Aristotle’s Politics

Following the extension of Islam from the seventh century, Caliphal policy,[1] supported the more or less systematic translation of Greek, Indian, Syriac and Persian texts. This resulted in a sort of golden age of translation between the ninth and eleventh centuries. Translations were encouraged under the financial support of sponsors like Tahîr ibn al-Husayn, who ordered the Arabic version of several commentaries on Aristotle’s works. Many translators active during this period were Christian. This was the case for Yûhannâ ibn al-Batrîq (m. 815-816), as his name suggests, to whom we owe this copy of Aristotle’s Politics[2]. His work sets out an analysis of the different forms of government encountered in the history of city-states, in order to deduce which regimes are best suited to human nature.

Two different translation methods were in use at the time. One consisted of translating the meaning of a paragraph into another language; the other, as used by Yûhannâ Ibn al-Batrîq, consisted of finding an Arabic equivalent for every Greek word. This method was not always highly felicitous, and led to a certain number of subsequent revisions of the translations.

It appears to have been mainly the scientific and philosophical works that were translated from Greek, and this manuscript fits that tradition. The second part of a two-volume work, this manuscript contains two texts separated by two blank folios. This is the second text, comprising folios 129v to 155v - a very partial copy of the Arabic translation of Aristotle’s Politics: al-Siyâsa fî tadbîr al-Riyâsa (Politics of Presidency Management) or Sirr al-asrâr  (The Secret of Secrets) by Yûhannâ ibn al-Batrîq.

The frontispiece is decorated with a band surrounded by a braid, housing an inscription written and vocalised in blue ink, bearing the title of the work. Each page is then covered with seventeen lines written in fine, regular Maghribi handwriting. The diacritic points, orthoepic[3] signs and vocalisations were written in the same light-brown colour, and key words are indicated by a larger format. The titles and sub-titles stand out in gold. The work contains another decoration on folio 139, where fine gold braids are worked into a wheel motif. The inscriptions that border the spokes refer to a series of syllogisms symbolising the workings of the State.

From the tenth century, Maghribi calligraphy differed from that of the Near East. It is characterised by strong baseline legibility, or by the way the alif extends under the line of writing, a style originating in ancient Oriental forms. Maghribi aesthetics are often based on repetition of the upper or lower part of the letters’ semi-circular forms. We can contrast the “Andalusian” style, characterised by a very small unit and used in medieval times, with the large unit style, which was rather popular towards the end of the Middle Ages. 

Aristotle’s work was translated into Arabic several times. This bears witness to the thirst for knowledge and cultural fulfilment experienced by the first Islamic civilisation, and which spread from the Oriental capitals to the Muslim West, and was then transmitted by them to the Christian world. An edition of this work kept at the Bibliothèque nationale de France is a physical testimony of this transmission - it was made in Lebanon around 1220 and written in Latin.

[1] In the eighth century, the Abbasside Caliph al-Mansûr created the “House of Wisdom” (Bayt al-Hikma), a major centre of knowledge transmission and translation, grouping over 76 translators.

[2] Greek philosopher (384-322 av. J.C).

[3] Orthoepic signs enable the notation of different phonetic particularities, such as the wasla, marking the elision of a vowel, or the shadda, indicating the doubling of a consonant.