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HAMMAD

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Originally appearing in Volume V12, Page 897 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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HAMMAD AR-RAWIYA [See also:

Abu-l-Qasim I3ammad See also:ibn Abi Laila Sapur (or ibn Maisara)] (8th See also:century A.n.), Arabic See also:scholar, was of Dailamite descent, but was See also:born in See also:Kufa. The date of his See also:birth is given by some as 694, by others as 714. He was reputed to be the most learned See also:man of his See also:time in regard to the " days of the See also:Arabs " (i.e. their See also:chief battles), their stories, poems, genealogies and dialects. He is said to have boasted that he could recite a See also:hundred See also:long'qasidas for each See also:letter of the See also:alphabet (i.e. rhyming in each letter) and these all from pre-Islamic times, apart from shorter pieces and later verses. Hence his name Hammad ar-Rawiya, " the reciter of verses from memory." The Omayyad See also:caliph \Valid is said to have tested him, the result being that he recited 2900 gasidas of pre-Islamic date and Walid gave him roo,000 dirhems. He was favoured by Yazid II. and his successor Hisham, who brought him up from See also:Irak to See also:Damascus. Arabian critics, however, say that in spite of his learning he lacked a true insight into the See also:genius of the Arabic See also:language, and that he made more than See also:thirty—some say three hundred—mistakes of See also:pronunciation in reciting the See also:Koran. To him is ascribed the See also:collecting of the Mo'allakdt (q.v.). No diwan of his is extant, though he composed See also:verse of his own and probably a See also:good See also:deal of what he ascribed to earlier poets. See also:Biography in McG. de Slane's trans. of Ibn Khallikan, vol. i. pp. 470-474, and many stories are told of him in the Kitdb ul-Aghdni, vol. v. pp. 164-175.

(G. W T.) The origin of the word "See also:

hammer-See also:cloth," an ornamental cloth covering the See also:box-seat on a See also:state-See also:coach, has been often explained from the hammer and other tools carried in the box-seat by the coachman for See also:repairs, &c. The New See also:English See also:Dictionary points out that while the word occurs as See also:early as 1465, the use of a box-seat is not known before the 17th century. Other suggestions are that it is a corruption of " hamper-cloth," or of " See also:hammock-cloth," which is used in this sense, probably owing to a See also:mistake. Neither of these supposed corruptions See also:helps very much. See also:Skeat connects the word with a Dutch word hemel, meaning a See also:canopy. In the name of the See also:bird, the yellow-hammer, the latter See also:part should be " ammer." This appears in the See also:German name, Emmerling, and the word probably means the " chirper," cf. the Ger. jammern, to wail, lament.

End of Article: HAMMAD

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