![Fadl al-Sha'irah Fadl al-Sha'irah](/modules/owlapps_apps/img/nopic.jpg)
Fadl al-Qaysi or Faḍl al-Shāʻirah (Arabic: فضل الشاعرة; "Faḍl the Poet"; d. 871) was one of "three early ʻAbbasid singing girls, particularly famous for their poetry" and is one of the pre-eminent medieval Arabic female poets whose work survives. She was a concubine of caliph Al-Mutawakkil.
Born in al-Yamama (now in Saudi Arabia), Fadl was brought up in Abbasid Basra, (now in Iraq). She was from the Abd al-Qays tribe. Her brothers sold her to Muhammad ibn al-Faraj al-Rukhkhaji, a leading officer of the Caliphate, and he gave her to Caliph al-Mutawakkil (r. 847–861).
Fadl became a prominent figure in the court. According to Ibn Annadim, a bibliographer (died 1047), Fadl's diwan extended to twenty pages. Her pupils included the singer Faridah. When Fadl was brought to before al-Mutawakkil the very day she had been given to him, al-Mutawakkil asked her, "Are you really a poet"? She replied: Those who buy and sell me all say so. He laughed and said "Recite some of your poetry to us" and she recited following verses:
The rightly guided Ruler acceded in the year three and thirty.
A Caliphate entrusted to al-Mutawakkil, when he was seven and twenty Let's us hope, Rightly guided Ruler that your rule goes on for eighty.
God bless you! On all who do not say Amen" — The curse of Almighty
Abu al-Ayna said that the Caliph liked the poem and gave her fifty thousand dirhams.
She died in 870/71.
An example of Fadl's work, in the translation of Abdullah al-Udhari, is:
Riding beasts are no joy to ride until they're bridled and mounted.
So pearls are useless unless they're pierced and threaded.
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