Original Arabic Text

Metre: Vâfir (mufâ‘aletun mufâ‘aletun fa‘ûlun)

لهذا اليَومِ بَعْدَ غَدٍ أرِيجُ
وَنَارٌ في العَدُوّ لهَا أجيجُ

Li-hāẕe'l-yevmi ba‘de ġadin erīcu
Ve nārun fi'l-‘aduvvi lehā ecīcu

وَفِينَا السّيْفُ حَمْلَتُهُ صَدُوقٌ
إذا لاقَى وغارَتُهُ لَجُوجُ

Ve fīne's-seyfu ḥamletuhu ṣadūḳun
İẕā lāḳā ve ġāratuhu lecūcu

نُعَوّذُهُ مِنَ الأعْيَانِ بَأساً
وَيَكْثُرُ بالدّعاءِ لَهُ الضّجيجُ

Nu‘avviẕuhu mine'l-a‘yāni be'sen
Ve yekṡuru bi'd-du‘ā'i lehu'ḍ-ḍecīcu

رَضِينَا والدُّمُسْتُقُ غَيرُ رَاضٍ
بمَا حكَمَ القَوَاضِبُ والوَشيجُ

Raḍīnā ve'd-dumustuḳu ġayru rāḍin
Bimā ḥakeme'l-ḳavāḍibu ve'l-veşīcu

فإنْ يُقْدِمْ فَقَد زُرنَا سَمَنْدُو
وَإن يُحْجِمْ فمَوعِدُنَا الخَليجُ

Fe-in yuḳdim fe-ḳad zurnā Semendū
Ve in yuḥcim fe-mev‘idune'l-ḫalīcu

In English

1. After tomorrow this day will have a sweet fragrance (the news of this victory will spread everywhere); and within the enemy there is a fire that blazes and crackles.

2. Among us is such a sword (Sayf al-Dawla, "the Sword of the State") that when he meets the enemy his charge does not fail, and his raiding goes on relentlessly.

3. We seek God's protection for his valour against the evil eye; and the clamour of the prayers made for him grows ever louder.

4. We are content with the judgement given by the sharp swords and the spear shafts; but the Domestikos (the Byzantine commander-in-chief) is not content.

5. If he comes against us, let him know that we have visited Samandu (we have advanced that far); and if he holds back, our meeting place is the Khalij (the strait before the Byzantine capital; "Haliç" in the translation of the edition).

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

These five couplets (beyit) are the first, ninth, tenth, eleventh and twelfth couplets of a twelve-couplet kaside (qasida) that al-Mutanabbi wrote for Sayf al-Dawla. The kaside is written in the vâfir metre of Arabic prosody, and all its couplets rhyme on the letter "jim", ending in the sound "-îcu / -ûcu"; for this reason it belongs among the kasides known in Arabic literature, after their rhyme letter, as "Jimiyya". That both lines of the first couplet end in the same rhyme is a practice peculiar to the opening of a kaside. Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn Yasar quotes the couplets in this selection in Amasya Tarihi while narrating Sayf al-Dawla's campaign against Harşene, and states that they are recorded in the Ahbârü'd-düvel; he repeats the last couplet separately when describing the Ziyâre quarter. Because the text layer of the e-book is corrupt, the Arabic-script text is given from the common text of the divan; in Hüsameddin's text the second line of the third couplet reads "nukṡiru" (we increase) instead of "yekṡuru". The identification of the metre and the Latin-script reading are ours.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The kaside opens with the announcement of a victory. "Erîc" is a sweet fragrance that spreads; the poet describes the glory of the victory as a scent that will spread everywhere in the days to come, and sets it against the "ecîc", the crackling blaze, of the fire burning within the enemy. The contrast drawn between the two lines, between scent and fire, between joy and disaster, is the heart of the couplet. In the second couplet the emir's title becomes a play on words: "Sayf al-Dawla" means the sword of the state, and when the poet says "among us is a sword" he describes both the emir and a real sword. That his charge is "sadûk", a charge that keeps its word and finds its target, unites in a single word the sharpness of the sword and the resolve of the emir. In the third couplet the army's devotion to the emir is expressed through the belief in protection from the evil eye: he is so valiant that the evil eye is feared for him, and the voices of those praying for him turn into a clamour.

The last two couplets address the enemy. Swords and spears have given the verdict of the battle; in Arabic poetry "kavâdıb" describes sharp swords, and "veşîc" the reeds from which spear shafts were made. If the Byzantine commander-in-chief, the Domestikos, is not content with this verdict, there are two paths: if he comes to battle again, he must know that the Muslim army has advanced as far as Samandu; if he does not come, the army will this time await him at the gate of Byzantium, at the Khalij. The couplet is a challenge and a threat.

Historical Context

The importance of the kaside comes from Samandu, named in the last couplet. Relying on Badr al-Din al-Ayni's note that "Zemendû is also called Ziyâre", Hüsameddin takes this place to be the Ziyâre quarter in the east of Amasya, and writes that in 338 Sayf al-Dawla entered Harşene, that is, Amasya, and stayed two months at Semendû. The couplet, however, says only that the Muslim army reached Samandu; the names of Amasya, of Harşene or of a siege of a city do not occur. Hüsameddin himself records that the commentator of the Kâmûs took Samandu to be Belgrade or Smederevo (Semendire), and that there was a castle called Zamantı in the sanjak of Kayseri; he finds the first historically impossible and rejects the second because its name is not recorded as "Ziyâre". That the Samandu mentioned by al-Mutanabbi was the Ziyâre of Amasya has not been confirmed by any other source, and the kaside's connection with Amasya is therefore disputed. The question is discussed in detail on the poet's biography page.

Bibliography

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Academic studies

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