Abū al-Faraj ʿAlī ibn al-Ḥusayn al-Iṣbahānī (284/897 – c. 360/970), a resident of Baghdad for much of his career, and member of a Zaydī Shīʿī family, was a prominent scholar and, it seems, administrator in fourth/tenth-century Iraq. A long list of books is attributed to him, only four of which have survived more or less in their entirety. Of these the best known are the Maqātil al-Ṭālibiyin, a chronicle, organized by biographical entry, of the deaths of prominent Shī`ī figures of early Islamic history; and the Kitāb al-Aghānī, an enormous work – twenty-four thick volumes in one modern edition – covering early medieval Middle Eastern music, poetry, culture and society. The book is not easily described: it is organized around a large set of select songs, most of which are quoted very briefly, with additional comments on their composition, meaning and other salient facts. To this core material, Abū al-Faraj added a copious body of information on Arab tribes in the early Islamic period, the court life of the Umayyads (the first imperial dynasty of Islam), and the affairs of the early Abbasid caliphate, especially as it relates to the busy musical and literary culture of Baghdad up to the fourth/tenth century.

To bring order to this vast material, Abū al-Faraj organized it into distinct biographical articles on prominent singers, musicians, poets and composers. The text provided here derives from the article on Shāriya, a singer and performer of third/ninth century Baghdad and Samarra, the second of the Abbasid imperial capital cities. She is reported to have been born in Basra – her specific dates are not known – to a prominent Arab father and an unnamed concubine mother of unknown background. Brief references have Shāriya purchased first by a leading Arab family, the Banū Hāshim, then by Ibrāhīm ibn al-Mahdī, a member of the Abbasid ruling house and a skilled musician and composer in his own right. It was from Ibn al-Mahdī that she is said to have acquired her training and many of the songs that she went on to make famous. The article recounts only a small part of her life and career; what we learn, however, suggests very clearly the presence in medieval Middle Eastern cultural life of several generations of women singers, performers and composers who, by dint of skill, effort and the support of patrons, succeeded in achieving considerable social mobility.

Translated from the Arabic by Matthew Gordon. ʿAlī ibn al-Ḥusayn al-Iṣbahānī, Kitāb al-Aghānī, edited by `Abd al-Amīr ʿAlī Mahannā and Samīr Jābir (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiya, 1992), 16:6-7. This translation CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.

Muḥammad ibn Ibrāhīm ibn Qurayḍ[1] informed me[2] of Shāriya’s life and career. He indicated that Ibn al-Muʿtazz had provided him with his own book about her, saying that he was to cite him properly. He – Ibn Qurayḍ – said: “I copied from him what I thought was suitable for my book with his stipulation in mind and added other information about her that I came upon in books other than his. I gathered this information directly from each of these sources. Ibn al-Muʿtazz recounted the following information, citing ʿĪsā ibn Hārūn al-Manṣūrī as his source.

“Shāriya belonged to a Hashimite woman from Basra, a descendant of Jaʿfar ibn Sulaymān. The woman took her to Baghdad intending to sell her. She first presented her to Isḥāq ibn Ibrāhīm al-Mawṣilī who offered three hundred dinars but then, thinking the amount excessive, withdrew the bid. She then approached Ibrāhīm ibn al-Mahdī and presented Shāriya to him. He haggled over her price. Shāriya’s owner replied: ‘I have an offer out to Isḥāq ibn Ibrāhīm of three hundred dinars but you, my lord – may God keep you – are far more deserving of her.’ He ordered that very amount to be measured out and given to her. He then summoned the head of his household (Arabic, qayyima): ‘Secret this young (slave) woman away for a year and tell the other women singers to teach her all they know.’

A year later she was brought before him; he examined her thoroughly and listened to her sing. He then contacted Isḥāq ibn Ibrāhīm al-Mawṣilī, inviting him to see Shāriya and hear her perform. ‘I mean to sell her,’ he said, ‘Would you consider buying her?’ Isḥāq: ‘I’ll take her for three thousand dinars, which I think a fair price.’ Ibrāhīm: ‘Do you not recognize her?’ ‘No.’ ‘She is the young slave that the Hashimite woman offered to you for three hundred dinars, but you turned her down.’ Isḥāq, much embarrassed, expressed his astonishment at how she had turned out.”

[1] Or, possibly, Qurayṣ.

[2] That is, Abū al-Faraj al-Iṣbahānī.

Discussion Questions

  1. In what sense is Shāriya herself present in this account?
  2. In what sense is she treated here as a commodity?
  3. What does the brief account suggest of the manner in which younger singers, especially those of humble, including slave, background, climbed the social and professional ladder? What ingredients were required if one was to be successful in this regard?
  4. What does the text suggest of the overlap of slavery, the traffic in enslaved persons, social networking and elite medieval Middle Eastern culture?

Related Primary Sources

Themes

Elite Slaves, Labor, Music, Property, Trade, Women