§ I
THE ORIGIN OF THE NIGHTS.
A.--The Birth place.
Here occur the questions, Where and When was written and to Whom do
we owe a prose-poem which, like the dramatic epos of Herodotus, has
no equal?
I proceed to lay before the reader a procčs-verbal of the sundry
pleadings already in court as concisely as is compatible with
intelligibility, furnishing him with references to original
authorities and warning him that a fully-detailed account would
fill a volume. Even my own reasons for decidedly taking one side
and rejecting the other must be stated briefly. And before entering
upon this subject I would distribute the prose-matter of our
Recueil of Folk-lore under three heads
1. The Apologue or Beast-fable proper, a theme which may be of any
age, as it is found in the hieroglyphs and in the cuneiforms.
2. The Fairy-tale, as for brevity we may term the stories based
upon supernatural agency: this was a favourite with olden Persia;
and Mohammed, most austere and puritanical of the "Prophets,"
strongly objected to it because preferred by the more sensible of
his converts to the dry legends of the Talmud and the Koran, quite
as fabulous without the halo and glamour of fancy.
3. The Histories and historical anecdotes, analects, and acroamata,
in which the names, when not used achronistically by the editor or
copier, give unerring data for the earliest date ŕ quo and which,
by the mode of treatment, suggest the latest.
Each of these constituents will require further notice when the
subject-matter of the book is discussed. The metrical portion of
The Nights may also be divided into three categories, viz.:--
1. The oldest and classical poetry of the Arabs, e.g. the various
quotations from the "Suspended Poems."
2. The mediaeval, beginning with the laureates of Al-Rashid's
court, such as Al-Asma'í and Abú Nowás, and ending with Al-Harírí
A.H. 446-516 = 1030-1100.
3. The modern quotations and the pičces de circonstance by the
editors or copyists of the Compilation.[FN#127]
Upon the metrical portion also further notices must be offered at
the end of this Essay.
In considering the uncle derivatur of The Nights we must carefully
separate subject-matter from language-manner. The neglect of such
essential difference has caused the remark, "It is not a little
curious that the origin of a work which has been known to Europe
and has been studied by many during nearly two centuries, should
still be so mysterious, and that students have failed in all
attempts to detect the secret." Hence also the chief authorities at
once branched off into two directions. One held the work to be
practically Persian: the other as persistently declared it to be
purely Arab.
Professor Galland, in his Epistle Dedicatory to the Marquise d'O,
daughter of his patron M. de Guillerague, showed his literary
acumen and unfailing sagacity by deriving The Nights from India via
Persia; and held that they had been reduced to their present shape
by an Auteur Arabe inconnu. This reference to India, also learnedly
advocated by M. Langlčs, was inevitable in those days: it had not
then been proved that India owed all her literature to far older
civilisations and even that her alphabet the Nágari, erroneously
called Devanágari, was derived through Phnicia and Himyar-land
from Ancient Egypt. So Europe was contented to compare The Nights
with the Fables of Pilpay for upwards of a century. At last the
Pehlevi or old Iranian origin of the work found an able and
strenuous advocate in Baron von Hammer-Purgstall [FN#128] who
worthily continued what Galland had begun: although a most inexact
writer, he was extensively read in Oriental history and poetry. His
contention was that the book is an Arabisation of the Persian Hazár
Afsánah or Thousand Tales and he proved his point.
Von Hammer began by summoning into Court the "Herodotus of the
Arabs, (Ali Abú al-Hasan) Al-Mas'údi who, in A.H. 333 (=944) about
one generation before the founding of Cairo, published at Bassorah
the first edition of his far-famed Murúj al-Dahab wa Ma'ádin al-
Jauhar, Meads of Gold and Mines of Gems. The Styrian
Orientalist[FN#129] quotes with sundry misprints[FN#130] an ampler
version of a passage in Chapter lxviii., which is abbreviated in
the French translation of M. C. Barbier de Meynard.[FN#131]
"And, indeed, many men well acquainted with their (Arab)
histories[FN#132] opine that the stories above mentioned and other
trifles were strung together by men who commended themselves to the
Kings by relating them, and who found favour with their
contemporaries by committing them to memory and by reciting them.
Of such fashion[FN#133] is the fashion of the books which have come
down to us translated from the Persian (Fárasiyah), the Indian
(Hindíyah),[FN#134] and the Grćco-Roman (Rúmíyah)[FN#135]: we have
noted the judgment which should be passed upon compositions of this
nature. Such is the book entituled Hazár Afsánah or The Thousand
Tales, which word in Arabic signifies Khuráfah (Faceti): it is
known to the public under the name of [he Boot of a Thousand
Nights and a Night, (Kitab Alf Laylah wa Laylah).[FN#136] This is
an history of a King and his Wazir, the minister's daughter and a
slave-girl (járiyah) who are named Shírzád (lion-born) and Dínár-
zád (ducat-born).[FN#137] Such also is the Tale of Farzah,[FN#138]
(alii Firza), and Simás, containing details concerning the Kings
and Wazirs of Hind: the Book of Al-Sindibád[FN#139] and others of
a similar stamp."
Von Hammer adds, quoting chaps. cxvi. of Al-Mas'údi that Al-Mansúr
(second Abbaside A.H. 136-158 = 754-775, and grandfather of Al-
Rashíd) caused many translations of Greek and Latin, Syriac and
Persian (Pehlevi) works to be made into Arabic, specifying the
"Kalílah wa Damnah,"[FN#140] the Fables of Bidpái (Pilpay), the
Logic of Aristotle, the Geography of Ptolemy and the Elements of
Euclid. Hence he concludes "L'original des Mille et une Nuits * *
* selon toute vraisemblance, a été traduit au temps du Khalife
Mansur, c'est-á-dire trente ans avant le rčgne du Khalife Haroun
al-Raschid, qui, par la suite, devait lui-męme jouer un si grand
rôle dans ces histoires." He also notes that, about a century after
Al-Mas'udi had mentioned the Hazár Afsánah, it was versified and
probably remodelled by one "Rásti," the Takhallus or nom de plume
of a bard at the Court of Mahmúd, the Ghaznevite Sultan who, after
a reign of thirty-three years, ob. A.D. 1030.[FN#141]
Von Hammer some twelve years afterwards (Journ. Asiat August, 1839)
brought forward, in his "Note sur l'origine Persane des Mille et
une Nuits," a second and an even more important witness: this was
the famous Kitab al-Fihrist,[FN#142] or Index List of (Arabic)
works, written (in A.H. 387 = 987) by Mohammed bin Is'hák al-Nadím
(cup-companion or equerry), "popularly known as Ebou Yacoub el-
Werrek."[FN#143] The following is an extract (p. 304) from the
Eighth Discourse which consists of three arts (funún).[FN#144] "The
first section on the history of the confabulatores nocturni
(tellers of night tales) and the relaters of fanciful adventures,
together with the names of books treating upon such subjects.
Mohammed ibn Is'hak saith: The first who indited themes of
imagination and made books of them, consigning these works to the
libraries, and who ordered some of them as though related by the
tongues of brute beasts, were the palćo-Persians (and the Kings of
the First Dynasty). The Ashkanian Kings of the Third Dynasty
appended others to them and they were augmented and amplified in
the days of the Sassanides (the fourth and last royal house). The
Arabs also translated them into Arabic, and the loquent and
eloquent polished and embellished them and wrote others resembling
them. The first work of such kind was entituled The Book of Hazar
Afsán,' signifying Alf Khuráfah, the argument whereof was as
follows. A King of their Kings was wont, when he wedded a woman and
had lain one night with her, to slay her on the next morning.
Presently he espoused a damsel of the daughters of the Kings,
Shahrázád[FN#145] hight, one endowed with intellect and erudition
and, whenas she lay with him, she fell to telling him tales of
fancy; moreover she used to connect the story at the end of the
night with that which might induce the King to preserve her alive
and to ask her of its ending on the next night until a thousand
nights had passed over her. Meanwhile he cohabited with her till
she was blest by boon of child of him, when she acquainted him with
the device she had wrought upon him; wherefore he admired her
intelligence and inclined to her and preserved her life. That King
had also a Kahramánah (nurse and duenna, not entremetteuse), hight
Dínárzád (Dunyázád?), who aided the wife in this (artifice). It is
also said that this book was composed for (or, by) Humái daughter
of Bahman[FN#146] and in it were included other matters. Mohammed
bin Is'hak adds: --And the truth is, Inshallah,[FN#147] that the
first who solaced himself with hearing night-tales was Al-Iskandar
(he of Macedon) and he had a number of men who used to relate to
him imaginary stories and provoke him to laughter: he, however,
designed not therein merely to please himself, but that he might
thereby become the more cautious and alert. After him the Kings in
like fashion made use of the book entitled Hazár Afsán.' It
containeth a thousand nights, but less than two hundred night-
stories, for a single history often occupied several nights. I have
seen it complete sundry times; and it is, in truth, a corrupted
book of cold tales."[FN#148]
A writer in The Athenum,[FN#149] objecting to Lane's modern date
for The Nights, adduces evidence to prove the greater antiquity of
the work. (Abu al-Hasan) Ibn Sa'id (bin Musa al-Gharnati = of
Granada) born in A.H. 615 = 1218 and ob. Tunis A.H. 685 = 1286,
left his native city and arrived at Cairo in A.H. 639 = 1241. This
Spanish poet and historian wrote Al-Muhallá bi al-Ash'ár (The
Adorned with Verses), a Topography of Egypt and Africa, which is
apparently now lost. In this he quotes from Al-Kurtubi, the
Cordovan;[FN#150] and he in his turn is quoted by the Arab
historian of Spain, Abú al-Abbás Ahmad bin Mohammed al Makkári, in
the "Windwafts of Perfume from the Branches of Andalusia the
Blooming"[FN#151] (A.D. 1628-29). Mr. Payne (x. 301) thus
translates from Dr. Dozy's published text.
