Kalila wa Dimna

A rereading of the story “گربهٔ زاهد” ("Gorbeye Zahed", English: The Ascetic Cat) from “کلیله و دمنه” (Kalīleh o Demneh) chapter “باب البوم و الغراب” (Owl and Crow) written and translated by “نصرالله منشی” (Nasr Allah Munshi) into middle Persian from Indian collection of animal proverbs Panchatantra in the 12th century.

J'explique brièvement, à travers l'exemple du Panchatantra, comment sont organisés les oeuvres à récit-cadre, et les implications de cette technique.
NB : ce texte est complémentaire de « L'intrigue et l'entrelac : roman médiéval et moderne ». Mais l'un et l'autre peuvent être lus séparément.

Perhaps more than any other region in the Middle Ages, Iberia demonstrates the fluidity of the pre-modern world. Its position at a cross-roads between East and West and the confluence of cultures and religions that inhabited the Peninsula created far-reaching connections that facilitated the dissemination of people, ideas, cultural forms, and material objects. A land of shifting borders and fluid configurations, Iberia triggers questions about boundaries and power struggles and brings to the fore issues of identity, alterity, and intercultural relations. This essay traces the journeys of a work that characterises the dynamism and porosity of Iberian space and whose history in western Europe is closely linked with the Peninsula: the highly influential Arabic collection of exemplary fables known as Kalila wa-Dimna. It offers a comparative analysis of three translations produced between the XIIIc and XVIIc century: Calila e Dimna (1251), the Exemplario contra los engaños y peligros del mundo (1493), and the Espejo político y moral para príncipes y ministros y de todo género de personas (1654, 1659). While ostensibly the same collection of fables, each version arrived in Iberia via different routes and discrete sources and languages: Arabic, Latin (via Hebrew), and Turkish (via Persian) respectively – a fact that not only demonstrates the complexity of the book’s origins and transmission, but that highlights the Peninsula’s position as a point of intersection for global encounters.
While Calila e Dimna and the Exemplario contra los engaños y peligros del mundo have been the subject of considerable research, the Espejo político y moral has garnered much less critical attention. Previous scholarship has also largely eschewed comparisons between the three Spanish versions. As this essay argues, however, a cross-period, comparative approach provides a particularly productive methodology. The production of these translations spans four hundred years in which the geo-political and ideological boundaries of the world were being recalibrated and the relationships between East and West re-contextualised. Calila e Dimna, the Exemplario, and the Espejo político y moral represent productive textual spaces in which to consider not only the processes of translatio studii et imperii across this period but changing conceptualisations of identity and perspectives on intercultural relations. The essay explores the evolving significance of the fables by analysing how each translation is re-framed for new audiences through prefatory material and changes to physical form, as well as by considering a selection of tales that address topics of good governance, friendship, and enmity.

ʿAbd Allāh b. al‑Muqaffaʿ (d. c. 756) is one of the fathers of literary Arabic prose in the eyes of both Arab and Occidental academic traditions. His work, along with others chancellery secretaries, without a doubt laid the foundations of a cultural phenomenon whose golden age came soon thereafter through the adab. He is thus a precursor of a new cultural era. That said, we have to admit that his oeuvre is at the close of another literary, and more generally cultural epoch, characterized by a focus on orality, and labelled by some as the archaic period and by others as the Arab antiquity. This article proposes to situate his writing exactly at this turning point. In contrast to previous scholarship, we are interested in Ibn al‐Muqa aʿ less as the founder of a prose tradition than one who was able to build bridges between two sensibilities. A new reading of his collection of animal fables Kalīla wa Dimna, an Arabic adaptation of the Indian Pañcatantra through its intermediary pehlevi version, allows us to observe a culturally complex work. Through the de nition of two archetypes in his work, the kātib, or the man who writes, and the rawī, or the man who recites, we aim at describing how coexist in the structure of Kalīla wa Dimna several schemas of thought that sometimes resonate with an « administrative spirit » which redefined Arabic as a language of written transmission, and sometimes let the narration speak as the heir of a strong oral tradition we observe in the same period in the writings called traditional, that is belonging to the religious sphere, such as Qur’anic exegesis, prophetic traditions, hagiography, etc.
---
ʿAbd Allāh b. al‐Muqa aʿ (m. vers 756) est aux yeux de la tradition académique arabe et occidentale l’un des “pères” ayant contribué à la genèse de la prose littéraire arabe. Il est incontestable que son œuvre, parmi celles d’autres secrétaires de chancellerie, contribua à jeter les bases de tout un champ culturel qui connaîtra son âge d’or peu de temps après, à savoir l’adab. Elle se situe ainsi en amont d’une nouvelle ère culturelle. Cela étant, force est de constater que cette œuvre vient conclure une autre ère littéraire, et plus généralement culturelle, marqué par l’oralité et quali ée par les uns d’époque archaïque, par les autres d’antiquité arabe. Le présent travail propose de situer l’écriture de ce prosateur précisément dans ce moment charnière. Contrairement à l’opinion dominante, il s’intéresse moins à Ibn al‐Muqa aʿ comme fondateur d’une tradition prosaïque, qu’à Ibn al‐Muqa aʿ comme passeur. Une nouvelle lecture de son fablier Kalīla wa Dimna, adaptation arabe du Pañcatantra indien par l’intermédiaire de sa version pehlevi, permet ici d’observer une œuvre culturellement composite. La dé nition de deux  gures théoriques dans l’œuvre, le kātib, ou l’homme qui écrit, et le rawī, ou l’homme qui récite, vise à décrire la cohabitation dans la structure de Kalīla wa Dimna entre plusieurs schémas de pensée qui tantôt sont en consonance avec à un « esprit administratif » qui redé nit l’arabe comme langue d’écriture et de transmission écrite, tantôt laissent la narration s’exprimer comme héritière d’une forte tradition orale, laquelle est observable, à la même période, dans les écrits dits traditionnels, c’est‐à‐dire inscrits dans la sphère religieuse, telles l’exégèse coranique, les traditions prophétiques, l’hagiographie, etc.

