Yemen, ethnic conflict, the curse of Ham, facial marks, moles, beauty spots, belief and unbelief, the

triumph of Sam). This is clearly no coincidence. However, if AbQ'l-Ma'ali

died in 991/1583, and it is this work that played some part in shaping the content of the Sira, then we are compelled to date the final versions of the

latter to the concluding years of the sixteenth century. This is a date far too

late for much of the narrative of the Sra itself. A long period of composition seems obvious and it is hazardous to suggest an approximate date other than some time between 1400 and 1600:

Regarding the scars (al-lu'dt), known nowadays as al-shurUt, which are to be

found in the faces of the Ethiopians. The historians and those who are well

informed about strange sayings of wisdom and marvellous secrets, have reported the reasons for these scars and the adherence to the custom of these marks

branded on all the faces of the Ethiopians. It is one from ancient times. As for the

underlying reason for it they have said that one of the kings of the Yemen went to

war against them in bygone days. He besieged and surrounded them. He wished

to kill them, take them captive, rob them of their possessions and destroy their

produce. Due to that they were watchful and persevering, and they asked him for

peace and mercy. They said to him, "We are People of the Book, we follow the

religion of our lord Moses, upon whom be peace. We shall pay you the poll-tax like the other People of the Book, so do not interfere with our possessions and our

lives but grant protection to our peoples, safeguard them and our lands as the other

kings do with the People of the Book". He said, "We used to hear that you were

among those who adored idols like the rest of the Zanj and the Sudan".

They swore by God, by His signs and by Moses and his revelation to them, that

they had never done so, nor had they associated a partner with God. They followed the commandments (shari'a) of Moses -upon whom be blessing and

peace- and they produced arguments and proofs. They confirmed this with

reasonable evidence and testimonies handed down in traditions which they could quote and repeat. They brought their books, their priest and their monks, and they made it plain to him that their way of life and their practises conformed

with their books. When he was satisfied that this was correct and that they were

truly People of the Book he divided them into two protected communities

(dimmatayn) and he established them in their country, and he imposed the poll-tax

upon them, and they were obedient to him. When he desiderd to journey from

their country, the lords of his kingdom and the heads of his state said to them, "It

is useful that you establish a sign and a mark to identify yourselves, so that you will be distinguishable from the polytheists and the idol-worshippers. It will be an

identification of salvation and submission, and it will inform other kings and

people of Islam and the true faith among those who came to this place that you are

People of the Book and not polytheists, nor adorers of idols, and that you are folk

141

who have been granted a status of protection. Thus they will accept the poll-tax from you, and will enjoy protection and liberty".

So they consulted one another in that matter for three days. After diversity of

opinion they were at length in agreement that they would put this brand on their

faces, and they devoted their efforts to this task. Some of them were content to

make a mark between the eye-brows while others made three of them, one

between the eye-brows and two others, each of them adjacent to the eyes. They

accomplished this, and a huge gathering came before the presence of the king with these marks upon them. When he beheld the sight he was amazed and said, "What do you mean by these marks? What is your purpose?". They said, "We

have purposed a way to distinguish ourselves from the polytheists and the

idolators". He said, "Such is to be commended. It is indeed beautiful and not

ugly". He asked one who had been content with only one mark what the reason

for its singularity might be. He was told, "We have done it simply as a sign, in

order to distinguish ourselves. It has been accomplished by this one mark, and

there is no need for a further". But the other said, 'This one mark which we have

put between our eyes is merely a sign, a mark of distinction. As for the other two

which are adjacent to the eyes, such are an embellishment and adornment and a

gain for the eye". He found that commendable and acceptable, and he was

content. He returned to this country and his homelands (the Yemen), and these

marks have remained on their bright and comely faces until now, unchanged and without excess, without blemish or disfigurement.

