Kitāb al-aṣwāt: suoni, voci e versi nella lessicografia araba tra VIII e IX secolo

This article is devoted to sounds, voices, calls and cries as defined and conceived in the early Arabic lexicographic tradition (8th–9th century). It discusses the first evidence for the use of the Arabic term ṣawt (pl. aṣwāt) in the Qurʾān and early lexicons. It then examines direct and indirect accounts of the transmission of the Kitāb al-aṣwāt—especially those attributed to Quṭrub (d. 206/821), al-Aṣmaʿī (d. 216/831) and Ibn al-Sikkīt (d. 244/858)—as well as some chapters devoted to the subject in coeval multi-thematic lexicographical works such as those of Abū ʿUbayd al-Qāsim ibn Sallām (d. 244/838) and of the later Ibn Qutayba (d. 276/889). Taken together, the information that emerges from all these texts displays the many shades of meaning that the aṣwāt have taken at the beginning of Arab-Islamic cultural history.