Eastern Dreams (4 page)

Much of this Muslim cultural flowering occurred during the five-hundred-year Abbasid caliphate (749–1258
CE
), a golden age of high civilization recalled as fondly in Islam as is King Arthur's quasi-mythical Camelot in the West. Supplanting the Umayyad caliphs who ruled the Middle East for most of a century following Muhammad's death, the Abbasid family (descended from al-Abbas, an uncle of the Prophet) initiated the greatest period of sustained intellectual inquiry in Islam's history.

Cognizant of the power of knowledge, the Abbasids presided over a time when Arab culture lay so far above the West as to be practically astral. No better symbol of their civilization exists than the Abbasids' fantastical capital of Baghdad, at its peak the greatest and, at almost a million inhabitants, the most populous, city outside China. Constructed over a four-year period in the eighth century to replace the Umayyad centre of Damascus as the capital of Islam, Baghdad typified the intellectual ferment of the Abbasid caliphate, becoming “
a Paris of the ninth century”—a legend of the best of humanity.

Built by the western banks of the Tigris River in northern Mesopotamia (Iraq), Baghdad lay on trade routes linking modern Syria, Iraq, Iran, India and China. The city's location southwest of Damascus spread the caliphate eastward, absorbing influences from Persia and the Far East as the capital quickly became an important western terminus of the fabled Silk Road. Known formally as
Madinat al-Salaam or “the City of Peace,” Baghdad was more commonly called “the Round City” because of its perfectly circular, thirty-metre-high walls. The early town was structured as a series of concentric circles emanating from a central core containing the Grand Mosque and the caliph's palace compound, but over time the metropolis expanded beyond its original walls to the eastern banks of the Tigris as numerous suburbs and workers' communities developed around the original city.

Within a generation, Baghdad enjoyed a reputation as a place of extravagant fortune—the richest and most beautiful urban centre on earth. It is said that in the caliph's palace there existed a shining mercury pond on which floated tiny golden boats, as well as an artificial tree on whose branches mechanical birds sang and chirped when prompted by hidden devices. An army of city workers walked constantly through Baghdad's earthen streets, sprinkling scented water to settle the dust and leave a lingering sweetness in the air. Citizens could attend polo matches, listen to poetry or story recitals, visit zoos (where, legends say, the last phoenix in captivity was housed), browse through a hundred bookshops or seek earthier delights in quarters where secret cabarets were held.

All the same, the City of Peace was no mere pleasure-place, for at its height Baghdad teemed with libraries, workshops, academies, a free public hospital and even an astronomical observatory for charting the stars. Law, medicine, mathematics, optics and astronomy were all studied and taught in Baghdadi academies. It was here that the mathematician Muhammad al-Khwarizimi wrote a book entitled
Kitab al-Jabr wa l-Muquabala
(
The Book of Reduction and Comparison
), giving the world both the word and the system known as “algebra.” Plato, Aristotle and other classical writers from Greece, Rome, Persia, India and even China were translated in the place where al-Khwarizimi worked, the Dar al-Hikma or “House of Wisdom”—essentially, Baghdad's version
of Alexandria's great library—and their ideas assimilated into Islamic, and eventually western, thought.

Baghdad was not just the capital of a far-flung Muslim empire. For its time it was a revolutionarily cosmopolitan place, home not only to Muslims but to whosoever accepted Abbasid rule and subjected themselves to Islamic law. Merchants and travellers from as far afield as Spain and China congregated in the city to exchange trade goods, news, views and stories as pagans, Jews, Christians, Zoroastrians, Hindus and Buddhists found themselves part of one of the earliest and most culturally integrated cities on the planet—a kind of medieval Muslim New York.

The entire caliphate, in fact, reflected the diversity of peoples found within all the widespread political systems. For five centuries, the black-and-gold Abbasid banner fluttered over lands from Egypt to India, encompassing a host of cultures and resources and turning the caliphate into one of the most prosperous regimes of the period. It is no coincidence that the earliest prototypes of
The Thousand and One Nights
were set down and compiled in a land composed of so many different peoples.
Arabian Nights
' tales concern not only Arabs and Persians but Indians, Chinese, Jews, Greeks (Alexander the Great, known as
Iskander Dhoulkernein
or “Alexander the Two-Horned,” figures in more than one story), Africans and even “Franks” (Europeans), reflecting a multi-ethnic culture presided over by a generally tolerant Muslim hierarchy.

In a society where much of the population was of mixed lineage, there was little tension caused by racial prejudice, and few rivalries born of creed or religious differences. Enjoying an elevated standard of living based on commercial importance and administrative efficiency, the Abbasid caliphate is the capital of Muslim heritage, a civilization centred in a marvel town that has assumed the status of a shining city in a golden time—one immortalized by the English poet James Thomson in his “Castle of Indolence”:

Such the gay Splendor, the luxurious State,
Of
Caliphs
old, who on the Tygris' Shore,
In mighty
Bagdat
, populous and great,
Held their bright Court, where was of Ladies shore;
And Verse, Love, Music, still the Garland wore.

The analogy between Abbasid Baghdad and Camelot is not as unrealistic as it might seem, since the caliphate had its own version of King Arthur among its rulers—the fifth caliph, known as Haroun al-Rashid or “Aaron, the Righteous.” Like his legendary British counterpart, Haroun made such a strong impression on his age that he swiftly passed into myth. Thanks to numerous appearances in
The Thousand and One Nights
, he is today the most famous of the caliphs in the West, yet even during his own time his name was familiar to Europeans as a ruler of magnificent power and wealth.

