Ab? Abdall?h al-?usayn ibn ?A?mad al-Mughallis al-Mar?gh? ( Arabic : ??? ??? ???? ?????? ?? ???? ?????? ??????? ; the epithet also appears as al-Mughallis? ) was a tenth-century CE poet. He flourished around 381 AH/991 CE, ^{[1] : 121} being associated with the court of Bah?? al-Dawla . ^[2] He is noted as one of the only known composers of Arabic riddles in the third century AH. ^[3]

Epithets [ edit ]

A few sources refer to Ibn al-Mughallis instead as al-Muflis ('the bankrupt'), but this is due to scribal confusion of the Arabic letters ? and ?: in medial position these look similar, and short vowels are not written, so that ?????? 'al-Mughallis' was miscopied as ?????? 'al-muflis'. ^{[1] : 121 fn. 90} Mughallis has been glossed to mean 'the one who tarries'. ^[4]

The epithet al-Mar?gh? has been thought to suggest that al-Mughallis originated in the Adharbayjani town of Maragheh . ^{[5] : 120}

Works [ edit ]

According to Bilal Orfali, the eleventh-century literary scholar ?Abd al-Malik ibn Mu?ammad Tha??lib? quotes from al-Mughallis's poetry in many of his works. ^{[1] : 120 fn. 81} His poetry anthology Yat?ma includes al-Mughallis's work in 'the third region of the Yat?ma al-Dahr : on the clever curiosities of the inhabitants of Jib?l , F?rs , Jurj?n , and ?abarist?n ' ( ????? ?????? ?? ????? ????? ?? ????? ??? ????? ??? ???????? ??? ????? ??? ?????? ????? ?????? ???????? )', ^{[1] : 198} specifically the eighth chapter, 'mention of all the poets of al-Jabal and those who went there from Iraq and other places, and the clever curiosities of their accounts and poems' ( ?? ??? ???? ????? ????? ????????? ???? ?? ?????? ?????? ???? ??????? ???????? ). ^{[6] [1] : 199} The collection quotes two riddles, on a touchstone ( ??? ????? ) and banner ( ?????? ), ^[7] and a little more poetry besides.

Tha??lib? included more of al-Mughallis's poems in the sequel to the Yat?ma , his Tatimma al-Yat?ma , where al-Mughallis appears in the second region, entitled: 'completion of the second region on the beauties of the Iraq?s ? rather, their best achievements and clever related curiosities' ( Arabic : ???? ????? ?????? ?? ????? ????? ??? ?????? ?? ??????? ??? ???? ??? ?? ??? ??????? ). ^{[8] [1] : 202} According to both the Beirut edition of 1983 and Radwan's critical edition of 1972, the Tatimma records eleven riddles by al-Mughallis along with a brief excerpt from a ghazal . ^{[9] [5] : 67-69 [ch. 66]}

Primary sources [ edit ]

• a?-?afad? , Salah al-D?n (2000), ?Adn?n al-Ba??t, Mu?amm?d (ed.), "al-W?f? bi ?l-wafay?t" , Bibliotheca Islamica (in Arabic), 29 , Beirut: Dar Ehia al-Tourath al-Arabi , vol. 13 p. 202 [no. 3555]
• ?Abd al-Malik ibn Mu?ammad Tha??lib?, Yat?ma :
  • ?Abd al-Malik ibn Mu?ammad Tha??lib?, Yat?mat al-dahr f? shu?ar?? ahl al-?a?r (????? ????? ?? ????? ????????), 4 vols (Damascus: [al-Ma?ba?ah al-?ifn?yah] ???? : ??????? ???????, 1302 AH [1885 CE]), II 228.
  • Yat?mat al-dahr f? shu?ar?? ahl al-?a?r ????? ????? ?? ????? ??? ????? , ed. by Mu?ammad Mu?y? al-D?n ?Abd al-?am?d ???? ??? ????? ????????? , 4 vols (Cairo 1956), vol. 3 pp. 415?16. ^{[1] : 121 fn. 90}
  • Yat?mat al-dahr f? ma??sin ahl al-?a?r ma? al-tatimma wa-l-fah?ris ( ????? ????? ?? ????? ??? ????? ?? ?????? ???????? ), ed. by Muf?d Mu?ammad Qumay?ah, 6 vols (Bayr?t: D?r al-Kutub al-?Ilm?yah ( ??? ????? ??????? ), 1983), vol. 3 p. 463 (ch 34) , p. 468 (ch 34) , p. 481 (ch 42)
• ?Abd al-Malik ibn Mu?ammad Tha??lib?, Tatimma :
  • Ahmad Shawqi Radwan (ed.), ' Tha??lib?'s “Tatimmat al-Yat?mah”: A Critical Edition and a Study of the Author as Anthologist and Literary Critic ' (unpublished PhD thesis, University of Manchester, 1972), pp. 67?69 [ch. 66].
  • Yat?mat al-dahr f? ma??sin ahl al-?a?r ma? al-tatimma wa-l-fah?ris ( ????? ????? ?? ????? ??? ????? ?? ?????? ???????? ), ed. by Muf?d Mu?ammad Qumay?ah, 6 vols (Bayr?t: D?r al-Kutub al-?Ilm?yah ( ??? ????? ??????? ), 1983), vol. 5 pp. 24-26 [ al-Tatimma ch. 11].

References [ edit ]