"Ibn Said (may God have mercy upon him!) sets forth in his book, El
Muhella bi-s-Shaar, quoting from El Curtubi the story of the
building of the Houdej in the Garden of Cairo, the which was of the
magnificent pleasaunces of the Fatimite Khalifs, the rare of
ordinance and surpassing, to wit that the Khalif El Aamir bi-ahkam-
illah[FN#152] let build it for a Bedouin woman, the love of whom
had gotten the mastery of him, in the neighbourhood of the Chosen
Garden'[FN#153] and used to resort often thereto and was slain as
he went thither; and it ceased not to be a pleasuring-place for the
Khalifs after him. The folk abound in stories of the Bedouin girl
and Ibn Meyyah[FN#154] of the sons of her uncle (cousin?) and what
hangs thereby of the mention of El-Aamir, so that the tales told of
them on this account became like unto the story of El
Bettál[FN#155] and the Thousand Nights and a Night and what
resembleth them."
The same passage from Ibn Sa'id, corresponding in three MSS.,
occurs in the famous Khitat[FN#156] attributed to Al-Makrizi (ob.
A.D. 1444) and was thus translated from a MS. in the British Museum
by Mr. John Payne (ix. 303)
"The Khalif El-Aamir bi-ahkam-illah set apart, in the neighbourhood
of the Chosen Garden, a place for his beloved the Bedouin maid
(Aaliyah)[FN#157] which he named El Houdej. Quoth Ibn Said, in the
book El-Muhella bi-l-ashar, from the History of El Curtubi,
concerning the traditions of the folk of the story of the Bedouin
maid and Ibn Menah (Meyyah) of the sons of her uncle and what hangs
thereby of the mention of the Khalif El Aamír bi-ahkam-illah, so
that their traditions (or tales) upon the garden became like unto
El Bettál[FN#158] and the Thousand Nights and what resembleth
them."
This evidently means either that The Nights existed in the days of
Al-'Ámir (xiith cent.) or that the author compared them with a work
popular in his own age. Mr. Payne attaches much importance to the
discrepancy of titles, which appears to me a minor detail. The
change of names is easily explained. Amongst the Arabs, as amongst
the wild Irish, there is divinity (the proverb says luck) in odd
numbers and consequently the others are inauspicious. Hence as Sir
Wm. Ouseley says (Travels ii. 21), the number Thousand and One is
a favourite in the East (Olivier, Voyages vi. 385, Paris 1807), and
quotes the Cistern of the "Thousand and One Columns" at
Constantinople. Kaempfer (Amn, Exot. p. 38) notes of the Takiyahs
or Dervishes' convents and the Mazárs or Santons' tombs near Koniah
(Iconium), "Multa seges sepulchralium quć virorum ex omni ćvo
doctissimorum exuvias condunt, mille et unum recenset auctor Libri
qui inscribitur Hassaaer we jek mesaar (Hazár ve yek Mezár), i.e.,
mille et unum mausolea." A book, The Hazar o yek Ruz ( = 1001
Days), was composed in the mid-xviith century by the famous
Dervaysh Mukhlis, Chief Sofi of Isfahan: it was translated into
French by Petis de la Croix, with a preface by Cazotte, and was
englished by Ambrose Phillips. Lastly, in India and throughout Asia
where Indian influence extends, the number of cyphers not followed
by a significant number is indefinite: for instance, to determine
hundreds the Hindus affix the required figure to the end and for
100 write 101; for 1000, 1001. But the grand fact of the Hazár
Afsánah is its being the archetype of The Nights, unquestionably
proving that the Arab work borrows from the Persian bodily its
cadre or frame-work, the principal characteristic; its exordium and
its dénoűement, whilst the two heroines still bear the old Persic
names.
Baron Silvestre de Sacy[FN#159]--clarum et venerabile nomen--is the
chief authority for the Arab provenance of The Nights. Apparently
founding his observations upon Galland,[FN#160] he is of opinion
that the work, as now known, was originally composed in
Syria[FN#161] and written in the vulgar dialect; that it was never
completed by the author, whether he was prevented by death or by
other cause; and that imitators endeavoured to finish the work by
inserting romances which were already known but which formed no
part of the original recueil, such as the Travels of Sindbad the
Seaman, the Book of the Seven Wazirs and others. He accepts the
Persian scheme and cadre of the work, but no more. He contends that
no considerable body of prć-Mohammedan or non-Arabic fiction
appears in the actual texts[FN#162]; and that all the tales, even
those dealing with events localised in Persia, India, China and
other infidel lands and dated from ante-islamitic ages mostly with
the naďvest anachronism, confine themselves to depicting the
people, manners and customs of Baghdad and Mosul, Damascus and
Cairo, during the Abbaside epoch, and he makes a point of the whole
being impregnated with the strongest and most zealous spirit of
Mohammedanism. He points out that the language is the popular or
vulgar dialect, differing widely from the classical and literary;
that it contains many words in common modern use and that generally
it suggests the decadence of Arabian literature. Of one tale he
remarks:--The History of the loves of Camaralzaman and Budour,
Princess of China, is no more Indian or Persian than the others.
The prince's father has Moslems for subjects, his mother is named
Fatimah and when imprisoned he solaces himself with reading the
Koran. The Genii who interpose in these adventures are, again,
those who had dealings with Solomon. In fine, all that we here find
of the City of the Magians, as well as of the fire-worshippers,
suffices to show that one should not expect to discover in it
anything save the production of a Moslem writer.
All this, with due deference to so high an authority, is very
superficial. Granted, which nobody denies, that the archetypal
Hazár Afsánah was translated from Persic into Arabic nearly a
thousand years ago, it had ample time and verge enough to assume
another and a foreign dress, the corpus however remaining
untouched. Under the hands of a host of editors, scribes and
copyists, who have no scruples anent changing words, names and
dates, abridging descriptions and attaching their own decorations,
the florid and rhetorical Persian would readily be converted into
the straight-forward, business-like, matter of fact Arabic. And
what easier than to islamise the old Zoroasterism, to transform
Ahrimán into Iblís the Shaytan, Ján bin Ján into Father Adam, and
the Divs and Peris of Kayomars and the olden Guebre Kings into the
Jinns and Jinniyahs of Sulayman? Volumes are spoken by the fact
that the Arab adapter did not venture to change the Persic names of
the two heroines and of the royal brothers or to transfer the mise-
en-scčne any whither from Khorasan or outer Persia. Where the story
has not been too much worked by the literato's pen, for instance
the "Ten Wazirs" (in the Bresl. Edit. vi. I9I-343) which is the
Guebre Bakhtiyár-námah, the names and incidents are old Iranian and
with few exceptions distinctly Persian. And at times we can detect
the process of transition, e.g. when the Mázin of Khorásán[FN#163]
of the Wortley Montagu MS. becomes the Hasan of Bassorah of the
Turner Macan MS. (Mac. Edit.).
Evidently the learned Baron had not studied such works as the Totá-
kaháni or Parrot-chat which, notably translated by Nakhshabi from
the Sanskrit Suka-Saptati,[FN#164] has now become as orthodoxically
Moslem as The Nights. The old Hindu Rajah becomes Ahmad Sultan of
Balkh, the Prince is Maymún and his wife Khujisteh. Another
instance of such radical change is the later Syriac version of
Kaliliah wa Dimnah,[FN#165] old "Pilpay" converted to Christianity.
We find precisely the same process in European folk-lore; for
instance the Gesta Romanorum in which, after five hundred years,
the life, manners and customs of the Romans lapse into the knightly
and chivalrous, the Christian and ecclesiastical developments of
mediaeval Europe. Here, therefore, I hold that the Austrian Arabist
has proved his point whilst the Frenchman has failed.