Sayf seeks the Book of the history of the Nik. In a short chapter, entitled 'the legend of the waters', Ulfa al-Adlabi, in

Nazra fi adabina al-$a'bils compares and contrasts the bride-seeking adventures of Sayf and his son Damir. Through the mastery of waters controlled by magical powers, life and prosperity come to Cairo and to

Damascus, to Egypt and to Syria. Politically, the two countries stand close

together, as was indeed the case in the Mamlak age. Leaving on one side the account of Damir's wooing of al-Gabiya, and his control of the waters of the

Barada, and concentrating exclusively on Sayf s wooing of Sama, the

daughter of King Afrah, I shall comment upon his journey to collect her dower (mahr), the talismanic Book of the history of the Nile, whereby he can turn the great waters of the African river in any direction he pleases. There are formidable obstacles on the way to the temple which houses this book.

However, aided by the wise-woman, 'Aqila, and by his ginniyya half-sister,

'Aqisa, his labours are eventually crowned with success. Just as the pearly bead of Ku? gains Damir's bride, so the Book of the history of the Nile wins the hand of Sama. It wins the Nile waters for Egypt and it spells the doom of the

worship of stars and planets in Sayf Ar'ad's Ethiopia.

18 Published by Mansurat ittihad al-kuttab al-'arab, Damascus, 1974, pp. 122-6. The section in

question is called usturat al-miyah. The Sira of Sayf b. J)l Yazan occupies considerable attention and the author discussed several topics, including the role played by women characters of forceful personality in the plot.

142

Let us select one episode in this Nilotic geste, to illustrate the story teller's art. I am concerned whit that anonymous master artist, or artists, who

composed the Sira, his/their debt to other essentially literary sources for material and for scene and pseudo-historical data that are introduced in the narrative. At the same time I might make, once again, a passing reference to The Squire's Tale in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, where, in the latter, there is that unelaborated allusion to another perilous quest for a bride, though in a

Persian rather than the Arabian manner:

Then I shall speak of Algarsyf his son

And next of Theodora whom he won

To wife, and of the perils he must pass On her account, helped by the steed of brass

(N. Coghill, The Canterbury Tales, Penguin, 1960, page 425).

One special feature about this particular 'steed of brass', mentioned in

another verse of Chaucer's, was that it 'ran within the normal circuit of the

sun'. Solar movement is important. Africa was the habitat of many wonderful steeds, placed there by Ptolemy, or by Ctesias, or through details in the Alexander Romance, or by Mandeville, or in the Hereford Mappa

Muncli, or by the Arab geographers. Al-Dima?qi (d. 1327) tells of the Nile Horse (faras al-bahr), inspired by the hippopotamus. It lives at the borders of

the land of the Abyssinians. It is black in colour, like ebony, and it has a

trailing mane and a tail. 'Sometimes it mates with a mare', he writes, 'and

the resulting offspring is a horse of unbeatable swiftness'. Such horses are the steeds of every Arab folk hero. Sayf s magic steed, Barq al-BurUq, had powers to match Chaucer's.

La Geste du roi Sayf, Chelhod's analysis of the Sira.

J. Chelhod has analysed the Sira of Sayf in an article of this tide 19. His

findings carry us further in the text than the pioneer investigations of Rudi

Paret which are set forth in his own masterly book and his comprehensive article on Saif b. D* Yazan in the Encyclopedia of Islam. Surveying the

thematic complexity of the work, yet bringing out a basic unity, Chelhod stresses that the Nile has always been the mental and geographical horizon

of those who live upon its banks. The Arab geographers and story tellers

were curious to explore or to describe the world at its source. In this particular Sira, notwithstanding the foreign inspiration in many details, and the

cosmological mysteries to which it refers, the essential story is Egyptian.

Ethiopia and Egypt competed for the Nile waters. This was important at the

19 "Le geste du roi Sayf', Revue de VHistaire des Religions, 1967, pp. 181-205.

143

time when Sayf s exploits became the Sira we now know. There was also a

mythological basis to the plot. The Nile did not always flow, so says the

myth, and its valley was once an arid region. If we add the Western African

Sahel, the so-called 'Sadanic Nile', and Lake Chad, or Karkar, to the course of

the river, then all this has a very topical ring indeed. It is, in a way, a

statement of current climatic realities.

