(INTRODUCTION)
Among the early chronicles of the Arabs, as we have already stated, by
far the most celebrated is the many-volumed work of Masoudi, called,
the "Book of Golden Meadows." It is a collection of interesting and
sometimes scandalous anecdotes about anything and everything in the
past, but chiefly about the earlier caliphs. These, with true Eastern
subtlety, Masoudi criticises where criticism will be safe, in order
that he may praise with a convincing air where he thinks praise will be
especially pleasing to the powerful of his own day. In other words, the
author is an accomplished courtier as well as a witty and entertaining
writer. His book begins, as do all Arab books, with the formula, "In
the name of the most merciful God," followed by the usual preface
praising Mohammed and the author's own work, and explaining its origin.
Then follow, chronologically arranged, the anecdotes of which we quote
some that refer to the best-known caliphs.
Masoudi himself was of the genuine Arab blood, a man of prominence
descended from one of the comrades of Mohammed. He was born at Bagdad,
but was, like many of his countrymen, a wanderer. After visiting all
lands, he finally selected Egypt as his dwelling-place, and there
died, probably in A.D. 957. Al Bukhari and other earlier travelers had
collected all the tales of the Prophet, so Masoudi devoted himself
to gathering other legends. From the vast bulk of these he made a
thirty-volume historical work, most of which has disappeared. He then
selected from this the material for a briefer work, and then, by a
third process of distillation, gathered the best of his anecdotes into
the "Golden Meadows."
Of the more careful historians and genuine scientists who followed,
Avicenna, from whose philosophical work we give an extract here, must
assuredly be ranked the first.