The Reality of Abu Al-Ataheya's (d. 210 AH) Departure from Classical Arabic Prosody

Abstract

It was widely circulated in the ancient books of prosody and criticism that Abu Al-Ataheya used to deviate from the prosody in the poetry he wrote. Abu Al-Ataheya did not deny that he departed from the prosody. Rather, he used to say that it was greater than the prosody, and that it was older than the prosody. It is earlier than the accidents, but if we looked closely at the matter of Abu Al-Ataheya’s departure from the accidents, we would find that he did not depart from it. All the poetic verses in which it was said about him that he departed from the prosody were committed to Al-Khalili’s prosody, and did not deviate from him. It has been proven that the prosodyists did not do their duty to investigate and scrutinize the accusation directed at Abu Al-Ataheya, while the critics continued to repeat what the predecessors said without scrutiny.