JAAFER BEN YEHYA AND ABDULMELIK BEN SALIH THE ABBASIDE.[1]
It is told of Jaafer ben Yehya the Barmecide that he sat down one day to drink and being minded to be private (with his friends), sent for his boon-companions, in whom he delighted, and charged the chamberlain[2] that he should suffer none of the creatures of God the Most High to enter, save a man of his boon-companions, by name Abdulmelik ben Salih,[3] who was behindhand with them. Then they donned coloured clothes,[4] for that it was their wont, whenas they sat in the wine-chamber, to don raiment of red and yellow and green silk, and sat down to drink, and the cups went round and the lutes pulsed.
Now there was a man of the kinsfolk of the Khalif [Haroun er Reshid], by name Abdulmelik ben Salih
- ↑ Breslau Text, vol. vii. pp. 251–4, Night dlxv.
- ↑ Syn. doorkeper (hajib).
- ↑ Ibn Khellikan, who tells this story in a somewhat different style, on the authority of Er Reshid’s brother Ibrahim ben El Mehdi, calls the person whom Jaafer expected “Abdulmelik ben Behran, the intendant of his demesnes.”
- ↑ The wearing of silk and bright colours is forbidden to the strict Muslim and it is generally considered proper, in a man of position, to wear them only on festive occasions or in private, as in the text.