Mr. Lane, during his three years' labour of translation, first
accepted Von Hammer's view and then came round to that of De Sacy;
differing, however, in minor details, especially in the native
country of The Nights. Syria had been chosen because then the most
familiar to Europeans: the "Wife of Bath" had made three
pilgrimages to Jerusalem; but few cared to visit the barbarous and
dangerous Nile-Valley. Mr. Lane, however, was an enthusiast for
Egypt or rather for Cairo, the only part of it he knew; and, when
he pronounces The Nights to be of purely "Arab," that is, of
Nilotic origin, his opinion is entitled to no more deference than
his deriving the sub-African and negroid Fellah from Arabia, the
land per excellentiam of pure and noble blood. Other authors have
wandered still further afield. Some finding Mosul idioms in the
Recueil, propose "Middlegates" for its birth-place and Mr. W. G. P.
Palgrave boldly says "The original of this entertaining work
appears to have been composed in Baghdad about the eleventh
century; another less popular but very spirited version is probably
of Tunisian authorship and somewhat later."[FN#166]
B.--The Date.
The next point to consider is the date of The Nights in its present
form; and here opinions range between the tenth and the sixteenth
centuries. Professor Galland began by placing it arbitrarily in the
middle of the thirteenth. De Sacy, who abstained from detailing
reasons and who, forgetting the number of editors and scribes
through whose hands it must have passed, argued only from the
nature of the language and the peculiarities of style, proposed le
milieu du neuvičme sičcle de l'hégire ( = A.D. 1445-6) as its
latest date. Mr. Hole, who knew The Nights only through Galland's
version, had already advocated in his "Remarks" the close of the
fifteenth century; and M. Caussin (de Perceval), upon the authority
of a supposed note in Galland's MS.[FN#167] (vol. iii. fol. 20,
verso), declares the compiler to have been living in A.D. 1548 and
1565. Mr. Lane says "Not begun earlier than the last fourth of the
fifteenth century nor ended before the first fourth of the
sixteenth," i.e. soon after Egypt was conquered by Selim, Sultan of
the Osmanli Turks in A.D. 1517. Lastly the learned Dr. Weil says in
his far too scanty Vorwort (p. ix. 2nd Edit.):-"Das
wahrscheinlichste dürfte also sein, das im 15. Jahrhundert ein
Egyptier nach altern Vorbilde Erzählungen für 1001 Nächte theils
erdichtete, theils nach mündlichen Sagen, oder frühern
schriftlichen Aufzeichnungen, bearbeitete, dass er aber entweder
sein Werk nicht vollendete, oder dass ein Theil desselben verloren
ging, so dass das Fehlende von Andern bis ins 16. Jahrhundert
hinein durch neue Erzählungen ergänzt wurde."
But, as justly observed by Mr. Payne, the first step when enquiring
into the original date of The Nights is to determine the nucleus of
the Repertory by a comparison of the four printed texts and the
dozen MSS. which have been collated by scholars.[FN#168] This
process makes it evident that the tales common to all are the
following thirteen:--
1. The Introduction (with a single incidental story "The Bull and
the Ass").
2. The Trader and the Jinni (with three incidentals).
3. The Fisherman and the Jinni (with four).
4. The Porter and the Three Ladies of Baghdad (with six).
5. The Tale of the Three Apples.
6. The Tale of Núr-al-Dín Ali and his son Badr al-Dín Hasan.
7. The Hunchback's Tale (with eleven incidentals).
8. Nur al-Dín and Anís al-Jalís.
9. Tale of Ghánim bin 'Ayyúb (with two incidentals).
10. Alí bin Bakkár and Shams al-Nahár (with two).
11. Tale of Kamar al-Zamán.
12. The Ebony Horse; and
13. Julnár the Seaborn.
These forty-two tales, occupying one hundred and twenty Nights,
form less than a fifth part of the whole collection which in the
Mac. Edit.[FN#169] contains a total of two hundred and sixty-four
Hence Dr. Patrick Russell,[FN#170] the Natural Historian of
Aleppo,[FN#171] whose valuable monograph amply deserves study even
in this our day, believed that the original Nights did not
outnumber two hundred, to which subsequent writers added till the
total of a thousand and one was made up. Dr. Jonathan
Scott,[FN#172] who quotes Russell, "held it highly probable that
the tales of the original Arabian Nights did not run through more
than two hundred and eighty Nights, if so many." So this suggestion
I may subjoin, "habent sue fate libelli." Galland, who preserves in
his Mille et une Nuits only about one fourth of The Nights, ends
them in No. cclxiv[FN#173] with the seventh voyage of Sindbad:
after that he intentionally omits the dialogue between the sisters
and the reckoning of time, to proceed uninterruptedly with the
tales. And so his imitator, Petis de la Croix,[FN#174] in his Mille
et un Jours, reduces the thousand to two hundred and thirty-two.
The internal chronological evidence offered by the Collection is
useful only in enabling us to determine that the tales were not
written after a certain epoch: the actual dates and, consequently,
all deductions from them, are vitiated by the habits of the
scribes. For instance we find the Tale of the Fisherman and the
Jinni (vol. i. 41) placed in A.H. I69 = A.D. 785,[FN#175] which is
hardly possible. The immortal Barber in the "Tailor's Tale" (vol.
i. 304) places his adventure with the unfortunate lover on Safar
10, A.H. 653 ( = March 25th, 1255) and 7,320 years of the era of
Alexander.[FN#176] This is supported in his Tale of Himself (vol.
i. pp. 317-348), where he dates his banishment from Baghdad during
the reign of the penultimate Abbaside, Al-Mustansir bi
'llah[FN#177] (A.H. 623-640 = 1225-1242), and his return to Baghdad
after the accession of another Caliph who can be no other but Al-
Muntasim bi 'llah (A.H. 640-656 = A.D. 1242-1258). Again at the end
of the tale (vol. i. 350) he is described as "an ancient man, past
his ninetieth year" and "a very old man" in the days of Al-
Mustansir (vol. i. 318); SO that the Hunchback's adventure can
hardly be placed earlier than A.D. 1265 or seven years after the
storming of Baghdad by Huláku Khan, successor of Janghíz Khan, a
terrible catastrophe which resounded throughout the civilised
world. Yet there is no allusion to this crucial epoch and the total
silence suffices to invalidate the date.[FN#178] Could we assume it
as true, by adding to A.D. 1265 half a century for the composition
of the Hunchback's story and its incidentals, we should place the
earliest date in A.D. 1315.
As little can we learn from inferences which have been drawn from
the body of the book: at most they point to its several editions or
redactions. In the Tale of the "Ensorcelled Prince" (vol. i. 77)
Mr. Lane (i. 135) conjectured that the four colours of the fishes
were suggested by the sumptuary laws of the Mameluke Soldan,
Mohammed ibn Kala'un, "subsequently to the commencement of the
eighth century of the Flight, or fourteenth of our era." But he
forgets that the same distinction of dress was enforced by the
Caliph Omar after the capture of Jerusalem in A.D. 636; that it was
revived by Harun al-Rashid, a contemporary of Carolus Magnus and
that it was noticed as a long standing grievance by the so-called
Mandeville in A.D. 1322. In the Tale of the Porter and the Ladies
of Baghdad the "Sultáni oranges" (vol. i. 83) have been connected
with Sultáníyah city in Persian Irák, which was founded about the
middle of the thirteenth century: but "Sultáni" may simply mean
"royal," a superior growth. The same story makes mention (vol. i.
94) of Kalandars or religious mendicants, a term popularly
corrupted, even in writing, to Karandal.[FN#179] Here again
"Kalandar" may be due only to the scribes as the Bresl. Edit. reads
Sa'alúk = asker, beggar. The Khan al-Masrúr in the Nazarene
Broker's story (i. 265) was a ruin during the early ninth century
A.H. = A.D. 1420; but the Báb Zuwaylah (i. 269) dates from A.D.
1087. In the same tale occurs the Darb al-Munkari (or Munakkari)
which is probably the Darb al-Munkadi of Al-Makrizi's careful
topography, the Khitat (ii. 40). Here we learn that in his time
(about A.D. 1430) the name had become obsolete, and the highway was
known as Darb al-Amír Baktamír al-Ustaddar from one of two high
officials who both died in the fourteenth century (circ. A.D.
1350). And lastly we have the Khan al-Jáwali built about A.D. 1320.
