Arabic Version A (The Seven Viziers): Difference between revisions

Latest revision as of 09:57, 11 November 2025

The narrative titled Kitāb al-Sindbād, or الوزراء السبعة [Al-Wuzarāʾ al-sabʿa, The Seven Viziers] is redacted as part of the One Hundred and One and One Thousand and One Nights tale collections, but was also transmitted independently of those larger frame narratives. This iteration of the Seven Viziers narrative, usually referred to in scholarship as Arabic Version A, is most closely related to the version found in the One Hundred and One Nights (A101), but also exhibits some distinct differences. For example, A101 usually inserts the story Elephantus at the start of the text, which is not found in Arabic Version A. The following stories are then the same for the two versions up to the 15th (Version A) or 16th (Version A101) story, Simia, after which their patterns diverge, and each ends with four or five unique stories (see story order, below).

The different Arabic Version A manuscripts, listed here, also demonstrate some variation in the number and order of stories contained within them. For example, the earliest surviving independent Seven Viziers text - c. 1535, edited by Ateş in the appendix to his edition of Sindbad-name (1948), found in the Ali Paşa Library in Istanbul - contains the 21 stories listed below. Other later versions from the 18th century, including Bibliothèque nationale de France, Arabe 3670 and Paris Bibliothèque nationale de France, Arabe 3639 edited by Basset in 1903, include 24 stories instead. Notably, they include some stories - e.g. Curiositas, Imago, Capsa - that appear infrequently (if at all) elsewhere in the tradition.

Identification and general Information
Reference Number
Siglum of the version of the Seven Sages	A (The Seven Viziers)
Version Number
Title	الوزراء السبعة (Al-Wuzarāʾ al-sabʿa, The Seven Viziers)
Author

Tradition and Lineage
Branch of the tradition	East
Adapted from (version)
Adapted into (version)
Source for composition and adaptation information

Recorded secondary versions
Seven Viziers Arabic Version A (The Seven Viziers) Arabic Version A1001 (Thousand and One Nights) Arabic Version A101 (Hundred and One Nights)

Connected manuscripts

Language and Composition
Original language of version	Arabic
Language of text	Arabic
Regional or specific language of version
Translated into (languages)
Place of composition
Date of composition	700 - 850
Islamic date of composition
Hebrew date of composition
Source for date of composition	Krönung (2016), Ateş (1948)

Modern Scholarship and Editions
Modern research literature	Ateş (1948), Krönung (2016), Redwan (2023), Ott (2012), Artola (1978), Perry (1960), Basset (1903), Belcher (1987)
Modern Editions	Ateş, Sindbād̲-nāme (1948)

Notes and Commentary
Note
Notes on motifs
Notes on the frame

Pattern of embedded stories in this version

Has Short Title	Has Sequence Number	Has Narrator	Has Name Variation
Leo	1
Avis	2
Lavator	3
Panes	4
Gladius	5
Striga	6
Mel	7
Zuchara	8
Fons	9
Balneator	10
Canicula	11
Aper	12
Canis	13
Pallium	14
Simia	15
Turtures	16
Elephantinus	17
Ingenia	18
Puer 3 annorum	19
Puer 5 annorum	20

