THE SPREADING OF THE MUWAŠŠAH

Abstract

The muwassah is a vocal composition, which is based on the poetic form of the same name. It was always sung with musical accompaniment, at least since about the year 900 a.d. when it achieved popularity in Spain under the name muwassah andalusi (that means muwassah in the Andalusian tongue). Since the 10th century, it has been much favored throughout the entire Iberian peninsula. It is the first strophic poetry known in Western civilization and it probably influenced the songs of the troubadours. The Andalusian muwassah was adapted to the more or less sophisticated colloquial Arabic and appeared in meters (awz?n) which were not the classical form1. In Andalusia, it developed its own art-form of meter, which was known as the 'ar?d al-balad (the popular prosody)2. The local song-writers and performers wrote their compositions in this form. In ?muwassah?, they held onto the inflectional endings. In ?zagal?, the second colloquial form the endings probably were dropped. This contributes to the idea that the muwassah predates the zagal, according to Ibn Hald?n (who died in 1406), who identified that the endings could be dropped in the colloquial tongue. The first zagal collection was that of Ibn Quzm?n (who died in 1160)3. Generally, we are of the opinion that the muwassahof the reign of 'Abdallah b. Muhammad al-Marw?n? (888 912) became one of the widely known forms of art4.