Great Books of Islamic Civilization

Ibn ∏Abd The Center for Muslim Contribution to Civilization

Rabbih

the Unique Necklace

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l-‘Iqd al-Farı̄d (The Unique Necklace) is one of the classics of Arabic literature.
Compiled in several volumes by an Andalusian scholar and poet named Ibn

Unique Necklace
‘Abd Rabbih (246–328 A.H. / 860–940 C.E.), it remains a mine of information
about various elements of Arab culture and letters during the four centuries before his
death. Essentially it is a book of adab, a term understood in modern times to specifically
Unique

Volume II
mean literature but in earlier times its meaning included all that a well-informed person
had to know in order to pass in society as a cultured and refined individual. This
meaning later evolved and included belles lettres in the form of elegant prose and verse
that was as much entertaining as it was morally educational, such as poetry, pleasant
anecdotes, proverbs, historical accounts, general knowledge, wise maxims, and even
practical philosophy.
Ibn ‘Abd Rabbih’s imagination and organization saved his encyclopedic
compendium from becoming a chaotic jumble of materials by conceiving of it as a
necklace composed of twenty-five ‘books’, each of which carried the name of a jewel.
Necklace
Each of the twenty-five ‘books’ was organized around a major theme and had an
introduction written by Ibn ‘Abd Rabbih, followed by his relevant adab selections of
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verse and prose on the theme of the ‘book’. He drew on a vast repertoire of sources
including the Bible, the Qur’an and the Hadith, and the works of al-Jahiz, ibn Qutayba,
al-Mubarrad,Abu ‘Ubayda ibn al-Muthanna and several others, as well as the diwans of
many Arab poets, including his own poetry.
Volume I of this translation of Al-‘Iqd al-Farı̄d (Garnet Publishing, 2006) contained
four of its twenty-five ‘books’.The present volume,Volume II, contains two more.
The translator Issa J. Boullata is a literary critic and scholar, who also writes fiction.
Al-‘Iqd al Farı-d
Formerly Professor of Arabic Literature at McGill University, Montreal, Canada, he has
published several books, including Trends and Issues in Contemporary Arab Thought (1990)
and a novel in Arabic, Homecoming to Jerusalem (1998), in addition to numerous studies OR
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of Arabic literature, book reviews, short stories in English, and translations of Arabic
poetry and novels.
The reviewer Terri DeYoung is Associate Professor in the Department of Near
Ibn ∏Abd Rabbih
Eastern Languages and Civilization at the University of Washington, Seattle, USA. Her Center for
Muslim
book, Placing the Poet: Badr Shakir al-Sayyab and Postcolonial Iraq, won a Choice Award Contribution to
(given by the American Association of Research Libraries) in 1998. She has also Civilization
co-edited a volume of essays in honor of Professor Mounah Khouri, Tradition and Doha, Qatar
Translated by Professor Issa J. Boullata
Modernity in Arabic Literature (1997), with Professor Issa Boullata of McGill University.

RELIGION
Reviewed by Professor Terri DeYoung
ISBN 978-1-85964-226-9

9 781859 642269