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An Almohad Copy of The Kitab Al Agani in
An Almohad Copy of The Kitab Al Agani in
An Almohad Copy of The Kitab Al Agani in
Articles
AN ALMOHAD COPY OF THE KITĀB AL-AĠĀNĪ IN SANAA1
Umberto Bongianino
(Khalili Research Centre, University of Oxford)
Anne Regourd
(CNRS, UMR 7192; Head of the Nouvelles Chroniques du manuscrit au Yémen)
Abstract
This note presents a rediscovered manuscript from the Islamic West today in the Dār al-maḫṭūṭāt, Sanaa.
It is a fair copy of the third volume of the Kitāb al-aġānī, probably produced in al-Andalus in the late
twelfth century. The inscriptions on its title page allow us to connect it with the library of the Almohad
prince Abū Zakariyāʾ Yaḥyā (fl. 585/1190) and two subsequent owners. It can be argued that the manu-
script was kept in Marrakesh, possibly for centuries, before being brought to Yemen. That may have hap-
pened before the mid-eighteenth century.
Résumé
Une copie almohade du Kitāb al-aġānī à Sanaa
Cette note présente un manuscrit tout juste redécouvert, venant de l’Ouest musulman et actuellement
conservé à Dār al-maḫṭūṭāt, Sanaa. Il s’agit d’une bonne copie du troisième volume du Kitāb al-aġānī,
probablement effectuée en al-Andalus à la fin du xiie s. Les inscriptions sur sa page de titre nous permet-
tent de le relier à la bibliothèque d’un Prince almohade, Abū Zakariyāʾ Yaḥyā (vivant en 585/1190), puis à
deux autres propriétaires. On peut soutenir que le manuscrit s’est trouvé à Marrakesh, sans doute plu-
sieurs siècles, avant de parvenir au Yémen, peut-être dès avant le milieu du xviiie s.
اخلالصة
نسخة موحدية لـكتاب الغاين يف دار اخملطوطات بصنعاء
اهنا نسخة جيدة.تقدم هذه املقاةل الصغرية خمطوطة أعيد اكتشافها من الغرب الساليم اليوم يف دار اخملطوطات بصنعاء
تسمح، اذلي يُرحج أنه مت نسخه يف الندلس يف أواخر القرن الثاين عرش امليالدي،من اجملدل الثالث من كتاب الغاين
1
The authors would like to thank warmly the staff of Dār al-maḫṭūṭāt for providing us with high resolution
images of the manuscript for publication, allowing us to complete our reading of its marginal notes. Spe-
cial acknowledgments are due to Hamdi al-Razihi, Dār al-maḫṭūṭāt, for his constant help and the useful
information he was willing to share with us. Without their help, this article would not have come to frui-
tion.
) م1190/ هـ585 لنا الكتاابت املوجودة عىل صفحة العنوان بربطها مبكتبة المري املوحدي أبو زكراي حيىي (اكن حي ًا س نة
قبل، رمبا لعدة قرون، ميكن القول ان اخملطوطة مت حفظها يف مدينة مراكش.وانتقلت ملكيته بعد ذكل اىل مالكني أآخرين
. ورمبا حدث ذكل قبل منتصف القرن الثامن عرش،احضارها اىل المين
Keywords
Kitāb al-aġānī — Maġribī script — al-Andalus — 12th century — Almohads — Sanaa — Dār al-maḫṭūṭāt
Mots-clés
Kitāb al-aġānī — écriture maghrébine — al-Andalus — xiie s. — Almohades — Sanaa — Dār al-
maḫṭūṭāt
I. Introduction
The Dār al-maḫṭūṭāt in Sanaa houses an important paper codex, in relatively good con-
ditions, written in an elegant Maghribī round script. It contains the third volume of the
Kitāb al-aġānī, the encyclopaedic collection of poems and songs attributed to Abū al-
Faraǧ ʿAlī b. Ḥusayn al-Iṣfahānī (284/897–356/967). The Dār al-maḫṭūṭāt acquired the
manuscript in 1986, allegedly from the private library of a family of Yemeni scholars who
had owned it for more than 150 years.
Ill. 1. Ms. Sanaa, Dār al-maḫṭūṭāt, the third vol. of the Kitāb al-aġānī,
the encyclopaedic collection of poems and songs attributed to
Abū al-Faraǧ al-Iṣfahānī (284/897–356/967), title page with table of contents.
2
On zigzag marks see A. Gacek, Arabic Manuscripts: a Vademecum for Readers, 2009, p. 297.