Connected prints
No connected prints

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 {{Version
-|Has Description=The version of the ''Sindbad'' narrative titled ''Kitāb al-Sindbād'', or  الوزراء السبعة [Al-Wuzarāʾ al-sabʿa, ''The Seven Viziers''] is referenced in Arabic literature dating from the 9th and 10th centuries. Though no early versions of the full text survive, allusions to the narrative may be found in the works of the historian such as al-Ya'qūbī (9th century) and al-Shābushtī (d. after 998 CE / late 4th century AH), suggesting that the narrative was well known by the 10th century, with the original Arabic transmission date by the 9th, or possibly even 8th century ([[Krönung (2016)|Krönung 2016, p. 370)]]. Additional references to the narrative are found in ''Murūj al-Dhahab by'' al-Masʿūdī’ (d. 956 CE / 345 AH), who claims the popular entertainment book ''Kitāb al-Sindbād'' refers to the sage Sindbād who lived during the reign of the Indian king Kush and relates the story of the Seven Viziers, the Prince, and the King's wife; it is also mentioned in ''al-Fihrist'' by Ibn al-Nadīm (d. 995 CE / 385 AH), in which ''Kitāb Sindbād al-Ḥakīm'' is referenced as a book of entertainment that exists in two forms - long and short - and has either Persian or Indian origins (see [[Ateş (1948)|Ateş 1948]], pp. 12-13). Ibn al-Nadīm identifies the Arabic poet Abān al-Lāhiqī as the author of one version, and also 'transmits the name of the Persian scholar Mūsā b. 'Īsā al-Kisrawī (d. 874/875 CE), one of the leading translators from Persian into Arabic, who has been unanimously identified in modern scholarship as Mousos from Andreopoulos's Preface' in the Greek version (Krönung 2016, p. 370).
+|Has Description=The narrative titled ''Kitāb al-Sindbād'', or  الوزراء السبعة [Al-Wuzarāʾ al-sabʿa, ''The Seven Viziers''] is redacted as part of the ''[[Arabic Version A101 (Hundred and One Nights)|One Hundred and One]]'' and ''[[Arabic Version A1001 (Thousand and One Nights)|One Thousand and One Nights]]'' tale collections, but was also transmitted independently of those larger frame narratives. This iteration of the ''Seven Viziers'' narrative, usually referred to in scholarship as Arabic Version A, is most closely related to the version found in the ''One Hundred and One Nights'' (A101), but also exhibits some distinct differences. For example, A101 usually inserts the story [[Elephantus]] at the start of the text, which is not found in Arabic Version A. The following stories are then the same for the two versions up to the 15th (Version A) or 16th (Version A101) story, [[Simia]], after which their patterns diverge, and each ends with four or five unique stories (see story order, below).
+The different Arabic Version A manuscripts, listed here, also demonstrate some variation in the number and order of stories contained within them. For example, the earliest surviving independent ''Seven Viziers'' text -  c. 1535, edited by Ateş in the appendix to his edition of ''Sindbad-name'' (1948), found in the Ali Paşa Library in Istanbul - contains the 21 stories listed below. Other later versions from the 18th century, including [[Paris Bibliothèque nationale de France, Arabe 3670|Bibliothèque nationale de France, Arabe 3670]] and [[Paris Bibliothèque nationale de France, Arabe 3639]] edited by Basset in 1903, include 24 stories instead. Notably, they include some stories - e.g. [[Curiositas]], [[Imago]], [[Capsa]] - that appear infrequently (if at all) elsewhere in the tradition.
-The surviving copies of the text in Arabic are much younger than this, however, and they fall into three distinct versions or redactions:
+|Has Parent Version=Seven Viziers
-*A1001: The version of ''The Seven Viziers'' found in the ''One Thousand and One Nights''
-*[[A101 (Hundred and One Nights)|A101]]: The version of ''The Seven Viziers'' embedded in the ''One Hundred and One Nights''
-*Arabic Version A: ''The Seven Viziers'' redacted indepently of a larger frame structure.
-There is some variation within each of the above groups. The independent ''Seven Viziers'' redactions, discussed below, demonstrate some variation in the number and order of stories contained within them. For example, the earliest surviving independent ''Seven Viziers'' text -  c. 1535, edited by Ateş in the appendix to his edition of ''Sindbad-name'' (1948), found in the Ali Paşa Library in Istanbul - contains the 21 stories listed below. Other later versions from the 18th century, including [[Paris Bibliothèque nationale de France, Arabe 3670|Bibliothèque nationale de France, Arabe 3670]] and [[Paris Bibliothèque nationale de France, Arabe 3639]] edited by Basset in 1903, include 24 stories instead. Notably, they include some stories - e.g. [[Curiositas]], [[Imago]], [[Capsa]] - that appear infrequently elsewhere in the tradition.
 |Has Title=الوزراء السبعة (Al-Wuzarāʾ al-sabʿa, The Seven Viziers)
 |Has Siglum=A (The Seven Viziers)