in another setting. He would alter his appearance, and they were astonished at the ease with which he ran in his field, at his skill in adopting fresh guises, and at the perfection of his craft; upon him I built these Maqāmāt.

This account was relayed by al-Tāj al-Masʿūdī, from Ibn al-Naqūr, from him.

I add: The Maqāmāt became celebrated and so delighted the vizier of the caliph al-Mustarshid, Sharaf al-Dīn Anwushirwān al-Qāshānī (1) that he urged their completion. In the preface al-Harīrī says of him: “He whose mere signal is law and whose obedience is pure gain directed me.”

As for his calling the narrator al-Ḥārith ibn Hammām, he meant himself, drawing on the ḥadith, “All of you are ḥārith, and all of you are hammām (2).” Ḥārith means “one who earns,” while hammām denotes “one of great concern”; he intended the descriptive sense, not an actual personal name.

Banū Ḥarām—ḥāʾ and rāʾ both bearing a fatḥa—and al-Mashān, likewise vocalised with a fatḥa, is a small settlement north of Basra, notorious for its unhealthy air.

Ibn Khallikān (3) said: “I found in several historical chronicles that al-Harīrī composed…"