Brains Confounded by the Ode of Abū Shādūf Expounded, with Risible Rhymes. Yūsuf al-Shirbīnī

for the meter;¹⁷⁹ that is, “stronger and more extreme than him” in the harm he does me and his oppression of me.

      11.4.4

      ʾibnu-khūhu (“is the son of his brother”): that is, of the brother of Muḥaylibah, the latter being his brother on both his mother’s and his father’s side. He should have said akhīhi, as a genitive construct, but his tongue gave him no help in producing such a form because he was from the countryside, and it would have broken the meter, too.¹⁸⁰

      11.4.5

      Next he states his nephew’s name, by saying

      Khanāfir: derived from khanfarah (“snoring”) of the measure of kharkharah (“snorting”) or barbarah (“jabbering”). One says, “So-and-so slept and snored (khanfar),” meaning that he stored up the breath in his throat and expelled it through his nostrils in such a way as to make a loud breath accompanied with snoring and snorting. Said the poet:

      He snored on sleeping through his nostril

      And thus he got this name—Khanāfir.

      He was so called because he snored so much when sleeping. The paradigm is khanfara, yukhanfiru, khanfaratan, active participle khanfūr,¹⁸¹ of the measure of khanshūr (“tough guy”), while Khanāfir is of the measure of ʿabāyir, plural of ʿabūrah (“sheep”). His brother’s¹⁸² name was Qādūs (“waterwheel jar”), of the pattern of buʿbūṣ (“goosing”); this Qādūs fathered two boys, Muḥaylibah and Fasāqil, and this Khanāfir was the latter’s son, meaning the poet suffered harm from both his paternal cousin¹⁸³ and his paternal cousin’s son.¹⁸⁴

      11.4.6

      Next the poet makes plain the harm that he suffered from the latter by saying: yuqarriṭ (“he draws tight”): with u after the y, of the measure of yuḍarriṭ (“he farts audibly and repeatedly”).¹⁸⁵ Yuḍarriṭ has two forms, as already stated.¹⁸⁶

      As the poet has it:

      There the snitches all farted together,

      So their farts wafted everywhere about.

      The word yuqarriṭ is used here in the sense of constricting (taqrīṭ) strongly and forcibly with a rope. Qarṭ with a after the q and no vowel after the r refers to the qarṭ of the crops, namely, taking the ears and leaving the roots in the ground. One says, “So-and-so cut off the ears of so-and-so’s crop (qaraṭa zarʿa fulān).” With u after the q, it is the name of a small ring of silver that is put in the ear of a young boy—a praiseworthy custom, especially if the boy is beautiful, for it adds to his good looks and clothes him in cuteness. Abū Nuwās¹⁸⁷ says in the opening line of one of his odes:

      An earringed¹⁸⁸ boy who hastens to the drinking companions

      With a carnelian in a white pearl

      —that is, this graceful beauty and charming form, adorned with and characterized by this silver earring, now hastens towards the drinking companions, with a wine in his hand whose color resembles that of a carnelian, in a cup resembling in purity of substance and refinement of form a white pearl, and gives them to drink from what is in his hand and passes the wine among them, beguiling them with his slender figure and charming talk … and so on to the end of the poem.

      11.4.7

      ʿalā bayḍī (“around my balls”): that is, the poet’s balls, not those of the person actually reciting the verse, nor the “balls” of anything else such as a chicken, a bird, or the like.¹⁸⁹ Testicles are called “eggs” because they resemble them if you peel the skin off them. The word is derived from bayāḍ (“whiteness”) or from abū buyūḍ (“the one with the eggs”), an animal resembling a spider,¹⁹⁰ or from bayḍat al-qabbān (“the ‘egg’ of the steelyard”, i.e., the counterweight).

      11.4.8

      A Silly Topic for Discussion: What is the wisdom in bayḍ (“balls”) also being called khiṣyatān (“testicles (dual)”),¹⁹¹ and what points of resemblance are there between the two in name, and what is their etymology and what does it mean? The Facetious Answer is that the singular of khiṣyatān is khiṣyah with i after the kh; and likewise the dual of khiṣā (“testicles (plural)”) is khiṣwān, and one of them is a khiṣy/khaṣī,¹⁹² and if you were to take one khaṣiy, for example, and add another, you would have taken a pair of balls (khiṣwayn), no doubt about it! Understand this well! The same thing may also be called khiṣw, with w instead of a, which is also a word for the penis,¹⁹³ for the latter is like a father to the two testicles, because it never leaves them, and they are as two daughters to it; thus its name is derived from that of the subordinate entity because it is never separated from the latter. From this it follows that the two testicles are in a position of permanent submission to the male organ, while the latter is in a position of high standing over them and they likewise are in a position of dependence while it is in a position of upward mobility; and, additionally, they are in the position of annexation, while it is in the position of the elevated and erected vowels.¹⁹⁴ Further, the male organ has the power to open locked doors, assault fortresses, and knock at smooth domes, while the testicles politely wait for him at the entrance, which is a sign of the filial piety due to a father. In illustration of which, it once came about that a certain poet sought out a king in order to plead for his charity and found him to be in his garden. The poet stood by the gate and tried to gain entrance, but the guard prevented him. The poet then looked behind the wall of the garden and found a water channel running towards, and ending at a point beneath, the wall, where it debouched into a large basin, next to which he beheld the king sitting. So he took a piece of paper and wrote on it this verse:¹⁹⁵

      Everyone else, like a penis, has gone in,

      But this slave, like the testes, is left lying at the door.

      Then he folded it and put it in a Persian reed, sealed it with wax, and threw it into the channel, whence the water carried it until it cast it at the feet of the king. The king picked it up, broke the seal, and pulled out the piece of paper. When he read the verse he smiled and called out to him, “Come in, testicles!” to which the poet replied, “This is just evidence of your great capacity, God preserve you!”¹⁹⁶ The king was well pleased with the aptness of the joke and rewarded him, and the poet retired, giving thanks.

      11.4.9

      Apropos of the aptness of these words, I am reminded of what happened once when Sultan Qānṣawh al-Ghawrī, God have mercy upon him, got angry with a man and wanted to kill him. Some of those present interceded on his behalf, and the sultan imposed on him instead a fine of three thousand dinars. The man left the sultan’s presence to get them and one of his friends, encountering him as he was descending the steps from the audience chamber, said to him, “I hear that the sultan has fined you a thousand dinars.” The other replied, “No, may I be divorced—times three!”¹⁹⁷ When the sultan heard of this bon mot of his and how he had used the same word to cover both divorce and money, he pardoned him, forgave him the three thousand dinars, and rewarded him, and the man went his way.

      11.4.10

      The word khiṣā may also be applied to the male organ, which is also called duldūl (“dangler”),¹⁹⁸ dhanab (“tail”), zubb,¹⁹⁹ ayr,²⁰⁰ ghurmūl,²⁰¹ and other names too. However, the best known are five, which I have mentioned in my treatise Meadows of Intimate Vim concerning What Transpired ’twixt the Prick and the Quim, namely:

      They give me different names, some quite popular:

      Ayr, zubb, duldul,²⁰² and dhakar there are.²⁰³

      The