3
J.-L. Estève, “Le zigzag dans les papiers arabes. Essai d’explication”, 2001, pp. 40–49.
other manuscripts, however, the zigzag marks are not always found near the folds, and
some specialists have suggested that they may simply represent some sort of workshop
trademark.4
Zigzag marks commonly appear in manuscripts copied between the twelfth and
the fourteenth century in al-Andalus, but also in some North African cities that plugged
into Andalusī scribal practices, such as Ceuta.5 Palaeographically, the Sanaa Aġānī can
be attributed to the second half of the twelfth century and compared with another un-
dated but roughly contemporary codex in the Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF,
ms. Arabe 3298), containing the sixth volume of the same work.6 The script is an elegant
and poised bookhand, featuring a number of mannered traits that include the perfectly
oval body of ṣād and ḍād; the stretched horizontal strokes of final bāʾ, tāʾ, and ṯāʾ; the
semicircular bowls of final and isolated nūn, lām, yāʾ and alif maqṣūra; the elongated
and flattened body of initial and medial kāf; the long and neatly curled tail of final mīm.
Although lacking the final folio(s) with the original colophon [Ill. 3], the Sanaa
Aġānī has miraculously preserved its title page. Just like in the BnF Aġānī, the title of
work is followed by a table of contents, here arranged in two parallel columns. In the
empty margins around it, and at the top of the page above the title, several ownership
notes (some of which erased and illegible) yield important information about the man-
uscript’s history [Ill. 1].
4
M.-T. Le Léannec-Bavavéas, “Zigzag et filigranes sont-ils incompatibles ? Enquête dans les manuscrits
de la Bibliothèque nationale de France”, 1999, pp. 124–125.
5
U. Bongianino, The Manuscript Tradition of the Islamic West. Maghribī Round Scripts and the Andalusī
Identity, 2022, p. 192.
6
On Maġribī round scripts in the twelfth century, see U. Bongianino, The Manuscript Tradition of the Is-
lamic West, 2022, pp. 171–294. The BnF Aġānī can be consulted online at https://archivesetmanu-
scrits.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cc31195t.
Ill. 2. Ms. Sanaa, Dār al-maḫṭūṭāt, the third vol. of the Kitāb al-aġānī, the encyclopaedic collection
of poems and songs attributed to Abū al-Faraǧ al-Iṣfahānī (284/897–356/967), incipit.
Ill. 3. Ms. Sanaa, Dār al-maḫṭūṭāt, the third vol. of the Kitāb al-aġānī, the encyclopaedic collection
of poems and songs attributed to Abū al-Faraǧ al-Iṣfahānī (284/897–356/967), end of the manuscript.
7
A. Huici Miranda, Historia política del Imperio Almohade, 1956–1957, vol. 2, p. 627.
8
On Maġribī ṯuluṯ see U. Bongianino, The Manuscript Tradition of the Islamic West, 2022, pp. 251–255.
9
On Aḥmad b. Yūsuf al-Qaysī see the online database PUA (Prosopografía de los ulemas de al-Andalus),
id. 2101, at https://www.eea.csic.es/pua/. On his activity as copyist and calligrapher, see U. Bongianino,
The Manuscript Tradition of the Islamic West, 2022, pp. 206–208. The most complete biography of Abū al-
Rabīʿ Sulaymān can be found in the introduction to the edition of his poems: Dīwān Abī al-Rabīʿ Sulaymān
ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Muwaḥḥid, 1969, pp. 4–14. Although Abū al-Rabīʿ is best known as governor of Tlemcen
and Siǧilmasa towards the end of his life, a later source mentions that he had previously been appointed
governor of Seville, Murcia, and Córdoba. Averroes dedicated to Abū al-Rabīʿ Sulaymān his commentary
on the Urǧūza fī al-ṭibb by Ibn Sīnā: see L. Benjelloun-Laroui, Les bibliothèques au Maroc, 1990, p. 29.
10
Other manuscripts bearing the same line of poetry on their title pages are in Istanbul, Süleymaniye
Library, Köprülü collection, mss Fazıl Ahmet Paşa 347 and 349 (a multi-volume copy of Al-tamhīd li-mā fī
al-Muwaṭṭaʾ by Abū ʿUmar Yūsuf Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr al-Namarī al-Qurṭubī); Rabat, National Library of the
Kingdom of Morocco, ms. 586 J (a copy of Muslim’s Ṣaḥīḥ); and a copy of the Mašyaḫa of ʿAbd Allāh b.
Wahb al-Qurašī currently held in a private collection in Rabat.
muʾminīn …, traced in large Maġribī ṯuluṯ.11 In this case, the owner was a son of the third
Almohad caliph, Abū Yūsuf Yaʿqūb al-Manṣūr (r. 580/1185–595/1198).