In Badr al-Din Hasan (vol. i. 237) "Sáhib" is given as a Wazirial
title and it dates only from the end of the fourteenth
century.[FN#180] In Sindbad the Seaman, there is an allusion (vol.
vi. 67) to the great Hindu Kingdom, Vijayanagar of the
Narasimha,[FN#181] the great power of the Deccan; but this may be
due to editors or scribes as the despotism was founded only in the
fourteenth century(A.D. 1320). The Ebony Horse (vol. v. 1)
apparently dates before Chaucer; and "The Sleeper and The Waker"
(Bresl. Edit. iv. 134-189) may precede Shakespeare's "Taming of the
Shrew": no stress, however, can be laid upon such resemblances, the
nouvelles being world-wide. But when we come to the last stories,
especially to Kamar al-Zaman II. and the tale of Ma'arúf, we are
apparently in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The first
contains (Night cmlxxvii.) the word Láwandiyah = Levantine, the
mention of a watch = Sá'ah in the next Night[FN#182]; and, further
on (cmlxxvi.), the "Shaykh Al-Islam," an officer invented by
Mohammed II. after the capture of Stambul in A.D. 1453. In Ma'arúf
the 'Ádiliyah is named; the mosque founded outside the Bab al-Nasr
by Al-Malik al-'Ádil, Túmán Bey in A.H. 906 = A.D. 1501. But, I
repeat, all these names may be mere interpolations.
On the other hand, a study of the vie intime in Al-Islam and of the
manners and customs of the people proves that the body of the work,
as it now stands, must have been written before A.D. 1400. The
Arabs use wines, ciders and barley-beer, not distilled spirits;
they have no coffee or tobacco and, while familiar with small-pox
(judrí), they ignore syphilis. The battles in The Nights are fought
with bows and javelins, swords, spears (for infantry) and lances
(for cavalry); and, whenever fire-arms are mentioned, we must
suspect the scribe. Such is the case with the Madfa' or cannon by
means of which Badr Al-Din Hasan breaches the bulwarks of the Lady
of Beauty's virginity (i. 223). This consideration would determine
the work to have been written before the fourteenth century. We
ignore the invention-date and the inventor of gunpowder, as of all
old discoveries which have affected mankind at large: all we know
is that the popular ideas betray great ignorance and we are led to
suspect that an explosive compound, having been discovered in the
earliest ages of human society, was utilised by steps so gradual
that history has neglected to trace the series. According to
Demmin[FN#183], bullets for stuffing with some incendiary
composition, in fact bombs, were discovered by Dr. Keller in the
Palafites or Crannogs of Switzerland; and the Hindu's Agni-Astar
("fire-weapon"), Agni-bán ("fire-arrow") and Shatagni ("hundred-
killer"), like the Roman Phalarica, and the Greek fire of
Byzantium, suggest explosives. Indeed, Dr. Oppert[FN#184] accepts
the statement of Flavius Philostratus that when Appolonius of
Tyana, that grand semi-mythical figure, was travelling in India, he
learned the reason why Alexander of Macedon desisted from attacking
the Oxydracć who live between the Ganges and the Hyphasis (Satadru
or Sutledge):- "These holy men, beloved by the gods, overthrow
their enemies with tempests and thunderbolts shot from their
walls." Passing over the Arab sieges of Constantinople (A.D. 668)
and Meccah (A.D. 690) and the disputed passage in Firishtah
touching the Tufang or musket during the reign of Mahmúd the
Ghaznevite[FN#185] (ob. A.D. 1030), we come to the days of Alphonso
the Valiant, whose long and short guns, used at the Siege of Madrid
in A.D. 1084, are preserved in the Armeria Real. Viardot has noted
that the African Arabs first employed cannon in A.D. 1200, and that
the Maghribis defended Algeciras near Gibraltar with great guns in
A. D. 1247, and utilised them to besiege Seville in A.D. 1342. This
last feat of arms introduced the cannon into barbarous Northern
Europe, and it must have been known to civilised Asia for many a
decade before that date.
The mention of wine in The Nights, especially the Nabíz or
fermented infusion of raisins well known to the prć-Mohammeden
Badawis, perpetually recurs. As a rule, except only in the case of
holy personages and mostly of the Caliph Al-Rashid, the "service of
wine" appears immediately after the hands are washed; and women, as
well as men, drink, like true Orientals, for the honest purpose of
getting drunk-la recherche de l'ideal, as the process has been
called. Yet distillation became well known in the fourteenth
century. Amongst the Greeks and Romans it was confined to
manufacturing aromatic waters, and Nicander the poet (B.C. 140)
used for a still the term , like the Irish "pot" and its
produce "poteen." The simple art of converting salt water into
fresh, by boiling the former and passing the steam through a cooled
pipe into a recipient, would not have escaped the students of the
Philosopher's "stone;" and thus we find throughout Europe the
Arabic modifications of Greek terms Alchemy, Alembic (Al- ),
Chemistry and Elixir; while "Alcohol" (Al-Kohl), originally meaning
"extreme tenuity or impalpable state of pulverulent substances,"
clearly shows the origin of the article. Avicenna, who died in A.H.
428 = 1036, nearly two hundred years before we read of distillation
in Europe, compared the human body with an alembic, the belly being
the cucurbit and the head the capital:-he forgot one important
difference but n'importe. Spirits of wine were first noticed in the
xiiith century, when the Arabs had overrun the Western
Mediterranean, by Arnaldus de Villa Nova, who dubs the new
invention a universal panacea; and his pupil, Raymond Lully (nat.
Majorca A.D. 1236), declared this essence of wine to be a boon from
the Deity. Now The Nights, even in the latest adjuncts, never
allude to the "white coffee" of the "respectable" Moslem, the Ráki
(raisin-brandy) or Ma-hayát (aqua-vitć) of the modern Mohametan:
the drinkers confine themselves to wine like our contemporary
Dalmatians, one of the healthiest and the most vigorous of
seafaring races in Europe.
Syphilis also, which at the end of the xvth century began to infect
Europe, is ignored by The Nights. I do not say it actually began:
diseases do not begin except with the dawn of humanity; and their
history, as far as we know, is simple enough. They are at first
sporadic and comparatively non-lethal: at certain epochs which we
can determine, and for reasons which as yet we cannot, they break
out into epidemics raging with frightful violence: they then
subside into the endemic state and lastly they return to the milder
sporadic form. For instance, "English cholera" was known of old: in
1831 (Oct. 26) the Asiatic type took its place and now, after
sundry violent epidemics, the disease is becoming endemic on the
Northern seaboard of the Mediterranean, notably in Spain and Italy.
So small-pox (Al-judrí, vol. i. 256) passed over from Central
Africa to Arabia in the year of Mohammed's birth (A.D. 570) and
thence overspread the civilised world, as an epidemic, an endemic
and a sporadic successively. The "Greater Pox" has appeared in
human bones of pre historic graves and Moses seems to mention
gonorrha (Levit. xv. 12). Passing over allusions in Juvenal and
Martial,[FN#186] we find Eusebius relating that Galerius died (A.D.
302) of ulcers on the genitals and other parts of his body; and,
about a century afterwards, Bishop Palladius records that one Hero,
after conversation with a prostitute, fell a victim to an abscess
on the penis (phagedćnic shanker?). In 1347 the famous Joanna of
Naples founded (ćt. 23), in her town of Avignon, a bordel whose in-
mates were to be medically inspected a measure to which England
(proh pudor!) still objects. In her Statuts du Lieu-
publiqued'Avignon, No. iv. she expressly mentions the Malvengut de
paillardise. Such houses, says Ricord who studied the subject since
1832, were common in France after A.D. 1200; and sporadic venereals
were known there. But in A.D. 1493-94 an epidemic broke out with
alarming intensity at Barcelona, as we learn from the "Tractado
llamado fructo de todos los Sanctos contra el mal serpentino,
venido de la Isla espanola," of Rodrigo Ruiz Días, the specialist.
In Santo Domingo the disease was common under the names Hipas,
Guaynaras and Taynastizas: hence the opinion in Europe that it
arose from the mixture of European and "Indian" blood.[FN#187] Some
attributed it to the Gypsies who migrated to Western Europe in the
xvth century:[FN#188] others to the Moriscos expelled from Spain.
But the pest got its popular name after the violent outbreak at
Naples in A.D. 1493-4, when Charles VIII. of Anjou with a large
army of mercenaries, Frenchmen, Spaniards, and Germans, attacked
Ferdinand II. Thence it became known as the Mal de Naples and
Morbus Gallicus-una gallica being still the popular term in neo
Latin lands-and the "French disease" in England. As early as July
1496 Marin Sanuto (Journal i. 171) describes with details the "Mal
Franzoso." The scientific "syphilis" dates from Fracastori's poem
(A.D. 1521) in which Syphilus the Shepherd is struck like Job, for
abusing the sun. After crippling a Pope (Sixtus IV.[FN#189]) and
killing a King (Francis I.) the Grosse Vérole began to abate its
violence, under the effects of mercury it is said; and became
endemic, a stage still shown at Scherlievo near Fiume, where legend
says it was implanted by the Napoleonic soldiery. The Aleppo and
other "buttons" also belong apparently to the same grade. Elsewhere
it settled as a sporadic and now it appears to be dying out while
gonorrha is on the increase.[FN#190]
The Nights, I have said, belongs to the days before coffee (A.D.
