Note 481
A popular phrase, derived from the Koranic "Truth is come, and falsehood is vanished: for falsehood is of short continuance" (chapt. xvii.). It is an equivalent of our adaptation f…
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Notes to The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 — Page 21
698 notes in Richard Francis Burton translation. Follow a thought back to its place in the book.
698 notes
Note 482
In Night lxxv. these lines will occur with variants.
Read the noteNote 483
This is always mentioned: the nearer seat the higher the honour.
Read the noteNote 484
Alluding to the phrase "Al-safar zafar" = voyaging is victory (Pilgrimage i., 127).
Read the noteNote 485
Arab. "Habb;" alluding to the black drop in the human heart which the Archangel Gabriel removed from Mohammed by opening his breast.
Read the noteNote 486
This phrase, I have said, often occurs: it alludes to the horripilation (Arab. Kush'arírah), horror or gooseflesh which, in Arab as in Hindu fables, is a symptom of great joy. So B…
Read the noteNote 487
Arab. "Hasanta ya Hasan" = Bene detto, Benedetto! the usual word-play vulgarly called "pun": Hasan (not Hassan, as we will write it) meaning "beautiful."
Read the noteNote 488
Arab. "Loghah" also = a vocabulary, a dictionary; the Arabs had them by camel-loads.
Read the noteNote 489
The seventh of the sixteen "Bahr" (metres) in Arabic prosody; the easiest because allowing the most license and, consequently, a favourite for didactic, homiletic and gnomic themes…
Read the noteNote 490
"Her stature tall—I hate a dumpy woman" (Don Juan).
Read the noteNote 491
A worthy who was Kazi of Kufah (Cufa) in the seventh century. Al-Najaf, generally entitled "Najaf al-Ashraf" (the Venerand) is the place where Ali, the son-in-law of Mohammed, lies…
Read the noteNote 492
Usually by all manner of extortions and robbery, corruption and bribery, the ruler's motto being Fiat injustitia ruat Coelum. There is no more honest man than the Turkish peasant o…
Read the noteNote 493
Arab. "Malik" (King) and "Malak" (angel) the words being written the same when lacking vowels and justifying the jingle. [FN #494] Arab. "Hurr"; the Latin "ingenuus," lit. freeborn…
Read the noteNote 495
This is one of the best tales for humour and movement, and Douce and Madden show what a rich crop of fabliaux, whose leading incident was the disposal of a dead body, it produced.
Read the noteNote 496
Other editions read, "at Bassorah" and the Bresl. (ii. 123) "at Bassorah and Kájkár" (Káshghár): somewhat like in Dover and Sebastopol. I prefer China because further off and makin…
Read the noteNote 497
Arab. "Judri," lit. "small stones" from the hard gravelly feeling of the pustules (Rodwell, p. 20). The disease is generally supposed to be the growth of Central Africa where it is…
Read the noteNote 498
In Europe we should add "and all fled, especially the women." But the fatalism inherent in the Eastern mind makes the great difference.
Read the noteNote 499
Arab. "Uzayr." Esdras was a manner of Ripp van Winkle. He was riding over the ruins of Jerusalem when it had been destroyed by the Chaldeans and he doubted by what means Allah woul…
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Arab. "Bádhanj," the Pers. Bád. (wind) -gír (catcher): a wooden pent-house on the terrace-roof universal in the nearer East.
Read the noteNote 501
The hunchback, in Arabia as in Southern Europe, is looked upon by the vulgar with fear and aversion. The reason is that he is usually sharper-witted than his neighbours.
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Arab. "Yá Sattár" = Thou who veilest the discreditable secrets of Thy creatures.
Read the noteNote 503
Arab. "Nasráni," a follower of Him of Nazareth and an older name than "Christian" which (Acts xi., 26) was first given at Antioch about A.D. 43. The cry in Alexandria used to be "Y…
Read the noteNote 504
Arab. "Tasbíh," = Saluting in the Subh (morning).
Read the noteNote 505
In the East women stand on minor occasions while men squat on their hunkers in a way hardly possible to an untrained European. The custom is old. Herodotus (ii., 35) says, "The wom…
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