The mythological Nile is one of the four rivers of Paradise and the source of it is located in the Mountain of the Moon. Its waters, whiter than

milk, sweeter than honey and more scented than musk issue forth in a

domed structure out of the portals of which emerge four rivers. In the earliest

times, following the creation, Egypt was all well-watered and fertile. Then,

following the flood, the earth was covered by lime and sand. Barren hills

dotted the once fertile plains. The river, which had then settled in a lake

named buhayrat Qasim, stopped flowing, as magical forces had diverted its

natural course. Two magicians of two cities, Gabarsa and Gabalqa, held

captive the waters. Gabalqa wrote the Book of the history of Nile, which he concealed in an inaccessible place that was protected by charms and by talismans. The destiny and destinations of the waters of the Nile were thus

recorded within the pages of a book. Gabarsa, in his fury, blocked the river course with seven mountains and with seven cataracts and he set a guard of

the ginn to watch over the aproaches to this inner southerly and mountainous

region of the African continent.

Aided by the Almighty, by the priestess, 'Aqila, and by 'Aqisa, Sayf obtains the Book of the history of the Nile and, thereby, he masters the river's flow though the obstacles that block its course have also to be removed and the mountains laid low. To attain all his goals Sayf needed seven

instruments of power. Inspired by such details one reads of in the Alexander

Romance, Pseudo-Callisthenes, and thereby displaying certain similarities to

Chaucerian narrative, these seven objects and servant ginn were held to be: 1. The talismanic Book of the Nile.

2. The sword of Asaf, the wazzr of Solomon.

3. The magic horse, Barq al-BurQq, which can subdue the baleful and

hurtful powers of the dwellers in the underworld.

4. The pick of Japheth whereby mountains can be rent asunder.

5. The magic stone of KOS.

6. The picture-board of the subjugated ginn, Haylagan and his brother.

7. The Hfrit, called Rahaq al-Aswad.

Sayf rides forth to reach the source of the Nile. Seated upon his magic steed he sees the waters at a great distance. Counselled by a holy sage of

Islam, he is told that this is a vision of Paradise. He is also told that Allah will

empower the ginn to clear the river bed. he is commanded to mount, to arm

144

himself with his sword and to wear the Book of the history of the Nile as his

breastplate. Rahaq destroys the rocky barriers which impede the flow of the

river, while Sayf routs every foe of magic power that bars his way. At Cairo the waters meet, then branch forth into the Delta. Sayf now turns to convert

the world of men and ginn to the faith of the Prophet. Then he abdicates. His

son, Misr, mounts the throne, and Sayf retires into a mountain region in

order to meditate and to glorify his Maker, recounting, in a lengthy ode, all

the labours and perils which he had experienced and faced and the

achievements of his progeny during a lifetime spent in adventure and in

deeds which would bring glory to the name of the Prophet, to the Yemenites and to the Arabs in general. Obviously, all these ideological and thematic and artistic factors impressed Chelhod more than the purely temporal

dispute which involved the ruler of Christian Ethiopia and the Mamlaks in

Egypt. The Srat Sayf embodies a whole vision of the world, especially Africa, in the MamlOk age. The local gestes of Kanim, of Borno, and parts of Maghrib and Nearer Asia, are borrowed reflections of the values and the heroic

idealism of this exciting age.

Sayf crosses the waters of an African sea on the back of a monster.

Returning for a moment to Ibn Sa'id's report that a distant ancestor of

Muhammad Sayf of Kanim, either Sayf b. Di Yazan himself or a Himyarite forebear of Sayf, was converted to Islam by a pious scholar, brings to mind

that passage in the Sira where Sayf meets the holy Sayh Giyad. The latter

discloses the true monotheistic religion to him, having waited for his

coming, and he tells Sayf to mount upon the back of the monstrous whale like dabba, the constant devourer-to-be of the sun in its 'normal circuit' (citing Chaucer). The whole graphic decription is an unusual one, as the following passage in the Sera shows:

J ;/111 ̂y?u>^jZ^> j>>LJ! dJLJI 'ijL^ ^>LwV

1 Jucl duJ-so jL> ?^J1

c LJ

^jJ Lso <jJL) I 'iS^jJs dL^^jJ^L ^-iJI J lii p L jlg,:Jl J-Jsl ^ pMJDL

jL> ^-iJl

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c 1 - k; H ^Jl ^J! p^-JI ̂ jij ̂ ^Jl V^W^ fW <^^i L^S j

