Literature of al-Andalus
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The literature of al-Andalus, also known as Andalusi literature (Arabic: الأدب الأندلسي, al-adab al-andalusī),[1][2] was produced in al-Andalus, or Islamic Iberia, from the Muslim conquest in 711 to either the Catholic conquest of Granada in 1492 or the expulsion of the Moors ending in 1614. Andalusi literature was written primarily in Arabic, but also in Hebrew, Latin, and Romance.
The Andalusi intellectual output influenced the Western Christian world and the Islamic East.[3] Among the Andalusi scholars most influential in the West are Ibn Rushd, Ibn Ḥazm and Ibn Arabī, while some of the Andalusi scholars most recognizable in the Muslim world are Abū ʽUmar b. ʽAbd al-Barr, Abū l-Walīd al-Bājī, Ibn ʽAṭiyya al-Andalusi [ar], Ibn al-ʽArīf, and Abu al-Qasim ash-Shāṭibī.[3] 11,831 scholars have been identified as having been active in al-Andalus, of whom it seems 5,007 wrote books or transmitted works of others, contributing to the 13,730 works identified as having been written or transmitted in al-Andalus.[3]
Poetry was considered the prime literary genre in Arabic.[4] Poetic forms such as the qaṣīda and maqāma were adopted from the Mashriq or Muslim East, while forms of strophic poetry such as the muwaššaḥ and its kharja as well as the popular zajal in Andalusi vernacular Arabic were developed in al-Andalus.[4] Andalusi strophic poetry had an impact on poetic expression in Western Europe and the wider Muslim world.[5]
Abdellah Hilaat's World Literature Encyclopedia divides the history of al-Andalus into two periods: the period of expansion, starting with the conquest of Hispania up to the first Taifa period, and the period of recession in which al-Andalus was ruled by two major African empires: the Almoravid and the Almohad.[6]