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Prosody and the Initial Formation of Classical ArabicAuthor(s): Farhat J. ZiadehSource:

Journal of the American Oriental Society,

Vol. 106, No. 2, (Apr. - Jun., 1986), pp. 333-338Published by: American Oriental SocietyStable URL:

http://www.jstor.org/stable/601598

Accessed: 10/04/2008 21:35

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ProsodiandtheInitial FormationofClassicalArabicArabicprosodyhad had atellingeffect on the formation of the classical Arabiclanguage.Itisgenerally agreed amongscholars that classical Arabic was asuper-tribal language,akoine,thatwasused inpre-lslamicArabiaby poets,seers,andcomposersofrhymed prose,and that itneverconstitutedthespokenvernacular ofanyoneArabic-speakingtribeorgroup.It,thus,wasnever a"natural"languagebut a "cultivated"languagethatdevelopedin such awayasto fit thepurposefor whichitwasused,namelypoetrywith itsproblemsofprosody, particularlymeter,andrhymedprose.Evidencepresentedsuggeststhat meterandrhymewere instrumentalinshapingthemorphologicalstructureof thelanguageby forcingthepoetsto coin new wordforms,tomodifyothers,andgenerallyto makemanyfeaturesofthelanguageserve therequirementsofmeter,andsometimesrhyme.Theevidence consistsofthe resultsof themolding processin thelanguageas itisknown tousinpre-lslamicpoetry,theQur'an,and laterliteraryworks.For some timenow,Ihave had thesuspicionthatArabicprosodyhas hadatellingeffect onthe formationoftheclassical Arabiclanguage(hereafterc.a.l.).It isgenerallyagreed amongWestern scholars thatc.a.l.was asupertriballanguage,akoine,that was usedinpre-IslamicArabiabypoets,seers andcomposersofrhymed prose,and thatit neverconstitutedthespokenvernacularofanyoneArabic-speakingtribe orgroup.'TraditionalMuslimscholarsmaintain,ofcourse,thatc.a.l.representedthelanguageoftheQurayshtribe,thetribeof theProphetMuhammad,inasmuchas theQur'anemploysthatlanguage,but thatview is evenques-tionedbymodernArablinguistswhoassert thatc.a.l.de-velopedas a distinctentitydifferent from the vernaculars ofQurayshorTamim oranyother tribe.2 If weassumethekoinetheorytobetrue,then itfollows thatc.a.l.was never a"natural"anguagebuta"cultivated"anguagethatdevelopedinsuch awayastofit thepurposefor whichitwasused,namely poetrywith itsproblemsofprosody,particularlymeter,andrhymedprose.It willbe remembered thatinpre-IslamicArabia literature consistedalmostexclusivelyofpoetryandrhymed prose.Scholars havealreadypointedout thatpoets,in theirendeavortofindtherightword for agivenmetricalpositionoragiven rhymescheme,often drewuponthediverse tribaldialects whichsuppliedsuch words.Examplesincludedequiva-lent forms ofdemonstrativepronouns,verbalnouns,andbrokenplurals.3ThisprocessofborrowingfromthevariousSeeMichaelZwettler,The OralTraditionofClassicalArabicPoetry (Columbus,Ohio,1978)p.101 and theauthor-itiesquotedthere.

SeeforinstanceM.T.al-Duwayk,"Al-Lughahal-'ArabTyahal-Mushtarakah,"Al-Sharqal-Awsat(14-2-1983)p.12.

Zwettler,p.11and the authoritiescitedthere.333dialectsmight helpexplainthe rich stock ofsynonymsandnearsynonymsfound in classicalArabicpoetryforobjects,concepts,andactivities.4Thispaper,however,proposestogo beyondtheprocessofborrowing,describedbythesescholars,to offersomeevi-dence that meter andrhymewere instrumentalinshapingthemorphologicalstructureofthelanguage by forcingthepoetstocoin newwordforms,tomodifyothers,andgenerallytomakemanyfeaturesof thelanguageserve therequirementsofmeter,and sometimesrhyme.That thisprocess mightnothave beenlimited to theArabiclanguagecan begleanedfromwhatM.Parrysaid about the Greeklanguage.In his"TheHomericLanguageas theLanguageofan OralPoetry"hesaysthatthe oralpoetinformulatinghispoetrymight repeatan element of dictionthat had been heardlongago,ormodifyoradapthistraditional dictiontoproducea newelement,oradopta word orusagefrom aspeech groupotherthan hisownbecause it had nomaterialequivalentin hisownspeech,oreven,under thepressureofaparticularmetricalneed,generatean otherwisenonexistent formtofilloutaline.5H. A.R.Gibb,speakingofthe"un-expectedness"ofpre-Islamicpoetry,says,"Atone momentArabiaseems,inaliterarysense,emptyanddumb ... at thenext,companiesofpoetsspringupallover NorthernArabia,recitingcomplexodes ... withvividness ofimagination... inaninfinitelyrichandhighlyarticulatedlanguage."6Thismightbe trueonlyifweunderstandby"moment"asufficientperiodinhistorytoallowforthedeveloment ofan"articulatedlanguage"to fittheexacting requirementsofmeterandrhyme.CharlesJamesLyall,inhisIntroduction toAncientArabianPoetrysays:

Ibid.

TheMaking ofHomeric Verse:TheCollectedPapersofMilmanParry,ed.A.Parry (Oxford,1971)p.334,asquotedinZwettler,p.99.

