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DIVAN (Arabic divan)

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Originally appearing in Volume V08, Page 326 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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See also:

DIVAN (Arabic divan) , a See also:Persian word, derived probably from Aramaic, meaning a " counting-See also:house, See also:office, See also:bureau, tribunal" ; thence, on one See also:side, the " See also:account-books and registers" of such an office, and, on another, the " See also:room where the office or tribunal sits "; thence, again, from " account-See also:book, See also:register," a " book containing the poems of an author," arranged in a definite See also:order (alphabetical according to the See also:rhyme-words), perhaps because of the saying, " See also:Poetry is the register (divan) of the See also:Arabs," and from " bureau, tribunal," " a See also:long seat, formed of a See also:mattress laid against the side of the room, upon the See also:floor or upon a raised structure or See also:frame, with cushions to lean against " (See also:Lane, See also:Lexicon, 930 f.). All these meanings existed and exist, especially " bureau, tribunal," " book of poems " and " seat "1; but the order of derivation may have been slightly different. The word first appears under the See also:caliphate of See also:Omar (A.D. 634-644). See also:Great See also:wealth, gained from the Moslem conquests, was pouring into See also:Medina, and a See also:system of business management and See also:administration became necessary. This was copied from the Persians and given the Persian name, divan." Later, as the See also:state became more complicated, the See also:term was extended over all the See also:government bureaus. The divan of the See also:Sublime See also:Porte was for long the See also:council of the See also:empire, presided over by the See also:grand See also:vizier. See Von Kremer, Culturgeschichte See also:des Orients, i. 64, 198. (D. B. MA.) 1 The divan in this sense has been known in See also:Europe certainly since about the See also:middle of the 18th See also:century.

It was fashionable, roughly speaking, from 182o to 185o, wherever the romantic See also:

movement in literature penetrated. All the boudoirs of that See also:generation were garnished with divans; they even spread to See also:coffee-houses, which were sometimes known as ` divans " or " See also:Turkish divans "; and a " See also:cigar divan" remains a See also:familiar expression.

End of Article: DIVAN (Arabic divan)

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