145

^Jcl^o. j t g . * J 1 ̂> I dJ^oo, ^

^r.*-*^-! I ^ I dJ Ub ̂ 5 J I d ? ??lYo 11

d^Ud-Jl ^JajJl^djJu V IjL^>o Aj'V ' ^ ^ f-J^ ^Jl I a Ji 7jLqJI *<L I jJ Iq-sIJjo d.44?ij ^ JUi duJI dJLoLw^lj Vo.

jSS^ J^?J j Ll^V 1 do. is Lo5 Lo^^ Ju50 djl jai

JuLaJl ^-c?iJl l.g ,1c j~J> \

^jo^CjJL5I Jl3 <ui^LgJ! dUbo, VI Loi jLg-jJI jkJtZ^j jLuaJI

v.q <?> L& jJaJ^ Lg "o.\^.1 Lajl^usU dJu^Jio

Lg401 j C...K-0* l.g ?l.c j-t-*>j Jt.?-fco.11 p-?^SJI dJUl ^Soi JLJI dU j ^JL

^?9 Clco t?is I Lfi> Jla-,^ dJuJui *i-<^s Lg-jV dJuJis I jl ^>j VI

d %\s I g x I c ^-L^ Lg-JI f Lai^cjP>.;.7 eJis I ̂ vJ-u*/^ <^c^j>^ I Jl& Ji lg.;tiu>

??J-?"^ j-5 A-L)l jL*o pi lg-??Ljl j p-Jic J L J-h* v-j?L-j*?^ ^1 p^^^LJI j-JI ̂ 1 lg g -*o, *i*i^LgJI dUb c^jl

j li ^Lm,oJI

(?g?-Jl J^iZjijojVl ^^Ic J^j (j-o L^jL ^jj* ^uwJI

I-& ^JL>^ I g q I a. ^j^o q L>^u**/ d.4uJLj ^.9 J Ls^ jii5 I j ix-oQ La I

LjI^ o^o-?V ̂ > ^jb^ci^^iJUJI dULoJI^ I^ f La*oJI ^-L> ^ jJI ^jb^

This da^foz is a creature that is derived from the monsters which occur in the Arabic 'Wonder books' (Kutub al-'Aga'ib) in the Middle Ages. Monsters

of this type occur from time to time, in geographical writings in those works

which are attributed to al-Mas'Udi, in particular. Such literary sources were a

mine of information for the lettered whose handiwork is everywhere in this recited Sira. However, since many of the fabulous creatures were inherited from ancient myth at a popular level, the story tellers drew on village fables

and half-pagan folk tales also to weave their fantasies.

Having acknowledged this debt to geographical and pseudo

geographical works, at the same time one cannot discount the importance of

works that treat of the apocolyptic. As Sayf s magic horse, Barq al-Buruq, owes his name, though not his function, either to the Prophet's steed, Buraq, or to a verse of the poet Umayya b. 'Abd Sams 20 so this dabba may be

inserted there in order to recall the dabbat al-ard which, on the last day, will

come forth in the earth when the sun shall rise in the West and set in the

2? Verse five of the poem published on p. 155 about Sayf b. "Qi Yazan in Muluk Himyar wa-Aqyal al-Yaman, the ode of Naswan b. Sa'id al-Himyari, together with its commentary, Hulasat al-$ira

al-Gami'a, edited by al-Sayyid 'Ali b. Isma'il al-Mu'ayyad and Isma'il b. Ahmad al-Carafi, Cairo, 1378/1958-9.

146

East. It would be a hairy beast, so say the commentators, and it would name

people as either believers or ungodly. The believer would be marked with a

white spot, the ungodly, to quote Abel 21, will have Solomon's seal affixed to the nose and 'it will spread until all his features become black'. According to

al-Zamah?ari and al-Razi, only its head will appear, and it will reach the

clouds in the sky. It will travel in turn through the Magrib, the MaSriq, Syria and the Yemen, proclaiming the vanity of all religions hostile to Islam.

Happening so soon after Sayf s conversion in the narrative, is it far fetched to see something essentially symbolic here?

jF/2 'id and the Nile and the ride on the sea monster in the writings of al-Mas "udx and

pseudo al-Mas udx.