Journalofthe American OrientalSociety106.2(1986)It isimpossibleto fix withany degreeofcertaintythedatewhen theArabs firstbegantopractisethe artofpoetry.Theoldestpoetsof whom we haveanyre-mainsbelongto thetime...[of]about ahundredandthirtyyearsbefore theFlight[Hi'ra].Butthesearespokenof,not as the inventors ofthepoeticart,butasthe authoritiesfor the laws of theKasidahorode.... Whatwepossessof thedistinguishedpoetstowhom theselaws were due is cast in forms whichwecannotbutsupposetobetheoutcome of alongeducationin the construction of verse. Thenumberandcomplexityof the measures whichtheyuse,theirestablishedlaws ofquantityandrhyme,andtheuni-form mannerinwhichtheyintroduce thesubjectsoftheirpoems, notwithstandingthe distance whichoftenseparatedonecomposerfromanother,allpointtoalong previousstudyandcultivationof theartofexpressionand thecapacitiesof theirlanguage,astudyofwhichnorecordnowremains.7Itisthecontention of thispaperthat inthislongperiodofcultivatingthe artofexpressionand thecapacityof thelanguagetodeal withitcertain features of thelanguageweremolded,modified,oreven invented toaccommodatemeter,rhyme,and assonance.Theresultwastheclassical Arabiclanguagethat theQur'dnlaterused-with certainmodifica-tions derivedostensiblyfromthe dialect ofQuraysh-andthat has been usedeversinceastheliterarylanguage.Here,aquestion mightlegitimatelyberaised astowhetherwearenotputtingthecart before thehorse insayingthat theverse metershapedthelanguage,whereas the naturalprocessis for thelanguagetoshapethemeter,sincelanguagecomesfirst inpointof time.Thismightbetrueinnaturallyspokenlanguages,butc.a.l.,aspointedoutabove,wasdevelopedasanartificial,supra-tribal,languageforthepurposeof com-posingpoetryto beunderstood inArabia from the confines ofSyriain the Northto theYemenintheSouth,andthereforeithad to beresponsiveto therequirementsofpoetry.Thebaseforthislanguage,however,must havebeen adialectordialects located mostprobablyin northandnortheast Arabiafrom wheremostof theearlypoetshailed.Theevidence that willbepresentedmust,inthe nature ofthings,becircumstantial;itconsists inthemain ofthe resultsofthemoldingprocessin thelanguageasitis known tousinpre-Islamicpoetry,theQur'5n,andlaterliteraryworks.Evensome evidence of themoldingprocessitself canbe detected inthose works intheattemptofthelanguagetoaccommodatemeter,rhyme,andassonance.

ArabicLiterature,Oxford, 1963,p.13.

7Translations

ofAncientArabianPoetry(Edinburgh,1885)pp.xv-xvi.A word ofcaution isnecessaryhere.At the outset of thispaperwe said thatwe havehad thesuspicionthat Arabicprosodyinfluencedtheformation ofc.a.l. Butsuspicionsometimesleadstoparanoiawhich seesevidence where noneis found!If weshould reachthatpointwehopethatreaderswill set usaright.Thefirst anddisarminglyobviousevidence is afeature ofthelanguagefor whichgrammarianshaveformulatedtherule:man'ilhiqa'al-sakina'n,(nojuxtapositionofvowellessconsonants)or no consonantclusters.8It isknown,though,that atleast modern Arabiccolloquialdialects dohandleconsonantclusters,and one wouldassume,for lackofevidenceto thecontrary,thatancient dialectshandled themaswell.Whyshould c.a.l. thenabjurethem?The answermightbefoundin themeterofArabicpoetrywhich iscomposedofvaryingseriesofshort andlong syllablesmadeupof cvforshort,andcvor cvc forlongsyllables.No othercombination(e.g.,vcc orccv)ispossible.To fit into thismeter,thesyllablesofc.a.l.had to conformtocv,cv,and cvcpatternsonly.EventheQuraniccvc-cvc(e.g.,radlun)becomes inpoetryci-cv-cvc.9Tobesure,linguistshaverecognizedthatthemostcommontypeofsyllablestructureofworldlanguagesis cv orcvc.Ifso,then itcanbesaid thatthepoetseitherpreserved,orharked backto,thatoriginalcharacterof thelanguage.The othercategoryof evidencepertainstobrokenpluralsandtheirmyriadforms.Why,onemightask,are thereseveralpluralsfor a non-derived noun? It hasalreadybeensuggestedthatthepoetofc.a.l.oftendrewuponthediverse tribaldialectswhichsupplieda brokenpluralto fit ametricalpositionor arhymescheme.'0Mightnotsuch apoetuse abrokenplural patternto invent a newpluralof anoun,oreven tomodifyapatternbyaddingafeminineta'orelongatinga shortvowelto fithismetricalposition?Totestthe firstproposition,I askeda number ofmyfellowArabistswhatthewordashharmeant,and allanswered "months"withouthesitation,althoughthey qualifiedtheir answerbysayingthat sucha word hasnot beenusedinc.a.l. But ifapoethaduseditin apoeticalformulaandotherpoetsfollowedsuit,the wordwouldhave becomeastandardplural,asprobablymanyothershave becomein asimilarfashion. Asan actualexampleof thisprocess,onemightcite theQuranicusageof

'ijaf

asthepluralof

'Ca/a',

"lean,"insteadoftheregularplural

'u/f

because of thedesire toproduceanassonance oraparallelism.Thereference hereistoSurahXII,

Theonlyquasi-,exceptionis inwordslikejaffunwherethealifisconsidered avowelless letterfollowedbyanothervowellessletter.But inrealitythealifis alongvowel,and therulestillapplies.It isinstructivethatsuchwords canonlybeaccommodated inpoetrybytheformjarfifun.9Seenote8 above.