have“loved painting and never tired of looking at illustrated books.”^2 So
Yazuri invited the Iraqi painter ibn‘Aziz, whose fame equaled that of the
calligrapher ibn al-Bawwab, to compete with the Egyptian painter al-Qasir,
who demanded high wages because he claimed to be as good at painting as
ibn Muqla was at calligraphy.^3 The Iraqi announced that he would paint an
image as if it were going into the wall, while the Egyptian countered that he
would paint it as if it were walking out, which impressed the audience
more. When they executed their paintings of dancing girls in opposite
niches, they were both equally rewarded.
Interpretation of the story hinges on the detail of Yazuri’s love of
painting. Although by al-Maqrizi’s time illustrated manuscripts had
become a common element of elite culture, there is no evidence of it in
the Fatimid era. Atfirst glance, the detail might seem a mere anachronism,
familiarizing the court of the past in the guise of the court of al-Maqrizi’s
present.
However, the story borrows from the frame story ofKalila and Dimna,
in which the character Dimna, a jackal, describes how he would advise a
ruler, allegorized as a lion:
And I shall speak gently and advise prudently; and when he hears these my words
whose like he did not hear from his counsellors who preceded me, I do not doubt
he shallfind confidence before him, and that he will count me worthy of presents
and of great honours. For a man who walks with his companion in prudence, subtle
knowledge and sound intelligence, if he wishes to obliterate the truth and stultify
the right, and establish and accredit the false, so that his companion may believe a
lie, may sometimes be able to do so; and resembles a skilful painter who paints
portraits of every kind on the walls, for these pictures that are imprinted on the
walls look as if they were coming out of the wall, though they are not, and others as
if they are entering into it though they are not.^4
Al-Maqrizi’s conceit offinding the story in a historical text, rather than in
fables, enables him to follow Dimna’s advice about lying in order to
rhetorically advance the good or the true, even if based on a falsehood.
This reflects Socrates’distinction between a verbal falsehood, which can be
used to further an underlying truth, and a real falsehood, a false belief held
as absolute.^5 His incorporation of ibn Muqaffa’s invitation to read the text
to acquire wisdom suggests the continuing importance of the stories for the
ethics of his own era, roughly seven centuries later.(^2) Necipoğlu, 2015 : 36. (^3) Rabbat, 2006 : 102. (^4) Keith-Falconer, 1885 :14–15.
(^5) Plato, 2000 : 69 (382a–d).
160 Deceiving Deception