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Periodical article | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | The growth of Arabic-Islamic literary tradition in Northern Nigeria |
Author: | Raji, M.G.A. |
Year: | 1992 |
Periodical: | Savanna: A Journal of the Environmental and Social Sciences |
Volume: | 13 |
Issue: | 2 |
Pages: | 7-18 |
Language: | English |
Geographic terms: | Nigeria Northern Nigeria Arab countries |
Subjects: | Islam religious literature literature |
Abstract: | The Islamic scholarship tradition was introduced between the eleventh and fourteenth century in both Kanem-Borno and Hausaland, northern Nigeria, as an integral part of Islam. Its gradual development was aided by contacts with the outside Islamic world through pilgrimage, commercial activities and migrations of many itinerant African scholars. By the end of the seventeenth century it had become sufficiently mature to produce the first indigenous scholars who were able to write in Arabic. The earliest form of writing was probably record keeping and legal documentation. This subsequently developed into writing footnotes, annotations, commentaries, epitomes, and simple commercial or social correspondence. With the growth of the Islamic scholarship tradition, a literary tradition in the Arabic language gradually emerged. In verse composition, three of the conventional methods of composing poetry as a craft were adopted, with the use of the simplest metre. Both the scholastic and the artistic writings are seen as the beginning of an Islamic intellectual culture in Nigeria. Ref., sum. |