LabĪD

LabĪD (Abū ‘Aqīl Labīd ibn Rabī’a) (c. 560-c. 661), Arabian poet, belonged to the Banī ’Āmir, a division of the tribe of the Hawāzin. In his younger years he was an active warrior and his verse is largely concerned with inter-tribal disputes. Later, he was sent by a sick uncle to get a remedy from Mahomet at Medina and on this occasion was much influenced by a part of the Koran. He accepted Islam soon after, but seems then to have ceased writing. In Omar’s caliphate he is said to have settled in Kufa. Tradition ascribes to him a long life, but dates given are uncertain and contradictory. One of his poems is contained in the Mo‘allakat (q.v.).

Twenty of his poems were edited by Chalidī (Vienna, 1880); another thirty-five, with fragments and a German translation of the whole, were edited (partly from the remains of A. Huber) by C. Brockelmann (Leiden, 1892); cf. A. von Kremer, Über die Gedichte des Lebyd (Vienna, 1881). Stories of Labīd are contained in the Kitābul-Aghāni, xiv. 93 ff. and xv. 137 ff.

(G. W. T.)