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                                 ANTAR,
                           A BEDOUEEN ROMANCE.

                       TRANSLATED FROM THE ARABIC.

                        BY TERRICK HAMILTON, ESQ.
                ORIENTAL SECRETARY TO THE BRITISH EMBASSY
                           AT CONSTANTINOPLE.

                                 LONDON:
                     JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE-STREET.
                                  1819.

                  London: Printed by W. Bulmer and Co.
                       Cleveland Row, St. James’s.




INTRODUCTION.


The Translator of “The History of Antar” being out of England, it is not
in the Editor’s power to give to the reader much preliminary information
on the contents or nature of the Epic Tale, which is now for the first
time in part submitted to the European Public.

Antar is no imaginary personage. He was the son of an Arab Prince of
the tribe of Abs, by a black woman, whom his father had made captive in
a predatory excursion: and he raised himself by the heroic qualities
which he displayed from his earliest youth, and by his extraordinary
genius for poetry, from the state of slavery in which he was born, to
the confidence of his king, and to a preeminence above all the Chiefs of
Arabia. He flourished during the close of the sixth, and the early part
of the seventh century, of the Christian æra; there is, consequently,
little or no allusion to the customs or institutions of Islamism
throughout the work; though the Hero is frequently designated as “He by
whom God organized the earth and the world for the appearance of the Lord
of slaves.”

The following Romance, as it may be called, was first put together,
probably from traditionary tales current at the time, by Osmay, one of
the eminent scholars, who adorned the courts of Haroun-al-Raschid, and
of his two learned successors, Al-Amyn, and Al-Mamoun; and it still
continues to be the principal source whence the story-tellers of the
coffee-houses in Egypt, Syria, and Arabia, draw their most interesting
tales: but, notwithstanding, its general circulation in the Levant, the
name of Antar is hitherto only known to us in Europe, as that of the
Author of one of the seven poems, suspended in the temple of Mecca, and
from that circumstance called, _The Moallakat_.

The Author of this poem, and the Hero of our history, are identified, as
well by the similar names which occur; in both; as by the insertion of
the poem itself in the body of the history, when, after much persecution
and opposition, Antar at length succeeds in suspending the poem within
the Holy Sanctuary which surrounds the Kaaba.

There is reason to believe that this is the first attempt to transpose
into an European language, a real Arabian story, depicting the original
manners of the Arabs of the desert, uncorrupted by the artificial and
refined customs of the neighbouring cities in Syria, Egypt, and Persia.

The characteristics of the real Arabs or Bedowins are here presented
in their native simplicity. An eager desire for the property of
their neighbour; an unconquerable fondness for strife and battle; a
singular combination of profuse hospitality, with narrow economy—quick
perception—deep cunning—great personal courage, a keen sense of honour,
respect for their women, and a warm admiration and ready use of the
poetical beauties of their unrivalled language.

The supposition of the learned orientalist Mons. Langlès, that the
Thousand and One Nights were originally composed in the Pehlevi, or the
old Persian, and from that language translated into Arabic, appears
still more probable, when we observe the rich and gorgeous descriptions
of the works of art and nature which abound in them, their enchanted
palaces—their sultans and viziers, and all the attendant magnificence of
a court; their genii and magicians—their want of individual character
in the leading personages;—and when we contrast with those details the
simple manners of the Kings and Chieftains of the desert, pourtrayed
in this Romance; their rude tents; the familiarity with which they
live amongst each other, controuled only by the rules of patriarchal
authority; the almost total absence of supernatural agents; and above
all, the striking distinctions of character, which mark the whole
progress of the story. In this work indeed, The Subordination of the
warriors and others, whether of high or low rank, to the irresistible
Antar; in undaunted courage; in active prowess; in intellectual
acquirements; in public spirit; in the ardour of his love; in the
excellence of his poetry; and in acts of private generosity and
benevolence, is strictly consistent with the best rules which the Critics
have derived from the Homeric writings, for the conduct of the Heroic
poem.

In an adherence to these rules indeed, the early European writers of
Romantic Adventures, who followed the age of Charlemagne, and to whom,
perhaps, Antar was better known than to their successors, did not
follow the steps of their prototype. But whether he really deserve that
appellation, that is, whether from the frequent intercourse between the
Eastern and Western kingdoms of the Roman world, in the 8th, 9th and 10th
centuries, our Romance writers imbibed their taste for the adventures of
Chivalry from this singular Tale, is a question, to the solution of which
we may look forward, when the whole of it shall be before the public.
It may be observed, however, that little more was wanting in order to
compose the Romances of the middle age, than to engraft on the war,
love, and courtesy of the Arabs, the splendid and soft luxuries of the
other countries of the East, the witchcraft of Africa, the religious
fervour of the South of Europe, and the gloomy superstitions of the North.

The Editor abstains from adding any further observations at present
upon this subject. It had been his intention to request the indulgence
of the reader for the oriental phraseology which frequently occurs in
the following pages; but he prefers leaving the public to form their
own opinion, how far the Translator has rightly judged, in presenting a
literal translation of his original, by which the Arabic idioms might be
best preserved, rather than (by giving to it a strictly English dress,
and thereby destroying its native freshness,) to have been led into
an indulgence of ornament, which would have been equally remote from
the nice refinement of the languages of Europe, and from the copious
simplicity of that of the desert.




LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF ANTAR.




CHAPTER I.


Ishmael, son of Abraham, was the father of Adnan, who had a son called
Maad