Between the title and the table of contents of the Sanaa Aġānī are two more own-
ership statements written in Maġribī ṯuluṯ [Ill. 1]. The first reads: ṯumma li-ʿAbd Allāh ibn
al-sayyid Abī al-Ḥasan ibn sayyidinā Abī Ḥafṣ ibn sayyidinā … This note indicates that, at
some point in the first half of the thirteenth century, the manuscript passed from the
library of Abū Zakariyāʾ Yaḥyā to that of his younger relative ʿAbd Allāh, another Almo-
had prince whose grandfather had been the powerful emir Abū Ḥafṣ, brother of the sec-
ond caliph Abū Yaʿqūb Yūsuf. It is likely that, by this time, the manuscript was in Marra-
kesh, the only major city that the Almohads were able to keep under their direct control
during the final decades of their rule. The second ownership statement reads: ṯumma li-
ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn Yūnus ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Hintātī. This
unknown figure belonged to the Hintāta Berber confederation of the High Atlas, known
for their military support of the Almohad movement. The Hintāta remained close allies
to the Almohad caliphs until the end of the dynasty in 668/1269, and during the follow-
ing three centuries they exerted considerable power on the region of Marrakesh.12 It is
therefore possible, if not probable, that the Sanaa Aġānī remained in Marrakesh
throughout the thirteenth century and beyond.
11
https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b11002792v/f4.item.
12
P. de Cenival, “Les émirs des Hintāta, « rois » de Marrakech”, 1937, pp. 245–257. This ownership mark
refers no doubt to one of the awlād Yūnus, the branch of the Hintāta clan that, after the fall of the Almo-
hads, pledged allegiance to the Marinid sultans.
Ill. 4. Ms. Sanaa, Dār al-maḫṭūṭāt, the third vol. of the Kitāb al-aġānī, the encyclopaedic collection
of poems and songs attributed to Abū al-Faraǧ al-Iṣfahānī (284/897–356/967), Yemeni ownership marks.
On the second fly-leaf before the title page are three additional notes, most likely
added in Yemen [Ill. 4]. The lowest one is also the most legible: in it, a Yemeni hand
recorded that Qāsim b. ʿAlī b. Aḥmad bought the manuscript in ṣafar 1261/1845, under
the legal supervision of a faqīh and two witnesses. The two other notes above it are ear-
lier. The upper one is dated muḥarram 1166/1753, and it mentions a certain Aḥmad b.
ʿAlī b. … al-Tihāmī. The middle note mentions the subsequent owner of the book,
namely his son ʿAbd Allāh b. Aḥmad b. ʿAlī al-Tihāmī. The first ownership note confirms
the presence of the manuscript in Yemen in the first half of the nineteenth century,
while the second note indicates that it belonged to individuals of the same family from
the Tihāma, along the Red Sea coast, as early as the first half of the eighteenth century.
On the basis of published catalogues of libraries in and outside Yemen, other
manuscripts containing the Kitāb al-aġānī seem to have circulated in Yemen. In the
Caprotti collection of the Ambrosiana Library, Milan, extracts from the Aġānī are pre-
served in ff. 21b–50a of an undated safīna containing an anthology of poetry, measuring
12 × 17 cm.13 Safīnas are a kind of maǧmūʿ and book format well-attested in Yemen,14 but
13
O. Löfgren & R. Traini, Arabic Manuscripts in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana, 1981, vol. 2, cat. 374.ii, C 118,
pp. 178–179.
14
J. Dufour & A. Regourd, “Les safinas yéménites”, 2020.
for some reason, this safīna was described by Oscar Löfgren & Renato Traini as written
by a “Persian hand”. Other manuscripts indicate that the Kitāb al-aġānī was known and
copied in Yemen. Several examples are preserved in the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, e.g.
Ms. Landberg 370, datable to circa 600/1203 (non vidi, according to the catalogue),
Ms. Glaser 95 (circa 1100/1688); Ms. Glaser 246, (circa 1250/1834) or in Munich, Bayer-
ische Staatsbibliothek München, Ms. Glaser, Cod.arab. 1263 (1087/1676). This suggests a
sustained interest in al-Iṣfahānī’s work among Yemeni readers over the centuries, and
explains the presence of an early manuscript such as the Sanaa Al-aġānī among the
books belonging to successive members of a family from the Tihāma during the eight-
eenth-century 15.
