A Stylistic Analysis of the Mocking Discourse Directed at the Byzantine Leadership in Fatimid Naval Battle Poetry: A Study of Four Poems from Ibn Hānī al-Andalusī's al-Muʿizziyyāt
تحليل أسلوبي لخطاب التهكم المتوجّه إلى القيادة البيزنطية في شعر المعارك البحرية الفاطمية (دراسة في أربع قصائد من معزيات ابن هانئ الأندلسي)
Keywords:
Stylistics; Transitivity Theory; Poetic Mockery; Fatimi Naval Battle Poetry; Al-Muʿizziyyāt; Ibn Hānī Al-Andalusī; The Domesticus; Nikephoros II Phokas; Heraclius; Battle Of Ramṭah; Battle Of Al-MajāzAbstract
This research examines the stylistic structure of mocking discourse directed at Byzantine leadership in four poems by the Fatimid poet Abū al-Qāsim Muḥammad Ibn Hānī al-Andalusī, composed in the era of the Fatimid Caliph al-Muʿizz li-Dīn Allāh during the naval campaigns against the Byzantines in the Mediterranean between 353/963 and 356/967. Since these poems represent the apex of Fatimid naval poetry, and Byzantine-leadership mockery is a salient marker within them, the study deploys M. A. K. Halliday's Transitivity theory as the principal analytical tool to map how the poet structures linguistic action around the three Byzantine figures: the Domestikos (Nikephoros Phokas II), Manuel the commander of Rametta, and Heraclius. The research concludes with four distinct stylistic techniques the poet uses to produce mocking discourse, generating a cumulative effect that foregrounds the Fatimid caliphate.
