III.

Grammarians and Rhetoricians.

22. This codex is incorrectly labeled as a Muslim theological work; for it is actually a commentary on the most famous philological work, Talkhis al-Miftah fi al-Ma'ani wa al-Bayan Epitome of the Key of Rhetoric; by Sheikh Jalal al-Din Mohammed bin Abdur-Rahman. The Miftah al-'Ulum Key of the Sciences by Siraj al-Din Ya'qub bin Yusuf bin Abu Mohammed bin Ali al-Sakkaki is a most famous encyclopedia of philological sciences, from which Haji Khalfa drew the greatest part of his own encyclopedic work. This tripartite work deals with: 1) Etymology, 2) Syntax, 3) Rhetoric. Our author, therefore, reduced this third part into an epitome, also tripartite, completing all of Rhetoric in three chapters: 1) Ilm al-Ma'ani The Science of Meaning, regarding invention and disposition. 2) Ilm al-Bayan The Science of Eloquence, regarding elocution. 3) Ilm al-Badi' The Science of Stylistic Innovation, regarding figures of speech.

Haji Khalfa offers fifteen commentators on this work and notes the beginning of some works that do not correspond to our tenor. The author of this commentary seems to have been Sa'ad al-Din Mas'ud bin Umar al-Taftazani, who died in the year 792, and who composed a double commentary, one greater, the other smaller. Haji Khalfa enumerates more than thirty glossators of the former, and indeed our codex abounds with marginal glosses from beginning to end, the author of which is named on the first page as Jurjani. Now, Jurjani is the name of one of the aforementioned glossators, so that consequently no doubt remains for us that al-Taftazani is the author of this huge commentary.

23. Awfa al-Wafiyah fi Sharh al-Kafiyah The Most Sufficient of the Sufficient in the Commentary on the Grammatical Treatise called al-Kafiyah, by Haji Baba bin Sheikh Ibrahim bin Abd al-Karim bin Osman of Tus. Now, the Kafiyah is a most famous syntactic work by the grammarian Ibn al-Hajib al-Maliki; there is an innumerable legion of its commentators, many of whom are listed in the Cassiriana Library under the title of Grammar.

24. Misbah fi al-Nahw The Lamp of Syntax. A small but useful work by Imam Nasir bin Abdallah al-Mutarazi, who died in the year 610; divided into five parts: 1) On the terminology of syntax. 2) On the logical verbal particles (al-'awamil al-lafziyya al-qiyasiyya). 3) On the verbal particles that are heard (al-lafziyya al-sama'iyya al-'awamil). 4) On the significant particles (al-'awamil al-ma'nawiyya). 5) On the sections of Arabic speech. original: OCR for date "160" corrected to 610 based on historical identity of al-Mutarrazī.