How closely related the Srat Sayf actually is to passages in the Kutub al

'Aga'ib, more especially to parts of the Ahbar al-Zamdn, falsely attributed to al

Mas'Qdi, can be seen in the text itself, though the text which now bears al

Mas'Qdi's name is thought to be a Kitab 'Aga'ib. It is arguably the work of

Ibrahim b. Wasif Sah, who possibly wrote it at the end of the tenth or the

eleventh century in Egypt 22. This was long before the canonic text of Sirat

Sayf was composed and at a time when the hero was still principally associated with his wars of liberation within the Yemen. In this hybrid

composition the author tells of the journey of Ha'id b. Abi Salam, a

descendant of Ishaq b. Ibrahim to Egypt and, later, to the sources of the Nile.

Chelhod 23 points out that this account is repeated later by YaqUt (d. 1215). It

was therefore well known in thirteenth century literary circles.

To quote Chelhod, after having marched for thirty years, Ha'id met a

man named 'Imran, a holy man like Sayh Giyad, who had been told by God to wait for Ha'id and to show him the way. 'To reach the sources of the Nile our traveller had to cross an immense sea on the back of a giant whale-like

creature, the enemy of the sun. When he attains his destination, Ha'id finds

himself before a wall of gold from which descend four rivers which gush forth from four gates in a domed structure also made of gold. Having drunk

of the Nile waters, Ha'id attempts to scale the wall, but he is dissuaded by an

angel who tells him that he cannot enter since its portal is close to Paradise'.

The end of the passage in the so-called Ahbar al-Zaman ('Abd al-Hamid

Ahmad Press, 1938, page 215) reads:

21 See the article on the dabba by Abel in the Encyclopedia of Islam. 22 This whole question is discussed by Levtzion and Hopkins, op. cit., pp. 33-4 and by M.

Cook, "Pharaonic history in medieval Egypt", Studia Islamica, Vol. LVII, 1983, pp. 72-99. 23 See Chelhod, op. cit, p. 202.

147

L-gJoJ p "iJJ ̂ ??oy> ̂ j-JI dbli 4 j^>wJI I JJb ^JU Cl^l US w Jls

CLc5iJl>l jl4^M,0l)y. 1 r?LjUu) *<L!j l^-jli l^Sjli 4 Ub^ol djJo^>li Ub^>T<j^p

J3*. .i>vibli? J>Ls J-*jJ1 ^1 ^^x:^^ l^-Jx U^>ljIfr^Sj I jU

er-i Ig^j^jj^94^1^:^ LftjL>-il^ lgJU> -V^->o-? 2r^^

J .>; 11 pJU

dLJI 0g"* \> lgt*q 4 c-xA t^. lg,44^ IgJ L?j> j

The resemblance of the detail in the passage [above] to that in the Srat

Sayf is a close one. The author of the Sra almost certainly knew this text, or

another variant of it. He undoubtedly borrowed his dabba from it. But he did more than this. He altered the name of Ha'id, and he gave it to Sayh Giyad who is an Islamised character patterned on that of Sayh 'Imran. This one

tiny example shows how much this particular Sira owes its inspiration to

earlier literary sources. Other elements from pseudo Ahbar al-Zamdn are also

integrated at regular intervals into the narrative. Several heroic characters march to find the sources of the Nile in the Ahbar al-Zamdn and kindred literature. Thus, al-Rayan, the son of al-Walid b. Duma', the Amalekite Pharaoh of Egypt, marches to the kingdom of the Damdam cannibals. They are armed with iron spears and their king rides a horned beast of immense size. When they are defeated they withdraw into marshes and jungles (awhdl and adgdl). I suspect that this episode could explain the name of the

negro warriors, 'Atamtam and 'Atamtam Harraq al-Sagar in the &ra; a name

otherwise hard to identify 24.

