Sharh al-Qasaid al-Ashr
- Author died
- 502 AH
- Editions
- Idarat al-Tiba'ah al-Muniriyyah
Sharh al-Qasaid al-Ashr (شرح القصائد العشر, "Commentary on the Ten Odes") is a philological commentary on ten pre-Islamic and early Arabian odes, authored by the grammarian and lexicographer al-Khatib Abu Zakariya al-Tabrizi (421–502 AH / 1030–1109 CE) .
Purpose and Composition
Al-Tabrizi composed the commentary in response to an interlocutor who requested an abridgment of the commentaries on the famous odes . The requester observed that earlier commentaries had become excessively lengthy due to extensive lexical listings and superfluous textual attestations (istishhadat), and asked for a concise work focusing on essential philological analysis . In his preface, al-Tabrizi states that his objective was to clarify rare vocabulary (al-gharib), resolve difficult points of inflection (al-mushkil min al-i‘rab), elucidate textual meanings (idah al-ma‘ani), and verify textual transmissions and variant readings (tashih al-riwayat wa-tabyinuha), while citing only indispensable poetic evidence and avoiding both tedious prolixity and deficient brevity .
Scope and Structure
The book is structured around ten long odes (qasa'id):
- The original Seven Odes (the Mu‘allaqat) by Imru' al-Qays, Tarafa ibn al-‘Abd, Zuhayr ibn Abi Sulma, Labid ibn Rabi‘a, ‘Amr ibn Kulthum, ‘Antara ibn Shaddad, and al-Harith ibn Hilliza .
- Two odes added by Abu Ja'far al-Nahhas: the daliyya of al-Nabigha al-Dhubyani and the lamiyya of al-A‘sha .
- The ba'iyya of ‘Ubayd ibn al-Abras, which completes the selection to ten .
For each ode, al-Tabrizi provides the lineage and background of the poet, states the meter (bahr) and rhyme classification of the poem, and then proceeds verse by verse to examine lexical definitions, syntactic and grammatical variants, and semantic interpretations .
Manuscripts and Editions
Manuscripts of the commentary are preserved in libraries worldwide, including Leiden University Library, Trinity College at Cambridge, the British Museum (India Office collection), the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin, and the Feyzullah Efendi collection in Istanbul .
The work has been published in several printed editions:
- An early Cairo edition printed at Idarat al-Tiba‘a al-Muniriyya with glosses by al-Sayyid Muhammad al-Khadir (1343 AH / 1924 CE; reprinted 1352 AH) .
- An edition edited by Muhammad Muhyi al-Din ‘Abd al-Hamid, published in Cairo (1382 AH / 1962 CE) .
- An edition edited by Fakhr al-Din Qabawah, published in Aleppo (1388 AH / 1968 CE) and later reprinted in Beirut .
- An edition vocalized and verified by ‘Abd al-Salam al-Hufi, published in Beirut (1405 AH / 1985 CE) .
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