—and he copied it verbatim from Abu Muhammad ʿAbd al-Rahman b. Ahmad al-Tabari’s The Clear Guide to Archery and Arrow-Shooting. (1)

From that work he excerpts: the proper method of shooting, the standard length of an arrow; a chapter on inflicting damage; a chapter on the secrets of archery—twenty secrets in all; and a chapter on shooting while standing and while seated.

• Next he introduces a chapter on the “medicine” of archery, listing its ailments and defects together with the treatments or adjustments that set them right.

• He follows this with a chapter on the pillars of archery, describing each pillar and noting the divergent opinions about them.

• Then comes a chapter on aiming, its rulings, and its correct measure, after which he discusses the release and its various forms.

He concludes the material taken from al-Tabari with a chapter on the arrow’s passage across the bow-hand, identifying four types, and explaining why an arrow rises in the air, descends, flies straight, and how scholars differ on these matters.

Section Five: on courage and strength and what has been transmitted concerning them.

• He opens with a chapter praising strength and bravery and condemning incapacity and cowardice. He begins by citing the noble Quranic verses, then the prophetic hadiths on the subject, and afterward quotes what the poets have said about courage, such as Qatari ibn al-Fujaʿah and others.