The article analyses some of the approaches that have been established for years on the controversial origin of the collection and the value of its prologues. The need for new editions of both the Arabic text by Ibn al-Muqaffa‘ and the Latin translation of John of Capua is stressed, and finally, some of the current lines of research are highlighted.

This paper considers rewritings and translations of a key-episode within the cycle of fables known as the Kalila-Dimna in several innovative ways. First, by considering the ways in which this episode has been rewritten throughout the centuries, the essay takes a stand radically opposed to the prevalent scholarship around the fables, which consists in rating the rewritings for their faithfulness to the source text(s). The present approach "celebrates" the misreadings and rewritings for the insights they give us into the mechanisms of the tale. Second, by analysing the episode as a weighty lesson in domestic politics, showing the fatal mistakes that can build up to regicide, the essay also aims at re-introducing an awareness of the contents of the fables as a very effective and unusual mirror for princes.

This paper examines the translation by ‘Abdullah Ibn al-Muqaffa‘ (720–757 AD) of the Pahlavi version of Kalila wa Dimna in the early Abbasid period (750–1258 AD). Ibn al-Muqaffa‘ contributed to the translation movement supported by al-Mansur, the second Abbasid caliph. The patronage of translation allowed the caliphs to expand their support base by integrating elements from the different cultures of the empire into one Islamic whole. That was the political context of the translation. Ibn al-Muqaffa‘, a recent convert of Persian descent, took part in an intellectual and literary movement which attempted to infuse Islamic culture with Persian elements. To introduce these influences in Islamic terms, the translation was decidedly ‘domesticating’. In analyzing the textual strategies that the translator employed, this paper calls for a reconsideration of the functions of domesticating translation, which in the case under study contributed to cultural diversity, contrary to arguments common in modern translation theory. It is further argued that attendant notions of ‘equivalence’ and ‘faithfulness’ are conditioned by modern constructs of authorship and the nation state that do not hold for Arabic translation during that period, nor, probably, for premodern translation in general.

In comparison with earlier, medieval translations of Kalila wa-Dimna, such as the well-known Calila e Dimna (1251) or the Exemplario contra los engaños y peligros del mundo (1483), the version composed by Vicente Bratutti from a sixteenth-century Turkish source, the Espejo político y moral para príncipes y ministros y de todo género de personas (1654, 1659), has been the focus of much less scholarship. Yet, as I will argue, it is worthy of critical attention, above all for the ideological richness of the prefaces written by the translator and censors, which provide differing and often contrasting perspectives on both this famous Eastern work and Spain's position in the world and relations with other powers. This article examines how the fables were framed by Bratutti and the censors for new audiences, and how their relevance for the Spanish monarchy was justified. It considers the representation of translatio studii et imperii; and it looks at how its Ragusan translator was himself 'translated' by the Inquisition's censors for seventeenth-century Spanish audiences.

