PreIslamic Arab poetry
Essay on Pre-Islamic Arabic Poetry
Islam first came into prominence in 622 CE and quickly spread through the middle east over the course of a few decades. Many of the events that took place in and around Saudi Arabia are described as having taken place either before the birth of Islam or after it. Arabic poetry as most people know was never actually scripted by people during the pre-Islamic period, so many accounts of when the poetry was written may be wrong or falsified. This is because writing on paper/ printing was never discovered by most Arabs until they caught a Chinese traveler on the silk road a few centuries later. This was when the actual printing of poems began in Arabia.Although a lot of poetry has been lost over the centuries, whatever remains is considered as the finest Arabic poetry until date.The days before Islam in Arabic are known as Al Jahilidiyya.
Arabic poetry can be dated as far back as 500 CE in until the consolidation of the High Abbasid period in the late fourth/tenth century.Its foundations lie in the rich oral tribal court poetry which was recited in the form of the qasida of the ode.This poetry conserved the ways of the warrior aristocracy in a three part form, namely, the nasib which is the beginning of the poem in which the poet talks about his lover, then the rahil or the journey which talks about the poets journey through life.The last part is known as the gharad or the end goal which is usually the praise of a particular ruler or a tribal boast(Early poems and poetry, Suzanne Pinckey StetKevych, page1). It was also written in the form of invariants or fragments. It was passed down until the Islamic period by practtitioners and the dominant form of poetry. It was not only a dominant form of poetry in the Ummayyad and the Abbasid periods but also gave rise to a number of minor genres and gave rise to many derivative forms as well. Though there were many forms of poetry, the qasida and the ghazal were often the dominant forms
Islam first came into prominence in 622 CE and quickly spread through the middle east over the course of a few decades. Many of the events that took place in and around Saudi Arabia are described as having taken place either before the birth of Islam or after it. Arabic poetry as most people know was never actually scripted by people during the pre-Islamic period, so many accounts of when the poetry was written may be wrong or falsified. This is because writing on paper/ printing was never discovered by most Arabs until they caught a Chinese traveler on the silk road a few centuries later. This was when the actual printing of poems began in Arabia.Although a lot of poetry has been lost over the centuries, whatever remains is considered as the finest Arabic poetry until date.The days before Islam in Arabic are known as Al Jahilidiyya.
Arabic poetry can be dated as far back as 500 CE in until the consolidation of the High Abbasid period in the late fourth/tenth century.Its foundations lie in the rich oral tribal court poetry which was recited in the form of the qasida of the ode.This poetry conserved the ways of the warrior aristocracy in a three part form, namely, the nasib which is the beginning of the poem in which the poet talks about his lover, then the rahil or the journey which talks about the poets journey through life.The last part is known as the gharad or the end goal which is usually the praise of a particular ruler or a tribal boast(Early poems and poetry, Suzanne Pinckey StetKevych, page1). It was also written in the form of invariants or fragments. It was passed down until the Islamic period by practtitioners and the dominant form of poetry. It was not only a dominant form of poetry in the Ummayyad and the Abbasid periods but also gave rise to a number of minor genres and gave rise to many derivative forms as well. Though there were many forms of poetry, the qasida and the ghazal were often the dominant forms