1550) and tobacco (A.D. 1650) had overspread the East. The former,
which derives its name from the Káfá or Káffá province, lying south
of Abyssinia proper and peopled by the Sidáma Gallas, was
introduced to Mokha of Al-Yaman in A.D. 1429-30 by the Shaykh al-
Sházili who lies buried there, and found a congenial name in the
Arabic Kahwah=old wine.[FN#191] In The Nights (Mac. Edit.) it is
mentioned twelve times[FN#192]; but never in the earlier tales:
except in the case of Kamar al-Zaman II. it evidently does not
belong to the epoch and we may fairly suspect the scribe. In the
xvith century coffee began to take the place of wine in the nearer
East; and it gradually ousted the classical drink from daily life
and from folk-tales.
It is the same with tobacco, which is mentioned only once by The
Nights (cmxxxi.), in conjunction with meat, vegetables and fruit
and where it is called "Tábah." Lane (iii. 615) holds it to be the
work of a copyist; but in the same tale of Abu Kir and Abu Sir,
sherbet and coffee appear to have become en vogue, in fact to have
gained the ground they now hold. The result of Lord Macartney's
Mission to China was a suggestion that smoking might have
originated spontaneously in the Old World.[FN#193] This is un-
doubtedly true. The Bushmen and other wild tribes of Southern
Africa threw their Dakhá (cannabis indica) on the fire and sat
round it inhaling the intoxicating fumes. Smoking without tobacco
was easy enough. The North American Indians of the Great Red Pipe
Stone Quarry and those who lived above the line where nicotiana
grew, used the kinni-kinik or bark of the red willow and some seven
other succedanea.[FN#194] But tobacco proper, which soon superseded
all materials except hemp and opium, was first adopted by the
Spaniards of Santo Domingo in A.D. 1496 and reached England in
1565. Hence the word, which, amongst the so-called Red Men, denoted
the pipe, the container, not the contained, spread over the Old
World as a generic term with additions, like Tutun,''[FN#195] for
special varieties. The change in English manners brought about by
the cigar after dinner has already been noticed; and much of the
modified sobriety of the present day may be attributed to the
influence of the Holy Herb en cigarette. Such, we know from history
was its effect amongst Moslems; and the normal wine-parties of The
Nights suggest that the pipe was unknown even when the latest tales
were written.
C.
We know absolutely nothing of the author or authors who produced
our marvellous Recueil. Galland justly observes (Epist. Dedic.),
"probably this great work is not by a single hand; for how can we
suppose that one man alone could own a fancy fertile enough to
invent so many ingenious fictions?" Mr. Lane, and Mr. Lane alone,
opined that the work was written in Egypt by one person or at most
by two, one ending what the other had begun, and that he or they
had re-written the tales and completed the collection by new matter
composed or arranged for the purpose. It is hard to see how the
distinguished Arabist came to such a conclusion: at most it can be
true only of the editors and scribes of MSS. evidently copied from
each other, such as the Mac. and the Bul. texts. As the Reviewer
(Forbes Falconer?) in the "Asiatic Journal" (vol. xxx., 1839) says,
"Every step we have taken in the collation of these agreeable
fictions has confirmed us in the belief that the work called the
Arabian Nights is rather a vehicle for stories, partly fixed and
partly arbitrary, than a collection fairly deserving, from its
constant identity with itself, the name of a distinct work, and the
reputation of having wholly emanated from the same inventive mind.
To say nothing of the improbability of supposing that one
individual, with every license to build upon the foundation of
popular stories, a work which had once received a definite form
from a single writer, would have been multiplied by the copyist
with some regard at least to his arrangement of words as well as
matter. But the various copies we have seen bear about as much
mutual resemblance as if they had passed through the famous process
recommended for disguising a plagiarism: Translate your English
author into French and again into English'."
Moreover, the style of the several Tales, which will be considered
in a future page (§ iii.), so far from being homogeneous is
heterogeneous in the extreme. Different nationalities show them
selves; West Africa, Egypt and Syria are all represented and, while
some authors are intimately familiar with Baghdad, Damascus and
Cairo, others are equally ignorant. All copies, written and
printed, absolutely differ in the last tales and a measure of the
divergence can be obtained by comparing the Bresl. Edit. with the
Mac. text: indeed it is my conviction that the MSS. preserved in
Europe would add sundry volumes full of tales to those hitherto
translated; and here the Wortley Montagu copy can be taken as a
test. We may, I believe, safely compare the history of The Nights
with the so-called Homeric poems, the Iliad and the Odyssey, a
collection of immortal ballads and old Epic formulć and verses
traditionally handed down from rhapsode to rhapsode, incorporated
in a slowly-increasing body of poetry and finally welded together
about the age of Pericles.
To conclude. From the data above given I hold myself justified in
drawing the following deductions:--
1. The framework of the book is purely Persian perfunctorily
arabised; the archetype being the Hazár Afsánah.[FN#196]
2. The oldest tales, such as Sindibad (the Seven Wazirs) and
King Jili'ád, may date from the reign of Al-Mansur, eighth century
A.D.
3. The thirteen tales mentioned above (p. 78) as the nucleus
of the Repertory, together with "Dalilah the Crafty,"[FN#197] may
be placed in our tenth century.
4. The latest tales, notably Kamar al-Zaman the Second and
Ma'aruf the Cobbler, are as late as the sixteenth century.
5. The work assumed its present form in the thirteenth
century.
6. The author is unknown for the best reason; there never was
one: for information touching the editors and copyists we must
await the fortunate discovery of some MSS.
§ II.
THE NIGHTS IN EUROPE.
The history of The Nights in Europe is one of slow and gradual
development. The process was begun (1704-17) by Galland, a
Frenchman, continued (1823) by Von Hammer an Austro-German, and
finished by Mr. John Payne (1882-84) an Englishman. But we must
not forget that it is wholly and solely to the genius of the Gaul
that Europe owes "The Arabian Nights' Entertainments" over which
Western childhood and youth have spent so many spelling hours.
Antoine Galland was the first to discover the marvellous fund of
material for the story-teller buried in the Oriental mine; and he
had in a high degree that art of telling a tale which is far more
captivating than culture or scholarship. Hence his delightful
version (or perversion) became one of the world's classics and at
once made Sheherazade and Dinarzarde, Haroun Alraschid, the
Calendars and a host of other personages as familiar to the home
reader as Prospero, Robinson Crusoe, Lemuel Gulliver and Dr.
Primrose. Without the name and fame won for the work by the
brilliant paraphrase of the learned and single-minded Frenchman,
Lane's curious hash and latinized English, at once turgid and
emasculated, would have found few readers. Mr. Payne's admirable
version appeals to the Orientalist and the "stylist," not to the
many-headed; and mine to the anthropologist and student of
Eastern manners and customs. Galland did it and alone he did it:
his fine literary flaire, his pleasing style, his polished taste
and perfect tact at once made his work take high rank in the
republic of letters nor will the immortal fragment ever be
superseded in the infallible judgment of childhood. As the
Encyclopćdia Britannica has been pleased to ignore this excellent
man and admirable Orientalist, numismatologist and littérateur,
the reader may not be unwilling to see a short sketch of his
biography.[FN#198]
Antoine Galland was born in A.D. 1646 of peasant parents "poor
and honest" at Rollot, a little bourg in Picardy some two leagues
from Montdidier. He was a seventh child and his mother, left a
widow in early life and compelled to earn her livelihood, saw
scant chance of educating him when the kindly assistance of a
Canon of the Cathedral and President of the Collége de Noyon
relieved her difficulties. In this establishment Galland studied
Greek and Hebrew for ten years, after which the "strait thing at
home" apprenticed him to a trade. But he was made for letters;
he hated manual labour and he presently removed en cachette to
Paris, where he knew only an ancient kinswoman. She introduced
him to a priestly relative of the Canon of Noyon, who in turn
recommended him to the "Sous-principal" of the Collége Du
Plessis. Here he made such notable progress in Oriental studies,
that M. Petitpied, a Doctor of the Sorbonne, struck by his
abilities, enabled him to study at the Collége Royal and
eventually to catalogue the Eastern MSS. in the great
ecclesiastical Society. Thence he passed to the Collége Mazarin,
where a Professor, M. Godouin, was making an experiment which
might be revived to advantage in our present schools. He
collected a class of boys, aged about four, and proposed to teach
them Latin speedily and easily by making them converse in the
classical language as well as read and write it.[FN#199] Galland,
his assistant, had not time to register success or failure before
he was appointed attaché-secretary to M. de Nointel named in 1660
Ambassadeur de France for Constantinople. His special province
was to study the dogmas and doctrines and to obtain official
attestations concerning the articles of the Orthodox (or Greek)
Christianity which had then been a subject of lively discussion
amongst certain Catholics, especially Arnauld (Antoine) and
Claude the Minister, and which even in our day occasionally crops
up amongst "Protestants."[FN#200] Galland, by frequenting the
cafés and listening to the tale-teller, soon mastered Romaic and
grappled with the religious question, under the tuition of a
deposed Patriarch and of sundry Matráns or Metropolitans, whom
the persecutions of the Pashas had driven for refuge to the
Palais de France. M. de Nointel, after settling certain knotty
points in the Capitulations, visited the harbour-towns of the
Levant and the "Holy Places," including Jerusalem, where Galland
copied epigraphs, sketched monuments and collected antiques, such
as the marbles in the Baudelot Gallery of which Pčre Dom Bernard
de Montfaucon presently published specimens in his ''Palćographia
Grćca," etc. (Parisiis, 1708).
