Fables from “Consolation for the Rulers”

Abstract

Composed in the 12th century in Muslim Sicily by the Meccan scholar Muhammad Ibn Zafar (1104-1169), the “Consolation for the Rulers” is one of a long lineage, founded by Ibn Almuqaffa' in the 8th century, of political treaties in the form of advice to kings and potentates for whom they were written. Such treaties were accompanied by amthal, "exempla", which could take the form of historical or semi-historical anecdotes and, more rarely, fables. In the present work, there are translated fables contained in the fourth chapter (or “fourth consolation”) of that work, the only mirror of princes in Arabic produced in Sicily.