Epic
The epic was inspired by these historic events.
In it the Hilali leader Abu Zayd al-Hilali's rival is Khalifa al-Zanati, the hero of the tribe of Zenata. The war between the Arab Banu Hilal and the Berber Zenata is the main theme of the Sira named after Abu Zeid. Another character featured in the epic is Shehta (شحتة).
The Sira was initially carried orally and handed down from generation to generation often in poem form via bards and then recorded later in many variants.
The Egyptian poet and writer Abdel Rahman el-Abnudi has made an exhaustive collection of the Sira, travelling from Egypt to Libya to Tunisia to document the variants of the epic.
The epic was narrated by storytellers in cafés well into the 20th century, much like the Baibars biography.
Read more about this topic: Taghribat Bani Hilal
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“An epic of worry rather than of high tragedy.”
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“Primitive times are lyrical, ancient times epical, modern times dramatic. The ode sings of eternity, the epic imparts solemnity to history, the drama depicts life. The characteristic of the first poetry is ingeniousness, of the second, simplicity, of the third, truth.”
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