What the Qāḍī Should Not Hear: Women, Eloquence, and the Poetics of Kināya in the Maqāma Šāmiyya of al-Hamaḏān

Abstract

The Maqāma Šāmiyya of Badīʿ al-Zamān al-Hamaḏānī (d. 398/1008) has long been overlooked as a result of the decision of Muḥammad ʿAbduh to remove it from the first modern published edition of the Maqāmāt. This article provides a scholarly edition of the maqāma, a translation, and a study. It argues that al-Hamaḏānī's Šāmiyya uses the rhetorical device of kināya to reflect on the power of language and literary performance. © 2021 Brill. All rights reserved.