Kitāb al-Iklīl (Arabic: كتاب الإكليل) fully known as the Kitāb al-Iklīl min akhbār al-Yaman wa-ansāb Ḥimyar (Crowns from the Accounts of the Yemen and the genealogies of Ḥimyar), is a book about the ancient history of Yemen and the Himyarite Kingdom written by the 10th-century grammarian, chemist and historian Abu Muhammad al-Hasan al-Hamdani. It was first written and published in the 10th century in ten volumes, four of which only exist to this day.
| Author | Abu Muhammad al-Hasan al-Hamdani |
|---|---|
| Original title | Kitāb al-Iklīl min akhbār al-Yaman wa-ansāb Ḥimyar |
| Language | Arabic (translated into German in 1881) |
| Genre | History of Yemen |
| Publisher | Various (see below) |
| Publication place | Yemen |
History
editKitāb al-Iklīl was composed in ten volumes by Abu Muhammad al-Hasan al-Hamdani. However, only the first, second, eighth and tenth volumes have survived to the present day.[1][2] The historian Nabih Amin Faris compiled the surviving volumes into an annotated work, al-Juz' al-Thamin, published in 1940 by the Princeton University as part of the Princeton Oriental Texts collection.[2] In 1881, parts of the Kitāb al-Iklīl were translated into the German language by David Heinrich Müller.[3] In 2020, a portion of the sixth volume was found in the archives of the Bavarian State Library of Munich and was published by a researcher in the Arabia Felix Academy.[1] An abridged version of the texts using a Creative Commons license have also been made for public reading in some online libraries.[4][5]
Content
editThe first two volumes concern the genealogies of the ancient peoples and the family of Sheba son of Yashjoub.[1][2][5] In the second volume, there is a poem, known as the al-Risala al-Damighah.[6] This poem has sometimes been published separately with commentaries.[6] The eighth volume concerns the archaeological finds in Yemen as well as an observation into the poetry of Dhu Jadan and Abu Karib.[1][2] The tenth volume of al-Iklīl concerns the history of the people of Hamdan, which is also the hometown of the author.[7]
See also
editReferences
edit- ^ a b c d "Finding a missing part of the sixth volume of the book al-Iklil; A good news that restored faith". Al Masdar Online. 20 June 2020. Archived from the original on 5 December 2022.
- ^ a b c d al-Hamdani (1940). Faris, Nabih A. (ed.). Kitab al-Iklil al-Juz' al-Thamin. New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
- ^ Thatcher, G.W. "Hamdānī - Encyclopaedia Britannica (1911)". Encyclopaedia Britannica on Wikisource. Retrieved 2024-09-23.
- ^ al-Hasan ibn Ahmad al-Hamdani (16 April 2016). "al-Iklil: This book is published under a Creative Commons license with credit to the author and source". Noor Library.
- ^ a b al-Hamdani, Abu Muhammad al-Hasan. al-Iklil [The Diadem]. Al-Maktaba Al-Shamela.
- ^ a b al-Kumait bin Zaid al-Asadi. "The poem of al-Damighah by al-Hassan bin Ahmed al-Hamdani; from the Ain Shams University Library (History, Archaeology and Geography)". Ain Shams University Library. Archived from the original on 3 February 2023.
- ^ al-Hamdani, Hasan ibn Ahmad (1949). al-Iklil, Volume 10. Cairo, Egypt: Matba'at al-Salafiyyah wa Maktabatiha.