A marsiya ( fa, مرثیه) is an elegiac poem written to commemorate the martyrdom and valour of

Hussain ibn Ali Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Ḥusayn ibn ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib ( ar, أبو عبد الله الحسين بن علي بن أبي طالب; 10 January 626 – 10 October 680) was a grandson of the Islamic prophet Muhammad and a son of Ali ibn Ab ...

and his comrades of the Karbala. Marsiyas are essentially religious.A History of Urdu literature by T. Grahame Bailey; ''Urdu Poetry in Lucknow in the 19th century''
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Background

The word ''Marsiya'' is derived from the Arabic word ''marthiyya'' (

root In vascular plants, the roots are the organs of a plant that are modified to provide anchorage for the plant and take in water and nutrients into the plant body, which allows plants to grow taller and faster. They are most often below the su ...

R-TH-Y), meaning a great tragedy or lamentation for a departed soul. Marsiya is a poem written to commemorate the martyrdom of Ahl al-Bayt,

Imam Hussain Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Ḥusayn ibn ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib ( ar, أبو عبد الله الحسين بن علي بن أبي طالب; 10 January 626 – 10 October 680) was a grandson of the Islamic prophet Muhammad and a son of Ali ibn Abi ...

and

Battle of Karbala The Battle of Karbala ( ar, مَعْرَكَة كَرْبَلَاء) was fought on 10 October 680 (10 Muharram in the year 61 AH of the Islamic calendar) between the army of the second Umayyad Caliph Yazid I and a small army led by Husayn ...

. It is usually a poem of mourning. Marsiyas in Urdu first appeared in the sixteenth century in the Deccan kingdoms of India. They were written either in the two-line unit form, ''qasida'', or the four-line unit form, ''murabba''. Over time, the ''musaddas'' became the most suitable form for a marsiya. In this form, the first four lines of each stanza referred to as the ''band'' have one rhyme scheme while the remaining two line referred to as the ''tip'' have another. This form found a specially congenial soil in

Lucknow Lucknow (, ) is the capital and the largest city of the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh and it is also the second largest urban agglomeration in Uttar Pradesh. Lucknow is the administrative headquarters of the eponymous district and division ...

, an important

Shia Muslim Shīʿa Islam or Shīʿīsm is the second-largest branch of Islam. It holds that the Islamic prophet Muhammad designated ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib as his successor (''khalīfa'') and the Imam (spiritual and political leader) after him, most ...

community in the

Indian subcontinent The Indian subcontinent is a list of the physiographic regions of the world, physiographical region in United Nations geoscheme for Asia#Southern Asia, Southern Asia. It is situated on the Indian Plate, projecting southwards into the Indian O ...

, where it was regarded as an act of piety and religious duty to eulogize and bemoan the martyrs of the

battle of Karbala The Battle of Karbala ( ar, مَعْرَكَة كَرْبَلَاء) was fought on 10 October 680 (10 Muharram in the year 61 AH of the Islamic calendar) between the army of the second Umayyad Caliph Yazid I and a small army led by Husayn ...

. The genre was championed by

Mir Babar Ali Anis Mir Babar Ali Anees ( ur, مير ببر على انيس) (1800–1874), also known as Mir Anees was an Indian Urdu poet. He used his pen-name (takhallus) of Anees (Urdu: , ''Anees'' means "close friend, companion") in poetry. Anees used Persian, ...

. Famous marsiya writers in

Urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
'' Mirza Salamat Ali Dabeer,

Ali Haider Tabatabai Ali Haider Tabatabai (or Syed Ali Hyder Nazm Tabatabai) born 1854 in Awadh, died 1933 in Hyderabad Deccan, India, was a poet, translator and a scholar of languages. He descended from a long line of soldiers. He translated into Urdu Urdu ...

, Najm Afandi,

Josh Malihabadi Josh Malihabadi (born Shabbir Hasan Khan; 5 December 1898 – 22 February 1982) popularly known as Shayar-e-Inqalab (poet of revolution) was a Pakistani poet and is regarded as one of the finest Urdu poets of the era of British India. Kno ...

, and others. Well-known Persian poets of the genre include Muhtasham Kashani, Nawab Ahmad Ali Khan Qayamat and Samet Borujerdi. In Turkish,

Bâkî Bâḳî (باقى) was the pen name ( Ottoman Turkish: مخلص ''mahlas'') of the Ottoman Turkish poet Mahmud Abdülbâkî (محمود عبدالباقى) . Considered one of the greatest contributors to Turkish literature and Azerbaijani l ...

composed an important marsiya.

, a renowned

Urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
'' noha A noha ( fa, نوحه, ur, نوحہ; translit. ''nūḥa/nawḥa''; az, Növhə/Нөвһә/نؤوحه), when interpreted in light of Shia views, is an elegy about the tragedy of Husayn ibn Ali in the Battle of Karbala. Marsiya and Noha have ...

s and quatrains. While the length of elegy initially had no more than forty or fifty stanzas, he pushed it beyond one hundred fifty or even longer than two hundred stanzas or ''band''s, as each unit of marsiya in the ''musaddas'' format is known. Mir Anis drew upon the vocabulary of

Arabic Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...

, Persian,

Urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
'' Awadhi Awadhi (; ), also known as Audhi (), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken in northern India and Nepal. It is primarily spoken in the Awadh region of present-day Uttar Pradesh, India. The name ''Awadh'' is connected to Ayodhya, the ancient city ...

to a great degree. He has become an essential element of

Muharram Muḥarram ( ar, ٱلْمُحَرَّم) (fully known as Muharram ul Haram) is the first month of the Islamic calendar. It is one of the four sacred months of the year when warfare is forbidden. It is held to be the second holiest month after ...

among the Urdu-speakers of the Indian subcontinent. The first major and still current critical articulation about Mir Anis was ''Muazna-e-Anis-o-Dabir'' (1907) written by

Shibli Nomani Shibli Nomani ( ur, – ; 3 June 1857 – 18 November 1914) was an Islamic scholar from the Indian subcontinent during the British Raj. He was born at Bindwal in Azamgarh district of present-day Uttar Pradesh.Asaf-ud-Daulah Mirza Asaf-ud-Daula (23 September 1748 – 21 September 1797) was the Nawab wazir of Oudh ratified by Shah Alam II, from 26 January 1775 to 21 September 1797, and the son of Shuja-ud-Dowlah. His mother and grandmother were the Begums of Oudh. ...

. He was initially a ghazal poet with the

takhallus A takhallus ( ur, , fa, تخلّص, hi, तख़ल्लुस), is a pen-name. Pen names were widely adopted by Urdu, Punjabi, Hindi and Persian poets. ''Takhallus'' is an Arabic word which means, literally, "to get liberated" or "become s ...

‘Tarab’, before focusing on marsiya at a later stage. He converted to Islam and changed his name to Ghulam Hussain. His most popular marsiya is called گھبراۓ گی زینبؑ ‘ گھبراۓ گی زینبؑ.Chhannu Lal Dilgeer
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References

Cited sources

External links

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Marsiya of Imam Hasan Hussain
{{Urdu poetry Urdu-language poetry Shia literature Islamic poetry Cultural depictions of Husayn ibn Ali Islamic terminology Laments Persian literature

Background

See also

References

Cited sources

External links