\ js> j2*3i\ju UJ I i^jjJS Ujj^-f jJ I p^ojjjl

4?SJLoo I ^?L> j^J I J^p.?**J 1 p-o I ^JLc jLwj

iC>5j^ W"^(JP"^' <*ta-Ja? <L?Ij^JU p^SJLo ?jj>^4 JuJL>J I y> p^_?JL>U

d I jS. a-Jl

Lg j.h p^cLcl dJ L^.-v; p-li < aJ U^ q I J LgJ 13 J L>o, 1

Sra? So)/ m context of African popular folk epic and the impact of Islam in Africa. I have attempted to show how, in the oral literature and in popular

written folk epic of frequently un-lettered Islamised peoples, layers of a

higher cultural tradition are concealed, yet still exert an important influence on their modes of thought. The key geographical and historical position of

24 Levtzion and Hopkins, op. cit., pp. 36-7.

148

Egypt explains the particularly important role that it played. In this part oral,

part courtly, literature there is a common reservoir of plots, personalities, symbols, magical powers, and good and evil forces. There is a similar blackcloth against which the key figures play out their destinies. The Arabs seem to have borrowed from the Persians, yet, soon after the conquest, they

may have owed as much to the Copts. The latter were masters at shaping inherited legends to fit Islamic requirements. By the time of the Crusades and the Mamlaks, however, all this material was highly eclectic and

developed and the Copts as such had next to no say in its choice of subject. Further elaboration then took place, and a new emphasis was placed on Islam engaged in a war to the bitter end with a threatening infidelity. A

greater obsession with the magical is to be observed, yet, having conceded

this, there was little added that was not already to be found embryonic in

early Sra, or in Magazz, or in the 'Books of Wonders'. Islamised Africa was an heir to it yet at the same time made no small

contribution to it. Recently, Mme Fatimata Mounkaila has completed a thesis in the University of Dakar on the subject of Le Mythe et VHistoire dans la

geste de Zabarkane. In it she shows how, amongst the Zarma, mythical heroes come from the east and the north-east. Ideas borrowed from oriental texts, since Islamisation began, have brought together Zibriqan b. Badr, Tamim al

Dari, the Companion, and Sombo-Mali Bero into one standard pseudo historical folk epic in Niger 25.

The explorer, Gustave Nachtigal, towards the end of the last century, mentioned that the Bouddoma near Lake Chad, who were at least nominally Muslim, had a priest who watched over the talismanic objects, the help of which was sought in time of drought and calamity, a calebasse, a

mysterious and historic stone and a magical sword, though the greatest sovereign and protective power of all was a giant creature, some kind of

serpent, a ddbba it would seem, that inhabited the lake, the Genie of Chad. One never failed to implore it for assistance in time of grave happenings. It, or he, was there to offer counsel and to show his support. Is this borrowed or

indigenous, it is impossible to say? 26

25 Compare the conflict between Sayf b. Di Yazan and Sayf Ar'ad in the Sira and the

following comment by Dr. Mounkaila (with whom I have personally discussed these

comparisons) about the heroes in the geste of Zabarkane: 'Or ce qui frappe en premier lieu c'est une presentation tres nettement dichotomique de ce

tableau, parce que la geste presente deux points de departs initiaux:

- la Peninsule Arabique avec Zabarkane, dans un environnement alors domine par le

Prophete Mahomet et 1'Islam; - Malle ou Sudan Occidental avec Sombo-Mali Bero, un descendant du musulman

Zabarkane et, qui recourt largement ux forces de religions paiennes africaines. Le fosse est large entre les deux personnages'.

26 See Dr. Gustave Nachtigal, Sahara et Soudan, tome premier, Paris, 1981, pp. 501-2.

149

In his journey through Kanim and Borno, Nachtigal learnt of the

claim of their rulers to the lineage of Sayf. He was aware of the texts which

his predecessor, the explorer Henry Barth, had made familiar 27. In the view

of Nachtigal, Sayf s wanderings, via Kufra and Bardoa to Kanim, might be a

hazy folk memory of some early wanderings of Himyarite families from

the Yemen, Ethiopia or the Sudan, over many generations towards the lake, these numerous generations having been telescoped into that of Sayf, their

father, and so, ultimately, back to a nameless first Tubba'. Sceptics would

dismiss this as a mere speculation, yet there is no alternative to examining historical probabilities for such sagas when endeavouring to unravel the

mystery of the unrecorded past of such peoples. This is their value.

