The Visual Sign as Semiotic Signifier in the Arabian Nights

Abstract

This article concentrates on tales from the Arabian Nights where visual signs play a part in communication and narrative unfolding. The Tales of ‘Azīz and Azīza’ and ‘The Hunchback’ are examined in terms of how visual signs are interpreted by the characters. The typology and codes of these signs are explored to construct a latent semiotics based broadly on the categories of Peirce (icon, index and symbol) as well as insights drawn from recent semiotic research. This article also presents theoretical positions on the visual sign and on signification developed in medieval Arab civilisation in order to relate the underlying folk semiotics of the Arabian Nights to the learned semiotics and theories of interpretation articulated by medieval philosophers and scientists.