IV. Conclusion
The interest shown by the Almohad ruling élites in the Kitāb al-aġānī, as demonstrated
by both the Sanaa and the BnF manuscripts, was likely due to the prestige attached to
this fundamental work of adab in al-Andalus and the Maġrib. It is worth remembering
here that the Umayyad caliph al-Ḥakam II (r. 350/961–366/976) went to extraordinary
lengths to acquire a copy of the Kitāb al-aġānī directly from its author, and to have it
shipped to Córdoba from Iraq.16 Two centuries later, the Almohads considered them-
selves heirs to the Umayyad caliphs of Córdoba, and they keenly emulated their literary
inclinations and patronage. A thorough examination of the Sanaa Aġānī codex will no
doubt yield significant palaeographic and codicological data that will improve our un-
derstanding of Andalusī and Maġribī manuscript culture during the twelfth century. For
the moment, it has been possible to connect one more manuscript to the activity of the
Cordovan scholar and warrāq Aḥmad b. Yūsuf al-Qaysī, and to the libraries of not one,
but two Almohad princes.
Bibliography
Manuscripts
Berlin, Glaser 95, ca. 1100/1688, Abū al-Faraǧ al-Iṣfahānī, Kitāb al-aġānī,
https://mymssportal.dl.uni-leipzig.de/receive/DE1Book_manuscript_00006509
Glaser 246, ca. 1250/1834, Abū al-Faraǧ al-Iṣfahānī, Kitāb al-aġānī,
https://mymssportal.dl.uni-leipzig.de/receive/DE1Book_manuscript_00005714
Landberg 370, ca. 600/1203, Abū al-Faraǧ al-Iṣfahānī, Kitāb al-aġānī,
https://mymssportal.dl.uni-leipzig.de/receive/DE1Book_manuscript_00007027
15
At least another book by Abū al-Faraǧ al-Iṣfahānī was known in Yemen, Aḫbār maqātil walad Abī Ṭālib,
but obviously for its religious, shʿi content, see the copy dated aḫar yawm raǧab 1055/19 September 1645,
extant in Sanaa in: A. ʿAbd al-R. al-Ruqayḥī, ʿAbd A. M. al-Ḥibšī & ʿA. W. al-Ānisī, Fihris maḫṭūtāt Maktabat
al-Ǧāmiʿ al-kabīr – Sanaa, 1404/1984, vol. 4, pp. 1731-1732, ms. n° 2154.
16
Al-Maqqarī (d. 1632). Nafḥ al-ṭīb min ġuṣn al-Andalus al-raṭīb, 1968, vol. 1, p. 386.
Istanbul, Süleymaniye Library, Köprülü collection, mss Fazıl Ahmet Paşa 347 and 349,
Abū ʿUmar Yūsuf Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr al-Namarī al-Qurṭubī, Al-tamhīd li-mā fī al-
Muwaṭṭaʾ.
Milan, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, ms. C 118, Abū al-Faraǧ al-Iṣfahānī, extracts from Kitāb al-
aġānī.
Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek München, Glaser’s coll., Cod.arab 1263, Abū al-
Faraǧ al-Iṣfahānī, Kitāb al-aġānī,
https://mymssportal.dl.uni-leipzig.de/receive/DE12Book_manuscript_00000487
Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF), ms. Arabe 3298, Abū al-Faraǧ al-Iṣfahānī,
Kitāb al-aġānī, https://archivesetmanuscrits.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cc31195t
Rabat, National Library of the Kingdom of Morocco, ms. 586 J, Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim.
Rabat, private collection, ʿAbd Allāh b. Wahb al-Qurašī, Mašyaḫa.
Printed sources
Abū al-Rabīʿ Sulaymān al-Muwaḥḥid (d. 1207), Dīwān Abī al-Rabīʿ Sulaymān ibn ʿAbd
Allāh al-Muwaḥḥid, ed. Muḥammad al-Ṭanǧī et al., Rabat, Ǧāmiʿat Muḥammad al-
Ḫāmis, 1969.
Al-Maqqarī (d. 1632), Nafḥ al-ṭīb min ġuṣn al-Andalus al-raṭīb, ed. Iḥsān ʿAbbās, Beirut,
Dār Ṣādir, 1968, 8 vols.
Al-Ruqayḥī, Aḥmad ʿAbd al-Razzāq, ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad al-Ḥibšī & ʿAlī Wahhāb al-
Ānisī. 1404/1984. Fihris maḫṭūtāt Maktabat al-Ǧāmiʿ al-kabīr – Sanaa, Sanaa, al-
Ǧumhūriyya al-ʿarabiyya al-yamaniyya, Wizārat al-awqāf wa-al-iršād, 4 vols.