The reign of the historical Haroun al-Rashid, from 786 until his death in 809, is still remembered as Islam's greatest period. Muslim lore depicts him as a paragon among kings, one whose enlightened regard for his subjects superseded all other concerns. Chief among this caliph's legendary exploits was his habit of disguising himself as a commoner to descend among his people and gauge their mood and temper. As Scheherazade remarks, Haroun would often go out “
to solace himself in the city … and to see and hear what new thing was stirring,” often accompanied by his trusted vizier, Jafar. Haroun's adventures among the lowly provided ample material for court storytellers to flatter the historical caliph by including him in tales designed to showcase his wisdom and righteousness.

From these nocturnal excursions come a number of
Arabian Nights
stories placing Haroun, Jafar or Haroun's main wife, the lady Zubayda, at the centre of events. As both observer and participant in his subjects' affairs, Haroun is generally shown to be wise, beneficent and even playful, as in “The Sleeper Awakened,”
in which the caliph tricks a sleeping man into thinking he is the true Commander of the Faithful. Sometimes Haroun merely watches events unfold or hears a story from another party; on other occasions, he acts as a narrative
deus ex machina
, bringing matters to a just conclusion. Such was Haroun's fame that his reign has become more closely identified with the setting of the
Nights
than any other era.
Arabian Nights
' tales occur in many different times and places, but it is Haroun's world—the Baghdad of the early Abbasid caliphate—that provides our imaginations with the work's most common locale and period.

Nowhere is this better illustrated than in verse the young Alfred Tennyson included in his first volume of published poetry. Written to memorialize the delight of reading the
Nights
as a child—“
the silken sail of infancy”—Tennyson's fourteen-stanza “Recollections of the Arabian Nights” is a work of aching nostalgia for the era of al-Rashid, which he contrasts sharply with the depressing reality of the early Industrial Age. Envisioning himself a loyal caliphate subject travelling languidly along the Tigris, Tennyson tarries in exquisite gardens, gazes upon a beautiful Persian girl and finally beholds the great Haroun himself, enthroned beneath a golden canopy. “Thereon,” the poet writes, “
his deep eye stirr'd / With merriment of kingly pride” as the caliph contemplates the sheer brilliance of his domain.

The historical Haroun is remembered as a diligent ruler who was an early exponent of
realpolitik
, maintaining cordial diplomatic relations with Imperial China while forging a political understanding with the Holy Roman Emperor, the mighty Frankish king, Charlemagne. As an example of Haroun's methods, in return for Charlemagne harassing the breakaway Moors who were pressuring France from Spain, Haroun promised to politically badger the Byzantine Christians of the Near East, perpetual thorns in the side of Pope Leo III and the Holy Roman Empire. Although
Haroun and Charlemagne never met, gifts and communications were exchanged as mutual respect was forged between two rulers seeking their respective national securities.

For all his virtues, however, Haroun's reign is not spotless. His systematic and seemingly inexplicable destruction of the powerful Barmakid family—Persians who administered much of his kingdom (his vizier, Jafar, belonged to this family and died as a result)—“
marks his reign with a stain of infamy, with a blot of blood never to be washed away.” This act was also a serious political blunder that left the Abbasids without their most important supporters and servants. Verdicts regarding such malicious acts are best left to history's judgment, but within the world of the
Arabian Nights
, Haroun al-Rashid remains the benevolent overseer of a magnificent expanse, the personification of the glory that is the Muslim past. Such is the regard in which he is held both within and without Islam that each stanza of Lord Tennyson's poem ends with fond variations of the lines—a kind of punctuation to the caliph's historical age—“
For it was in the golden prime / Of good Haroun Alrashid.”

The dynasty of Haroun and the other Abbasid monarchs did not survive—weakened over time by internal decay, invasion (Mongol hordes sacked Baghdad in 1258, murdering the last caliph) and the rise of the Seljuk Turks—but its importance to the history of civilization is secure. Besides the caliphate's other myriad contributions to world culture, it is in this crucible of scientific inquiry, refinement and multi-ethnic interaction that the earliest versions of the story collection known in Arabic as
Alf Laila wa Laila
, or
The Thousand Nights and One Night
, were born.

Whatever the first
Arabian Nights
' stories were, wherever and whenever they arose, many are products of the oral tradition as
expressed through the art of storytelling. Though words and speech never relate exactly the same way twice, storytellers portray episodes with distinct beginnings, middles and ends to form a comprehensive narrative arc, prompting listeners to fashion for themselves interior images of characters, settings and actions.

This is what happened with many of the earliest tales forming
Alf Laila wa Laila
. Travel and trade mean exchanges not only of goods but also of ideas and information. Although their exact provenance is unknown, based on such internal evidence as cultural references and terminology it is believed that many of the stories in the
Nights
originated with Indian, Arab, Persian, Greek, Roman and possibly Chinese travellers, merchants and soldiers plying travel routes stretching from the Balkans to the China Sea. Rest stops were spent around campfires or in the occasional caravanserai—walled hostels catering to travellers—dotting the roads. At these times, it was customary to swap stories to while away the restful hours before setting out again. The more popular tales were thus transferred from place to place while being continually modified according to regional customs and circumstances, much as a joke will assume local colour and familiar allusions for better comprehension.

Eventually, some of these stories were absorbed and maintained by professional storytellers called in Arabic
al-hakawati
*
—often known popularly as
rawi
or “reciting storytellers”—who made their living by relating stories for paying customers. Somewhat like the Book People in Ray Bradbury's classic
Fahrenheit 451
, the
rawi
either memorized stories wholesale from other storytellers or manuscripts, or read them from bought or borrowed copies. Since tales that were actually written down were deemed superior
to simple verbal stories, it appears that many
Alf Laila wa Laila
tales were read from personal or loaned written copies, with the storyteller adding individual flourishes or alterations appropriate to the place or occasion of the recitation.