A Papyrus Fragment Related to Ibn ʿAbd Rabbih’s al-ʿIqd al-farīd*

Abstract

This article presents an edition and a translation of a papyrus fragment from the Beinecke Library at Yale (P.CtYBR inv. 2598), together with a brief commentary. This literary fragment, containing two verses of poetry, is interesting because it provides an oriental source for a text until then known only through the famous Andalusian work of Ibn ʿAbd Rabbih, al-ʿIqd al-farīd; it also serves as an example of an informal mode of written transmission of Arabic poetry.