Arabic Beyond the Arabs
Habib the Slav writes in praise of his people
حبيبٌ الصَّقلبيّ يكتب في فضل قومه
The Slavs of Córdoba were slaves brought young from Europe, who learned Arabic until poets, writers and philologists arose among them. In the time of al-Manṣūr ibn Abī ʿĀmir one of them, named Ḥabīb, wrote a book called «The Book of Proof and Contest against Those Who Deny the Merits of the Slavs», gathering their poems and stories. He defended his people in Arabic, and argued their case in it.
- In brief
- A Slav who wrote a book in Arabic answering those who denied his people's merit
«ورأيت تأليفًا لرجلٍ منهم يُدعى بحبيب مترجمًا بـ"كتاب الاستظهار والمغالبة على من أنكر فضائل الصقالبة"، وذكر فيه جملةً من أشعارهم ونوادر أخبارهم.»
Ṣaqāliba, singular ṣaqlabī, is the name of the Slavic peoples, taken into Arabic from Byzantine Greek (Sklavos, Sklavenoi), itself from the Slavs' own name. Medieval Latin sclavus meant "Slav" and then "slave", so many of them having been enslaved – whence English slave and French esclave. That is why al-Andalus called European slaves in general «Ṣaqāliba», Slavs or not.
Pérès places the book under al-Ḥakam al-Mustanṣir; Ibn Bassam and al-Maqqari (Nafḥ al-ṭīb 3/82) place it in the time of al-Manṣūr ibn Abī ʿĀmir, and Ibn al-Abbar's al-Takmila names Ḥabīb the Slav among the young men of the Umayyad palace in Córdoba.
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Sources
- ابن بسّام، الذخيرة، القسم الرابع، المجلّد الأوّل
- المقّريّ، نفح الطيب، تحقيق إحسان عبّاس، ٣/٨٢
- ابن الأبّار، التكملة لكتاب الصلة، رقم ٧٦٠
- هنري بيريس، مجلّة المجمع العلميّ العربيّ ١٩/٩ (١٩٤٤م)، ص٣٩٩–٤٠٠
- American Heritage Dictionary: slave, from Medieval Latin sclāvus, from Sclāvus, Slav
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