Abu al-Fadl Abbas Ibn al-Ahnaf () (750 in

Basra Basra () is a port city in Iraq, southern Iraq. It is the capital of the eponymous Basra Governorate, as well as the List of largest cities of Iraq, third largest city in Iraq overall, behind Baghdad and Mosul. Located near the Iran–Iraq bor ...

-809), was an

Arab Arabs (, , ; , , ) are an ethnic group mainly inhabiting the Arab world in West Asia and North Africa. A significant Arab diaspora is present in various parts of the world. Arabs have been in the Fertile Crescent for thousands of years ...

Abbasid The Abbasid Caliphate or Abbasid Empire (; ) was the third caliphate to succeed the prophets and messengers in Islam, Islamic prophet Muhammad. It was founded by a dynasty descended from Muhammad's uncle, Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib (566–653 C ...

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator (thought, thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral t ...

from the tribe of

Banu Hanifa Banu Hanifa () is an ancient Arab tribe inhabiting the area of al-Yamama in the central region of modern-day Saudi Arabia. The tribe belongs to the great Rabi'ah branch of North Arabian tribes, which also included Abdul Qays, Taghlib, al-N ...

. His work consists solely of love poems (

ghazal ''Ghazal'' is a form of amatory poem or ode, originating in Arabic poetry that often deals with topics of spiritual and romantic love. It may be understood as a poetic expression of both the pain of loss, or separation from the beloved, and t ...

). It is "primarily concerned with the hopelessness of love, and the personae in his compositions seems resigned to a relationship of deprivation". The vocabulary he chose was simple and his style is fluent and easy. He grew up in Baghdad, where he became a friend of the Abbasid caliph

Harun al-Rashid Abū Jaʿfar Hārūn ibn Muḥammad ar-Rāshīd (), or simply Hārūn ibn al-Mahdī (; or 766 – 24 March 809), famously known as Hārūn al-Rāshīd (), was the fifth Abbasid caliph of the Abbasid Caliphate, reigning from September 786 unti ...

. who employed him for the purpose of amusing him in time of leisure. His work was an acknowledged influence on

Abdullah ibn al-Mu'tazz Abdallah ibn al-Mu'tazz (; 861 – 29 December 908) was the son of the caliph al-Mu'tazz and a political figure, but is better known as a leading Arabic poet and the author of the ''Kitab al-Badi'', an early study of Arabic forms of poetry. ...

and Abu al-Atahiya.''Bird Through A Ceiling of Alabaster; Three Abbasid Poets'', translated by Abdullah Al-Udhari and George Wightman (Penguin, 1975)

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Article
750 births 809 deaths Poets from the Abbasid Caliphate 8th-century Arabic-language writers 8th-century Arab people {{MEast-poet-stub