This paper sets out to identify sciences prevalent among the Iranian Nizārīs through the fall of Alamūt in 1256 CE/654 AH. This is done through critical examination of two categories of documents: 1) the unpublished manuscript of Dustūr alMunajjimīn, which is currently housed at the Paris National Library; 2) Naṣīr al-Dīn-i Ṭūsī’s works from 1226 to 1256 CE (624-654 AH) while he stayed at the Ismā‘īlī fortresses. The unknown author of Dustūr al-Munajjimīn provides an invaluable account of books and treatises held at the Alamūt library as well as sciences practiced by the Iranian Nizārīs during the leadership of Ḥasan-i Ṣabbāh. The latter includes the whole array of sciences from literature, history and hadith to mathematics and astronomy. The Nizārīs’ dedication to these sciences after the death of Ḥasan-i Ṣabbāh is manifest in Nasīr al-Dīn Tūsī who, like the unknown author of Dustūr al-Munajjimīn, was committed to recording myriad sources and authors used for his research. This paper demonstrates the continuity of scientific tradition in Dustūr al-Munajjimīn and Tūsī’s works. Further, in light of the pedagogic character of Tūsī’s works, it shows how and why the aspirations of the Iranian Nizārīs were oriented to promoting sciences, rather than merely destroying their enemies.

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

García, M. y C. Sánchez (2019). “Nuevo catálogo de los motivos en el cuento breve hispanohebreo y sefardí: el caso de los exempla en la versión hebrea de Kalila y Dimna de R. Yoel”. I Simposio Internacional “Periferias sin Centro y centros Periféricos” (PeriCen). Madrid, 24 de octubre de 2019.

Here is offered a detailed discussion of the supposed influence of Arabic and Hebrew maqamat and other works on the Spanish narrative poem by Juan Ruiz, Archpriest of Hita, entitled Libro de buen amor ( = Book of good love). A critical review of the sociolinguistic and cultural situation of the Christian Iberian Kingdoms during the 14th century allows to rise very important objections to those alleged influence and, in general, to the view of Medieval Iberia as a tolerant multicultural fluid where were not barriers between religious and linguistic communities.

La naturaleza está en constante cambio, hay transformaciones y movimientos violentos que nos parecen completamente azarosos e incluso anárquicos ya que rompen con lo que podríamos considerar una armonía de lo cotidiano, un estado de tranquilidad en el que no somos más que sujetos en espera, pasivos, funcionales, monótonos, estáticos. Estos cambios no son externos a lo que en las religiones indoiranias se concibe con el concepto de Rta, es decir un orden establecido en principio por un mundo físico o material que se rige por leyes fijas en las que poco se podía incidir, si no es que sólo podían contemplarse o describirse, leyes que se perpetuaban cada día como el curso del agua, su llegada a un mar espumoso, el movimiento de los astros, la luminosidad y la oscuridad, el nacimiento y la muerte, la caída de las cosas, la existencia de seres vivos superiores, mejor adaptados físicamente y el forzoso enfrentamiento territorial contra ellos. La debilidad del ser humano hace que se sienta sometido y perteneciente a un kosmos, y que no sólo lo acepte, sino que invente medios por los cuales busque mantenerlo, uno de esos medios ha sido el litúrgico donde una serie de rituales o ceremonias imitan el Rta y lo perpetúan a través de sacrificios, de concepciones morales, de estructuras sociales y políticas. Es quizá una forma de concebirse con un papel activo o asignarse un rol en el universo, un intento de respuesta a cuestiones que rebasan el intelecto.

در اين مقاله بر اساس شواهدي از كليله و دمنه، مرزبان نامه، روضه العقول، هزار و يكشب و ... به بررسي شيوۀ خاصي از گسترش پيرنگ در قصۀ فارسي به¬ويژه داستانهاي جانوران پرداخته‌ايم. پيرنگ در اين گونه قصه‌ها، علي‌رغم شيوه مرسوم در ذهنيت داستاني خوانندگان امروزي، به جاي پرداختن به خطوط اصلي قصه، خطوط فرعي داستان را دنبال مي‌كند. بدين ترتيب با پيرنگي مواجه¬ايم كه از ديدگاه خوانندۀ امروزي در جريان گسترش روايت، ضعیف تلقي مي‌شود در حالي كه اين نكته، ويژگي خاص مربوط به اين نوع از قصه‌هاست و خصلتي عام و تا حدودي فراگير محسوب مي‌شود.

