both the above verses is that by gharb is denoted neither silver nor gold
but that wood from which the goblets of wine are made. Obviously,
wood cannot have the respect enjoined upon it as in the case of gold, and
the goblets of gold cannot be as large as the goblets of wood. The poet
thus wishes to say that he has quaffed from both large and small goblets.
By the small goblet he means goblet of gold and by the larger the khashbi (wooden) goblet, i.e., he has drunk from the smaller goblets and he
has tippled from the larger goblets. A poet before him has said thus:
We have tippled from large and small goblets at the behest of the
Caliph and his minister.
Munakhkhal says:
1 drank from the small goblet as well as from the larger one.
Apparently it means what we have said. Some people have said that
saghir means dirham and kabir means dinar. Some, on the other hand,
say that sagliir means the price of the smaller camels and kabir that of
the bigger ones. In support of this meaning, they have quoted the following couplet:
I drank — and drank worth the cost of mares and horses of fine
breed.
But, at the same time, it is quite possible that what the poet wishes to
say is that he drank at the back of the horse and mares or that he had his
fun having pawned them. Be that as it may, the most celebrated name of
silver is fiddah. God Himself has said:
"They who hoard up gold and silver — " 123
And He says:
". . .(Bright as) glass (made) of silver"124
and further:
"Bracelets of silver — "125
It is said it is called fiddah, since when its seal is broken, it comes out
beautiful.
Abu al-Fadl 'Urudi Saffar says:
God provided shelter to silver in the hearts of the rocks on account
of its dignity. When fire brings it out through excessively hard work,
time hands it over to a malicious being whose heart is harder than the
rocks.
At the village of Wastanah, near Zaruban, silver has at times been found
mixed with iron although the two had not formed an alloy. It was,
therefore, stripped as the silver came out without being melted. Once a
piece of silver was dug out of the iron mines, it was cut and clandestinely
distributed. Someone, however, reported the theft, and all the thieves
were caught.
The weight of gold, equivalent to the axis of gold, is 54-5/8.
When melted with sulphur for different purposes, it discharges colour
Flickr
Stumbleupon
Scribd
