The discussion is about what the picture illustrates. Fugcket about the "translation" or whether if Africans were slaves. What do you see???!!!...in the picture.
The notation matches the illustration?
Don't be obtuse.
The book was written like 50 years
before any illustrations were made
for it.
Check the definition of illustration.
The painting illustrates the text.
You erroneously argue from the
position that it pre-empts.
Also you work from a bubble that
isolates the illo from the other
100 miniature paintings in this
particular edition of al~Hariri's
Maqamat a classic Arabic work
studied in Islamic universities
and read by literate classes of
'Arab' society.
Your 'analysis' stems from the need
of a psychological cushion to soften
current social effects due to the
reality of the enslavement of Africans
who were shipped all over the world.
The context of al~Hariri's Maqamat
Portio 34 Zadib is quite clear that
* al~Harith is the man standing in the
lower right of the illo engaged in a
transaction with disguised
* Abu Zayd offering a boy for sale.
The text says this is transpiring
at a slave market. The top tier of
the illo shows people conducting
business such as assuring weight
of gold and silver coins and
looking over the human merchandise
depicted beneath the 'cash register'
between cashier and customer.
Further perusal of the text even
gives the dastard Arab notion that
an African black is naturally fit
for slavery more so than any other
people.
It is not comforting but these are
the facts of history no matter how
unpalatable they are. We have to
face facts unless we want to turn
our history into a fantasy that in
the end will be more harmful than
the lies and distortions of our
histories fabricated by Eurocentrics
and the other ignoramuses and haters.