Page 46 - Arabian Studies (I)

32 Arabian Studies /
Rain-making (tasqiyah)
Invoking Allah for rain is not only countenanced and approved in
Islam, but, as I show in my South Arabian Hunt, was, for example,
linked to the chase of the ibex in the pre-Islamic ages it takes
many forms in Arabia. In the regions around San‘a’ there is a
rain-ceremony known as tasqiyah. On 21 July 1972, driving down
the §an‘a’-Hodeidah road, we came upon, somewhere before
Manakhah, a group of men and boys walking down the road with
some black goats and singing. Our driver Husain b. Sa'Td of Jabal
‘Ayal Yazid told us they were invoking rain (yitsaqql). The goats arc
slaughtered but not eaten, being left to the vultures (? nusur), wild
animals and dogs. In northern Yemen usually they make a tour of
the town or village and then slaughter the animals, in no specific
place, but usually near the Jarni* mosque or else above the birkah
(large cistern) which will probably be empty of water. It is, as a rule,
he added, only when the camel or bull is worn out and old (taban)
that they leave it to the nusur, for they usually eat the younger
animals. In the Jabal they usually take a bull (thawr) or calf (7/7) of
one to one and a half years.34 Of what is said or sung at the tasqiyah
he could only remember
Give us water, o Allah Isqi-na yallah
Pity us/Give us rain, o Allah Irham-na yallah
Have pity on the beasts Irham al-'ajmah 3 5
Thirsting for water ‘Atishah li’l-md
Hungry for fodder Jaw rah li-l-alaf
etc.
Again, on 5 August, driving down into Wad! Dahr from San‘a* we
came upon women and boys walking up the road from the wad!,
performing a tasqiyah but without any goats or other animals for
sacrifice. My diary records rain on 9 and 10 August.

Gifts of First Fruits at Harvesting

On our way from SanT to Hada country in mid-June we were
offered gifts of many a bunch of green lentils ("adas) which the
farming folk, men and women were clearing off the fields. This
custom is said to be dying though we saw no sign of that! A gift of
first fruits of peas ('atar) or beans (qillah/qilld) is known as ghasus.
As you pass the harvesters they say, ‘Ta'al - lak shuwaiyat ghasus,
Come and you’ll get some peas/beans.’ Lasls is a gift of wheat (birr),
and sa'if one of any millet crop eaten green (sa'af/ista'af, to eat green
zar‘). In Wad! Sirr at mid-July a woman with a tiny vineyard offered
us sabuh of grapes, and a little later Shaikh Ahmad Faraj of Bait