Remember the two jealous brothers who got turned into dogs? We now learn that a similar story underlies the mistreatment of the black bitches. Maybe the jinnis have to follow magical best practice guidelines over jealousy.
The maltreated black bitches are the beautiful lady of the house’s beautiful full sisters (while the doorkeeper and the housekeeper are but her beautiful half-sisters). And their sin is jealousy.
Unlike those brothers, they do not covet their sister’s great wealth – she has given it to them – but they are mad with jealousy over her luck in love after their own misfortunes in that field, and they won’t stand for it. Their murderous plot is only half-successful, however, and once their sister gets involved with a jinni, their fate is sealed.
There is an unusual twist, however. The jinni cunningly ensures that their decidedly soft-hearted sister will never be tempted to mercy, swearing
By the inscription on the ring of our lord Solomon, on whom be peace, if you do not give each of these bitches three hundred lashes every day, I shall come and turn you into a bitch like them.
And who would not beat them every day to avoid that fate, no matter what they deserved?
As it is only just past midnight, Shahrazad moves right on, because the doorkeeper has yet to explain the origins of the mysterious scars on her body, and the Caliph Harun al-Rashid cannot be any more curious about them than King Shahriyar.
You won’t be too astounded to learn that her terrible scars are also linked with jealousy, although no jinni is involved on this occasion and they are the work of human hands alone. But it is an astoundingly tortured tale, not so much because of the actions of a madly (and stupidly) jealous man as because of the seemingly inexplicable actions of his mother.
The doorkeeper’s first sight of her mother-in-law-to-be (not that she knows this relationship awaits) is not reassuring:
…an old woman with pendulous cheeks, thinning eyebrows, popping eyes, broken teeth and a blotched face. She was bleary-eyed, with a head that looked as though it had been covered in plaster, grey hair and a bent body covered in scabs. Her skin was discoloured and she was dribbling mucus…
and as if this is not enough, poetry gets recited to express the full horror of
An old woman of evil omen – may God have no mercy on her youth
Or pardon her sins the day she comes to die –
She could lead a thousand bolting mules
With a spider’s web for reins, so domineering is she.
This is surely a nudge, a tip from the storyteller to the wide-eyed listener, from the author to the ‘gentle reader’ – watch out for this old witch! This narrative device is a little tricky for the oral storyteller to pull off neatly and it clunks a bit here in the mouth of the doorkeeper who is both narrator and protagonist. But never mind, we have got the message, even if she seems quite oblivious of the import of what she is saying.
For by her account it seems that the old woman wants nothing more than a kindness for her daughter, and happiness for her son, and the doorkeeper (not yet a doorkeeper, you understand) anyway falls head over heels for the handsome son of this ugly mother and is ready to do anything he asks and accept any condition in order to be his bride.
Of course, it is the breach of that condition which leads to the whip scars, and he is a jealous bully whose concern to be on the right side of the law owes more to his desire to cover himself for any action he might take than to his superior morals. And it is the old hag who pleads for her life, the saving of which is what now enables Harun al-Rashid to hear the full dreadful story from the victim herself, who lays no blame whatever at the old woman’s door.
Worth one kiss?
But. But.
We can’t help but note that the old woman actively encourages her daughter-in-law to permit the silk merchant’s kiss, on the grounds that it will a) save money and b) leave no trace. Does she really not know what the merchant, whom she clearly knows well, will do?
Is it a set-up?
If so, she has got clean away with it, with daughter-in-law cast out but believing her mother-in-law to be her saviour.
Or has the storyteller trailed a red herring before us?
We are left to wonder, while Harun al-Rashid orders it all to be written down in the archives.
Typo I think – “cover” should be “covet”.
What is a “black bitch”? I had assumed female dog but it doesn’t make sense. Your link to the “mistreatment of the black bitches” doesn’t clarify.
Thanks for spotting my typo, Vincent. I have put it right.
Your assumption is correct, the black bitches are two female dogs. You are also right that the link does not make this clear, as the referenced post says only that there was ‘cruelty to animals’.
I am probably going to fall into this trap several times on this journey, as no post fully recounts the details of the story it refers to!
Apparently “black bitch” is as taboo as “nigger” when spoken by a white person. It’s not a problem if you are black and female as your automatically generated possibly related post indicates (Black bitches bite harder than white).
What should white people call black female dogs, then?
The automatically generated posts do throw up some interesting connections. When I published the ‘Sorcery of Love’ post, a link appeared to a site offering voodoo for your love life…
I believe there is not much I can do about them unless I go for a paid version of WordPress.
I agree you have no choice, either in what to call black female dogs and or what conclusion is drawn from that by the link-robot! Never mind! But in your present post I searched in vain for any corroboration of my assumption that you were referring to dogs. On the contrary, you said they were “full sisters” of a lady. I’m still puzzled!
The answer is, they are the full sisters of the lady of the house, but were turned into dogs by a jinni on account of their jealousy of her (the jinni owed the lady of the house a favour). I hope that helps!
humm, I did fall immediately into the rhythm here and assume they were enchanted sisters, turned into black dogs. Perhaps because I followed the link to the prior post (which I’d missed) about the brothers turned into salukis.
The language of insult and intimidation is a problem when it takes legitimate words that have long been a part of language – bitches being a prime example – and uses them to denigrate portions of the population. Easy to toss out the n-word, which has no legitimate role in the language: much more difficult to toss out the word bitch, for which there is not only a legitimate use, but for which there is no real substitute beyond the awkward “female dog.”
what to do?
that said, the deliciousness of these stories is in the hanging fragments…. the story you tell slantwise, letting us conclude what must have happened through your discussion, while not letting us quite see beneath the veil. Love them! But it’s absolutely a popcorn experience, leaves me unsatisfied and wanting more.
Lots of unanswered questions though…
But if all our questions were answered, Cora, what would we DO all day?
[...] to the marital wealth were not the focus of the prenuptial agreement so gladly signed up to by our lovely doorkeeper (not a doorkeeper at the time, of course) so much as [...]