What are the literary eras of Arabic poetry?

Arabic poetry is divided into six eras. The pre-Islamic era precedes Islam; the Islamic era runs from the beginning of the prophetic mission to the end of the Rashidun caliphate; the Umayyad from 41 to 132 AH; the Abbasid from 132 to 656 AH; the Andalusian covers al-Andalus from the conquest to the fall of Granada; and the late era follows the fall of Baghdad.

What characterises pre-Islamic Arabic poetry?

It is marked by dense and often strange vocabulary, by exact observation of the desert environment, and by a fixed architecture: the poet halts at an abandoned campsite, recalls a woman, describes his mount at length, and only then arrives at his subject. Its most celebrated works are the Mu'allaqat.

What is the difference between Umayyad and Abbasid poetry?

Umayyad poetry stays close to pre-Islamic verse in language and structure, and is dominated by political poetry and by the naqaid, the duelling invective exchanges between rival poets. Abbasid poetry absorbed urban civilisation and the cultures of conquered peoples: its diction softened, rhetorical ornament multiplied, and new themes appeared, including asceticism and the poetry of the drinking party.

Who are the most famous Arabic poets?

From the pre-Islamic era, Imru al-Qays, Antara and Zuhayr ibn Abi Sulma. From the Umayyad, Jarir, al-Farazdaq and al-Akhtal. From the Abbasid, al-Mutanabbi, Abu Tammam, al-Buhturi, Abu Nuwas and al-Maarri. From al-Andalus, Ibn Zaydun and Ibn Khafaja.

Why is the pre-Islamic era called the Jahiliyya?

Jahiliyya refers to the period preceding the prophetic mission. The ignorance the word names is of the beliefs and conditions of Arabia before Islam, not ignorance of learning or of literature — the poetry of that period is among the most accomplished ever composed in Arabic.

The Six Eras of Arabic Poetry, and What Marks Each One

Arabic poetry is divided into six eras. The boundaries look political — a dynasty falls, another rises — but they are literary in substance. When the centres of power move, the cities, patrons and tastes move with them, and the poetry changes accordingly.

The six eras

Era	Span	Poets
Pre-Islamic	roughly two centuries before the prophetic mission	63
Islamic	from the mission to the end of the Rashidun caliphate	67
Umayyad	41 – 132 AH	88
Abbasid	132 – 656 AH	149
Andalusian	from the conquest of al-Andalus to the fall of Granada	40
Late	after the fall of Baghdad	166

573 poets in total, in the archive these figures are drawn from.

Pre-Islamic: fully formed from the start

The strangest fact about pre-Islamic poetry is that it arrives complete, with no primitive stage behind it. The oldest surviving material predates the prophetic mission by no more than two centuries, and it is already at the height of its powers in meter and construction. Whatever development produced it happened out of sight.

It is marked by dense, often difficult vocabulary, by precise observation of its environment, and by a fixed architecture: the halt at the ruined campsite, the amatory prelude, the long description of the mount, and then the subject. Its most celebrated works are the Mu’allaqat, by Imru al-Qays, Antara, Zuhayr ibn Abi Sulma and Tarafa ibn al-Abd.

Islamic and Umayyad: poetry enters politics

With the coming of Islam, the subject of poetry changed before its language did. It turned from boasting of lineage toward the concerns of the new faith, and the poets of the Prophet emerged, foremost among them Hassan ibn Thabit.

Then came the Umayyad period, with factional conflict at its height, and poetry became a political instrument. This is the age of the naqaid — a poet attacks a rival in a poem, and the rival answers in a poem built on the same meter and the same rhyme. The most famous are the exchanges between Jarir and al-Farazdaq, with al-Akhtal alongside them.

The language of the period is still close to pre-Islamic Arabic, and the architecture still the old one.

Abbasid: the richest era

Here the poetry genuinely changes. Urban civilisation arrived, Arabs mixed with Persians and Byzantines, and the centre of gravity moved from the desert to Baghdad. Diction softened, rhetorical ornament multiplied, and themes appeared that had not existed before: asceticism with Abu al-Atahiya, the drinking party with Abu Nuwas, philosophy with al-Maarri.

It is the era in which Arabic poetry reaches its summit with al-Mutanabbi, and in which two schools face each other: the elaborated craft of Abu Tammam against the classical line of al-Buhturi.

The Abbasid era is also the longest — five centuries — and the second largest by number of poets in this archive.

Andalusian: a different colouring

In al-Andalus, Arabic poetry took on another temperament. The environment was green with rivers and gardens rather than sand, and description of nature flourishes there in a way it does not in the east.

It also produced the muwashshah, a form that breaks with both the two-hemistich line and the single rhyme — the first real departure from the inherited architecture of the qasida. Its best known poets are Ibn Zaydun, Ibn Khafaja and Lisan al-Din ibn al-Khatib.

It is the smallest era in the archive at forty poets, its territory being narrower and its span shorter.

The late era: the largest by count

After the fall of Baghdad in 656 AH begins what is called the late era, running for centuries up to the modern period. It has the most poets in this archive at 166 — not because it was the most fertile, but because it is the longest and the nearest to us, so more of it survived.

Reading the poetry of one era

Knowing the era narrows a search considerably, and it can often be guessed from the language of a single line: rough, unfamiliar vocabulary points to the pre-Islamic; a soft diction dense with ornament points to the Abbasid.

On Qafiyah, poets can be browsed by era, and the figures above come from it. Era joins meter, rhyme and theme as a fourth axis — knowing any two of them will usually get you where you are going.