Islamised, yes, but so too was Alexander Islamised and this happened far

earlier and it was achieved by the Yemenite Arabs themselves 28. The deeds

of such an Islamised or Arabised superman will be remembered and cherished for generations. As Sayf was to say himself at the end of the Sira

in his lengthy ode, prior to this retirement from the world, 'Our deeds in

Cabal Qaf, the world's remotest mountain range, will be widely known and

they will continue to be recounted amongst the traditions in the memory of mankind'.

27 H. Barth's Travels and Discoveries in North and Central Africa, first published 1857, especially his historical notes and chapter XXIX, Authenticity and general character of the History of Bornu. For a convenient summary of Barth's historical and literary discoveries, and those cited by H. Richmond Palmer, see

Joseph N. Cuoq, Recueil des Sources Arabes

concemant VAfrique Occident ale du VIII* au XVI* siecle (Bilad al-Sudan), Editions di C.N.R.S., Paris, 1975. In his introduction (p. 34) Cuoq remarks: 'La deuxieme tendance a ete celle de chercher a s'attribuer une origine sud-arabique.

Ainsi les Sudan de la region di Kukya (au S.E. del Gao) font venir leur ancetre du Yemen; ceux de Kanem s'attribuent une

origine himyarite, en reconnaissant comme leur ancetre le sultan Sayf b. dhi 1-Yazan. Ces indications ne paraissent pas

etre d'origine africaine. Ce sont des

genealogies d'emprunt, que les sultans ont probablement importees de leurs

pelerinages aux heux saints de 1'Islam, ou ils entendirent celebrer les gloires de Sayf b. dhi 1-Yazan. Nous avons ici une genealogie de type ideal par prestige.' See likewise his remarks in footnote (4) on p. 370.

28 An appreciation of the African contribution to this, as well as translations from Nigerian manuscripts, is to be read in the valuable essay 'The legend of the Seiwufa: A study in the

origins of a tradition of origin', by the later Professor Abdullahi Smith. This has been

published (pp. 25-56) in a collection of his works by the Abdullahi Smith Centre for Historical Research, Zaria, Nigeria, 1987. As de

Polignac mentions in his article in

Arabica, Tome XXIX, L'Image d'Alexandre dans la htterature arabe, 1'Orient face a

l'Hellenisme?, 'L'annexion religieuse qui recouvre ici l'aspect cosmologique de l'activite du batisseur. La primaute accordee au fibre exercice de la volonte divine au detriment de la determination astrale ne diminue guere 1'importance des considerations astrologiques et magiques dont depend le sort de la cite'.

150

RESUME La Sira de Sayfb. Di Yazan de la fin de la periode medievale a ete generallement

etudiee et interpretee en tant qu'une expression d'hostilite des Arabes envers les

Ethiopiens qui ont soumis le Yemen et ont essaye de detruire la Mecque. Au 14*me siecle deux souverains Ethiopiens, 'Amda Sydn (1314-44) et son successeur Sayfa ArUd (1344-72), presentaient une menace et pour les royaumes musulmans voisins de

I'Ethiopie, et pour les souverains Mamluk de VEgypte. Ce conflit est essentiel a la raison d'etre de la Sira.

Neanmoins, il serait imprudent d'insister sur ce contexte historique seulement.

Beaucoup d'eveenements dans la Sira n'ont aucun lien avec ce conflit. Par ailleurs, ily a beaucoup d'emprunts des travaux de Wahb b. Munabbih, Kitab al-Tigan, et d'al

Mas^udii, Kutub al-'Aga'ib. A la difference d'autres Siras, celle de Sayf parait qu'elle a ete exportes a des

regions en Afrique oil son hero allait devenir Veponyme d'une dynastie souveraine

musulmane, d'origine Arabe, Berbere ou de Teda. Au Kanem et Borno, la Sira de Sayf semblait etre tres importante a son histoire medievale et a VIslamisation de la region pres du Lac du Tchad. On pent distinguer un lien ideologique entre les souverains de

Kdnim/Bornu et la Sira. Cependant, on sait pas encore si les souverains en questions ont fait usage d'une partie du complot canonique ou non.

151