In Syria Galland was unable to buy a copy of The Nights: as he
expressly states in his Epistle Dedicatory, il a fallu le faire
venir de Syrie. But he prepared himself for translating it by
studying the manners and customs, the religion and superstitions
of the people; and in 1675, leaving his chief, who was ordered
back to Stambul, he returned to France. In Paris his numismatic
fame recommended him to MM. Vaillant, Carcary and Giraud who
strongly urged a second visit to the Levant, for the purpose of
collecting, and he set out without delay. In 1691 he made a
third journey, travelling at the expense of the Compagnie des
Indes-Orientales, with the main object of making purchases for
the Library and Museum of Colbert the magnificent. The
commission ended eighteen months afterwards with the changes of
the Company, when Colbert and the Marquis de Louvois caused him
to be created "Antiquary to the King," Louis le Grand, and
charged him with collecting coins and medals for the royal
cabinet. As he was about to leave Smyrna, he had a narrow escape
from the earthquake and subsequent fire which destroyed some
fifteen thousand of the inhabitants: he was buried in the ruins;
but, his kitchen being cold as becomes a philosopher's, he was
dug out unburnt.[FN#201]
Galland again returned to Paris where his familiarity with Arabic
and Hebrew, Persian and Turkish recommended him to MM. Thevenot
and Bignon: this first President of the Grand Council
acknowledged his services by a pension. He also became a
favourite with D'Herbelot whose Bibliothčque Orientale, left
unfinished at his death, he had the honour of completing and
prefacing.[FN#202] President Bignon died within the twelvemonth,
which made Galland attach himself in 1697 to M. Foucault,
Councillor of State and Intendant (governor) of Caen in Lower
Normandy, then famous for its academy: in his new patron's fine
library and numismatic collection he found materials for a long
succession of works, including a translation of the
Koran.[FN#203] They recommended him strongly to the literary
world and in 1701 he was made a member of the Académie des
Inscriptions et Belles Lettres.
At Caen Galland issued in 1704,[FN#204] the first part of his
Mille et une Nuits, Contes Arabes traduits en François which at
once became famous as "The Arabian Nights' Entertainments."
Mutilated, fragmentary and paraphrastic though the tales were,
the glamour of imagination, the marvel of the miracles and the
gorgeousness and magnificence of the scenery at once secured an
exceptional success; it was a revelation in romance, and the
public recognised that it stood in presence of a monumental
literary work. France was a-fire with delight at a something so
new, so unconventional, so entirely without purpose, religious,
moral or philosophical: the Oriental wanderer in his stately
robes was a startling surprise to the easy-going and utterly
corrupt Europe of the ancien régime with its indecently tight
garments and perfectly loose morals. "Ils produisirent," said
Charles Nodier, a genius in his way, "dčs le moment de leur
publication, cet effet qui assure aux productions de l'esprit une
vogue populaire, quoiqu'ils appartinssent ŕ une littérature peu
connue en France; et que ce genre de composition admit ou plutôt
exigeât des détails de moeurs, de caractčre, de costume et de
localités absolument étrangers ŕ toutes les idées établies dans
nos contes et nos romans. On fut étonné du charme que résultait
du leur lecture. C'est que la vérité des sentimens, la nouveauté
des tableaux, une imagination féconde en prodiges, un coloris
plein de chaleur, l'attrait d'une sensibilité sans prétention, et
le sel d'un comique sans caricature, c'est que l'esprit et le
naturel enfin plaisent partout, et plaisent ŕ tout le
monde."[FN#205]
The Contes Arabes at once made Galland's name and a popular tale
is told of them and him known to all reviewers who, however,
mostly mangle it. In the Biographie Universelle of
Michaud[FN#206] we find:--Dans les deux premiers volumes de ces
contes l'exorde était toujours, "Ma chčre sur, si vous ne dormez
pas, faites-nous un de ces contes que vous savez." Quelques
jeunes gens, ennuyés de cette plate uniformité, allčrent une nuit
qu'il faisait trčs-grand froid, frapper ŕ la porte de l'auteur,
qui courut en chemise ŕ sa fenętre. Aprčs l'avoir fait morfondre
quelque temps par diverses questions insignificantes, ils
terminčrent en lui disant, "Ah, Monsieur Galland, si vous ne
dormez pas, faites-nous un de ces beaux contes que vous savez si
bien." Galland profita de la lecon, et supprima dans les volumes
suivants le préambule qui lui avait attiré la plaisanterie. This
legend has the merit of explaining why the Professor so soon gave
up the Arab framework which he had deliberately adopted.
The Nights was at once translated from the French[FN#207] though
when, where and by whom no authority seems to know. In Lowndes'
"Bibliographer's Manual" the English Editio Princeps is thus
noticed, "Arabian Nights' Entertainments translated from the
French, London, 1724, 12mo, 6 vols." and a footnote states that
this translation, very inaccurate and vulgar in its diction, was
often reprinted. In 1712 Addison introduced into the Spectator
(No. 535, Nov. 13) the Story of Alnaschar ( = Al-Nashshár, the
Sawyer) and says that his remarks on Hope "may serve as a moral
to an Arabian tale which I find translated into French by
Monsieur Galland." His version appears, from the tone and style,
to have been made by himself, and yet in that year a second
English edition had appeared. The nearest approach to the Edit.
Princeps in the British Museum[FN#208] is a set of six volumes
bound in three and corresponding with Galland's first half dozen.
Tomes i. and ii. are from the fourth edition of 1713, Nos. iii.
and iv. are from the second of 1712 and v. and vi. are from the
third of 1715. It is conjectured that the two first volumes were
reprinted several times apart from their subsequents, as was the
fashion of the day; but all is mystery. We (my friends and I)
have turned over scores of books in the British Museum, the
University Library and the Advocates' Libraries of Edinburgh and
Glasgow: I have been permitted to put the question in "Notes and
Queries" and in the "Antiquary"; but all our researches hitherto
have been in vain.
The popularity of The Nights in England must have rivalled their
vogue in France, judging from the fact that in 1713, or nine
years after Galland's Edit. Prin. appeared, they had already
reached a fourth issue. Even the ignoble national jealousy which
prompted Sir William Jones grossly to abuse that valiant scholar,
Auquetil du Perron, could not mar their popularity. But as there
are men who cannot read Pickwick, so they were not wanting who
spoke of "Dreams of the distempered fancy of the East."[FN#209]
"When the work was first published in England," says Henry
Webber,[FN#210] "it seems to have made a considerable impression
upon the public." Pope in 1720 sent two volumes (French? or
English?) to Bishop Atterbury, without making any remark on the
work; but, from his very silence, it may be presumed that he was
not displeased with the perusal. The bishop, who does not appear
to have joined a relish for the flights of imagination to his
other estimable qualities, expressed his dislike of these tales
pretty strongly and stated it to be his opinion, formed on the
frequent descriptions of female dress, that they were the work of
some Frenchman (Petis de la Croix, a mistake afterwards corrected
by Warburton). The Arabian Nights, however, quickly made their
way to public favour. "We have been informed of a singular
instance of the effect they produced soon after their first
appearance. Sir James Stewart, Lord Advocate for Scotland,
having one Saturday evening found his daughters employed in
reading these volumes, seized them with a rebuke for spending the
evening before the 'Sawbbath' in such worldly amusement; but the
grave advocate himself became a prey to the fascination of the
tales, being found on the morning of the Sabbath itself employed
in their perusal, from which he had not risen the whole night."
As late as 1780 Dr. Beattie professed himself uncertain whether
they were translated or fabricated by M. Galland; and, while Dr.
Pusey wrote of them "Noctes Mille et Una dictć, quć in omnium
firmč populorum cultiorum linguas conversć, in deliciis omnium
habentur, manibusque omnium terentur,"[FN#211] the amiable
Carlyle, in the gospel according to Saint Froude,
characteristically termed them "downright lies" and forbade the
house to such "unwholesome literature." What a sketch of
character in two words!
