3.6.11
“‘To proceed: a man has numerous charms that women do not. These include the breadth of his chest and of the pelt that’s upon it, the height of his shoulders and capacity of his breast, the straightness of his legs and the thickness of his arms and the number of muscles in them, the massiveness of his hands and the fact of his being strong and hard,99 stalwart and hearty, stalward and husky, stalworthy and strapping, stalworth, stout, and sturdy, stark and lusty, stith, stour, staunch and shredded, robustious, robustuous, rumbustious, robustic, wrast, mettlesome, doughty, puissant, potent, rugged, hale, flush, ripped, buff, diesel, beast, built, cut, jacked, yoked out, fine-looking, and loud-voiced.(1) All these attributes we women consider to be among men’s charms, and he has other, intangible, good qualities too, such as when he climbs the pulpit, for example, to preach, or rides a fine horse, or bears arms — and how fine a figure a man cuts when he walks along, his sword grazing the ground!’
3.6.12
“Then she said, ‘If only I knew how to read and write, I’d write more books about men and women than did that shaykh whose name you once mentioned but which I’ve forgotten because he’s dead on all the sciences put together.’ ‘That would be Imam al-Suyūṭī, God have mercy on his soul,’ I said. ‘Right,’ she said, ‘more than al-Suyūṭī and all the other suits too,’ to which I responded, ‘And all the sots as well.’100 ‘However,’ she continued, ‘it’s all the fault of those who left me without an education. The Arabs claim that a knowledge of reading will corrupt women and that as soon as a woman is able to stick one character next to another, she’ll spell out a letter to her lover. In fact, though, if left to her own devices, she will have in her shyness and sense of decency a minder stricter than any father or husband. If, on the other hand, she’s penned in and cooped up, she’ll keep trying to squirm out of and get away from the restrictions imposed upon her. It will be with her as it is with water, which becomes purer and more appetizing the faster it gushes and runs, or with a fast-walking person, who feels the air to be colder the faster he walks.’ ‘I swear they did the right thing!’ I thought to myself. ‘If she’d learned how to read and write, not one line of my poetry would have been left without her splitting it into hemistichs and inserting between them others of her own or building new stanzas based on what I’ve already written,101 so as to twist it to her purposes. May God direct what she already knows to useful ends, and spare me the evil that any increase therein attends!’”
Postscript102 on synonyms for “strong and vigorous” or “hard and tough,” and other words of similar meaning: ʿutʿut, kunbuth, kunduth, mikalth, milyath, maghith, ʿuḍāfij, ʿafḍaj, ʿullaj, hamarraj, ṣalawḍaḥ, ṣalanqaḥ, ṣamaḥmaḥ, ṣamaydaḥ, kirdiḥ, kaldiḥ, daḥūḥ, mujlandā, jalʿad, jalmad, ṣalkhad, ṣimqid, ḍahyad, ʿirbadd, ʿaṣlad, aqwad, dhifirr, dhimirr, dhaymurī, zibirr, zimirr, ṣamʿarī, ḍabīr, ḍibaṭr, ḍabaghṭarā, ʿayzār, ʿashanzar, qabaʿtharā, qunāṣir, kumātir, tiyazz, julabiz, julāfiz, khuzākhiz, turāmiz, dakhz, ḍubāriz, ʿaḍamazz, ʿilkiz, ʿalankaz, fiyazz, qilizz, kilizz, mulazzaz, ḥumāris, dakhnas, durāhis, dalahmas, mutashammis, ʿatras, ʿakandas, ʿamarras, qalammas, qunāʿis, hakallas, hamallas, furāfiṣ, kiyaṣṣ, mutakhammiṭ, ḍabanṭā, ḍifaṭṭ, ʿamallaṭ, muʿallaṭ, ḍalīʿ, ṣaniq, damakmak, ṣamakīk, ṣamallak, ʿabannak, ʿarik, janaʿdal, ḥuwwal, ʿarandal, ʿunthul, kamtal, kunbul, kanahdal, nabtal, buhṣum, dilaẓm, mirjam, ḍirghāmah, ʿardam, fayyim, qirshamm, hayzam, hayṣam.
(1) “‘The ʿiswaddah: “a small white creature to which virgins’ fingers are likened”; asārīʿ: “white worms with red heads that live in the sand in a valley known as al-Ẓaby; singular usrūʿ”; the ʿudhfūṭ: “a smooth white creature to which girls’ digits are likened”; the ʿanam: “a tree of the Hejaz that has a red fruit to which stained fingers are likened”; dasʿ: “the hiding of the sinew by flesh”; the kaʿs: “the bones of the phalanges or the bones of the finger joints”; the dakhīṣ: “the flesh of the inside of the hand”; the rawājib: “the joints of the roots of the digits, or their backs”; the rawāhish: “the veins of the visible part of the hand”; ʿursh: “the top of the foot between the prominent bones and the digits”; ʿasīb: “the top of the foot; also the coccyx”; mafāhir: “the flesh of the chest”; ʿaṭaf: “length of eyelash”; ḥārr: “nose hair”; rayash: “ear hair”; ghafar: “neck and nape hair”; surbah: “the hair from the middle of the chest to the belly”; daʾḍ: “fatness and fullness and the absence of any blemish on the skin.”95
(1) A list of further synonyms for these words may be found at the end of the chapter.
CHAPTER 7: THAT STINGING SENSATION YOU FEEL WHEN YOU GET HOT SAUCE UP YOUR NOSE
3.7.1
Our previous comments on the Fāriyāq, made at a time when he was single, were an intrusion; how much more so would they be now, when he’s a husband? I think it better, therefore, to leave him now, in his married state (for this conversation of theirs took place at night, and there’s no call for us to spoil the rest of it for them), until they awake and he goes to his Oneiromancer’s Chamber, meaning the place appointed for him to interpret dreams. Your Eminence may likewise be ready, after suffering the stinging sensation induced by all that hot sauce, to go to bed. Rest a while, then, and if you dream tonight, tell your dream to the Fāriyāq, for he is now considered to be one of the world’s great dream interpreters.
CHAPTER 8: DREAMS
3.8.1
Behold the Fāriyāq, seated on a chair, in front of him a table bearing a large number of books, among them, for all the scraps of paper they contained, not a scrap of food,103 in his fingers a long pen, and in his hands a pot containing ink as black as tar. He has started interpreting dreams seen by the head of the Chamber104 in his sleep.