Resumen: Este artículo analiza la naturaleza e identidad del falcón oriol, mencionado en obras castellanas medievales de primer orden (Calila e Dimna, Libro del cavallero Zifar, Elena y María) como soberano de todas las aves. Esta es la denominación que, durante el siglo XIII, recibió el fénix en la Península Ibérica, una de las criaturas mitológicas más importantes de las culturas europeas y orientales. A lo largo de más de dos milenios, su aspecto ha variado notablemente: primero adquirió el aspecto de una garza, después su efigie se asimiló a la de las rapaces. El color dorado que posee su plumaje y otros testimonios de incuestionable valor (relación con el Simurg, representaciones escultóricas, etc.) permiten esclarecer su identidad que, hasta el momento, había sido ignorada por la crítica. Para ello, se analizará la etimología del nombre oriol, serán estudiadas las aves que tradicionalmente han sido utilizadas como símbolos del poder y se examinará el desarrollo del mito del fénix desde el Antiguo Egipto hasta la Edad Media.
Abstract: This article analizes the nature and identity of the falcón oriol, mentioned on Spanish medieval works of relevance (Calila e Dimna, Libro del cavallero Zifar, Elena y María) as king of birds. This is the name given to the phoenix, which is one of the most relevant mythological creatures of European and Eastern cultures, in the Iberian Peninsula during the 13th century. Throughout more than two millennia, its appearance has varied remarkably: first it acquired the aspect of a heron, then its effigy was assimilated to that of the raptors. Its golden plumage and other testimonies of unquestionable value (relationship with the Simurg, sculptural representations, etc.) allow us to know the identity of this bird that, until now, was ignored by critics. Therefore, it will be analyzed the etymology of the name oriol, the birds that have traditionally been used as symbols of power and the development of the phoenix myth from Ancient Egypt to the Middle Ages.

De entrada pudiera parecer sorprendente que el primer ejemplo de ficción en prosa castellana del cual tenemos noticia, el Calila e Dimna, sea una traducción/adaptación de una obra clásica de la literatura sánscrita: el Pañcatantra. Sin embargo, amplios estudios textuales han logrado documentar las fases principales de la transmisión de dicha colección de cuentos desde la India antigua hasta la España medieval. Una veta de investigación que, en cambio, no se ha explorado es aquella que corresponde al análisis comparativo de las transformaciones que la obra sufrió en su largo peregrinaje para adaptarse a distintos contextos culturales. Este artículo es un paso hacia tal clase de estudios, ya que analizará algunas características de los personajes principales de la narración española, Calila y Dimna, e identificará sus similitudes y diferencias con sus ancestros indios: los chacales Karaṭaka y Damanaka.

Throughout the nineteenth century, the birth of what one may call philologia orientalis and the discovery of the linguistic similarities between Sanskrit and European languages radically transformed the perception of the East, much weakening the idea of a family relationship between Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The case of Ernest Renan (1823-1892) is here emblematic. The lecture will survey Renan's conception of Judaism and Islam, through his invention of the category of "Semitic religions." We shall reflect on its consequences on the study of monotheism among historians of religions, as well as on the development of anti-Semitism and Islamophobia in the last decades of the century. Advance Registration Required: https://umich.zoom.us/webinar/register/3216105505888/WN_oYvSLryURveHxXW0tu-28Q

A ‘think piece’ offering a practical methodology for the study of cultures in a transnational and translingual framework; using the teaching of Kalila wa-Dimna as a case study for ethical curriculum design.

NB: this is a pre-publication draft.

In the early medieval period, like in any other period of human history, ideas travelled wherever people travelled. The early Middle Ages are here defined as the seventh, eighth, and ninth centuries, and since there were very few places of the globe that had not yet been settled by humans by the seventh century, it is fair to say that the early medieval dissemination of ideas was a global phenomenon. The same is true to a lesser extent for intellectual discourse, which is here broadly defined as a discourse of ideas that transcended immediate practical needs, such as for economic, administrative, or liturgical purposes. No clear-cut separation between different types of human knowledge exists, but they can all be placed on a spectrum that runs from the intuitive and practitioner’s knowledge via technological knowledge to scientific and higher-order knowledge. This article focuses on the latter end of that spectrum. It therefore does not include technological treatises and ideas, but it does discuss medical texts, since those were more closely related to philosophical debates in this period.