The only fault found in France with the Contes Arabes was that
their style is peu correcte; in fact they want classicism. Yet
all Gallic imitators, Trébutien included, have carefully copied
their leader and Charles Nodier remarks:--"Il me semble que l'on
n'a pas rendu assez de justice au style de Galland. Abondant sans
ętre prolixe, naturel et familier sans ętre lâche ni trivial, il
ne manque jamais de cette elegance qui résulte de la facilité, et
qui présente je ne sais quel mélange de la naďveté de Perrault et
de la bonhomie de La Fontaine."
Our Professor, with a name now thoroughly established, returned
in 1706 to Paris, where he was an assiduous and efficient member
of the Société Numismatique and corresponded largely with foreign
Orientalists. Three years afterwards he was made Professor of
Arabic at the Collége de France, succeeding Pierre Dippy; and,
during the next half decade, he devoted himself to publishing his
valuable studies. Then the end came. In his last illness, an
attack of asthma complicated with pectoral mischief, he sent to
Noyon for his nephew Julien Galland[FN#212] to assist him in
ordering his MSS. and in making his will after the simplest
military fashion: he bequeathed his writings to the Bibliothčque
du Roi, his Numismatic Dictionary to the Academy and his Alcoran
to the Abbé Bignon. He died, aged sixty-nine on February 17,
1715, leaving his second part of The Nights unpublished.[FN#213]
Professor Galland was a French littérateur of the good old school
which is rapidly becoming extinct. Homme vrai dans les moindres
choses (as his Éloge stated); simple in life and manners and
single-hearted in his devotion to letters, he was almost childish
in worldly matters, while notable for penetration and acumen in
his studies. He would have been as happy, one of his biographers
remarks, in teaching children the elements of education as he was
in acquiring his immense erudition. Briefly, truth and honesty,
exactitude and indefatigable industry characterised his most
honourable career.
Galland informs us (Epist. Ded.) that his MS. consisted of four
volumes, only three of which are extant,[FN#214] bringing the
work down to Night cclxxxii., or about the beginning of
"Camaralzaman." The missing portion, if it contained like the
other volumes 140 pages, would end that tale together with the
Stories of Ghánim and the Enchanted (Ebony) Horse; and such is
the disposition in the Bresl. Edit. which mostly favours in its
ordinance the text used by the first translator. But this would
hardly have filled more than two-thirds of his volumes; for the
other third he interpolated, or is supposed to have interpolated,
the ten[FN#215] following tales.
1. Histoire du prince Zeyn Al-asnam et du Roi des
Génies.[FN#216]
2. Histoire de Codadad et de ses frčres.
3. Histoire de la Lampe merveilleuse (Aladdin).
4. Histoire de l'aveugle Baba Abdalla.
5. Histoire de Sidi Nouman.
6. Histoire de Cogia Hassan Alhabbal.
7. Histoire d'Ali Baba, et de Quarante Voleurs exterminés par
une Esclave.
8. Histoire d'Ali Cogia, marchand de Bagdad.
9. Histoire du prince Ahmed et de la fée Peri-Banou.
10. Histoire de deux Surs jalouses de leur Cadette.[FN#217]
Concerning these interpolations which contain two of the best and
most widely known stories in the work, Aladdin and the Forty
Thieves, conjectures have been manifold but they mostly run upon
three lines. De Sacy held that they were found by Galland in the
public libraries of Paris. Mr. Chenery, whose acquaintance with
Arabic grammar was ample, suggested that the Professor had
borrowed them from the recitations of the Rawis, rhapsodists or
professional story-tellers in the bazars of Smyrna and other
ports of the Levant. The late Mr. Henry Charles Coote (in the
"Folk-Lore Record," vol. iii. Part ii. p. 178 et seq.), "On the
source of some of M. Galland's Tales," quotes from popular
Italian, Sicilian and Romaic stories incidents identical with
those in Prince Ahmad, Aladdin, Ali Baba and the Envious Sisters,
suggesting that the Frenchman had heard these paramythia in
Levantine coffee-houses and had inserted them into his unequalled
corpus fabularum. Mr. Payne (ix. 268) conjectures the
probability "of their having been composed at a comparatively
recent period by an inhabitant of Baghdad, in imitation of the
legends of Haroun er Rashid and other well-known tales of the
original work;" and adds, "It is possible that an exhaustive
examination of the various MS. copies of the Thousand and One
Nights known to exist in the public libraries of Europe might yet
cast some light upon the question of the origin of the
interpolated Tales." I quite agree with him, taking "The Sleeper
and the Waker'' and "Zeyn Al-asnam" as cases in point; but I
should expect, for reasons before given, to find the stories in a
Persic rather than an Arabic MS. And I feel convinced that all
will be recovered: Galland was not the man to commit a literary
forgery.
As regards Aladdin, the most popular tale of the whole work, I am
convinced that it is genuine, although my unfortunate friend, the
late Professor Palmer, doubted its being an Eastern story. It is
laid down upon all the lines of Oriental fiction. The
mise-en-scčne is China, "where they drink a certain warm liquor"
(tea); the hero's father is a poor tailor; and, as in "Judar and
his Brethren," the Maghribi Magician presently makes his
appearance, introducing the Wonderful Lamp and the Magical Ring.
Even the Sorcerer's cry, "New lamps for old lamps !"--a prime
point--is paralleled in the Tale of the Fisherman's Son,[FN#218]
where the Jew asks in exchange only old rings and the Princess,
recollecting that her husband kept a shabby, well-worn ring in
his writing-stand, and he being asleep, took it out and sent it
to the man. In either tale the palace is transported to a
distance and both end with the death of the wicked magician and
the hero and heroine living happily together ever after.
All Arabists have remarked the sins of omission and commission,
of abridgment, amplification and substitution, and the audacious
distortion of fact and phrase in which Galland freely indulged,
whilst his knowledge of Eastern languages proves that he knew
better. But literary license was the order of his day and at
that time French, always the most begueule of European languages,
was bound by a rigorisme of the narrowest and the straightest of
lines from which the least ecart condemned a man as a barbarian
and a tudesque. If we consider Galland fairly we shall find that
he errs mostly for a purpose, that of popularising his work; and
his success indeed justified his means. He has been derided (by
scholars) for "Hé Monsieur!" and "Ah Madame!"; but he could not
write "O mon sieur" and "O ma dame;" although we can borrow from
biblical and Shakespearean English, "O my lord!" and "O my lady!"
"Bon Dieu! ma sur" (which our translators English by "O
heavens," Night xx.) is good French for Wa'lláhi--by Allah; and
"cinquante cavaliers bien faits" ("fifty handsome gentlemen on
horseback") is a more familiar picture than fifty knights.
"L'officieuse Dinarzade" (Night lxi.), and "Cette plaisante
querelle des deux frčres" (Night 1xxii.) become ridiculous only
in translation--"the officious Dinarzade" and "this pleasant
quarrel;" while "ce qu'il y de remarquable" (Night 1xxiii.) would
relieve the Gallic mind from the mortification of "Destiny
decreed." "Plusieurs sortes de fruits et de bouteilles de vin"
(Night ccxxxi. etc.) Europeanises flasks and flaggons; and the
violent convulsions in which the girl dies (Night cliv., her head
having been cut off by her sister) is mere Gallic squeamishness:
France laughs at "le shoking" in England but she has only to look
at home especially during the reign of Galland's contemporary--
Roi Soleil. The terrible "Old man" (Shaykh) "of the Sea" (-
board) is badly described by "l'incommode vieillard" ("the ill-
natured old fellow"): "Brave Maimune" and "Agréable Maimune" are
hardly what a Jinni would say to a Jinniyah (ccxiii.); but they
are good Gallic. The same may be noted of "Plier les voiles pour
marque qu'il se rendait" (Night ccxxxv.), a European practice;
and of the false note struck in two passages. "Je m'estimais
heureuse d'avoir fait une si belle conquęte" (Night 1xvii.) gives
a Parisian turn; and, "Je ne puis voir sans horreur cet
abominable barbier que voilŕ: quoiqu'il soit né dans un pays oů
tout le monde est blanc, il ne laisse pas ŕ resembler a un
Éthiopien; mais il a l'âme encore plus noire et horrible que le
visage" (Night clvii.), is a mere affectation of Orientalism.
Lastly, "Une vieille dame de leur connaissance" (Night clviii.)
puts French polish upon the matter of fact Arab's "an old woman."
The list of absolute mistakes, not including violent liberties,
can hardly be held excessive. Professor Weil and Mr. Payne (ix.
