IBRAHIM  AL-MAU$

ILI (742-804), Arabian singer, was born of Persian parents settled in Kufa . In his early years his parents died and he was trained by an uncle . Singing, not study, attracted him, and at the age of twenty-three he fled to Mosul, where he joined a band of wild youths . After a year he went to Rai (Rei, Rhagae), where he met an ambassador of the caliph Mansur, who enabled him to come to Basra and take singing lessons . His fame as a singer spread, and the caliph Mandi brought him to the court . There he remained a favourite under Hadi, while Harun al-Rashid kept him always with him until his death, when he ordered his son (Ma'mun) to say the prayer over his corpse . Ibrahim, as might be expected, was no strict Moslem . Two or three times he was knouted and imprisoned for excess in wine-drinking, but was always taken into favour again . His powers of song were far beyond anything else known at the time . Two of his pupils, his son Ishaq and Muhariq, attained celebrity after him . See the Preface to W . Ahlwardt's Abu Nowas (Greifswald, 1861), pp .

13-18, and the many stories of his

life in the Kitab ul-Aghani, V . 2-49 . (G . W .