La presente comunicación aborda el estudio de la versión hebrea de Kalila wa Dimna de Jacob ben Eleazar de Toledo. Lejos de una traducción literal a partir del original árabe, la obra de ben Eleazar nos ofrece una reelaboración del mismo, siendo frecuente la supresión y adición de pasajes, así como la intercalación de versículos bíblicos como recurso estético.
La investigación se centrará no sólo en un análisis del texto hebreo de ben Eleazar sino también en su comparativa con el resto de versiones de la España medieval, tanto en lenguas romance como la conocida versión hebrea de Rabbí Yoel.

ʿAbd Allāh b. al‑Muqaffaʿ (d. c. 756) is one of the fathers of literary Arabic prose in the eyes of both Arab and Occidental academic traditions. His work, along with others chancellery secretaries, without a doubt laid the foundations of a cultural phenomenon whose golden age came soon thereafter through the adab. He is thus a precursor of a new cultural era. That said, we have to admit that his oeuvre is at the close of another literary, and more generally cultural epoch, characterized by a focus on orality, and labelled by some as the archaic period and by others as the Arab antiquity. This article proposes to situate his writing exactly at this turning point. In contrast to previous scholarship, we are interested in Ibn al‐Muqa aʿ less as the founder of a prose tradition than one who was able to build bridges between two sensibilities. A new reading of his collection of animal fables Kalīla wa Dimna, an Arabic adaptation of the Indian Pañcatantra through its intermediary pehlevi version, allows us to observe a culturally complex work. Through the de nition of two archetypes in his work, the kātib, or the man who writes, and the rawī, or the man who recites, we aim at describing how coexist in the structure of Kalīla wa Dimna several schemas of thought that sometimes resonate with an « administrative spirit » which redefined Arabic as a language of written transmission, and sometimes let the narration speak as the heir of a strong oral tradition we observe in the same period in the writings called traditional, that is belonging to the religious sphere, such as Qur’anic exegesis, prophetic traditions, hagiography, etc. --- ʿAbd Allāh b. al‐Muqa aʿ (m. vers 756) est aux yeux de la tradition académique arabe et occidentale l’un des “pères” ayant contribué à la genèse de la prose littéraire arabe. Il est incontestable que son œuvre, parmi celles d’autres secrétaires de chancellerie, contribua à jeter les bases de tout un champ culturel qui connaîtra son âge d’or peu de temps après, à savoir l’adab. Elle se situe ainsi en amont d’une nouvelle ère culturelle. Cela étant, force est de constater que cette œuvre vient conclure une autre ère littéraire, et plus généralement culturelle, marqué par l’oralité et quali ée par les uns d’époque archaïque, par les autres d’antiquité arabe. Le présent travail propose de situer l’écriture de ce prosateur précisément dans ce moment charnière. Contrairement à l’opinion dominante, il s’intéresse moins à Ibn al‐Muqa aʿ comme fondateur d’une tradition prosaïque, qu’à Ibn al‐Muqa aʿ comme passeur. Une nouvelle lecture de son fablier Kalīla wa Dimna, adaptation arabe du Pañcatantra indien par l’intermédiaire de sa version pehlevi, permet ici d’observer une œuvre culturellement composite. La dé nition de deux gures théoriques dans l’œuvre, le kātib, ou l’homme qui écrit, et le rawī, ou l’homme qui récite, vise à décrire la cohabitation dans la structure de Kalīla wa Dimna entre plusieurs schémas de pensée qui tantôt sont en consonance avec à un « esprit administratif » qui redé nit l’arabe comme langue d’écriture et de transmission écrite, tantôt laissent la narration s’exprimer comme héritière d’une forte tradition orale, laquelle est observable, à la même période, dans les écrits dits traditionnels, c’est‐à‐dire inscrits dans la sphère religieuse, telles l’exégèse coranique, les traditions prophétiques, l’hagiographie, etc.

Abstract
This essay challenges the received idea that Ibn al-Muqaffa‘, the 8th-century Arabic translator of the Kalīla-Dimna fables, added the Trial of Dimna, the sequel to the first story of the Lion and the Bull, in order to let morality win in the end. The analysis of this sequel’s synopsis shows the absence of morality and how the ruler uses the judicial to manipulate public opinion and to redress his politically-damaged image. The essay also shows that the sequel’s main purpose and use is to give a practical demonstration of the art of forensic rhetoric, casting Dimna as a pre-eminent and redoubtable sophist. The Anvār-i Suhaylī version, the 15th-century Persian rewriting by Vā’iz Kāshifī, on which the essay is based, also engages with the philosophical conundrum of tasdīq, which seems absent in the Arabic versions of the text.