271) justly charge Galland with making the Trader (Night i.)
throw away the shells (écorces) of the date which has only a
pellicle, as Galland certainly knew; but dates were not seen
every day in France, while almonds and walnuts were of the quatre
mendiants. He preserves the écorces, which later issues have
changed to noyaux, probably in allusion to the jerking practice
called Inwá. Again in the "First Shaykh's Story" (vol. i. 27)
the "maillet" is mentioned as the means of slaughtering cattle,
because familiar to European readers: at the end of the tale it
becomes "le couteaufuneste." In Badral Din a "tarte ŕ la cręme,"
so well known to the West, displaces, naturally enough, the
outlandish "mess of pomegranate-seeds." Though the text
especially tells us the hero removed his bag-trousers (not only
"son habit") and placed them under the pillow, a crucial fact in
the history, our Professor sends him to bed fully dressed,
apparently for the purpose of informing his readers in a foot-
note that Easterns "se couchent en caleçon" (Night lxxx.). It
was mere ignorance to confound the arbalčte or cross-bow with the
stone-bow (Night xxxviii.), but this has universally been done,
even by Lane who ought to have known better; and it was an
unpardonable carelessness or something worse to turn Nár (fire)
and Dún (in lieu of) into "le faux dieu Nardoun" (Night lxv.): as
this has been untouched by De Sacy, I cannot but conclude that he
never read the text with the translation. Nearly as bad also to
make the Jewish physician remark, when the youth gave him the
left wrist (Night cl.), "voilŕ une grande ignorance de ne savoir
pas que l'on presente la main droite ŕ un médecin et non pas la
gauche"--whose exclusive use all travellers in the East must
know. I have noticed the incuriousness which translates "along
the Nile-shore" by "up towards Ethiopia" (Night cli.), and the
"Islands of the Children of Khaledan" (Night ccxi.) instead of
the Khálidatáni or Khálidát, the Fortunate Islands. It was by no
means "des petite soufflets" ("some taps from time to time with
her fingers") which the sprightly dame administered to the
Barber's second brother (Night clxxi.), but sound and heavy
"cuffs" on the nape; and the sixth brother (Night clxxx.) was not
"aux lčvres fendues" ("he of the hair-lips"), for they had been
cut off by the Badawi jealous of his fair wife. Abu al-Hasan
would not greet his beloved by saluting "le tapis ŕ ses pieds:"
he would kiss her hands and feet. Haďatalnefous (Hayat al-Nufús,
Night ccxxvi.) would not "throw cold water in the Princess's
face:" she would sprinkle it with eau-de-rose. "Camaralzaman" I.
addresses his two abominable wives in language purely European
(ccxxx.), "et de la vie il ne s'approcha d'elles," missing one of
the fine touches of the tale which shows its hero a weak and
violent man, hasty and lacking the pundonor. "La belle
Persienne," in the Tale of Nur al-Din, was no Persian; nor would
her master address her, "Venez çŕ, impertinente!" ("come hither,
impertinence"). In the story of Badr, one of the Comoro Islands
becomes "L'île de la Lune." "Dog" and "dog-son" are not "injures
atroces et indignes d'un grand roi:" the greatest Eastern kings
allow themselves far more energetic and significant language.
Fitnah[FN#219] is by no means "Force de curs." Lastly the
dénoűement of The Nights is widely different in French and in
Arabic; but that is probably not Galland's fault, as he never saw
the original, and indeed he deserves high praise for having
invented so pleasant and sympathetic a close, inferior only to
the Oriental device.[FN#220]
Galland's fragment has a strange effect upon the Orientalist and
those who take the scholastic view, be it wide or narrow. De
Sacy does not hesitate to say that the work owes much to his
fellow-countryman's hand; but I judge otherwise: it is necessary
to dissociate the two works and to regard Galland's paraphrase,
which contains only a quarter of The Thousand Nights and a Night,
as a wholly different book. Its attempts to amplify beauties and
to correct or conceal the defects and the grotesqueness of the
original, absolutely suppress much of the local colour, clothing
the bare body in the best of Parisian suits. It ignores the
rhymed prose and excludes the verse, rarely and very rarely
rendering a few lines in a balanced style. It generally rejects
the proverbs, epigrams and moral reflections which form the pith
and marrow of the book; and, worse still, it disdains those finer
touches of character which are often Shakespearean in their depth
and delicacy, and which, applied to a race of familiar ways and
thoughts, manners and customs, would have been the wonder and
delight of Europe. It shows only a single side of the gem that
has so many facets. By deference to public taste it was
compelled to expunge the often repulsive simplicity, the childish
indecencies and the wild orgies of the original, contrasting with
the gorgeous tints, the elevated morality and the religious tone
of passages which crowd upon them. We miss the odeur du sang
which taints the parfums du harem; also the humouristic tale and
the Rabelaisian outbreak which relieve and throw out into strong
relief the splendour of Empire and the havoc of Time. Considered
in this light it is a caput mortuum, a magnificent texture seen
on the wrong side; and it speaks volumes for the genius of the
man who could recommend it in such blurred and caricatured
condition to readers throughout the civilised world. But those
who look only at Galland's picture, his effort to "transplant
into European gardens the magic flowers of Eastern fancy," still
compare his tales with the sudden prospect of magnificent
mountains seen after a long desert-march: they arouse strange
longings and indescribable desires; their marvellous
imaginativeness produces an insensible brightening of mind and an
increase of fancy-power, making one dream that behind them lies
the new and unseen, the strange and unexpected--in fact, all the
glamour of the unknown.
The Nights has been translated into every far-extending Eastern
tongue, Persian, Turkish and Hindostani. The latter entitles
them Hikáyát al-Jalílah or Noble Tales, and the translation was
made by Munshi Shams al-Din Ahmad for the use of the College of
Fort George in A.H. 1252 = 1836.[FN#221] All these versions are
direct from the Arabic: my search for a translation of Galland
into any Eastern tongue has hitherto been fruitless.
I was assured by the late Bertholdy Seemann that the "language of
Hoffmann and Heine" contained a literal and complete translation
of The Nights; but personal enquiries at Leipzig and elsewhere
convinced me that the work still remains to be done. The first
attempt to improve upon Galland and to show the world what the
work really is was made by Dr. Max Habicht and was printed at
Breslau (1824-25), in fifteen small square volumes.[FN#222] Thus
it appeared before the "Tunis Manuscript"[FN#223] of which it
purports to be a translation. The German version is, if
possible, more condemnable than the Arabic original. It lacks
every charm of style; it conscientiously shirks every difficulty;
it abounds in the most extraordinary blunders and it is utterly
useless as a picture of manners or a book of reference. We can
explain its lâches only by the theory that the eminent Professor
left the labour to his collaborateurs and did not take the
trouble to revise their careless work.
The next German translation was by Aulic Councillor J. von
Hammer-Purgstallt who, during his short stay at Cairo and
Constantinople, turned into French the tales neglected by
Galland. After some difference with M. Caussin (de Perceval) in
1810, the Styrian Orientalist entrusted his MS. to Herr Cotta the
publisher of Tubingen. Thus a German version appeared, the
translation of a translation, at the hand of Professor
Zinserling,[FN#224] while the French version was unaccountably
lost en route to London. Finally the "Contes inédits," etc.,
appeared in a French translation by G. S. Trébutien (Paris,
mdcccxxviii.). Von Hammer took liberties with the text which can
compare only with those of Lane: he abridged and retrenched till
the likeness in places entirely disappeared; he shirked some
difficult passages and he misexplained others. In fact the work
did no honour to the amiable and laborious historian of the
Turks.
The only good German translation of The Nights is due to Dr.
Gustav Weil who, born on April 24, 1808, is still (1886)
professing at Heidelburg.[FN#225] His originals (he tells us)
were the Breslau Edition, the Bulak text of Abd al-Rahman al-
Safati and a MS. in the library of Saxe Gotha. The venerable
savant, who has rendered such service to Arabism, informs me that
Aug. Lewald's "Vorhalle" (pp. i.-xv.)[FN#226] was written without
his knowledge. Dr. Weil neglects the division of days which
enables him to introduce any number of tales: for instance,
Galland's eleven occupy a large part of vol. iii. The Vorwort
wants development, the notes, confined to a few words, are
inadequate and verse is everywhere rendered by prose, the Saj'a
or assonance being wholly ignored. On the other hand the scholar
shows himself by a correct translation, contrasting strongly with
those which preceded him, and by a strictly literal version, save
where the treatment required to be modified in a book intended
for the public. Under such circumstances it cannot well be other
than longsome and monotonous reading.
Although Spain and Italy have produced many and remarkable
Orientalists, I cannot find that they have taken the trouble to
translate The Nights for themselves: cheap and gaudy versions of
Galland seem to have satisfied the public.[FN#227] Notes on the
Romaic, Icelandic, Russian (?) and other versions, will be found
in a future page.
Professor Galland has never been forgotten in France where,
amongst a host of editions, four have claims to
distinction;[FN#228] and his success did not fail to create a
host of imitators and to attract what De Sacy justly terms "une
prodigieuse importation de marchandise de contrabande." As early
as 1823 Von Hammer numbered seven in France (Trébutien, Préface
xviii.) and during later years they have grown prodigiously. Mr.
William F. Kirby, who has made a special study of the subject,
has favoured me with detailed bibliographical notes on Galland's
imitators which are printed in Appendix No. II.
