The Functionality of Color Terms in Antarah IBN SHADAD's Poetry

Abstract

     To start with, a definition of the term 'color' in Arabic language is presented.  Then, a study of colors implications in Al-Jahili poetry is proceeded; the poet's creativity in using color terms and incorporating these terms in Jahili poems explicitly or implicitly in forming up the topics of their poetry, then outlined. Color figures and images are dominant in Al-Jahili poetry to its extreme so as to propagate an oasis of environmental emulations, on one hand, and an outlet for personal experience on the other. In his poetry, Antara followed his ancestors' poetic traditions and closely textualized their inspirations and fantasies in his versification.  Partly, his poetic diction was personalized; whereas, the semantic contents tackled by ancestors were mediated and de toured astray in some instanses.  Reviewing his poetry collection one can infer his typical attitudes of using colors: the black, the white, the red, the green, the blue, and the yellow. Excessive use of these colors can be cited along with multiplicity of presentation in creating a quantum of color implications especially those of the white and the black, he used a decorated mosaic of colors in forming his poetic image; whereas he incorporated a corona of colors in restoring his poeticity.  Color contrasts are foregrounded in building up perceptible imagesof his poems. Colorful images, he used, asa loverand as a knight are merged with his passion and bravery; though gloomy in his macabre. The paper concludes that Antara used an excessive influx of colors terminology and semantic sheds in entailing his topics, focusing on the red, black and white.  The black was his favorite; whereas the red and the black are used excessively in his expressions.  Explicit reference to the red and black was the highest in number in the selected poems.  Essentially, some node that the notability of the black was a symptom of suffering and degrading he suffered as a black.